Chapter Thirty-Seven: First Display of Skill

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Night had fallen, tranquil yet steeped in an uncanny, sinister air.

Outside the steakhouse, the incessant, unsettling rustle of crawling insects filled the air. Yet, something extraordinary was unfolding. By rights, the swarm should have already flooded most of the street, but instead, it moved straight down the center of the food street with no apparent urge to attack, as if following an invisible path.

Ji Yu drew aside a corner of the curtain and noticed that the forms of the insects seemed both real and illusory. It was as if the creatures were projections, mere images conjured into being. Their movement made noise, and their cries were audible, yet they appeared to exist on a different plane, intersecting with Ji Yu’s world only at certain points—both tangible and ephemeral.

Some of the insects passed through trash bins as if they were ghosts, phasing right through, while others collided with the bins and screeched in anger. The strange spectacle left Ji Yu deeply puzzled.

He even heard the cries of children from some of the shops along the street, but the insects seemed oblivious, crawling steadily onward.

“Something’s not right,” Ji Yu muttered, frowning.

These insects were clearly not to be trifled with; their jagged mandibles alone marked them as ferocious predators. Yet the peculiarity was that, while many appeared ghostly, a considerable number could interact with objects in Ji Yu’s world. Even so, when the cries of children rang out, the corporeal insects showed no interest in attacking, continuing forward as relentlessly as before.

“Are they fleeing from something else?”

No sooner had the thought occurred to him than it was answered: a piercing, dreadful howl echoed through the food street, heard by everyone present. At that very moment, five enormous shadows appeared in the sky, swooping down toward the swarm.

As the shadows descended, chaos erupted among the insects. Yet, after a brief disturbance, most of the swarm reared up, their bead-like eyes glinting with ferocity.

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Mouths agape, bristling with serrated teeth, they poised, and as the five monstrous shadows approached, the insects sprang upward, volleying into the air like bullets. Lacking the speed of actual projectiles, the sheer density of their assault was nonetheless terrifying.

But for the five creatures, each with wings spanning some five meters, these efforts were in vain. As the insects launched themselves, the monstrous birds spun their bodies with sudden violence, wings whirling like the blades of high-speed turbines.

Insects that drew close were instantly struck and flung aside by the massive rotating wings. In an instant, a purple “rain” began to fall from the sky.

Yet within this rain, some insects remained whole—flung through the air, scattering across the food street. The more ethereal, phantom-like insects caused little harm as they fell, passing harmlessly through rooftops and shop fronts, and vanished altogether once they drifted beyond the reach of the violet moonlight, as if they simply evaporated.

But among them, over a dozen solid, tangible insects crashed through the glass facades of various shops as they fell.

Suddenly, the food street, which had been silent for so long, erupted with cries of terror and panic.

And as fate would have it, one of the insects crashed into the glass wall of the steakhouse where Ji Yu was hiding.

“Crash! Bang!”

The glass wall, two meters from Ji Yu, shattered as the insect struck, toppling several chairs with its immense momentum.

Sliding across the tiled floor, the creature came to rest at the feet of a middle-aged woman. She stared in shock, paralyzed by fear, at the grotesque insect writhing and half-alive at her feet.

Her daze lasted only a moment—broken as the insect feebly opened its jagged maw and let out a chilling, low-pitched hiss.

“Ah!”

The woman shrieked, stumbling backward in terror.

At that same instant, Ji Yu lunged forward, wasting no time. He raised his foot and brought it down hard on the insect.

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A sickening, wet splatter echoed in the room as the insect, as thick as a grown man’s arm, burst apart in a spray of glistening purple blood and flesh.

Ji Yu’s hands, clothes, and face were instantly smeared with the strange purple fluid.

For a moment, everyone in the steakhouse was frozen in shock, their panic-stricken cries cut short by the sudden turn of events.

Ji Yu paid them no mind. After crushing the monstrous slug, he strode swiftly toward the shattered glass wall and hastily drew the curtains together, sealing off the breach the insect had made.

At the same time, under the stunned gazes of the others, Ji Yu pushed tables and chairs against the broken window, barricading it as best he could.

Only after all this did Ji Yu finally allow himself a slow, deep breath, calming his nerves.

To be honest, when he had rushed forward to stomp the grotesque creature, he had barely thought at all—his sole concern was to avoid exposing himself and the others to the monstrous birds circling outside.

Dealing with the slug that had crashed inside was the only thing he could do in that moment.

When he turned back, Ji Yu realized the entire restaurant was staring at him, wide-eyed with a mixture of curiosity and astonishment.

They were not simply surprised by his decisive act, but by the swiftness and sheer boldness of his response.

After all, that slug was clearly no Earth-born creature—its appearance alone was enough to make anyone’s skin crawl. Who would dare charge at it so fearlessly?

And the force of his stomp—crushing the slug and even cracking the floor tiles—left no doubt of his strength.

Ji Yu only frowned slightly at the attention. He said nothing, quietly returning to Ma Hongyu and the others. Under the watchful eyes of Ma Hongyu, Zhou Xin, and Wang Qiaoqian, he again pulled back a corner of the curtain and warily gazed out at the scene beyond the food street.