A round wooden barrel—that was the body of the creature before me. Its legs were short, or perhaps they weren’t legs at all, but mechanical stumps. One arm was a wrench, the other a drill. The head resembled a human’s, but only the upper half; below, a yellowed, rusted mechanical mouth jutted out, stiff and unnatural. It had only one eye, which flickered with a cold white light.
Calling it a robot didn’t quite fit. I sensed both yin and yang energy swirling chaotically within it—monster was the only word that came to mind.
"Can you understand me?"
I asked, but the creature remained blank-faced, sitting on the ground and staring at the dim, yellow sky. Only then did I realize—this place was an amusement park.
I got up and walked out, step by step. Sure enough, it was an amusement park—roller coasters, carousels, a Ferris wheel, all sorts of rides, all of them ancient and worn. But what puzzled me most was that every ride was incomplete. It wasn’t as though someone had destroyed them—they’d been built that way from the start.
The red roller coaster, its paint long faded to expose the steel beneath, was intact, but it had no safety locks. That struck me as odd. I even ran over to check—normally, there’d be safety locks to secure passengers, but there weren’t even holes for them, as if the design had never included any.
Some sections of the roller coaster track were missing entirely. I glanced at the carousel beside it—equally bizarre. The horses’ heads were nothing but smeared blobs of color, twisted together like monstrous faces. The sight was unsettling.
Looking around, I was still in the frozen tundra—no mountains in sight. The amusement park stood alone in the permafrost, and aside from that mechanical creature, I saw no other living soul.
I planned to climb the Ferris wheel, but as I approached, I realized its center was nothing but a massive lump of iron—completely immobile. There was no sign of the basic machinery that would make it move.
Finally, I reached the very top. Off in the distance, I saw a stretch of white—unclear, but it had to be a snowfield or something like it. Behind me, the desert was still visible.
The other rides were all missing something, in one way or another. After climbing down, I walked over to the abandoned building and watched the strange creature. That’s when I noticed white letters beneath its barrel-shaped body.
I crouched in front of it for a closer look. The writing was scrawled and messy—looked like it said "Machine No. 9." Just then, the creature stood up. As it passed me, its head creaked as it twisted to glance my way, then it hurried to the roller coaster. Its wrench arm began banging on the ride, while the drill spun into action.
I watched it fiddle for ages, but there wasn’t a single mark left on the roller coaster. I sighed helplessly.
"What on earth is this thing?"
Outside the amusement park were several bizarre cars—pointed, square, even two-headed. They were all strange, but the one thing they had in common was their empty interiors. Nothing inside, just the shell.
Thinking back, everything I’d seen—the powerful black Sand Wyrm, last night’s monster, this mysterious machine, the amusement park, the skyship, the UFO—they were all the stuff of fantasy. Even those that could move were hollow inside.
The machines had no engines, and the monsters—if you could call them people—were cold and soulless, unable to speak. The Sand Wyrms were the same. The one that bit me today, its round, tubular body was empty—nothing inside at all.
The most disorienting thing was that you couldn’t tell direction here. Both today and last night, I’d tried to watch the sun and moon, but their positions shifted wildly, with no pattern at all. It was as if this world was designed to make people lose themselves.
These moving machines or people did react to people like us—I’d confirmed that much. I had no idea what the barrel-shaped robot was up to, but I really wanted to take it apart and see what was inside. I didn’t, though. It had saved me. Out here in the freezing tundra, I might have turned into a ghost again if not for it.
Everywhere in this amusement park were piles of discarded junk, all of it incomplete. The barrelbot was hauling the debris around, as if trying to fix the place up.
Just then, hunger gnawed at my stomach again, and it rumbled loudly.
I lay down on the ground, staring at the sky, miserable. Then came a creaking sound—the wooden creature approached and looked at me, then turned toward the back of the amusement park. I watched it in confusion. It walked a few steps, glanced back, and I got up to follow.
By a small train in the amusement park, I saw the entrance to a basement. Barrelbot Nine’s eye shot out a beam of light, gesturing for me to go down. I didn’t hesitate—I went straight in.
Gradually, I felt a strange warmth. A violet-green glow shimmered below. I swallowed and stepped down slowly.
Suddenly, my eyes widened. Before me stood a tree, its branches aglow with soft, white light. Hanging from its limbs were countless fruits, each one shimmering with blended violet and green hues. The fruits were all irregular—some shaped like stones, some triangular, some long and thin.
I swallowed and walked over, picked one, and popped it into my mouth. Instantly, warmth shot up from my feet to my head. I exhaled in comfort, letting out a satisfied burp.
This chapter isn’t finished yet~.~ Click next page for more!
Warmth flooded my heart; the cold and malice vanished instantly, and my fatigue was swept away. My strength returned completely. Staring at the spiritfruit tree, I remembered what Zhu Tang had told me—the food of the Holy Spirits.
I didn’t eat more. Instead, I walked out. Barrelbot Nine was still busy. I sat on the front of the little train, grateful as I watched it. We couldn’t communicate, but I was sure it had some awareness.
"By the way, can you write?"
I walked over and asked. Barrelbot Nine stopped, its eye flickering at me. I found a stick and wrote my question on the ground. Barrelbot Nine paused, struggled to squat down, and with its drill arm, scrawled the character for 'yes.'
I breathed a sigh of relief—it understood me. I was about to ask about this place when a cold gust swept in. Barrelbot Nine bolted, and with a whoosh, a shadow descended on the amusement park.
With a rush, I stared wide-eyed as Barrelbot Nine was sucked toward it. A person—fully formed and normal-looking—stood there: black leather pants, two bands of black tattoos on his arms, close-cropped white hair, a long narrow face, pointed chin, and cold eyes.
With a crack, I raised my hand in shock as Barrelbot Nine opened its mouth wide and swallowed him whole.
"Hmm, not bad. This guy tastes like an evolutionary type."
In an instant, I lunged at him. He ate quickly—by the time I reached Barrelbot Nine, its eye light had gone out and most of its body had been consumed.
With a bang, I punched the intruder in the face. He stared at me in shock as he flew backward. I caught Barrelbot Nine, but it was motionless now. With a pop, its body dissolved into nothing.
"What the hell are you doing?"
I shouted angrily. The intruder stood up, a patch of his mouth scorched by fire, and looked at me with a mocking smile.
"Just foraging. But why is there a Holy Spirit here? Tastes pretty good, too."
With a crack, the intruder suddenly bent his body at a forty-five-degree angle. Blackness spread rapidly across his cheek, like burning tissue paper, and his eyes turned dark red.
Bang—before I could react, his fist sank into my stomach. I spat blood and was sent flying.
With a crash, I slammed into the carousel. The impact echoed; I hit the ground and rolled several times before stopping.
"That last hit hurt, huh? But I won’t kill you yet. Hard to come by such delicious food."
He stood over me; I could barely breathe. That blow had turned my insides to pulp—I kept coughing blood. The intruder squatted down, his ash-burned face gleaming with excitement. He opened his mouth and sucked up all the blood and flesh I’d spit out, looking utterly satisfied.
"What are you doing?"
I barely got the words out before he grabbed my neck and lifted me off the ground, sizing me up.
"Let me have a few bites first."
With a boom, flames burst across my body. His hand turned black from the heat and he let go. I shot into the air, massive Vermilion Bird Wings unfurled, fire crawling over me like armor, shifting from red to crimson.
"Who are you?"
I asked. The intruder laughed out loud.
"Looks like you’re a newborn Holy Spirit, Forsaken 016. Give up—you can’t beat me."