The news of the gate opening quickly spread throughout the valley. Children were drawn in, curiously entering and exiting the new Teleportation Gate. But soon, the younger children were dragged back to the "town" by their "parents"—after all, the orphanage was still in ruins, filled with construction machinery. For those children who hadn't yet mastered their abilities, or hadn't even awakened them, playing here was undoubtedly dangerous.

Snow White and the others led a group of older children to explore the ruins, searching within the area that didn't interfere with the cleanup crew.

Despite the entire orphanage being leveled and the two main buildings being massively distorted during the process of becoming an "umbilical cord," occasionally, some intact items could still be found in the ruins. These items might not be useful but held nostalgic value for the members of "Fairy Tales."

Dorothy made a discovery from afar: "Long-haired Princess! I found some novels, see if they are yours! There are also a couple of broken figurines beside them..."

The Long-haired Princess screamed and ran over.

Snow White, meanwhile, directed the Thunderbolt Titans to move the piles of cement rubble that had melted together. They uncovered part of the activity classroom underneath the debris—they found a graffiti board and a wooden box filled with indoor toys.

Yu Sheng and Little Red Riding Hood stood a short distance away, silently observing the scene. After a moment, Yu Sheng softly spoke, "Aren't you going to look around? Maybe some of your stuff is still here."

"The important things were already taken out," Little Red Riding Hood shook her head. However, after a brief silence, she turned to Li Lin, who was standing nearby, "Can I trouble you to keep an eye out? If you find any relatively intact items while clearing the ruins, could you collect them for us…"

"Of course," Li Lin immediately nodded but then added, "We can only do our best, though. We're working with machines directly, and most of the cleanup crew can't be as meticulous as you guys."

"Doing your best is enough."

"That won't be a problem."

Yu Sheng listened quietly but didn't intervene. At this moment, a phone ring suddenly came from his pocket, interrupting the conversation between Little Red Riding Hood and Li Lin.

Yu Sheng took out his phone and saw it was an unknown number.

After a slight hesitation, he answered the call and put it to his ear.

A somewhat familiar voice, tinged with nervousness and fear, came through the earpiece. It was a young man: "Hello? Hello! Can you hear me? Brother Yu? I'm %￥%%@..."

The earpiece emitted intermittent static. Yu Sheng was momentarily stunned and then finally recognized the familiar voice: "...Nephew?!"

Next to him, Little Red Riding Hood immediately looked puzzled: "Who's calling?"

"Old Zheng's nephew," Yu Sheng quickly replied, already sensing something was wrong from the static over the phone. He immediately asked, "This is Yu Sheng, what's happening on your end? Are you in danger?"

There was another brief burst of static from the earpiece, but two or three seconds later, a coherent voice came through: "I'm at the mall, things here seem off, a lot of stuff has moved all of a sudden, and people look different. There are many mirrors... This is my first time experiencing this, and I don't know any other experts... Can you come %￥@%#￥..."

Yu Sheng switched to speakerphone halfway through. Before he could speak amidst the renewed static, Little Red Riding Hood shouted into the speaker: "Stop wasting time! Just tell us which mall you're in!"

The static persisted, mixed with the increasingly panicked voice of the young man: "Heyang District... @#￥Wanxiang Mall... I went through a strange door, inside it doesn't look like... &**&￥"

The static completely drowned out the young man's voice, turning his words into a muffled mumble. Shortly after, the phone signal was lost.

Yu Sheng looked at Little Red Riding Hood, who looked back equally puzzled. Before he could speak, Li Lin quickly picked up his phone, skillfully dialed a number, and placed the phone to his ear: "Second squad, Li Lin here. Abnormal situation III, suspected person trapped at Wanxiang Mall in Heyang District... Yes, there was a signal a minute ago, but now communication is lost. Suspected to be sinking into the Exotic Realm... Alright, the patrol team is dispatched? Good."

Yu Sheng observed Li Lin's reflexive response with some surprise. Noticing Yu Sheng's gaze, Li Lin felt a bit awkward: "Uh, what is it?"

"You're quite reliable," Yu Sheng said casually, "Do you handle this kind of thing often?"

"Not often, but we learned this during training—after all, this is what the Special Service Bureau does," Li Lin said quickly, but his expression was a bit unnatural, "Honestly, I'm a little nervous. This is my first time reporting an anomaly situation III alone..."

