As the light of the Miracle Imprint shone bright, a burst of vigorous drum beats erged from within. Soon after, a vast Laser Ball rose slowly from the light, reflecting a dazzling array of colorful brilliance.
It illuminated the figures of sixteen big-bearded dwarves wearing only tight leather pants.
Bare-chested, as if they had oiled their bodies, they glinted with an eerie light.
The muscular, stocky Abyss dwarves began to jump around to the rousing music, singing in unison, "Hey, young n..."
Huai Shi closed his eyes in despair.
Out of respect for Orchard Gym, he didn't imdiately press the repatriation button. Instead, after fumbling in his pocket for a long ti, he pulled out a gun.
He raised the gun, pulling back the hamr.
He closed his eyes and fired randomly.
Whatever number he could kill, he would kill.
After emptying an entire magazine, amidst the booming sounds, the group of dwarves who already looked like they deserved to be shot on the spot were huddled together, shivering.
The sight made him even more eager to fire a few more shots.
HUFF...
In the silence, Beelzebub, who had long been idle, couldn't help but groan with pleasure, "Thank you, brother, I'm good now."
"You're not allowed to be good!"
Huai Shi was furious. He was tempted to purify this piece of junk and the bunch in front of him—to put them out of their misery together.
"Where did you guys co from!"
He glared at the group of bizarre dwarves, realizing that several of them looked familiar, though he couldn't quite place where he had seen them before. "What on earth are you trying to do?!"
Among them, a muscular dwarf who had been leading the dance, shivering behind a thin veil, timidly held up a sign—In crucial tis, how could there be no song?
[The Abyss Choir is at your service.]
"Unbelievable! It's you guys again!"
"We-we ca to apply for a position!"
The dwarves huddled together, shivering. With the gun that had started to emit a sort of lethal threat pointed at them, they were nearly scared to tears and hurriedly held up the Hell Music Association's letter of recomndation.
"Mr. Paganini referred us here!" the lead dwarf shrieked. "He also said you would definitely like this program... told us to cater to your preferences..."
Cater to my preferences, my ass!
Does the Hell Music Association have so kind of misunderstanding about ?
Huai Shi stared at the crowd of muscular, oil-covered dwarves before him, a headache coming on.
"Could you please not join in on this chaos?" Huai Shi covered his face, waving his hand. "I freaking just wanted to recruit a bunch of Pokémon, why do you have to do this to ?"
BEEP!
He pressed the repatriation button.
With a glimr of hope, Huai Shi looked up.
Next one.
But this ti, the light shone for an unnervingly long ti—nothing erged from it, only the faint, continuous sound of tearing paper.
Like the fear that echoes through the spine at midnight.
It was hair-raising.
Soon, the light vanished, but nothing appeared.
Only dozens of torn and shredded red paper scraps fell out, as if so sort of ticket had been torn apart, brimming with the aura of Curses and rage.
It seed like soone was cursing softly.
Imdiately after, a jarring alarm sounded, and the defense chanisms of the Ivory Tower activated instantaneously. A blaze of intense light flashed by and then returned to silence.
The air still carried a faint scent of blood.
Only about a dozen vague footprints remained on the ground, evidence of what had just happened.
In the quiet, Huai Shi gasped.
Inside the stifling interior of the Summon Dragon Flute, he was so frightened his hands and feet turned cold. Is there any hope for this world?
He knew exactly what had happened.
Just now, so indescribably weird entity from Hell had set its sights on him. If not for the protection of the Miracle Imprint of the Summon Dragon Flute, he feared he might have already died a horrible death.
No, death was probably the easy part. There were many grueso cases in the library of those who desperately wanted to die but couldn't. How could he not be afraid?
This incident served as a rude awakening for Huai Shi.
He regained the wariness he should have had.
Even with the Summon Dragon Flute to assist, he had to face all sorts of peculiar things from Hell. Even archaeological teams sotis capsized in the gutter.
At tis like these, one couldn't be too careful.
He sighed from the bottom of his heart. Reliability is what matters most.
But among the countless hells filled with weirdness and terror, where could he find a reliable species to nurture with confidence?
Powerful species like sled dogs had enough destructive force, but they were too difficult to ta and control. And those bizarre, alluring, otherworldly won were too strange, utterly untrustworthy.
The 'good brothers' from Little Cat Paradise were indeed powerful, and Huai Shi knew them well. However, that bastard Little Cat ran faster than anyone when he saw Huai Shi, as if he'd seen a ghost.
It seed the Paradise Legal Departnt was dood to beco a thing of the past...
Huai Shi sighed and was about to start over when the Book of Fate suddenly moved.
It directly adjusted the resonance sequence within the Miracle Imprint, bringing an inconspicuous response signal from the back to the very front.
The glow of the Mystic Ritual lit up imdiately afterward.
