The night was bleak and hazy, the moon half-veiled behind clouds and mist, showing only a blurred outline.
The Monkey Garden was pitch-black and silent, hung with a few streetlamps resembling bug zappers. Their radius of illumination spanned no more than two meters, bringing not light so much as adding a sinister, eerie chill.
Hearing the monkey speak, Zhang Yuanqing could no longer take another step.
Ahead of him, the Palace Master of Halting Slaughter and Commandery Princess Yinyao stopped as well, glancing first at Zhang Yuanqing, then at the monkey.
Just then, the large monkey atop the rockery spoke again:
"If it can't be stored in an inventory, it can't recognize a master. This is a rule-based item you forged yourself—in ancient times, it would be a natal dharma artifact. As long as the original owner isn't dead, a natal artifact won't acknowledge anyone else. Heavenly Master Zhang, you're making things difficult for me."
The large monkey paused for a few seconds before continuing:
"I've talked to it. I have important matters to attend to and will be away for a while—maybe a few days, maybe a few months, maybe even a few years. During that time, you'll act as the caretaker. It agreed.
"Elder Gou, if you don't wish to take on this responsibility, I can find another way. But you know what's suppressed inside this zoo. Handing it to someone untrustworthy... I wouldn't feel at ease, and neither would you."
This was a conversation from twenty years ago, or perhaps even earlier, recorded by the monkeys in the garden.
And the participants in the conversation were Heavenly Master Zhang and Elder Gou.
As before, the monkey paused for a few seconds, then continued:
"The four of you shouldn't have barged into that ruin in the first place. You barged in and released those terrifying things. You couldn't send them into the Spirit Realm, yet they were difficult to eradicate completely, so now you've forged this item to contain them, landing yourself in such an awkward spot."
"The secret of the Spirit Realm was hidden there. We had to go."
The conversation ended there, for the large monkey gave a bizarre screech, hopped down from the rockery, flicked up its tail, and darted swiftly into the depths of the Monkey Garden.
Zhang Yuanqing remained immersed in the conversation, standing beside the bushes near the fence with lowered eyes, deep in thought.
The volume of information was immense; he needed to think it through carefully.
"What's wrong?" The Palace Master of Halting Slaughter's voice broke his reverie. "What are you daydreaming about?"
"Jiejie, what did you think of what the monkey just said...?" Zhang Yuanqing suddenly looked up, only now seeming to realize something. With a strange expression, he stared at the Palace Master of Halting Slaughter. "The monkey was talking just now—did you not hear it?"
At that, even the Palace Master's expression changed.
Commandery Princess Yinyao wanted to change expression too, but being a yin corpse, she couldn't make any.
"We only heard that monkey screeching..." Commandery Princess Yinyao raised her little loudspeaker, her voice trailing off toward the end as she cautiously scrutinized Zhang Yuanqing. "Are you alright?"
*I'm the only one who can hear the monkey speak?* Zhang Yuanqing was stunned. When he heard the monkey speaking human language, he had felt an ominous premonition, but the monkey was already talking, which had seemed like an unalterable fact.
So he had adopted a wait-and-see attitude and kept listening.
But if he was the only one who had heard it, the nature of the situation was entirely different.
Why was he the only one who could hear it?
After examining him, the Palace Master saw nothing abnormal about Yuanshi Tianzun, so she asked, "What did you hear?"
Perhaps there were clues in what the monkey had said.
Zhang Yuanqing recounted the conversation "played" by the monkey in full to the two of them.
Commandery Princess Yinyao was an outsider; she neither knew Heavenly Master Zhang nor was familiar with Elder Gou, so she listened to it like a bizarre tale.
Shock seeped into the Palace Master's tone: "This zo—this park... your father forged it? It didn't come from the Spirit Realm? No wonder Elder Gou hasn't been able to completely control this item for over twenty years—it's been pining for its first master all along."
In her astonishment, she had almost blurted out "Zoo" and "Heavenly Master Zhang," which would have violated the Zoo's taboos.
*It's been longing for my dad, waiting for over twenty years, never knowing that he will never return...* Zhang Yuanqing finally understood why the Zoo was so full of resentment and sorrow.
"Night Walkers don't possess skills for forging items, so my dad probably wasn't the leader, but he definitely had a hand in creating the zoo. None of that matters, though. What truly concerns me are the bizarre abominations suppressed in this place and the ruin the four-man team explored."
He didn't dare mention the Xiaoyao Organization, fearing it might trigger undesirable developments.
However, judging from the current situation, the Zoo's artifact spirit didn't seem to attack proactively. The spirit likely had to follow its own rules as well. Considering how last time it had mistaken him for Zhang Zizhen—plaintively accusing him while watching him leave—the spirit itself didn't seem to possess offensive capabilities.
All of its power was hidden within the web of rules.
The Palace Master mused, "In their quest for the secrets of the Spirit Realm, they found a ruin that existed in reality. As a result, they accidentally unleashed the evil entities sealed within. To prevent those monsters from wreaking havoc on the real world, they forged this zoo to contain the bizarre horrors.
