Chapter 132: Spatial Rift

Chapter 132

After everyone had climbed aboard the battered ship, Mei turned around and counted. Apart from the seven of them, fourteen others had come along.

When she saw that Wanqu Wen Yue was among them, her delicate brows immediately drew together.

“Why are you here?”

Following Mei’s gaze, the others saw a woman in a tight, dark-red leather outfit, her voluptuous figure both striking and alluring. She was staring at Mei with shining eyes.

Aside from Night Jingxuan, none of them knew that although Wanqu Wen Yue looked every inch the mature, commanding beauty, she actually had a preference for cute young girls. After glancing back and forth between the woman and Mei several times, Mo Chen stepped forward unhappily and blocked Wanqu Wen Yue’s view.

“Hey, handsome, are you standing in front of me because you want me to play with you?”

Ever since Mei had removed her hood earlier, Wanqu Wen Yue had been hiding to one side, watching her with barely concealed drool. The moment she saw Mei board the ghost ship, she had followed without a second thought. Now that her view was blocked—and by an exceptionally handsome man at that—she figured that if she could not have the little girl, playing with a handsome man would do just as well. She immediately put on her usual seductive expression and winked at Mo Chen.

“Play? Sure. How would you like to play?” The moment Mo Chen saw her expression, his displeasure deepened, though an evil smile appeared on his face.

Hearing his answer, Wanqu Wen Yue assumed he shared her tastes. She smiled seductively.

“I like things exciting. What about you, handsome?”

“Something exciting? I like that too. I wonder if this is exciting enough?”

Mo Chen’s narrow, peach-blossom eyes lifted slightly, and his wicked smile suddenly made him seem irresistibly charming. His actions, however, contained not the slightest hint of romance.

Electricity crackled around him, and bolts of lightning shot rapidly toward Wanqu Wen Yue.

She had not expected him to attack without warning and was unable to dodge. The lightning struck her squarely. In an instant, her alluring curls were transformed into a frizzy, explosive halo.

“Pfft!”

Mei could not hold back her laughter.

This woman was simply too entertaining. Last time, she had watched her give herself a nosebleed; this time, she had been turned into a walking explosion of hair. If Wanqu Wen Yue did not keep dredging up unpleasant memories, Mei might actually have enjoyed playing with her.

The others also struggled not to laugh. Even the corners of Night Jingxuan’s lips lifted slightly.

“All right, A-Chen! We still have things to do. Stop playing around!”

Amused though she was, Mei did not forget to stop Mo Chen from continuing his quarrel with Wanqu Wen Yue.

“Listen. And all of you as well—are you planning to split up, or are you coming with us? Let me make this clear first: whether you follow us or not, we will not be responsible for your safety. At most, if we have the strength to spare, we may lend a hand. Otherwise, you are on your own.”

Mei made the situation plain in advance.

She had never been a saint.

She did not care in the slightest whether these people lived or died.

The moment she finished speaking, Wanqu Wen Yue was the first to declare, “Little girl, I’m coming with you!”

“Your legs are your own. Do as you please.”

Mei gave her a cool glance, then turned toward her own companions.

“We’re leaving. If they want to follow, let them. If they don’t, that’s fine too.”

With that, Mei headed toward the cabin door.

The ship was not very large. From bow to stern, the entire deck could be seen at a glance, and there was nothing particularly unusual about it. If they wanted to discover anything, entering the cabin was inevitable.

Yet the instant Mei crossed the threshold, she sensed that something was wrong.

At first, she had assumed that someone had placed a barrier here, which was why her mental power could not penetrate the area and scan it. Now, however, she realized that this was no barrier at all.

This was a spatial rift.

No wonder everyone who entered had vanished without a sound, never to return.

Anyone who entered a spatial rift without guidance would be completely unable to find a way out.

Mei glanced at the empty surroundings and waited for a while, but no one appeared beside her. Her brows gradually furrowed.

Although everyone had entered through the same doorway, and the place seemed to consist of only a single spatial plane, the truth was that the moment they stepped inside, they had been scattered across different dimensions.

Every step here could trigger a change in the spatial structure. This place was a convergence point of fractured spaces. The slightest carelessness could result in being sucked into another dimension. At worst, the chaotic energy within the fractures could tear a person apart.

Besides that, they also had to deal with the monsters that had escaped from other spaces. If Mei’s guess was correct, the cloaked attackers who had ambushed those compatriots earlier were monsters that had fled through the spatial rift.

But where had those monsters gone afterward?

Had they returned to the rift?

Or had they…

Mei shook her head, casting aside those unnecessary thoughts. The most urgent task was to find Mo Chen and the others. As for everyone else, she had no intention of worrying about them for the time being.