This ti, a faint squeaking sound ca from within it.
Huai Shi's eyes widened.
He saw a nearly hairless young mouse crawl out, squeaking at Huai Shi as if it were both wailing and trying to curry favor.
A mouse?
Huai Shi was montarily dumbfounded, his expression blank.
He couldn't understand the Book of Fate's selection criteria at all.
However, right after that, he saw a sharp beak poke out from the light, targeting the little mouse's neck and pecking down swiftly and cleanly.
SNAP. The mouse lay on the ground, motionless.
Then, a giant black bird, larger than a large dog, erged from the Miracle Imprint. With the small mouse in its beak, it cawed twice affectionately and started running towards Huai Shi on its short legs.
It placed the still-breathing mouse on the ground.
It nudged Huai Shi.
It hopped up and down on the spot excitedly, as if presenting a greeting gift.
"CAW!!!"
The newcor's blood-red eyes were filled with excitent as it unfolded its pitch-black wings and let out a shrill cry toward Huai Shi.
It looked sowhat familiar?
While Huai Shi was still in shock, the huge Raven that appeared out of nowhere, as if worried Huai Shi would be too polite, picked up the small mouse, placed it in Huai Shi's arms, and nudged him a couple more tis.
Signaling Old Pal to eat it while it was still warm.
"Uh..."
Huai Shi's expression twitched, and he quickly waved his hands. "No, that won't be necessary..."
Seeing him refuse to eat, the summoned Raven looked sowhat disappointed. It swallowed the small mouse in one gulp, then hopped a couple more tis on the spot, cawing at Huai Shi.
He had no idea what it was saying...
Huai Shi scratched his head, looking down at the unfamiliar bird, which felt increasingly familiar the more he observed it.
The Raven cawed twice more. Realizing Huai Shi didn't understand what it was saying, it started to spin around frantically on the spot. Shortly after, it vigorously shook its wings, and a green seed fell from between its feathers, landing in Huai Shi's hand.
Taking the seed, Huai Shi squeezed and sniffed it, imdiately sensing a familiar presence.
This particular kind of seed was rare, even in Hell. The only ti he recalled seeing it was in Xiematai Hell's... Ueno Park?
Huai Shi paused for a mont, finally recalling the flock of Ravens that had filled the skies of Xiematai.
That was when he first made enemies with the Lin family. Those local young companions had been very enthusiastic, guiding him and providing navigation. Huai Shi sotis reminisced about them, never expecting they would et again.
"So it's you guys!"
Huai Shi reached out to cradle the oversized Raven, examining it with pleasant surprise. "You've grown this big? I almost didn't recognize you!"
Seeing that Huai Shi finally recognized it, the Raven got excited again and turned to caw at the Secret Ritual.
Huai Shi instinctively felt that sothing was off.
And then, he saw, along with countless sharp cries, a massive tide of darkness spewing from the Mystic Ritual—
Engulfing everything.
In just half a minute, when the fully ard administrators burst through the door at the sound of the alarms, ready for a fight, they saw... a fluttering darkness that had already covered the entire interior of the Summon Dragon Flute.
In the dark, countless crimson eyes turned to stare at them.
Like countless blood-red stars rising in the night sky.
Amongst the specks of dancing red, only the young man, nearly drowned by the flock, managed to raise his head. Struggling under the weight of several hundred excited Ravens, he squeezed out an awkward smile at the administrators.
"Sorry, the recruitnt fair has ended," he said. "It's just that... the number of recruits is, well, a bit much..."
Half an hour later, he sat in the principal's office of the main school building, which was now covered by a swarm of Ravens.
"A total of 1,120... you really are sothing," Luo Su said, looking down at the report on his phone. He took off his glasses and scrutinized the student in front of him. "Did you move an entire family here from so Hell?"
"Uh, to be honest, I didn't expect that many either," Huai Shi said awkwardly, waving his hand. "I just nodded slightly, just a tiny bit... I didn't expect them to bring their entire households."
"Then you're quite lucky," Luo Su picked up a magnifying glass, walked over to Huai Shi, and carefully examined the overly large Raven on his shoulder. He even pulled open its wings to observe the long white stripe along the edge.
"Especially this one, the quality is quite good," he remarked admiringly. "It's already evolved into a Winter's Crow. It seems their tribe really suits you."
"Winter's what?" Huai Shi asked, puzzled.
"You don't know?" Luo Su glanced at him, reached out, and picked up the cup from the office desk, pouring its contents directly onto the Raven's wings. The Raven imdiately shook its wings unhappily and cawed at Luo Su.
If it weren't for Huai Shi, it probably would have pecked the old man's eyes out by now.
The water from the cup, after flowing over the Raven, fell to the ground and rapidly solidified, forming bits of frost.
The chilly air was intense.
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