CHAPTER 60: CHAPTER 60: ETERNAL NIGHT

"To be honest, I am more concerned about the ’Eternal Night’ that Song Yarong mentioned, which covers the entire Shuzhou Region," Sun Hang said.

This was Sun Hang’s first encounter with a mysterious creature ranked among the top three in sequence numbers, and it was a phenomenon-based creature second only in difficulty to the ’Type A·Rule-based’ mysterious entities.

Although a sequence number cannot completely represent the strength of a mysterious creature, any creature ranking in the top ten, regardless of classification, is no easy opponent.

Every time a single-digit sequence mysterious creature appears in the human realm, it signifies the onset of a disaster.

"The last time ’Eternal Night’ appeared was in the year 4533 of the Yellow Calendar, covering the entire Hexi Corridor Region, and more than half of the Liangzhou Territory," Ye Xuan said with a serious expression.

"4533? But Song Yarong told me that Eternal Night has been gone for one hundred thirty years..." Sun Hang furrowed his brow, realizing the issue at hand, "Don’t tell me the ’Eternal Night’ that appeared in 4533 lasted for over fifty years?"

"Precisely, fifty-five years, nine months, and twenty days," Ye Xuan said, "From September 12, 4533, to July 2, 4589, according to records, the Hexi Corridor Region saw no daylight year-round, vegetation withered, plagues were rampant, venomous insects and beasts ran rampant. The four cities of Hexi — Xiliang, Suzhou, Ganzhou, Shadu — were left almost empty, with refugees numbering in the millions."

"This time, ’Eternal Night’ won’t last for decades, will it?" Sun Hang glanced at the night sky outside the cabin and whispered.

"No idea." Ye Xuan shook her head. "Recorded durations of Eternal Night have ranged from over three hundred years to as short as four months with no discernible pattern. Besides, there’s one thing you hunters must pay attention to."

"What?"

"During ’Eternal Night,’ whenever there is a full moon, the ’Type B6·Blood Moon’ will inevitably appear," Ye Xuan said solemnly, "Therefore, according to the Disaster Response Committee’s arrangement, regardless of combat conditions, all mysterious creature hunters must evacuate from the area covered by Eternal Night the day before a full moon."

"It seems this time’s commander is more sensible than those incompetent fools in Celestial City," Sun Hang remarked.

"Continuously deploying troops and hunters to resist mysterious creatures is not a long-term solution." Ye Xuan’s tone was somewhat heavy, "If Eternal Night lasts beyond three months, the federation will likely begin an immigration plan, relocating the inhabitants of the Shuzhou Region to other places... If it lasts over a year, the plan to abandon the Shuzhou Region will be officially proposed."

"So, if we can’t handle this situation, the area within human activity will shrink again, right?" Sun Hang said.

"It’s not about whether we can handle it... it’s about how long ’Eternal Night’ will last," Ye Xuan corrected, "Concerning ’Eternal Night,’ the only measure we can take is to wait for it to fade on its own."

"What if Eternal Night appears in the federation’s capital Chunming City, would you abandon Chunming City too?"

"Yes." Ye Xuan nodded.

"Tsk... if Eternal Night’s coverage includes the entire Xiazhou Continent, would that mean we could all stop existing?"

"Theoretically, yes." Ye Xuan said calmly, "Human defenses are actually incredibly brittle."

Just as Sun Hang was about to ask something else, a sharp, piercing cry suddenly emanated from the city district below.

"Not a sound humans can make." Wang Xiyi quickly responded, "Hover on the spot!"

"OK!" The pilot immediately replied, controlling the helicopter to hover in mid-air.

Following the sound, the group saw a bloated humanoid creature sitting on the rooftop of an office building, producing the eerie crying sound.

"Do we have binoculars?" Sun Hang asked.

A member of the special action team quickly pulled a small, exquisite monocular from the bag and handed it to Sun Hang.

With the aid of the binoculars, Sun Hang saw clearly that it was a "suspected human female" creature with a distended abdomen. In contrast to its bloated torso, its limbs were so thin that it reminded Sun Hang of the skinny girl he encountered at the breakfast stall earlier.

Its messy, filthy long hair covered its face, yet its pale skin bore patches of purple and red livor mortis markings, and one of its legs was encased in a rusted shackle with a similarly rusted chain trailing behind.

No doubt, this was a mysterious creature.

"How did such a creature show up here?" The team member who handed Sun Hang the binoculars whispered, "Could it be that the defense line at the southern bridge has been breached?"

"Probably just one that slipped through." Ye Xuan shook her head, "If the southern bridge had been breached, the Celestial City district would already be littered with corpses."

"This mysterious creature... I found a perfectly matching file in the database." Yang Lian, who hadn’t said much the whole journey, suddenly spoke up.

"Oh? Is it a previously discovered creature?"

"’Type C634·Pregnant Girl’. Discovered sixty-five years ago, eliminated sixty-five years ago," Yang Lian said.

"Pregnant Girl?" Sun Hang repeated the name, "Do you mean there’s a baby inside that swollen belly?"

"Indeed, this creature ties into a murder case from sixty-five years ago... The involved parties were lovers deeply enamored with each other. After six months of dating, the woman discovered she was unexpectedly pregnant... In that era, unmarried pregnancy was a significant scandal, causing the woman to be heavily criticized by society, while severely impacting the man’s future prospects. Driven by various factors, the man took extreme measures to confine his girlfriend and stage her vanishing as an accident."

Yang Lian paused and continued, "Months later, the woman had a difficult labor, and the man buried both her and the unborn child together."

"...An eye for an eye, judged as purely born evil," Sun Hang commented.

"But what the man didn’t anticipate was, the woman didn’t die immediately despite massive hemorrhage due to labor complications, she merely passed out... Later, sheriffs discovered signs of struggle in the woman’s burial site and found soil fragments in her respiratory tract, indicating she regained consciousness after being buried alive—her death wasn’t due to labor complications, but the burial that killed her."

"Alright, with that explanation, the guy sounds even more despicable," Sun Hang said. "But I’m curious, how did the girl become a mysterious creature? Was it due to resentment?"

"This aspect remains unclear." Yang Lian continued, "In any case, after transforming into a mysterious creature, she dug herself out of her grave, sneaked into her lover’s residence, and murdered his entire family of six."

"Good riddance."

"After killing the man’s family, the creature hunted down its relatives based on kinship proximity, killing them brutally one by one... When mysterious creature hunters found it, it had already committed four family massacres, with a total of twenty-one victims."

"Tsk, having such a contemptible relative... really is unlucky," Sun Hang sighed. "How was this creature eliminated?"

Though the experience of the "Pregnant Girl" in life was tragic and infuriating... Nonetheless, once she became a mysterious creature, her elimination became necessary.

Otherwise, following her logic of vengeance, a vast number of innocents could suffer unimaginable calamity. After all, no one could guarantee the absence of even the slightest blood relation with that scoundrel from the past.