An Conghao replied, "Chairman, by your order, all the thugs, traitors, and spies have been reassigned there."
Jiang Yan curled the corner of his mouth into a cold smile. "Then let's wait for the show to begin."
What he needed to do was pour fuel on the internal strife inside the Xuanjian Division; everything on his side was proceeding in orderly fashion.
The pawn that had absorbed the special flesh was still incubating, and the search for a consciousness-type Awakened had only just yielded results.
Jiang Yan intended to use this window to manipulate the situation.
"But before that, let's clean up the mess." Jiang Yan looked at the screen displaying three camera feeds.
Two were aimed at the strongholds, one at the outside.
The outside feed now showed a dense gray mist descending, with red paper sheets drifting down inside it.
The mist covered only about two kilometres.
At its centre appeared a bride in red wedding dress, shoes and veil.
Her death-pale hands clasped over her stomach, she stepped toward the city.
After Jiang Yan let her out to feast, her power had advanced: her ghost domain now spanned two kilometres and she had gained a new ability.
Ghost World: the space inside her ghost domain expands tenfold relative to the outside (internal diameter: twenty kilometres).
The city of barely a hundred thousand, already battered by the battle between Awakened and Monsters, was now shrouded in gray mist.
On the city's edge several Old Blacks stared at the approaching fog, puzzled.
"What's with this gray mist? I've got a bad feeling," one middle-aged black with yellowed teeth and rough features muttered, scratching hair washed only when it rained.
The blacks beside him wore identical frowns. "Same here—what's going on?"
Their wits were too dull to grasp what the mist might be.
Uneasy, they still stood and let the fog roll over them.
Once inside, it felt cut off from the world; all distant clamour vanished.
Then a dense crowd of stiffly walking "people" in assorted clothes appeared before them.
"What the—why are so many folks here?" The yellow-toothed black's expression flickered, though his dark face masked it.
"No… they don't look human!!!" A sharp-eyed black spotted something wrong with the lead "person" from afar.
Their livid faces bore cadaverous blotches; empty eyes showed no emotion.
As they neared, a stench of rot stabbed the blacks' nostrils.
"They—they're dead," stammered Yellow-Tooth, then spun and sprinted inward.
"Run!" The rest fled in panic.
They raced through the mist, yet the houses that should appear after a few steps were gone.
"Huff, huff—" Yellow-Tooth glanced back mid-run.
But the companions who had been beside him seemed to have vanished; only his own figure moved in the fog.
"Why me, Lord? Save me!" Tears welled in his eyes.
Silence reigned; no matter how far he ran there was only gray mist—buildings had disappeared.
A red scrap drifted down; he looked and saw a palm-sized red paper with a hollow centre.
Tap-tap-tap!
Footsteps sounded ahead. He lifted his gaze to a black-skinned figure in white clothes.
It was one of the Old Blacks who had been with him.
Yellow-Tooth exhaled in relief. "Great, you're here—I thought you were all gone."
But the other gave no answer, only kept walking toward him.
Annoyed, Yellow-Tooth stepped up. "Cut the crap, don't—"
His words froze as fear seized him.
The white-clad black's eyes were hollow, cadaverous blotches on his face, a faint stench of rot wafting off him.
"No, no…" Yellow-Tooth's pupils shrank, heart pounding.
True despair washed over him.
Instinct made him back away—only to bump into something cold and stiff.
He turned his head with difficulty to find a Caucasian man with empty eyes and blotched skin staring at him.
The man's rigid arms wrapped around Yellow-Tooth before he could struggle.
Cadaverous spots spread across Yellow-Tooth's body; his eyes dulled and emptied, the stench of rot rising as he stiffly followed the Caucasian deeper into the mist.
Behind them, countless stiff silhouettes moved amid the fog.
Further back, a red figure advanced step by step.
Having drawn every black into the mist, the fog—two kilometres outside—held a space as vast as a metropolis within.
From above, the huge gray cloud slowly devoured the city.
Blacks were swallowed one by one… Inside a Nanwu Country military base in a small city.
Jiang Ao and Deng Mengcheng stood outside a cell holding a rat-like Monster with black wings.
A powerful psychic force enveloped the creature, rifling through its mind for intelligence; the intense probe left its eyes rolled back, body twitching.
After a moment Deng Mengcheng lowered his arm beyond the bars, withdrawing the mental power, and turned to Jiang Ao with a grin. "There's a super-large Monster Association stronghold in Jiangjin City, Shi Country—conservative estimate, over two hundred common Monsters. We're going to score big."
Jiang Ao glanced at the Monster whose mind had been destroyed, now an idiot, and said flatly, "I'll arrange personnel. We leave tonight and wipe out the stronghold tomorrow."
Tap-tap-tap! Just then a middle-aged man in a suit strode in.
His face grim, he said, "Team Leader Jiang, Team Leader Deng—Fang Wenyu just led a team in Vitka Country to smash a Monster Association cell, capturing or killing nearly forty Monsters!"
Had Jiang Ao heard this minutes earlier he might have felt pressure—now.
A cold smile curved his lips. "A mere forty. Tomorrow I'll blow their numbers away."
With a stronghold this size, once it falls the Monster Association will have to shuffle its other bases.
Fang Wenyu would have no chance of overtaking his tally any time soon.