She formed a hand seal. A thread of white light drifted from her fingertips. One end hovered motionless in the air, as though nailed there, while the other remained attached to her fingers. As she moved forward, the white light extended little by little, like a thread that continually guided her back to her starting point.

Mei lightly touched the team emblem on the back of her hand and carefully sensed the location of the nearest emblem. She then decisively walked in that direction. Although she continued moving forward, the white thread extended only to her feet before seeming to snap and refusing to go any farther.

Mei knew that she had long since left the original spatial plane, so she paid it no mind.

After proceeding cautiously for more than ten minutes, Mei finally saw a dazzling field of multicolored light ahead.

Contrary to what she had expected, there was not just one person there. Four people had gathered together, and only one of them was someone she knew.

It was Lin Shaojie.

The moment Lin Shaojie entered the cabin, he discovered that all his companions had vanished.

He had no idea what had happened and did not dare to act rashly, so he could only stand where he was and wait. After a long while, however, the only people who appeared were several ability users who had come with them to search the ghost ship.

“Has everyone come in? How many are still behind you?” Lin Shaojie asked as soon as he saw them.

“No one is behind us. I was the last one in! What is this place? Why are you alone? Where are your companions?” the last person to arrive asked.

Once he learned that everyone had entered the cabin, even Lin Shaojie, who was not particularly quick-witted, understood that he had been separated from the others.

After thinking for a moment, he said, “I don’t know what this place is, but that cabin door seemed to send people to different locations. In other words, we’ve been separated from the others.”

“Then what should we do? Should we continue waiting here?” someone asked.

His question left the others looking at one another helplessly. None of them had ever encountered anything like this, and for a moment, no one knew what to do.

“If you want to wait, then wait. I’m going to look for my companions!” Lin Shaojie declared first.

“Look for them? How? Everything here looks the same. It’s all gray and hazy. There’s no way to tell direction, and there aren’t even any landmarks. Do you know which way to go?” someone immediately asked.

Lin Shaojie was rendered speechless. He truly had no idea which way to go.

But he could not simply stand there and wait like an idiot, either.

What on earth was he supposed to do?

In the past, other people had always made the decisions, and he only needed to follow their instructions. Now that he had to think of a solution himself, he was genuinely unaccustomed to it.

Lin Shaojie irritably scratched his hair. Then he heard the ornament hanging from his wrist give a clear chime, and his eyes suddenly lit up.

He grabbed the team emblem hanging from his bracelet and began channeling mental power into it.

He remembered Mei once saying that the emblem had a function similar to a positioning device. By infusing it with mental power, one could sense the locations of other emblems within a certain range.

They had always acted together before, so this function had never been used. Now, however, it was finally proving useful.

As Lin Shaojie sent his mental power into the emblem, he soon sensed a pull guiding him in a particular direction.

“Now I have a way to find my friends. Are you going to stay here, or come with me?” he asked the others after confirming that the emblem was working.

He was cautious and did not reveal how he intended to find them.

“In that case, let’s go together,” someone said after a brief hesitation. “There’s no food or water here. Staying behind means waiting for death. Perhaps we’ll find a way out while searching.”

The others felt that there was some sense in his words. Besides, traveling together would be safer. Who knew what other dangers might be lurking here?

“Which way should we go?” someone asked once the decision had been made.

That person was tactful enough not to ask how Lin Shaojie intended to find the others. He simply asked for the direction.

“That way! We’ll go that way!” Lin Shaojie said, pointing toward the direction indicated to him.

The others looked over but could not see anything different in that direction. Still, they did not question him and followed him forward.

They had barely taken a few steps when something strange happened.

Of the five ability users who had entered later, one happened to move two steps ahead of the others. Immediately afterward, he vanished into thin air right before everyone’s eyes, leaving not the slightest trace behind.

“What is going on? How did he disappear just like that?” someone muttered, rubbing his eyes vigorously. Yet the man was indeed gone.

Someone stepped forward and extended a foot, testing whether there might be some mechanism or trap ahead. But there was nothing. The ground was just as solid as the surface beneath their own feet.

“Why don’t we move forward side by side and see what happens? I once heard of a formation that could exploit a person’s visual blind spots and create an illusion. Perhaps that person hasn’t disappeared at all. Maybe something is simply blocking him from view.”

With everyone at a loss, someone offered the suggestion.

“All right. Let’s try it.”

With no better option, the others could only agree.

The remaining five people formed a line and stepped forward together. Yet after taking two steps, they still could not see the person who had vanished earlier.

With no alternative, the five continued onward.

Before long, another person disappeared.

No one knew how it had happened. Even the person standing beside him had not noticed a thing.

What were they supposed to do now?

If they continued like this, would all of them end up separated?

To be continued.