A mottled black patch, about the size of a palm, appeared on Commandery Princess Yinyao's back, as if splashed with dark ink. It was an exact duplicate of what they had seen on that blue-uniformed employee in the Monkey Garden, with the only difference being that the black stain on the blue uniform had already spread to cover his entire back.
On Commandery Princess Yinyao, it had only just appeared and had not yet expanded.
Yet even in the brief moments Zhang Yuanqing observed it, the palm-sized mark silently bled outward, growing to the size of two palms.
"What is it?" Commandery Princess Yinyao warily raised her mini-speaker. "You're looking at me like I have a terminal illness."
"You're not terminally ill, but you are about to be done for," the Palace Master of Halting Slaughter pointed out. "Your back has turned black."
Commandery Princess Yinyao froze for a second before realizing what she meant. With a loud *crack*, she twisted her head all the way around behind her and peered down at her back.
With another *crack*, she snapped her head back around, grabbed Zhang Yuanqing by the sleeve, and spoke hurriedly through the speaker:
"Quick, have Blood Rose take my place."
*The princess is such a coward!* Zhang Yuanqing nodded with a grave expression.
"I will, but I think both you and Blood Rose can still be saved... Um, do you feel anything off yourself?"
Commandery Princess Yinyao shook her head. "Both my body and soul are completely normal."
"Just because you don't feel anything doesn't mean you're fine." The Palace Master of Halting Slaughter circled Commandery Princess Yinyao, the hem of her red skirt trailing along the ground.
Strangely enough, despite dashing all over the zoo with her skirt dragging behind her, it had not collected a speck of dirt.
The skirt seemed to possess some kind of dust-repelling effect.
After completing a circle, the Palace Master remarked, "There should be some sort of corruption in this zoo. Those who succumb to it turn dark and transform into some sort of monster—like the black-uniformed employees, or like Wang Mingming.
"Not sensing any abnormalities is the greatest abnormality of all. Didn't Wang Mingming think he was perfectly normal too? And that blue-uniformed worker we saw in the Monkey Garden—he didn't seem to think he was corrupted either."
A thought struck Zhang Yuanqing as he recalled Rule Eight from the Employee Handbook:
*Please remember: Pandas are soft, cute, and gentle animals. If they are not, please look at your employee badge and speak your name aloud.*
"Yinyao, your name! Shout your name aloud!" he barked in a low voice.
As if triggering a switch, the crimson glow in Commandery Princess Yinyao's eyes suddenly turned dull and vacant. She murmured, "My name... I... I can't remember..."
At that exact instant, Zhang Yuanqing noticed the black mark on her back spreading outward like spilled ink, swiftly devouring half of her spine.
*The corrosion is intensifying?* Zhang Yuanqing's heart sank. Pure, domineering halos of pale gold light flared across both of his palms as he pressed them firmly against Yinyao's back.
The spread of the "ink" was visibly checked.
Commandery Princess Yinyao's red eyes remained vacant as she muttered, "My name... My name... I don't remember..."
An illusory light flickered in the eyes of the Palace Master of Halting Slaughter. She stepped in front of Commandery Princess Yinyao, meeting her gaze and causing an identical illusory glow to kindle in the princess's crimson pupils.
Hypnosis!
"You are Commandery Princess Yinyao. You are Commandery Princess Yinyao..."
The Palace Master repeated the words again and again, her voice gentle and imbued with a reassuring power.
Yet it was useless.
Commandery Princess Yinyao murmured like someone trapped in a nightmare, unable to reclaim her sense of self. Meanwhile, after being briefly suppressed, the ink on her back began a frantic counteroffensive. Hissing sounds erupted continuously as plumes of black smoke billowed upward.
Zhang Yuanqing felt as though he were plunging his hands into a cauldron of boiling oil. A sinister, foul force was eroding his divine power of the sun, attempting to corrode him in turn.
The tier of this corrupting force was far too high. His half-baked divine power of the sun was simply incapable of suppressing it. Once Commandery Princess Yinyao was fully "blackened," she would be completely finished.
"Hypnosis isn't working?!" Zhang Yuanqing shouted while simultaneously taking out an Evil-Breaking Talisman.
—He had very few Evil-Breaking Talismans left.
The Palace Master of Halting Slaughter pondered for a moment and said, "Hypnosis seems ineffective. Or perhaps... I didn't say her real name."
*So Yinyao is just her princely title? She actually held an official fief title...* Zhang Yuanqing activated the Evil-Breaking Talisman, temporarily holding back the ink's corrosion.
However, he found himself in a dilemma. Commandery Princess Yinyao had never disclosed her real name.
Whom could he ask?