"I'm going to check the situation," Little Red Riding Hood interrupted the conversation between Li Lin and Yu Sheng, as shadows of wolves began to loom around her, "Yu Sheng, are you coming?"

"Let's go together," Yu Sheng didn't hesitate, "They called me after all."

"I have a mission, I have to stay here," Li Lin shook his head helplessly, "But my colleagues are over there, you can ask them for help if needed."

Yu Sheng nodded, then called over Hu Li and Erin, and followed the pack of wolves into the shadows with Little Red Riding Hood.

The pack of wolves made of shadows quickly crossed dimensions between light and shadow, leaping through the shadowed and abstract city "panels", crossing several blocks in the blink of an eye.

Hu Li, mimicking Yu Sheng, also sat on the back of a shadow wolf, her eyes wide with curiosity as she looked around at the monochrome projections of the vaguely familiar city buildings. Erin clung tightly to Yu Sheng's shoulder, nervously muttering while observing her surroundings, "What's going on, what happened... Is the 'little nephew' alright?"

"High Sensitivity Low Stability is like this," Little Red Riding Hood's voice came from beside them, sounding a bit annoyed, "I should have applied for Special Service Bureau protection for him, but his 'High Sensitivity Low Stability' is outrageously extreme… He nearly didn't have any formal contact with any supernatural elements during Old Zheng's case, the only connection was being near the scene... How could he still be 'entangled' by the 'other side'..."

"Who could have known," Yu Sheng's tone was also complicated, as this was the first time he saw directly how an ordinary person could really get entangled by supernatural events again after contacting information from the 'other side world', "After dealing with Old Zheng's issue, we told him to go home quickly, thought it was over..."

He paused for a moment, raising his head to look at Little Red Riding Hood, "Do you know that mall he mentioned? Is there an Exotic Realm there?"

"Wanxiang? I know it, I've been there twice. It's definitely not an Exotic Realm—but many Exotic Realm entrances move randomly, sometimes appearing directly in front of the victim when conditions are right, it's not surprising where you encounter one," Little Red Riding Hood looked serious, "You even encountered a sudden ice rain, remember?"

Yu Sheng paused, recalling the frog in the rain, his expression subtle, "Gosh, I almost forgot if you hadn't reminded me, it feels like ages ago."

Then he shook his head, temporarily pushing aside some of the broad-minded memories, "You're the expert, can you deduce anything from that phone call earlier? Do you think the 'little nephew' is in trouble?"

"When the call first connected, the sound was clear, meaning he had not completely 'submerged' at that time, probably was transitioning from L-0 to L-1. If he were an experienced Spirit Realm detective or investigator, he could have possibly escaped at this stage, as the depth between zero and one almost directly connects with the real world, with visible safe rifts."

Little Red Riding Hood said, shaking her head.

"Then noise appeared, with signal interference, suggesting he crossed L-1 depth. At this point, it would depend on luck for an ordinary person to escape, but the surrounding environment should not be fatal. The first-level depth often just 'looks strange', almost without deadly mechanisms, and there are safe passages to return to reality... But again, it depends on luck.

"What's troubling is, the signal cut off quickly, the whole process lasted only about a minute? Then the noise completely covered his voice, accompanied by murmurs... This suggests he was 'sinking' rapidly, possibly directly past L-1, I hope he ends up in an Exotic Realm of L-2 level... at least until the rescue team finds him..."

Yu Sheng listened attentively, even though he had gone through a Dark Angel level event once, this basic knowledge of the field was still quite new to him, much of it wasn't in the database, only experienced Spirit Realm detectives like Little Red Riding Hood would know.

At this moment, Hu Li turned back, chiming in, "He also mentioned that people and things were changing, and there were many mirrors..."

"That doesn't tell us much, transformations of surroundings are the most common phenomena during entry to an Exotic Realm, many times it's not the surroundings changing, but the victim's 'view' that's altering. As for many mirrors... there are tons of Exotic Realms associated with mirrors," Little Red Riding Hood waved her hand, "I can name at least a dozen—specifics need to be determined on site, the Special Service Bureau personnel should be there by now, they have more detection equipment, and there are high-power scanning stations throughout the city, maybe they've already captured the 'little nephew's' sinking signal."

Erin looked up at Little Red Riding Hood and Yu Sheng, finally couldn't resist, "...You both keep calling him 'little nephew', shouldn't he have a name? What's his name?"

Little Red Riding Hood and Yu Sheng exchanged glances.

"...No idea!" They said in unison.

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