Qin Yuan, having abruptly entered his heightened state, significantly lessened Ding Yi’s burden and the persistent threat of ambush.

In the blink of an eye, he carved a bloody swathe through the beastmen, clearing a path for Yan Ming and Jiang Xianqing.

“Go!”

The instant the word left his lips, Yan Ming and Jiang Xianqing surged forward like released arrows.

Qin Yuan and Ding Yi drew most of the attackers’ attention, allowing the two who had veered off the paved road to sprint unhindered all the way to the apple orchard.

The rich, cloying aroma of ripe apples permeated the air. As soon as they stepped within the orchard’s boundaries, the lingering scent of blood and violence seemed to dissipate completely.

All that remained in their minds was the sweet and intoxicating fragrance of the fruit.

The smell was so overpowering that Yan Ming felt the persistent ache in his injured body recede. A gentle breeze caressed his skin. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, savoring the sugary aroma. When he opened his eyes again, he found himself standing before his old, dilapidated childhood home.

His older sister, who had always kept her hair severely short to dedicate all her time to studying and working, was wearing a faded, shapeless short-sleeved shirt that their mother had worn for countless years before her passing. She stood beneath the sprawling camphor tree, a warm smile gracing her lips as she looked at him.

“Did you get bullied again? Come on, your sister will always have your back.”

Yan Ming’s breath hitched in his throat, tears welling up and streaming down his face.

He didn’t dare to speak.

He was terrified of shattering the illusion, of scaring her away, and equally afraid of shattering the fragile dream he was experiencing.

“Come on, silly. Are you scared out of your wits?”

The sharp, burning sting on his cheek yanked him back from the vivid illusion in the blink of an eye.

“Yan Ming!”

“Sister Qing.” Yan Ming’s nose felt strangely congested. He sniffled loudly and realized that his nose had been running for quite some time.

This intensely sweet aroma possessed a peculiar effect: it could induce vivid hallucinations, conjuring the deepest desires of one’s heart, and then subtly ensnare the individual in its addictive embrace.

Jiang Xianqing had no time to inquire about his strange behavior. She had only run a short distance before glancing back to see the younger man standing stock-still like a zombie, as if a magical talisman had been affixed to his forehead.

Fortunately, a couple of sharp slaps to the face had managed to drag his wandering soul back to reality.

It had likely cost them two precious minutes.

They had to hurry.

“Let’s go, let’s go! Run!”

The two of them resumed their frantic sprint. The largest apple tree was impossible to miss. As soon as they entered the orchard, it dominated the landscape.

It wasn’t far, and the path leading to it was straight and unobstructed.

Before they even reached the base of the colossal tree, both of them spotted a conspicuous pit dug into the earth.

As they drew closer, Jiang Xianqing rubbed her eyes in disbelief. “Is she… blind?”

Yan Ming slapped himself once more, just to be certain it wasn’t another hallucination, then cautiously replied, “Sister Qing, do you think that goddess has some aversion to apples? Is that why she hasn’t been able to find it?”

Within the tub-sized pit lay a child, its body human but its head that of a sheep. If one averted their gaze from the cleanly severed neck, it appeared as if the child was merely sleeping peacefully.

The two of them reached out hesitantly, unsure of the correct course of action.

After a moment of shared uncertainty, Yan Ming gritted his teeth, lowered himself, and supported his weight with one hand, carefully stepping onto the firm soil on either side of the pit to maintain his balance.

Seeing his resolve, Jiang Xianqing repeated a silent mantra to herself: Think of it as a mannequin—just a model. Model, model, this is simply a model.

While reciting this mental reassurance, she reached down and gently lifted the child’s severed head.

Yan Ming’s eyes caught sight of the fresh, brutal cut, and the wave of nausea and fear that had begun to rise within him was forcefully suppressed by the stinging pain of biting down hard on his tongue.

Carefully carrying the small body out of the pit, Jiang Xianqing seemed to be operating on pure instinct. Perhaps her self-suggestion had taken root. She reached out and tentatively pressed the severed head against the body’s neck.

“Sister Qing?” Yan Ming’s voice was a choked whisper, the two simple words drawn out with disbelief.

Magically, inexplicably, the severed neck seamlessly rejoined the moment the head made contact, startling both of them.

Jiang Xianqing quickly brought her hand to her nose, but detected no sign of breath.

“Don’t dwell on it. Let’s get him out of here quickly.”

“Send him where?”

“The child has been reunited with its body, yet there’s still no reaction. The only logical course of action is to return him to that goddess.”

As Jiang Xianqing spoke, she raised her voice and shouted, “Goddess! What was her name again? O… oh, Ophelia!”

“Ophelia! Your child is here!”

The two of them dared not waste another precious second. Yan Ming carefully hoisted the child onto his back, and they both began to run, shouting in unison, “Ophelia, the child is here!”

Emerging from the relative safety of the apple orchard, the most direct route back to the circular plaza was the path they had just traversed.

Both of them gritted their teeth, desperately trying to block out the vivid and horrifying memories of the bloody carnage that had unfolded on that very path.

Yan Ming continued to bellow Ophelia’s name at the top of his lungs.

Jiang Xianqing added her desperate cries, “Ding Yi! Qin Yuan! We’re here!”