Perhaps her name could be found in historical records—after all, she had an official title. Erudite figures like Xiahou Aotian and Li Chunfeng could certainly look it up. But the Zoo blocked all communications; this rule-based item could even shield against Stargazing.
Even a satellite phone wouldn't do any good here.
"She's a Ming dynasty commandery princess with the surname Zhu!" Zhang Yuanqing looked toward the Palace Master of Halting Slaughter.
He didn't know her full name, but she could call out her surname. When pushed to the brink, it was worth a shot.
If they still couldn't awaken Commandery Princess Yinyao, they would have no choice but to sacrifice Blood Rose.
Exceedingly clever, the Palace Master instantly understood his intention. Shifting her approach, she intoned, "You are Commandery Princess Yinyao. Your surname is Zhu..."
A Musician's voice held formidable magic, and combined with her hypnotic capabilities, it could awaken even a stone.
A fleeting spark of lucidity bloomed within Commandery Princess Yinyao's hollow, blank eyes before vanishing.
"You are Commandery Princess Yinyao. Your surname is Zhu..."
Amidst the continuous repetitions, the spark of lucidity in her empty gaze blossomed repeatedly, growing brighter and stronger.
"I... I am... Zhu Huiyao." The light in Commandery Princess Yinyao's eyes suddenly flared into brilliance, her crimson pupils shining like two bright bulbs. Raising her mini-speaker high like a hot-blooded shonen protagonist igniting their cosmos, she cried:
"I am Zhu Huiyao!"
Zhang Yuanqing watched as the black stain on her back hissed furiously, converting into thick billows of black gas that dispersed into the night sky.
*Your parents really were creative geniuses when it came to naming you. Your given name sounds like 'biting pig,' and your title sounds like 'aphrodisiac'...* Zhang Yuanqing chuckled in relief.
"Biting Pig, don't yell so loudly. You'll attract the staff."
Commandery Princess Yinyao's body stiffened. Whirling around, she shoved the speaker right against Zhang Yuanqing's ear and corrected him vehemently:
"Zhu Huiyao! Zhu Huiyao! It's Zhu Huiyao!"
Beside them, the Palace Master of Halting Slaughter frowned deeply and remarked in an utterly frigid tone, "Are the two of you flirting?"
Commandery Princess Yinyao was terrified of her and immediately piped down.
The Palace Master let out a cold huff and warily surveyed their surroundings. They were currently positioned between the Panda Garden and the next enclosure, surrounded by expansive landscaped greenery. Beneath their feet ran a stone-paved path, flanked by two public benches.
Withdrawing her gaze, she spoke with gravity: "Something isn't right. The dangers we're encountering are far too frequent. If this were normal, the park would have collapsed into chaos long ago. The administrator would have to constantly replenish staff and perpetually extinguish those who turn black.
"Yet in reality, this item has remained stable in Songhai for over twenty years."
Throughout their journey, virtually no enclosure had been safe. Right from the start, they had encountered a combination of rules, followed by crises and corruptions in both the Monkey Garden and the Panda Garden.
Zhang Yuanqing had noticed this detail early on. After frowning in thought for a moment, he ventured, "Is it possible that the problem lies with us?"
The Palace Master's eyes darkened, and she gave a slight nod. "That's precisely what I mean. We're being targeted—perhaps by the item spirit, or perhaps by something else."
"Targeted by the item spirit, deliberately making the anomalies inside hyperactive so that every step we take is fraught with peril?" Zhang Yuanqing sank into thought.
Just then, Commandery Princess Yinyao raised her speaker.
"I have a different view."
Zhang Yuanqing and the Palace Master looked toward her simultaneously.
The princess's mature, commanding voice suddenly lowered. "I have experienced the power of this corruption firsthand. I have the right to speak."
"Speak," Zhang Yuanqing and the Palace Master said in unison.
Carefully choosing her words, Commandery Princess Yinyao asked, "Do you remember the rule for the Monkey Garden?"
Zhang Yuanqing answered, "Monkeys in the zoo cannot speak."
Clutching the speaker, Commandery Princess Yinyao nodded.
"Earlier, Yuanshi Tianzun nearly turned into a monkey. Such a lethal crisis, yet no solution was provided. The Employee Handbook exists to help employees do their jobs faithfully and combat supernatural anomalies, not to feed companions to them. So why wasn't a solution written down?"
Without waiting for Zhang Yuanqing or the Palace Master to answer, she continued:
"There is only one possibility: the power of corruption works gradually, imperceptibly affecting one's body and mind without being immediately fatal. The blue-uniformed employees unknowingly contract corruption while on patrol, but as long as it is discovered and addressed promptly, there won't be a problem.
