To be honest, taking that first bite was quite difficult for Yu Sheng—not because he wasn't hungry, he hadn't eaten anything for a long time and was already famished. Nor was he afraid to challenge the "food" in front of him. After all, he had eaten Hu Li's cooking once before and knew that while her creations looked peculiar, they actually tasted pretty good. Plus, the fox girl was sitting right there, resting her head on her hands and watching him eagerly with her big eyes. He had to at least try the thing in the bowl.

The main challenge was that this "stew" in the bowl... it dodged the spoon.

Yes, this mysterious hodgepodge, apparently imbued with some cyber immortal technique, was dodging the spoon! And it was squirming while forming a bump in the middle that looked like it was flipping him off—this was beyond Yu Sheng's understanding of food.

After a prolonged psychological battle staring at the bowl on the table, Yu Sheng finally looked up somewhat hesitantly, "Is this normal?"

"Ah, sorry, I forgot a step!" Hu Li suddenly realized, waving her hand to draw some glowing symbols in the air. She then muttered something unintelligible, performing a series of operations that seemed completely unrelated to cooking, before finally letting out a sigh of relief and smiling, "Alright, Savior, it understands now."

Yu Sheng was completely baffled—Huh? Understand? Understand what? Who understands? Wait, hold on, this is cooking! Why is the final step of cooking about communicating with the food to make it "understand"? Is it because Boundary Land machinery have a Mechanical Soul, and Hu Li can cultivate a rice soul in her pot?

He looked down at the bowl again, seeing that the constantly changing colored substance had indeed quieted down. After seriously contemplating for several seconds, he confirmed with Hu Li, "Just to be clear—this thing doesn't have Spiritual Wisdom, right?"

"Of course not," Hu Li quickly waved her hand, "It's just that everything has spirituality; stews with souls temporarily stew the spirituality of the world in the food, but too many souls can make the food move around... That's what mom says."

Yu Sheng felt that just these few words from Hu Li would need a sanity check from ordinary people—the combination of language and text was simply too mind-blowing.

Then he took a deep breath, imagined the shimmering thing in the bowl as something normal like solid tentacles or Wolf Grandmother's heart, and closed his eyes to take a bite.

A slight warmth flowed through him, followed by a fairly decent taste—no strange flavors, and nothing suddenly squirmed in his mouth. Yu Sheng couldn't quite identify the texture, but it was evidently normal food.

Even better than the last dish Hu Li made.

"This... is pretty good," Yu Sheng opened his eyes, slightly surprised as he looked at the fox stew in the bowl, "It's definitely better than the last time."

The fox girl, who had been eagerly waiting for praise, squinted her eyes and swayed back and forth, her tails wagging, "As long as Savior likes it."

Yu Sheng took another bite.

He felt his entire exhaustion dissipate within a few breaths; his initially drowsy mind quickly became alert, not temporarily from strong stimulation but as if he had received enough rest and nourishment, reaching full clarity.

And the "food," he consumed continued to nourish his body, subtly soaking his limbs and bones.

He frowned in confusion and saw Hu Li extract two small chicks from her tails, preparing a small bowl of "stew" for them too, "White Cut, Salt Roasted, time to eat~ You guys are lucky to share Savior's benefit today~"

The two chicks happily approached.

They seemed to have grown quite a bit, clearly well cared for by the fox girl. White Cut's head was already sprouting a tuft of pale golden down, and Salt Roasted's tail was visibly surrounded by a translucent glow.

Yu Sheng: "..."

Something seemed off. He needed to take another look.

Yu Sheng rubbed his eyes and then looked at Hu Li.

"What's wrong, Savior?"

"Just confirming," Yu Sheng hesitated, pointing at the stew on the table, "Is this really the 'ordinary food' you ate daily at home?"

"No, it's only for special occasions, like scoring full marks or celebrating holidays," Hu Li replied earnestly, "Making this is troublesome and exhausting, especially during Spirit Storage. I'm not skilled, so I can only make it occasionally."

Yu Sheng: "..."

The silly fox definitely must have confused cooking with something else! What exactly is the situation at her home?

Seeing the half-nodding and seemingly muddled appearance of the fox girl, Yu Sheng decided not to ask further. He just finished the food in front of him cleanly, and then watched the two chicks, whose feathers now appeared shinier, as they contentedly strolled on the table, lost in thought.

Hu Li happily went to scrub the pot and wash the dishes.

Yu Sheng stared at the two chicks promenading and digesting their food on the table, with big eyes fixed on small eyes.

