Chapter 28-The Manga Pariah's Guide to Self-Salvation
The sudden flood, like a monstrous white serpent, devoured everything. Facing this irresistible force of nature, the young fighters had to quickly halt their battle and run in the opposite direction to escape the mysterious disaster.
Even the invincible greatsword was swallowed by the surging torrent. Percy, who had just been struggling against the sword, ran and turned his head, a look of disbelief on his face. Was this flood an enemy... or an ally?
The System, witnessing all this from a different perspective, was about to short-circuit. It knew Ye Zheng had something special, but wasn't her ability called 'Stream'? What kind of stream looks like this!
It quickly pulled up the character setting that the manga creator had given the editor.
[Ye Zheng
Ability: Stream (Nominally A-rank, but what's the actual rank?)
Age at Debut: 17
Height: 175cm
Personality: Gentle, kind, and idealistic
Identity: A privileged young lady from a judge's family, Sei Curia's Saintess
Hobbies: Healing, reading
Goal: To bring justice and hope to the world (A very cute and naive idealistic person (lol))
Character Tags: A seemingly gentle but rebellious little Saintess
Experience: Lived with her grandparents in the lower district for a while as a child. Lost an important relative in the 'Blood Flower' Incident, which sowed a seed in her heart. At 17, she met Percy, who had a similar experience, and, regardless of her noble status and the pressure, joined the protagonist team, taking on the role of healer.
PS: Her ability holds a secret. She will unleash her true power later for Percy, sacrificing herself at a critical moment to pave the way for him to defeat Sykes, tragically fulfilling the Saintess's mission (resurrection may be arranged based on popularity and plot development).]
The System looked at this character setting. Everything about Ye Zheng's current actions, except for her height which the editor had changed—the original 155cm was too short, the editor suggested 165cm, but the creator insisted on 155cm, so the angered editor sister changed it to 175cm—aligned with the creator's design. Her personality, identity, hobbies, goals, and even her experiences all matched. But where did it feel wrong?
It always felt like the Ye Zheng that the manga creator had envisioned was vastly different from the Ye Zheng it actually interacted with.
As it understood it, the creator wanted a naive, cute, and idealistic noble young lady—a pure Saintess with a great spirit of self-sacrifice, basically the ideal woman in a man's mind.
"Well, this should wash them all to Sei Plaza. That spot is perfect for a fight; it won't affect ordinary people or their private property." The girl sighed. "Healing is too delicate and mentally taxing; combat is much simpler."
Ye Zheng supported herself on the ground with both hands. She used her ability to manipulate the nearby rivers, covering this entire area. If someone could see through the ground, they would be shocked to discover a network of watery streams beneath the region, as if the crowded buildings were tall trees held up by gnarled, watery branches.
"If the core of this Demonic Domain is just a shadow of Percy or Bai Muqing, it wouldn't be able to overwhelm even them. The core must be something else, perhaps hidden in the shadows."
"System, thank you for the reminder." Ye Zheng's eyes curved, her smile sweet and gentle.
The System looked at her intently. The words the creator used to describe her... they didn't seem wrong?
She risked her life and expended her energy for a minor manga NPC in its eyes, and the people she saved wouldn't even know her true identity. She was indeed an idealistic person with a spirit of self-sacrifice.
To pursue such a grand and illusory ideal, calling her naive was accurate. As for cute... well, that couldn't be denied either, the System thought helplessly, after its long time with Ye Zheng.
Although Ye Zheng always wore that 'I've figured everything out' smile, which made it feel a little subtly scared, she was sometimes a bit cute when she was stumped by a term on the forum and came to it with a pure, confused look in her eyes to ask for help.
The tags the manga creator gave Ye Zheng were simple and one-dimensional, but under these tags, Ye Zheng herself had developed immense potential.
The System watched the roaring flood outside with a sense of dread. The creator gave her a hidden, high-level ability just to set up Percy's final battle, a tool for her to sacrifice herself for his strength and ideals.
But now, it seemed, even if it, the System, hadn't appeared, would Ye Zheng really have followed that path?
Ye Zheng closed her eyes, searching for the true core.
Ability users and Demonic Domain monsters have special energy fluctuations. The stronger they are, the more powerful their aura is. It wouldn't be difficult for the streams to follow these fluctuations and find the hidden core monster.
But why was there no unusually strong energy signature in this area?
The girl frowned. Not on the ground, so it must be underground? That was the only possibility.
Below the surface, countless small streams burrowed into the earth.
Suddenly, the girl's beautiful face tightened, and she abruptly opened her eyes, as if she had encountered a difficult problem.
Ye Zheng's lips moved as if she wanted to ask something, but she quickly fell silent and closed her eyes again. The veins on her hands, pressed against the ground, bulged, her fingers tightly gripping the dirt.
A few minutes later, the floor in front of Ye Zheng cracked, and a water column shot up, carrying a black object. The girl looked up and reached out to catch the object.
It was cylindrical, about the length of her palm, and hollow in the middle. The edges were jagged, as if it had been snapped off, like a piece of dark bamboo, but much thicker.
This was the object her streams had detected with the strongest energy fluctuations deep underground.
"...Apart from the color, it looks more like bone."