"Only when a very rare employee makes an error during patrol and fails to follow the handbook does the corruption deepen, eventually transforming them into a black-uniformed employee.
"Yet we only just entered this place and had clearly never been corrupted before. Why did we skip the 'accumulation' phase entirely and suffer an outright outbreak of corruption?"
Whether it was Yuanshi Tianzun's transformation or her own blackening, both were fatal.
This was plainly an outbreak that occurred only when corruption reached its absolute limit, which made no sense.
Hearing this, Zhang Yuanqing finally made a deduction. "Unless... we were already corrupted without realizing it."
With that, the three fell silent, reviewing every detail since entering the zoo. When exactly had they been corrupted?
Zhang Yuanqing had too many thoughts running through his head. After less than ten seconds, he abandoned the attempt to dig to the bottom of it. His primary objective was to rescue Demonic Eye; with immense pressure weighing on him, he couldn't afford to devote his undivided attention to solving the mystery.
"Let's not—"
Just as he was about to say they should stop overthinking and focus on saving Demonic Eye, he noticed a sharp gleam ignite within the Palace Master's lovely eyes behind her mask.
"We overlooked a detail.
"There's something wrong with Wang Mingming's journal. The dorm door was locked, and Wang Mingming couldn't return to his room, which was why he knocked on the windows of other dorm rooms, leading to the deaths of the staff members one by one.
"Yet the journal we read clearly documented that someone went missing every night. Isn't that contradictory?"
A chill ran through Zhang Yuanqing's heart. He couldn't enter his dorm room, which was why he "killed"; in that case, the notebook shouldn't have contained entries documenting the nightly disappearances. Who wrote them?
*Damn it! I thought the dormitory plotline was over, but it was lying in wait for me here?!*
Zhang Yuanqing looked toward his two female companions, and they looked back at him.
Amidst the heavy silence, Zhang Yuanqing, as the core of the group, spoke up:
"This might be a curse—a very high-tier curse. But I should be fine now. As for you, Palace Master, you haven't suffered any misfortune yet, likely because your level is high enough to resist the curse's erosion. As for the princess..."
He didn't dare claim Commandery Princess Yinyao was entirely out of the woods, even though she had just undergone purification from an Evil-Breaking Talisman.
After all, if the curse could affect him despite his divine power of the sun, an Evil-Breaking Talisman wouldn't be enough to permanently resolve it unless a Day Wanderer intervened.
"Why is it that after increasing my cultivation, I feel even weaker instead!" Commandery Princess Yinyao complained to her master.
*From now on, I'll try my best not to meddle in Dominator-tier conflicts. Try my best...* Zhang Yuanqing muttered inwardly before saying, "Time is running short. Let's keep moving."
The group dashed along the winding sightseeing pathway. Two or three minutes later, an artificial lake came into view ahead.
The surface of the water was pitch-black and calm, draped in a thin veil of mist. In the middle of the lake grew a massive camphor tree with a lush, canopy-like spread of branches and leaves, from which vines hung down like curtains.
Amidst the dense tangle of vines, the silhouette of a person with a drooping head was faintly discernible.
Heavenly King Demonic Eye!
Overjoyed, Zhang Yuanqing was about to rush to the lakeside when, emerging from the bushes, his peripheral vision caught sight of a robust, majestic white lion crouched on the shore.
He slammed on the brakes!
"Get down, get down..."
He led the Palace Master and Commandery Princess Yinyao back behind the bushes.
Two humans and one corpse cautiously poked their heads out, scrutinizing the magnificent white lion.
It lay lazily along the shore with half-closed eyes, appearing to doze. However, the occasional flick of its tail signaled that it was not asleep.
"What's the white lion's level?" The Palace Master looked at Zhang Yuanqing. If it were merely Level 7, she would simply kill it by force.
"I'm not sure. I've never seen it fight. At first, I assumed it was an outer guard, but after reading the Employee Handbook, this white lion is almost certainly the strongest entity in the park. I even suspect Elder Gou might not necessarily beat it," Zhang Yuanqing whispered in a low voice.
The Palace Master was taken aback. After pondering briefly, she said, "If that's the case, our only option is to lure it away."
Zhang Yuanqing nodded, then suddenly asked, "Musicians excel at transmitting sound. Is there a way to communicate with Demonic Eye without alerting the white lion? Something like ultrasound or infrasound? That guy has been trapped in the park for months; he definitely knows more than we do."
"Any sound the white lion can't hear, Demonic Eye won't be able to hear either." The Palace Master dismissed his far-fetched notion, tilted her head in thought for a moment, and said, "However, there is indeed a way to contact Demonic Eye without being detected by the white lion."
Chapter 509