"Wow, kid, you look as somber as if you're just back from a funeral." Raven looked astonished as she examined Huai Shi's face. "Did you get rejected after confessing your love in just an afternoon?"

"If only it were just a matter of being rejected." Huai Shi, massaging his face, pushed open the door and headed down the stairs into the sealed basement. "When are we leaving?"

"It starts at midnight. You've still got two hours to take a bath, trim your nails, brush your teeth, and then get back and lie down on this bed," Raven said, perched on the table and stepping on a letter. "As for the ticket, it was delivered at six o'clock."

Inside the envelope was an elegantly styled Card. It bore the name Huai Shi, as if it were an invitation prepared by some banquet hall.

"Is this it?" Huai Shi looked over curiously.

"Ah, just as I expected, the most common off-the-shelf stuff. Those people at the Jurisdiction Bureau are really stingy," Raven huffed disdainfully. "Other than getting in and out of Witch's Night, it has no other functions. It might just ensure you don't kick the bucket... Hey, I bet they saved the important spots for their internal researchers, huh?"

"Is there something better than this?"

"Of course. Can a regular account and a premium account be the same?"

Raven hummed a few times, lifted her wing, and snatched the invitation out of Huai Shi's hand. "Anyway, there's still some time left. Let me see if there are any bugs or loopholes we can exploit... Who says free-to-play accounts can't hit the jackpot?"

"Hey, don't mess around." Huai Shi broke out in a cold sweat. "What if I get taken down by some antivirus program?"

"Relax, relax. When it comes to cheating, I'm a professional! Back when I caused trouble, not even the tech department could catch a whiff of my exhaust... Ah, those were the days."

Raven let out a cackling laugh that sent shivers down Huai Shi's spine, snatched up the invitation, and flew into her workshop. She even locked the door behind her to prevent Huai Shi from interfering.

I'm doomed. She's going to get me killed again... Huai Shi's face twitched; he realized he had grown accustomed to jumping into pitfalls. After pondering for a while, he shook his head, sighed, and went to take a shower.

I hope this Witch's Night won't be too much trouble. Yes, best-case scenario, I come out unscathed and victorious. Please, let there be no surprises. He prayed sincerely from the bottom of his heart...

. .

When it was nearly midnight, Huai Shi lay on the bed, clutching the invitation that was now barely recognizable. A thin layer of circuitry Chip, resembling a detached memory Card, was affixed to it. Holding it, he felt a subtle resonance with his own Source Substance. As if they were one.

"You didn't mess with it, did you?" Huai Shi still felt uneasy.

"Relax," Raven said proudly. "When hacking, one absolutely can't go overboard, at least not to the point where it's noticeable... Everyone can cheat, but cheating skillfully without giving others a chance to complain is another thing entirely."

"What did you do!" Huai Shi's anxiety was mounting.

"Ah, I opened a backdoor for you. Once you enter the Witch's Dream, due to some accidental reason, you'll get some extra privileges, and nobody will be able to tell. No matter how many times they check, they'll only find a small accident.

"However, I don't know the specific details of Witch's Night, so I didn't dare to give you functions like Unlimited Blood, Unlimited Mana, or Auto-lock One-shot Kill. I can only ensure you have a slight edge over others. Just think of it as having a few extra attribute points." Raven paused, smiling pleasantly. "And you can make an emergency call for outside help when necessary."

"Won't there be a problem?" Huai Shi was dumbfounded.

"Of course, there will," Raven glanced at him. "But when you're about to die, naturally, you use whatever tricks you can. Otherwise, isn't it dumb to die with hacks in hand and not use them?"

"...You make a good point." Huai Shi shifted to a more comfortable position and settled down, still worried. "But I still feel like you want to cheat me."

"You should look on the bright side," Raven said. "You might even meet that girl named Lily this time. Isn't that a nice surprise?"

"Really?" Huai Shi said, thrilled.

"Ahaha, of course not. What did you expect?" Raven snorted derisively, cruelly crushing any little hope that had formed in Huai Shi's heart. "What the Creator's Witch's Dream can offer is nothing but the last remnants of an inheritance. It's useless to a Creator of the same tier. Otherwise, the Astronomical Society would have divided it among themselves long ago. It would hardly fall to you foot soldiers."

"...Then why did you bring it up?" Huai Shi glared at her.

"Isn't it to help you relax a bit?" Raven lifted her wing and gestured at the item in Huai Shi's hand. "It's time for you to head out."

"What?" Huai Shi looked down in a panic at what he was holding.

Before he could make sense of it, his vision went black, and he slipped into a sudden stupor.

It was as if... he had suddenly plummeted into the Abyss, falling endlessly without any support. After abandoning his shell, only his consciousness and Soul continued to drop into a sea of slowly rising bubbles. They plunged into those fleeting bubbles.

Murmurs of countless voices emerged around him, flooding into his Soul. Even Sublimators couldn't bear the immense flood of information that overwhelmed all consciousness.