"Is the purpose of the employee patrols to prevent the abominations from escaping the zoo? But the employees also get corrupted by them, turning from blue uniforms into black uniforms."
Zhang Yuanqing nodded. His earlier confusion had now been resolved: the mutual slaughter among the staff wasn't some sick joke by the artifact spirit, but the result of this rule-based item contending against the evil entities imprisoned inside.
The Ancient God of War in the thick fog was probably one of those evil entities.
At that moment, Commandery Princess Yinyao raised her little loudspeaker and said, "Every garden confines an evil entity. The one in the Dodder Garden is related to inner demons—a Voidwalker—and the thick fog is related to an Ancient God of War. Then..."
She looked toward the Monkey Garden. "What evil entity is this place related to?"
Just as Zhang Yuanqing was about to hazard a guess, an intense itch suddenly flared across his body. Raising a hand to scratch his neck, he pulled away a clump of dark brownish fur.
An ominous dread surged within him. Then he heard the Palace Master's startled cry:
"Yuan... Yuanshi, you're turning into a monkey!!"
Commandery Princess Yinyao was stunned too, staring blankly at him.
Zhang Yuanqing's heart sank. He immediately brought out the Ghost Mirror. Reflected in the bronze surface was a half-human, half-monkey face that was rapidly turning simian.
Dark brown monkey fur sprouted rapidly from the follicles on his face, his brow ridge protruded, his irises shifted into fractured gold, black fur emerged on the backs of his hands, his fingers elongated while his palms narrowed, and his spine began to hunch...
He understood.
The consequence of hearing the monkey speak was turning into a monkey.
The root power at work was a curse!
He had encountered a similar occurrence in the Yin Yang Town instance, where everyone in the team had been transformed into cats.
The Palace Master and Commandery Princess Yinyao were at a loss; neither cursing nor purifying curses was their forte.
"Yuanshi, purify the curse!" the Palace Master urged urgently.
Without needing her reminder, Zhang Yuanqing was already circulating the Pure Yang Body Cleansing Record, channeling the divine power of the sun to suppress the curse.
Yet the mutation merely stalled for a brief instant; it did not stop.
This was different from the Dodder Garden. That time, he hadn't broken any rules, so the divine power of the sun had held down the temptations of the inner demons.
His physical transformation continued, and his thoughts shifted as well. His intellect plummeted, while urges to climb, feed, and sleep became his strongest cravings.
The transformation wasn't merely cosmetic; it was from the inside out.
Once the mutation completed, he would turn entirely into a monkey, losing his human identity.
Zhang Yuanqing strained to think of a solution, but his intelligence had already plunged into an abyss. His brain was like mush, empty and muddled.
Monkeys might be clever animals, but compared to humans, the gap was vast.
"Yuan... Yuanshi Tianzun, your eyes look stupid..."
Commandery Princess Yinyao keenly spotted the change and paced in an anxious fluster. But if even the divine power of the sun couldn't resolve it, what could she possibly do?
The Palace Master marched forward, a faint, illusory glimmer surfacing in her eyes. "Look at me!"
The half-human, half-monkey Zhang Yuanqing instinctively raised his eyes. Reflected in his pupils were hers, and a hazy glimmer stained his vision as well.
"You are Yuanshi Tianzun, not a monkey. You are Yuanshi Tianzun, not a monkey..."
The soft, ethereal voice repeated again and again.
Zhang Yuanqing's gaze was hollow and his expression blank, but his plunging intellect screeched to a halt, his sense of human self-awareness jolted awake.
The next second, a spark of clarity burst in his pupils, briefly restoring his mental state.
Without hesitation, Zhang Yuanqing instantly opened his inventory, pulling out the Flawless Human Skin and Yata no Kagami.
The handleless bronze mirror, round as a full moon, reflected the half-human, half-monkey figure. Then, a flash of yellow light bounced from the mirror's surface, manifesting as another half-human, half-monkey Zhang Yuanqing.
"Ah, losing SAN right out of the gate... Main body, you're already Level 6, why are you always running into danger..."
Grumbling as it spoke, the half-human, half-monkey avatar grabbed the Flawless Human Skin and slapped it onto its face.
The human skin melted like wax, covering the clone's body. It remained half-human, half-monkey without visible change, but the real Zhang Yuanqing began shedding fur, his irises, hands, and other mutated parts steadily reverting to normal.
The avatar created by Yata no Kagami had shouldered the karma of the original body.
Lacking the divine power of the sun and hypnosis, the avatar soon turned fully into a monkey, scratching its ears and cheeks while screeching wildly.
Zhang Yuanqing seized the monkey and did a quick check, finding that it was an authentic monkey in bone density, muscle elasticity, and every other aspect.