Amidst the deafening cacophony of battle, Ding Yi thought she faintly heard someone calling her name. She frantically scanned her surroundings, but all she could see were relentless beastmen, their attacks seemingly unending. The overwhelming stench of blood was fraying her nerves, and her reactions were beginning to lag.

Qin Yuan, having fully embraced his heightened state, had transformed the initial massacre into his own personal, brutal performance.

As if to eliminate this singular, overwhelming threat, all the beastmen within the instance seemed to have received a unified command, converging upon them with a clear and unwavering purpose.

“Long live Ophelia!” The unified roar of the gathered beastmen completely drowned out Yan Ming’s already weakened voice.

“Shut the hell up!” Yan Ming, his lungs burning and his legs threatening to buckle, cursed vehemently. “It’s not like she can even hear you!”

Ophelia might not have heard his desperate plea, but the beastmen immediately surrounding him certainly did.

Not only did they hear him, but they also caught sight of the child on his back, whose features bore an uncanny resemblance to their enraged goddess.

The beastmen’s unified chant shifted, their voices now reverent as they intoned the goddess’s name: “Oh… Ophelia…”

Yan Ming was initially overwhelmed with fear, but when the beastmen’s fierce attack unexpectedly stopped, his heart rate calmed slightly. He stepped forward carefully, nervously whispering, “You guys… You decide for yourselves.”

“This is your guardian’s child.”

“If you dare to harm him, don’t expect me to plead for your miserable lives.”

Jiang Xianqing clutched her weapon tightly and moved to stand shoulder to shoulder with Yan Ming, her eyes darting around frantically, wishing they could rotate a full 360 degrees without any blind spots to anticipate any sudden attacks.

She continued to shout, her voice hoarse, “Ding Yi! Qin Yuan!”

“Ding Yi!”

The fighting duo, utterly unaware that they had inadvertently acquired a form of death immunity, had descended into a state of bloodthirsty efficiency.

Ding Yi vaguely registered that the relentless attacks of the beastmen surrounding her were beginning to falter.

They were stopping, yet the weapon in Ding Yi’s hand, which she had exchanged countless times for a fresher one, did not cease its brutal work simply because their assault had paused.

The crushing exhaustion of her physical strength and the rapid loss of blood were causing her brain, which had been operating on a meager vegetarian diet for the past two days, to teeter on the brink of oxygen deprivation.

The buzzing in her ears grew louder and more insistent.

Hold on.

Ding Yi, you absolutely have to hold on.

She was pushing herself with sheer mental fortitude every single second until the beastmen around her, having seemingly received some crucial information, began to retreat as if she were a raving lunatic, giving her a wide berth. Yet, she continued to stare fiercely at her surroundings, her voice a low growl: “Come on!”

She couldn’t grasp what had happened. However, the beastmen were no longer attacking her.

She spun around, but Qin Yuan was nowhere to be seen.

An inexplicable wave of irritability and sudden panic caused her to tremble. She stumbled towards the direction of the most intense movement, her legs heavy and unresponsive.

The heart of the bloody storm was still thick with a crimson mist. The tireless asura at its center was still a whirlwind of deadly motion, various shapes of weapons pointing towards him with unwavering intent.

She failed to notice that the beastmen’s attacks had ceased within a small radius around her, and she didn’t see Yan Ming, carrying their unlikely shield of death immunity, approaching rapidly from behind.

All she could see were countless sharp blades aimed directly at Qin Yuan’s exposed back.

The horrific images of the two youths whose heads had been brutally chopped off after their transformation, the young woman who had desperately tried to flee only to have her neck cruelly severed, all flashed through her mind in rapid succession.

She seemed to have already witnessed it. Qin Yuan’s neck was also about to be broken under the brutal swing of a heavy axe.

The fragile thread of reason holding her together finally broke. She rushed into the heart of the fierce battle, ignoring the danger to herself, and instinctively raised a weapon—she didn’t even notice what it was—to deflect a heavy strike aimed at his back. However, her already weakened arm shook violently and could not rise to its former strength again.

Seeing another attack hurtling towards him, and knowing she didn’t have the time to block it properly, she subconsciously took a desperate step to the side, intending to shield him with her own body.

Every frame of the chaotic scene seemed to unfold in agonizing slow motion before her eyes. Just as the sharp tip of a blade was about to pierce her clothes, a hand suddenly clamped down on the attacker’s wrist, halting its forward momentum.

A flash of steel, followed by a clean, brutal cut, severed the beastman’s neck.

“Ding Yi!”

She heard the sound clearly through the ringing in her ears.

It was Jiang Xianqing’s voice.

“What in the world were you trying to do just now?” A voice devoid of any discernible emotion sounded close to her ear.

Ding Yi turned her head in a daze, her eyes locking onto Qin Yuan’s, which still held a lingering intensity from the recent slaughter. Her sore and trembling hands instinctively reached up to touch his intact neck, leaving a smear of fresh, red blood on his skin.

“Still… stuck together.”

She murmured the words so softly that even she could barely hear them.

“You’re alright.”

She subconsciously looked up, meeting his fierce gaze, and a small, relieved smile touched her lips. “That’s… great.”

Just as her knees threatened to buckle and she began to lose her balance, a cold, female electronic voice echoed through the chaotic scene:

[Task completed, instance ended.]