Chapter 896: Chapter 564: The Concert and... Gathering Storms
Fusang Country, Beiyang Road, Ruyue City.
The sky was shrouded in heavy fog, and a light rain tentatively began to fall.
The towering skyscrapers rose into the clouds, with waterfall-like neon spreading from various parts of the city, merging into the leaden sky.
Such weather, paired with this garish neon, was more than fitting.
The tops of many buildings were intentionally styled to resemble ancient Fusang, with lanterns bearing their respective trademarks hanging from roof eaves and corners. Gorgeous advertisements spread out from billboards, flickering across the city.
The constant flow of traffic was like blood through veins, the wet road surfaces weaving light and shadow into clusters, bizarre and unpredictable, but not giving people time to see clearly before being crushed by vehicles. The cars in the sky moved like a long dragon between the buildings, headlights mixing with the 24-hour holographic projections to form a chaotic and confusing halo, yet creating a sense of bewildering atmosphere.
On the ground streets, pedestrians in various attire mingled with the vehicles, and under umbrellas and raincoats, it was not only human heads that appeared; about half bore animal ears, horns, and scales, or even fish-like gills.
Here, everyone seemed accustomed to it.
For the residents of this coastal city... whenever they went out, rain gear had to be carried at all times.
After all, except for the pure-blooded human Spirit Masters who were less affected, neither ordinary humans nor Beastmen wanted to get soaked in the acid rain filled with polluted Ether for no reason.
Otherwise, allergies, fevers, and rashes would be the least of their worries; accumulating too much pollution and having an outbreak... that would definitely mean a trip to the hospital.
For many financially struggling, loan-repaying lower-class Beastmen, going to the hospital not only meant spending large sums of money but also losing their ability to work.
That was something they absolutely could not afford.
The rain mixed with filthy air kept falling, finally pausing briefly after a whole morning.
A figure finally emerged slowly from the depths of a maze-like dark alley in the city.
He was a tall man.
He wore a worn gray cloak, with a hood large enough to cover most of his face. Under the shadow, only his slightly disheveled pale golden hair, a chiseled jawline, and two irregular pitch-black horns growing from the sides of his forehead could be seen.
One of them was longer, elegantly curved, while the other was noticeably shorter as if it had been forcibly broken off in a fierce battle.
The man looked up at the giant holographic screen flashing on the exterior wall of a nearby building.
On the screen.
A gaudily dressed, street-styled female host, with a pair of gray-white mouse ears and a sharp nose and chin, was reporting the morning news in an exaggerated tone.
[——Good morning, Ruyue City! Your old friend Ayuan is meeting you again!]
[Let’s take a look at yesterday’s Dead Lotto! The final result is——a full 215! That’s 20 more than the day before, looks like everyone’s bonus this month is gone!]
[The gang wars between the dog-eared "Night Howls" in the West District and the cat-clawed "Shadow Cats" in the South District continue! Thanks to them, they added 25 more unlucky souls just last night! Nakatomi Plaza’s cleaners are probably working overtime to scrub off the blood stains!]
[The situation outside the city is as bad as ever! The beast tide alert in the East has gone up another level, and it’s rumored that a few reckless "wandering Magical Beasts" have reached the outskirts of the mining area, miners who have offended colleagues should watch out not to become material sold on the black market!]
[The Price Department has a friendly reminder, the price of inhibitors this month might go up just a bit!]
[But of course, there is also good news! With more deaths, a new batch of goods has arrived at the black market in the South of the city! Surely quite a few desperate fools will eye it, risking their lives in the Wilderness, hunting Magical Beasts, or venturing into the mines, dreaming of striking it rich? Good luck to them, may they not become the next batch of goods!]
The man listened to this chaos and blood-filled, almost black comedy-like news, pulled his hood down, and turned away.
——It was obviously not an official news channel, without any bureaucratic rhetoric or seemingly objective statements.
But in this city near the outer edge of the Fusang dominion, almost able to be called autonomous... such private radio channels, as long as they grab enough attention, pay enough Fusang coins, and have a suitable Credit Level recorded in the "Fusang Dew," can thrive regardless of how low the threshold is, even owning buildings of their own.
Of course, not everything can be said.
After all, the black giant tower in the very center of the city, with its black iron sixteen-petal chrysanthemum, still slowly rotated, like it was watching everything below.
The man blended into the city’s shadows.
He passed through alley after alley, those places between shadow and light, not receiving sunlight yet full of neon signs like luminous pollution.
He passed a bar glowing with ambiguous pink light, a cheap billboard carved with a voluptuous and seductive vixen.
A few fox-eared women stood at the door, heavily made-up, scantily clad, large swathes of white skin and cleavage exposed.
"Sir, come play~"
Seeing him approach, the fox women posed coquettishly, tails swaying, looking delicate and pitiable. However, the next moment, they were pushed aside by an invisible force, instantly showing a look of reverence, no longer daring to make a move.
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