Ye Zheng's eyes widened slightly, her expression frozen. She had a bold guess.
"This black thing is a replica of a certain bone!"
If her theory was correct, this rule-based Demonic Domain could create replicas of ability users—the black shadows. But that statement now seemed inaccurate. The biggest difference between ability users and ordinary people was that ability users possessed powers—powers that were bestowed upon humanity since the Demonic Domain's arrival and were of the same origin as the Demonic Domain.
This meant that this Demonic Domain could replicate black shadows from any person or object that carried this power.
"The core of this Demonic Domain, the most powerful monster, is actually a piece of bone."
The moment a peculiar bone was mentioned, every person in the empire would think of that holy relic.
Life might be illogical and absurd, but a manga must adhere to a certain internal plot logic.
Ye Zheng let out a small laugh, her eyes coolly appraising the black bone in her hand, a complex expression on her face.
"Saying this might sound disrespectful, but this is the symbol of hope for the Holy Sei Empire—"
"A dragon bone."
Legend says the demonic dragon spread its wings, covering the sky and bringing endless shadows over the empire. After the God of Hope killed the dragon, its massive body was buried beneath the upper district, which has been free from Demonic Domain incursions ever since.
One of the dragon's bone wings was buried in the Middle District, and as a result, Demonic Domains no longer descend upon the area frequently.
The lower district only has one of the dragon's horns, which provides it with some protection.
And now, something that looked like a replica of a dragon bone was in Ye Zheng's hand.
Where there is a replica, there must be a genuine article within the Demonic Domain. But besides this replica, Ye Zheng couldn't detect any other movement.
The lower district was supposed to only have the dragon's horn, and its burial location was nowhere near here. So why was a dragon bone here?
And the fact that she couldn't detect the genuine dragon bone, only the replica, could only mean someone was deliberately concealing the genuine article. With her current strength, she couldn't break through the obstacle of this person, or a certain force, to touch the original.
The girl's breathing quickened slightly, her eyes growing brighter, like a predator who had unexpectedly hunted down its prey in the dead of night.
Ye Zheng carefully felt the power overflowing from this dragon bone replica. The energy she had just consumed seemed to be slowly recovering after she touched it.
"This black shadow dragon bone is the core of this Demonic Domain. If I'm not mistaken, it's supplying power to the other black shadows, which is why those guys were so hard to deal with."
Ye Zheng's grip on the dragon bone replica tightened slightly. Normally, solving the core would destroy the Demonic Domain, but this was a dragon bone, even if it was just a replica.
No outsider, apart from the royal family's rulers, had ever touched a dragon bone. It was an almost legendary existence.
And now, the secret of the legend was in her hands.
Ye Zheng took a deep breath, calming her turbulent mind. After a while, the girl's expression returned to her usual gentle and peaceful state.
She had been so engrossed in her thoughts that her other hand, which was responsible for healing the injured people in the ruins, had become unsteady, almost breaking the healing connection. That wouldn't do; several people were critically injured.
"Calm down," Ye Zheng told herself. There must be a way to take this replica while also solving this Demonic Domain.
Suddenly, she asked, "System, in this part of the plot, Percy didn't discover this dragon bone replica, right?"
Otherwise, the manga's rules would have intervened to stop her before she got it.
The System was silent for a while.
[You truly never cease to amaze me... This dragon bone replica doesn't appear directly in the plot, but the secret it represents will be gradually revealed. It's a major plot point of the manga.]
Ye Zheng smiled, the pure black pupils concealed by her green irises glimmering.
"You're not going to stop me? Such an important thing is in my hands now."
[This tiny replica itself isn't important, unless you can truly use it to dig up the whole truth.]
"You think I can't?"
[...It's precisely because you might be able to that I warned you before. This isn't just the core of this Demonic Domain, it's the core setting and suspense of the entire King of the Demonic Domain. How could you be allowed to obtain the truth so easily?]
[The ones guarding the dragon bone and writing the legends about it are those two forces. Are you sure you want to offend the roy—]
The System suddenly went silent. Ye Zheng's mind was now eerily quiet, and she was a little unaccustomed to it.
Ye Zheng recalled the time she had received a character OOC warning. The System must have received a warning of its own.
She hoped it would come back. She had grown used to her noisy and not-so-smart partner.
After a moment of silence, Ye Zheng's attention returned to the black bone in her hand. Since in the original plot, Percy and the others were able to clear the Demonic Domain without finding this replica...
This dragon bone replica itself had no offensive power; it only amplified others' strength. So, as long as all the black shadows were killed, the Demonic Domain would no longer be a threat.
Ye Zheng lowered her gaze, her thick eyelashes fluttering. She sat in the ruins like a statue of a fallen goddess who still held her grace.
After a Demonic Domain is destroyed, the monsters within will vanish, while inanimate objects like minerals will remain as human trophies.
She could wait for Percy and the others to clear the Demonic Domain according to the original plot, but with this dragon bone replica in hand, she was already impatient to study this new trophy.
What kind of grand drama did the manga creator want to stage with the high and mighty royal family and Sei Curia, the ability user competition filled with powerhouses, and the mysterious appearance of the dragon bone?
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