He fell into a lengthy slumber.

. .

Three minutes earlier, the Teenage Girl emerged from the bathroom, soaking wet, holding a towel in one hand, and fumbling in a hurry. "Hairdryer, where's the hairdryer... Where did I put it?"

Although the hotel provided a hair dryer, it always seemed to be of poor quality, as if using it would cause hair loss. It would be better to use my own.

However, she seemed to have packed it away somewhere and couldn't find it no matter how hard she searched. In the end, she had no choice but to open her luggage and search through it item by item.

Then, she saw an invitation that had been carelessly stuffed inside.

Fu Yi picked up the invitation, shaking it in confusion. "What is this? Are they starting to prepare wedding invitations now?"

The phone rang urgently. She had just noticed there were several missed calls on her mobile phone, all from her mother, who was now calling the hotel room's landline.

"Hello? Mom, I'm at the hotel." She cradled the phone between her shoulder and ear, glancing around the room. "Do you know where I put my hair dryer? The invitation? Are you talking about the one you stuffed in my bag? Oh, right, I just took it out… Do you need it?"

At that moment, she heard a stern command from the phone: "That's not yours! Put it down immediately! Right now!"

It was the first time she had heard such a serious, no, such a panicked tone from her mother. Fu Yi subconsciously lowered her head to look at the invitation in her hand.

In the final moment, the thought that flashed through her mind was—Wow, this thing actually glows? How impressive…

. .

Huai Shi woke up from a harrowing nightmare, suddenly jumping up from the ground, frantically looking around.

He had a long dream. In the dream, he struggled through a barren desert, enduring thirst and pain, the scorching Sun, fighting for survival, leaving one oasis after another just to avoid the impending doom that followed him like a shadow.

An overwhelming fear surged in his heart, as if he had narrowly escaped death. Yet all his companions were dead; only he had managed to escape to this land, as yet untouched by disaster, welcoming a new life.

Like recovering from a severe illness, he struggled to support his body. Surveying his surroundings, he saw a small cave, barely enough for him to fit in, his limbs hardly able to stretch out—in fact, it was more like a crack in the rocks.

Isn't this a bit too miserable?

However, he immediately realized something that horrified him: his Stigma seemed to be completely absent. Only a faint trace of his Soul Ability remained, preserved through the back door Raven had opened.

Feeling the weakness in his limbs and the hunger in his belly, he was acutely aware that he was on the brink of death. If he didn't find food to replenish his energy, he might die within minutes!

Hunger, weakness, and fear. The plethora of sensations from this new body, the one he now inhabited, continuously surfaced in his consciousness, urging him to quickly embark on a new journey, to seek a glimmer of hope in the catastrophe.

Otherwise, only death awaits…

Huai Shi focused on recalling details about the disaster, but he couldn't remember how it started; he could only recall the sky scorched by flames, the fissured land, and the mountains sinking into the depths of the sea… Flying birds wept, walking beasts roared, and amidst the overwhelming smoke, there was only death, death, and more death.

He had to flee, had to head towards a place where the disaster had not yet struck. Only then was there the slightest chance of survival. Only then could he continue to live…

A fear deep in his soul summoned the last bit of strength from his feeble body. He let out a hoarse scream and crawled up from the ground.

He crawled out of the cave.

And then he saw a vast expanse of white snow before him; the bone-chilling wind whipped snowflakes into a howl, bringing a cold that penetrated his bones. Behind him stood towering snow-capped mountains, like a massive wall stretching to the horizon, enclosing the land within. When he looked towards the distance, he could see rivers and green mountains, a haven amidst chaos.

He tumbled and staggered downhill, soaked by the melting snow, shivering uncontrollably, sprinting with his last strength towards this new sanctuary. It was in a crevice that he found a mouse that hadn't managed to escape.

Huai Shi was starving. He forwent the idea of making fire and pounced directly on it, bit off the mouse's head, and then, grinding his teeth and sucking its blood, ravenously devoured it.

Only when warm blood and flesh filled his empty insides did he feel fully alive once more. New vitality emerged from within him, giving him the Power to keep moving forward.

So, he continued his trek towards the foot of the nearby mountain. From staggering to steady, he eventually ran swiftly.

Facing the oncoming cold wind, he ran with large strides, as if he had endless energy. He felt the ancestral Power boiling in his blood, urging him to howl at the sky. He forgot the cold, ran with abandon, and suddenly leaped into a stream filled with broken ice, bathing joyously. Then he shook his body, shaking off the excess water from his fur and tail.

Wait… Fur? Tail?

Huai Shi finally sensed something was very wrong. He looked down, studying the now calm surface of the water, and his Reflection within it.

Yes, those solemn, furrowed brows, those mischievous and deep ice-blue eyes, that unruly gaze hinting at dominance, and that classic, simple black and white color scheme…

"WOOF?"

In the Reflection on the water's surface, a recently frolicking Husky stood frozen in place.

What do I do now that I've turned into a dog? Online, waiting, urgent!

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