The Island Nation, by the seaside.
A familiar place, familiar faces.
Yu Xian and Zhang Buyao stood atop a reef, gazing out at the surging ocean.
Just like before, there was nothing unusual visible to the naked eye. Instead, an intense, putrid stench hung heavy in the air.
The ocean had now completely become a pot of rotting, fermenting seafood soup—a foul soup steeped in lukewarm water, reeking many times worse than canned surströmming.
Yu Xian had long since placed two spatial bubbles in his nostrils, drawing in only the freshest air from the Hulunbuir Grassland.
He stole a glance at Zhang Buyao. Seeing her breathing the rancid air without the slightest twitch of discomfort, he had to admire her sheer endurance in her quest to become a “hero.”
“Yaoyao, don’t you think it stinks?”
After a short while, as a gust of sea wind swept past and instantly doubled the sickening odor, Yu Xian couldn’t help asking.
He hadn’t placed a spatial bubble over his mouth. The moment he spoke, the foul stench invaded his palate; his tongue was far too sensitive, leaving him slightly nauseated.
“Does it stink? It’s bearable, I guess,” Zhang Buyao replied with belated realization upon seeing Yu Xian look ready to retch.
Yu Xian stared at Zhang Buyao in shock. That wasn't stinky to her? It was actually *bearable*?
Could Zhang Buyao have smelled things far worse than this, or had she grown up living in some kind of foul environment? Or was her definition of a stench completely different from that of a normal person?
Take dogs, for instance—they could eat feces and probably didn't think it smelled bad at all, finding it appetizing instead.
Could Zhang Buyao possess a similar talent?
Noticing the shock on Yu Xian’s face, Zhang Buyao quickly explained, “Wait, don't get the wrong idea! It’s not that I’m immune to bad smells. It’s just that I carry a blessing called ‘May All the World's Beauty Intertwine with You.’ Anything I hate—stenches, dirt, filth—automatically gets dialed down to a level I can tolerate. So while it stinks a little, it’s not too bad.”
“That's quite a long name for a blessing. Did your father give it to you?” Yu Xian remarked.
Zhang Buyao shook her head. “Not my dad. I think it was his senior martial brother. I was only a month old at the time, so I don’t have any memory of it.”
“Your dad has a senior martial brother?” Yu Xian asked in surprise.
In his mind, he immediately pictured a colossal sect spanning myriad heavens and realms, with Zhang Buyao’s family as members of this great faction.
“No idea. Something like that, probably. I never really asked,” Zhang Buyao said casually.
In truth, she was like most people—few children showed much interest in their father’s personal connections. Sometimes, after living together for many years, a child would only occasionally discover in shock that their father actually knew some major figure or celebrity.
Yu Xian didn’t press the issue. After all, it was Zhang Buyao’s family business, and asking too much would be overstepping boundaries.
“You said the ocean crisis wasn’t over. Could you have been referring to this stench?” Yu Xian asked, looking out at the sea, where far more foam than usual drifted across the surface.
Zhang Buyao answered, “Of course not. So many living creatures died all at once, and your world contains corpse qi. Haven’t you considered another possibility?”
The Corpse Qi Expansion Theory!
Yu Xian slapped his forehead. He had completely forgotten about that.
The ocean held far more life than the land. If all those organisms perished at once, a single drop of corpse qi would be enough to infect all the carcasses resting beneath the waves. As a result, massive quantities of corpse qi would be generated in a short period.
Once that corpse qi erupted, Earth would be finished. Just like that dead world from before, all living things would turn into zombies.
“Yaoyao, could all the carcasses on the ocean floor already be infected by corpse qi?” Yu Xian asked, gazing out over the water in worry.
Building was always harder than destroying, and even harder than building was maintaining a complex system.
Yu Xian possessed the power to shatter Earth with a single punch, and the ability to erect all kinds of wonders upon it in a matter of moments. Yet he truly had no way to resolve the corpse qi issue, much less keep Earth perpetually brimming with life on his own.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have had to travel to Crescent Bay to procure an All-Races Life Support Apparatus.
“Regrettably, they’re already infected.”
“And there’s even worse news: the ocean itself... is also a corpse.”
Zhang Buyao glanced at Yu Xian, then turned her gaze back toward the sea, answering in all seriousness.
The ocean itself was a corpse?
Yu Xian froze, his eyes widening. The ocean had been activated—Thales’s body at that time had been the ocean itself, and Thales’s death meant the ocean was... dead.
*Holy crap.*
*What kind of absurd setting is this?*
Yu Xian took a deep breath, only now realizing the gravity of the situation. If the entire ocean turned into a zombie, what kind of monstrosity would that be?
“Even web novels wouldn't write something so ridiculous. A zombie sea? Or should we call it a sea zombie?” Yu Xian couldn't help muttering.
Zhang Buyao rolled her eyes at him. “What’s so ridiculous about that? I’ve even seen planet zombies. The entire planet was a living organism to begin with, and after dying, it became a planet zombie. Any creature that landed on its surface would be drained of blood and die.”
“Fine, I'm the ignorant one here.”
Hearing that, Yu Xian readily conceded that he was just a bumpkin with limited horizons.
At that moment, Yu Xian received an incoming message on Qixin. Opening his Star Ring, he saw Zhang Yubao’s avatar flashing. When he had brought the installation team back, he had added the foreman, Zhang Yubao, to his contacts for easy communication and progress updates.
Could the All-Races Life Support Apparatus have been installed ahead of schedule?
Yu Xian answered the call, and Zhang Yubao’s three-dimensional holographic projection appeared before him. The man looked at Yu Xian in panic and said, “Fish God, unknown creatures are attacking our barrier! Our barrier won’t hold for much longer! Please come support us!”
Working on the seabed naturally required a barrier to keep the surrounding seawater out.
As a professional contractor for All-Races Life Support Apparatus installations, Zhang Yubao used top-of-the-line barrier materials. Not only could they adapt to diverse environments, but they also possessed formidable defensive strength, capable of withstanding most attacks below Star Rank.
Now, however, dense cracks had spread across the barrier, and a small amount of seawater was already seeping through. That water gave him an extremely ominous feeling, prompting him to order everyone to keep away from it while he urgently called Yu Xian for help.
“I’m on my way!”
Yu Xian understood perfectly that nothing could be allowed to go wrong with the installation of the All-Races Life Support Apparatus, and he agreed immediately.
He then turned to Zhang Buyao and said helplessly, “Yaoyao, I need to make a trip down to the seabed. You’ll be fine here, right?”
“Go on, I can handle things myself,” Zhang Buyao said with a wave of her hand.
Yu Xian had only asked out of courtesy; Zhang Buyao was far stronger than he was, and she didn't need him to worry about her in the slightest.
As for why he was so certain of her superior strength, the reason was simple: he himself could never travel from the present into an unimaginably distant future, let alone do so through someone else’s eyes.
He still couldn't even comprehend the principles behind such a technique, which spoke volumes about how powerful Zhang Buyao truly was—especially considering she had crossed over with hardly any effort at all.
Taking his leave of Zhang Buyao, Yu Xian stepped forward and vanished on the spot.
Chapter 362