*If I had turned into a monkey, I probably would never have been able to recover. This curse is definitely Dominator-tier, perhaps even higher...* Lingering fear washed over Zhang Yuanqing. Exerting force with his fingers, he snapped the monkey's neck with a sharp crack.
The brown-furred monkey stopped struggling, its limbs drooping limply before scattering into yellow light.
In Zhang Yuanqing's hand remained only a piece of human skin, thin as a cicada's wing.
At times like this, the benefits of having an abundance of items shone through.
Spirit Realm walkers possessed many professions, each with its own special abilities. In a place with tangled, convoluted rules like the Zoo, possessing diverse means was more important than having a high level.
Though the Palace Master of Halting Slaughter was a Dominator, she had been helpless in that scenario; every profession had its limits.
"This item is quite handy. Where'd you get it?" Breathing a sigh of relief, the Palace Master eyed the Flawless Human Skin and beamed. "Lend it to me to play with, will you?"
Zhang Yuanqing swiftly stashed it back into his inventory and cleared his throat.
"Let's go. Getting down to business is more important."
The Palace Master wrinkled her nose. "Stingy!"
Two people and two corpses pushed onward, trekking through the quiet park grounds. After the recent episode, they became even more vigilant.
Along the way, Zhang Yuanqing looked around, hoping to spot the camphor tree sealing Demonic Eye amid some greenery. In their group, only he had seen the tree before.
It wasn't tall, but exceptionally thick.
They passed another fork in the path. This time, the signboard indicated the "Panda Garden" and the "Giraffe Garden."
By now, the bits of mud on the ground had thinned to the point of being nearly undetectable, pointing toward the Panda Garden.
"Lady Luck truly favors me," Zhang Yuanqing said delightedly.
Rules for the Panda Garden had appeared in the employee manual, whereas they knew nothing about the giraffes.
Just then, a deep, resonant roar echoed from the distance.
It was far away, faintly audible.
Hearing the roar, Zhang Yuanqing beamed. "That's the white lion's roar! We aren't far from that tree."
The Palace Master of Halting Slaughter and Commandery Princess Yinyao perked up.
The sooner they finished the mission, the sooner they could leave this damned zoo.
Although they had never complained, within a span of just ten-odd minutes, from the Dodder Garden to the Monkey Garden, Yuanshi had weathered two life-or-death crises. If the road ahead remained long, who knew how many more perils awaited them?
Knowing that their target tree was just ahead was undoubtedly the best boost of morale.
Before long, they arrived at the Panda Garden.
The panda habitat was planted with a vast bamboo grove, complete with rockeries and pools. From a distance, Zhang Yuanqing spotted a scruffy, dirty panda sitting in the grove, clutching a stalk of bamboo, its head drooping as it snoozed away in deep slumber.
*Silly and adorable...* Zhang Yuanqing felt a slight wave of relief. Seeing a silly, cute panda indicated that all was calm and quiet.
*Exactly,* he thought. *How could every single step be fraught with peril, running into disaster at every turn? That'd be excessively unlucky, and the Lucky Necklace around my neck isn't a fake.*
Feeling relaxed, he quickened his pace.
Yet at that very moment, Commandery Princess Yinyao tremblingly raised her little loudspeaker:
"Th-That panda is terrifying..."
Commandery Princess Yinyao's mental fluctuations were erratic and intense, as though she had witnessed something immensely horrifying.
*Terrifying?* Startled, Zhang Yuanqing looked back at the panda in the bamboo grove. Nothing had changed—it was still dirty and clumsy, looking none too bright even as it slept.
He immediately looked at the Palace Master of Halting Slaughter, who said softly, "I see the same thing you do."
Her expression remained calm, free of worry; after all, the one running into trouble wasn't her little paramour.
Zhang Yuanqing thought for a moment and asked in a low voice, "What do you see?"
Commandery Princess Yinyao's trembling voice came through the loudspeaker: "A three-meter-tall panda... massive and burly, with razor-sharp claws. Its eyes are red, resembling those of a Bewitching Demon... ferocious and horrifying. It's staring right at me, as if it wants to tear me to shreds..."
Zhang Yuanqing's heart seized, adrenaline surging. Without a second thought, he immediately brought out the Flawless Human Skin and said, "Leave at once! If it chases us, I'll have Blood Rose take your place."
Yata no Kagami's ability was still on cooldown, so he could only use Blood Rose as a scapegoat.
The team sprang into action, sprinting forward along the visitor path. In a dozen seconds, they burst out of the Panda Garden and reached an open clearing.
"It didn't follow us..." Stopping beside a streetlamp, Zhang Yuanqing turned to Commandery Princess Yinyao. "How are you? Any changes to your body?"
Commandery Princess Yinyao shook her head. "None!"
*Strange, she's actually fine?*
Suspicious, Zhang Yuanqing circled around Commandery Princess Yinyao to inspect her. When he stepped behind her, his gaze abruptly sharpened.
On Commandery Princess Yinyao's back, a mottled patch of pitch-black had appeared.
Chapter 508