As the light talisman, resembling a candle flame, brightened, Bai Ru and Gu Yi both stiffened; the Yin energy in the sewer where they stood seemed to grow heavier.

They adjusted their breathing rhythms. Gu Yi glanced at Bai Ru and said, "I have the Clear Sight, capable of handling illusions designed to deceive. You need to be careful and watch out for snares."

Bai Ru nodded, "I have two Celestial Master Talismans; they should be able to break illusions."

Gu Yi said no more, pointing the flashlight forward. "Let's go."

The two stepped forward. Since the area just ahead had been cleared of animal remains, their progress was smooth, but that stretch soon ended. Before them lay the path almost entirely covered in animal bones—countless, of every kind imaginable.

Bai Ru instinctively stopped. Gu Yi startled and quickly asked, "What is it? Any bad feeling?"

Bai Ru shook her head, "No, but honestly, I feel a bit uneasy."

Gu Yi let out a breath. "Did you notice? This barrier doesn't show anything strange immediately upon entry. Could my phone theory actually be right?"

Bai Ru gave him an annoyed look. "At a time like this, stop analyzing and watch your step."

She meant for Gu Yi to watch where he walked, to avoid stepping on the bones, but he paid no attention. He strode forward, not looking down, stepping on skeletal remains almost every few paces. Beneath his feet, there was the occasional crunch of brittle bone breaking, or the squelch of stepping on a carcass recently dead and starting to decompose.

The sounds made Bai Ru involuntarily frown, but she said nothing. Perhaps due to an innate feminine disposition, she could face terrifying ghosts, yet she couldn't bring herself to step on these animal remains. Thus, with every step, she habitually illuminated the path ahead with her light, trying to avoid the dead creatures.

Involuntarily, Bai Ru's pace slowed considerably compared to Gu Yi's. Soon, she sensed something was wrong. After a moment of thought, she realized Gu Yi’s footsteps were getting farther and farther away.

Bai Ru raised her flashlight forward and was shocked to see the space ahead empty. Gu Yi, who should have been in front of her, had vanished. She immediately sensed trouble. She looked up; in the air not far above her, the light from the talisman had brightened to a level comparable to fireflies.

She instantly knew something was wrong. Gu Yi would never abandon her and walk off alone. Could she have fallen into a hallucination? With this thought, she tucked the flashlight under her arm and placed a hand on her chest. Before descending, she had already affixed one Celestial Master Talisman there, just in case.

"...Report to Hua Jue, think of the Nine Provinces below... Slash when encountering evil, capture when meeting a tiger, behead fierce ghosts, leave no living ghosts behind... Divine soldiers, rush as the law commands." Bai Ru chanted the incantation to activate the Celestial Master Talisman.

Immediately, a burst of yellow light erupted from her chest. Bai Ru felt her entire body enveloped by a gentle, warm current and involuntarily trembled.

Logically, the Celestial Master Talisman was specifically designed to break the harm caused by evil arts and techniques, but Bai Ru instantly realized it had no effect on her current predicament. The warm current quickly vanished, and simultaneously, she noticed the guiding talisman above her had also extinguished. Gu Yi, who should have been in front of her, remained nowhere in sight. Most significantly, she felt the ambient temperature drop suddenly; the entire sewer became piercingly cold.

Bai Ru was astonished. Had the magic failed, or was this barrier of dark sorcery simply unbreakable? But the situation escalated further. Before she could process her thoughts, she heard a faint hissing sound from behind her. She spun around, shining her light backward, and saw that on the section of the path they had just traversed, countless animal bones were slowly rising to their feet.

At that precise moment, she heard a chilling, cold laugh, as if right beside her ear. She whipped her head to the side; nothing was there. She immediately looked down again and saw, not far from her feet, a black cat—missing one eye, its body rotting in patches—standing there, tilting its head, grinning with a disturbing smile. The laughter had come from this very cat.

Bai Ru frowned. As the cat saw her turn, its body suddenly arched, and it leaped violently, soaring instantly to the height of Bai Ru's head. Then, it swiped a front paw toward her face.

Bai Ru dodged backward, flipping her wrist, and brought the Demon-Subduing Rod down directly onto the cat’s head. The creature shrieked and fell heavily, rolling twice before tumbling into the drainage ditch, nearly a meter wide, in the center of the path.

Not daring to delay, Bai Ru shoved the flashlight into her coat pocket, freeing her hand to pull out two Fire Talismans and fling them toward the animal remains stirring ahead. To her surprise, the Fire Talismans failed to ignite as she expected; they merely drifted into the pile of bones without even sparking.

This failure brought a sliver of terror to Bai Ru. Before she could contemplate why the talismans had failed again, she heard the rush of wind behind her ear. She quickly leaned forward, whipping the Demon-Subduing Rod in a "Sweeping a Thousand Armies" motion, knocking down a dog and a rabbit that were lunging at her almost simultaneously.

But she soon spotted several stragglers preparing to attack from below—a few extremely fast-moving rats. Bai Ru was generally fearless, but she had a weakness: rats. Especially when alone, and even more so now, facing several rats whose guts were spilling out.

Under the dual assault of sight and psychology, Bai Ru managed to suppress a scream. Instinctively, she jumped over the drainage ditch, scrambling to the wall on the opposite side. However, animal bones were closing in on her from that side as well. Left with no choice, Bai Ru fought her way through, using a combination of strikes with her rod and kicks, barely carving out a path. Yet, more and more rats joined the skeletal army surrounding her.

Bai Ru suddenly felt trapped, with no way forward or back. Her gaze swept across to the opposite side, where she spotted the distant corner turn, and she let out a silent sigh of relief. She quickly leaped back across. Just then, a splash sounded. The black cat she had knocked into the foul water earlier sprang out, accompanied by a gust of air thick with the stench of decay, and lunged at Bai Ru.

She hadn't expected the cat to attack again, even with its head smashed in. Bai Ru spun around, using the rod with a skillful flick to deflect the cat's body. It missed, landing on the ground, and Bai Ru seized the opportunity to dash toward the corner turn.

Just as Bai Ru reached the turn, about to round the corner, an immense force instantly clamped down on her entire body, rendering her immobile. The force was so sudden that Bai Ru was momentarily stunned, her mind going utterly blank.