White Cut and Salt Roasted stopped, tilting their heads without any fear, meeting Yu Sheng's gaze; their little eyes shining with an inexplicable light.

Yu Sheng even suspected that these two feathered beasts were about to gain spiritual wisdom.

But he had no evidence.

...

At the same time, outside the city.

The Boundary Land is not an infinite space, and Boundary City—although it is so vast that it gives people an almost "Endless City" illusion—is obviously limited.

At the end of this enormous city lies the "Ring" composed of various heavy factories and vertical farms. Beyond the Ring is the city wall established by the Council, and past the wall is a vast wilderness. This area has already left the most stable and secure "prosperous urban area" of the Boundary Land, so it is called the "suburbs".

In the suburbs, there are only a few stable settlements scattered across the boundless wilderness, along with some observation posts and outposts set up by the Council around the settlements and other key areas that need special monitoring. Under normal circumstances, the Special Service Bureau wouldn't send personnel deep into this desolate area.

But today was clearly a special circumstance.

Several "Meteors" that fell from the sky above Boundary City crashed into the "outskirts" — they had to be recovered and contained as quickly as possible.

Song Cheng jumped out of the vehicle, tightened his coat against the cold wind blowing across the wilderness, and walked forward.

The terrain here is flat, with wilderness stretching as far as the eye can see. The city in the distance forms a jagged silhouette on the horizon, and in another direction, one can see faint light screens rising, piercing the distant, chaotic sky—those light screens are the "Boundary Steles" set by the Council at the boundary of the Boundary Land, marking the farthest point that an ordinary person living in the Boundary Land could theoretically reach in their lifetime.

"This landing point is really remote, a bit further and it would be beyond the 'border'," a Special Service Bureau officer muttered beside him, "It's really hard to find."

"Count yourself lucky, at least it's outwards and not near the city. If it fell near the city, that would be a huge problem," another officer said, "Of course, the ones pulling overtime then would be the unlucky bunch from the third squadron..."

Song Cheng coughed twice: "What's the equipment reading now?"

"Depth 0, slightly offset to L-1, but within safe limits," his subordinate immediately reported, "No signs of contamination."

Song Cheng nodded.

Just then, a shout suddenly came from ahead: "Found it! The landing point is here!"

A crater more than ten meters in diameter, like a scorched black scar, "marked" the wilderness covered in wild grass.

A small unmanned aircraft arrived buzzing above the crater, monitoring the surrounding environmental parameters. Then a multi-legged robot moved forward, setting up basic monitoring equipment and protective devices around the edge and inner walls of the crater. After a while, the Special Service Bureau officers in heavy protective suits approached, observing the situation inside the crater.

A faint light caught Song Cheng's eyes.

This experienced frontline Special Service Bureau commander looked seriously at the bottom of the crater—there lay an irregularly shaped, semi-transparent white crystal, with signs of remelting and resolidification on its surface. The soil layers around the crystal were still emitting faint white smoke, with small, glittering crystals scattered around the large crystal, slowly flickering in response.

He heard an officer behind him whisper nervously, "So that's the 'corpse' of the Dark Angel..."

"Just some small fragments. Its main structure 'evaporated' during the fall," Song Cheng said casually and then waved his hand, "Prepare the recovery process—send the drone for the contact tests first."

After a while, Song Cheng stepped away from the crater and approached the command vehicle.

"How are the other recovery teams doing?"

"Teams 2 and 3 are still searching within the range given by the Director but haven't found the wreckage landing points yet. Team 4 just reported that they discovered a small fragment and are performing the first phase of contact tests," a Special Service Bureau officer with headphones on reported, "An unexpected situation is that the small fragment's landing point is near a Gathering Point, only two or three hundred meters from the isolation wall. Although the Gathering Point itself wasn't damaged, since the landing point is so close and local residents witnessed the flash from Angel Fall at close range, there might be some risks. An assessment team has already departed from headquarters."

"Hmm," Song Cheng nodded, looking up at the sky, "…It's going to get windy here soon, the forecast said temporal turbulence. Once the container's on board, let's evacuate quickly—it's rare to have a weekend, let's not open our eyes and find it's Monday again."

"Understood!"

Song Cheng acknowledged with a hum, and just as he was about to oversee the recovery process in person again, the communications officer suddenly looked alarmed and quickly engaged in a hurried conversation on a communication channel.

"Sir, something might have happened," the communications officer said, his tone changed with urgency, "Team 3 just reached out, they found a crater—but it's empty."

Song Cheng: "…What?!"

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