Yu Sheng had a dream.

In the dream, he once again entered the dense fog, but this time without Hu Li and Erin. A strange street stretched straight forward from his doorstep, and something at the end seemed to be emitting a strong attraction — he kept walking forward, deeper into the fog, as if he had been walking for ten, a hundred years...

In the dream, he walked tirelessly, and gradually, the city within the fog displayed increasingly bizarre landscapes. He saw buildings bending over like candles melting in a hot breeze, roads curling upward towards the sky like peculiar seaweed floating in water, and countless inverted shadows floating above the city, emitting strange lights through the fog.

Yet, he continued to walk forward, delving deeper into the increasingly strange Boundary City, as if traversing through layer after layer of increasingly eerie mirages, until the surrounding fog turned into thick darkness. Shadows, tangible as if solid, formed enormous masses, silently moving across the desolate and shattered earth above, turning the entire dream world dim. Then he stood at the edge of a desolate, broken land and saw that tall, slender figure once again.

The Artificial Saintess of the Venerate Saints Monastery, that killing machine once again drifted over with an elegant, dance-like ghostly step, but suddenly a rocket-like speed burst from behind her, leading to a steel headbutt slamming into his chest...

Yu Sheng woke with a shout, and upon opening his eyes, saw the daylight bright outside. Steel Erin was sitting cross-legged on his chest, but was clearly not awake at all—this puppet, with eyes closed, muttered in slumber, "I, Alice Puppet, transfer money!"

Then she toppled over again, rolling from Yu Sheng's stomach onto the bed, lying flat on her back and continuing to snore loudly.

Yu Sheng's shout upon waking didn't wake a single Erin—he looked up to find another Erin clinging to his shin like a koala, muttering, "Totally a noob... who's the noob... your whole family... hehe..."

The third Erin was crawling awkwardly on the floor, probably having fallen off during sleep, and was trying to find her way back to the bed while sleepwalking, but clearly in the wrong direction.

Yu Sheng sat up in bed, feeling a bit dazed for a moment.

...Just how could a puppet, originally sealed in an oil painting, sleep so energetically and chaotic, and crawl all over the place?

He shook his head, cleared his mind a bit, and carefully extracted his leg from the Erin at the foot of the bed's embrace. Then he turned to look at the painting frame on the bedside table—since the range of the bedroom was just right and there was no worry about exceeding the painting's "connection distance," Erin always placed her painting frame on the bedside table when sleeping at home—the stuffed bear inside the frame lay quietly on a chair draped with a red velvet cloth, with its beady button eyes staring blankly at the outside world.

Yu Sheng tapped on the painting, as a greeting to Erin's "main body" and the stuffed bear within, then picked up his phone to check the time, finding it already close to ten in the morning.

It was too late to go back to sleep by now, so Yu Sheng got out of bed and went to the bathroom to freshen up.

Just as he finished brushing his teeth, the Erins in the room also woke up, three groggy little puppets lined up to greet him messily: "Good morning." "Morning, Yu Sheng." "Yawn... did you kick me onto the floor last night?"

Yu Sheng casually brushed off their comments, turned on the water tap, and picked up an Erin to wash her face, using a few fingers to splash some water on the small puppet, then setting her back down on the floor and tossing a small towel over for her to dry herself. He then proceeded to wash the second and third one with ease and fluency. By the time he finished with the last one, the first was still drying off.

The three Erins stood in a circle on the floor, using a single towel to wipe each other's faces while glancing up at Yu Sheng: "What are today's plans?"

Yu Sheng took out his smartphone, checked it, and shook his head: "Nothing special planned, mainly waiting for news from the Special Service Bureau—see if Baili Qing's deep diver troops can find clues about that 'Artificial Saintess' in the fog. We can't handle such extensive dragnet search operations."

One Erin raised a towel, a bit surprised on her face: "Still no news?"

"Nonsense, it's been such a short time, and the environment in that dense fog is so complex, the operation speed is greatly affected."

Yu Sheng explained while bending down to retrieve the small towel, hanging it on Erin's designated towel hook—in fact, the small puppet could also come to the master bathroom to wash herself. Yu Sheng had placed a small ladder beside the sink specifically for her; she could climb up to the sink without assistance, but ever since she slipped and fell into the sink while bathing once, she hasn't climbed up by herself since, preferring help for something as simple as washing her face.

Yu Sheng felt this little creature was just being fussy.

"I'm going to the kitchen to cook, you go see if Hu Li is awake, if not, wake her up."

The three Erins replied in unison, "Got it."

As Yu Sheng and the Erins stepped out the door, they found Hu Li not only awake but seeming to have been up for quite some time.

The demon fox girl's room door was wide open, and she was sitting cross-legged on the bed, facing the window with her back to the door, completely still as if in meditation or contemplation.

As soon as Erin saw this scene, she whispered to herself in surprise: "Hey! Isn't this silly fox doing the legendary 'cultivation'? Like those written in novels... absorbing nature's spiritual energy or something... she's quite diligent?"

Yu Sheng was also seeing this scene for the first time. After hearing Erin's whisper, he was dumbfounded but didn't dare to interrupt the fox girl's "cultivation". Yet, he was curious, so he carefully led three puppets closer to take a look at the situation. As soon as he entered the room, he saw Hu Li's big ears twitch, then she turned her head with a bright smile: "Savior! Erin! You're awake?"

Erin was instantly startled (the one carrying a picture frame actually jumped): "Whoa, I thought you were here absorbing nature's spiritual energy."

"Absorbing nature's spiritual energy?" Hu Li tilted her head, "That's some kind of energy conversion technique from the ancient era... isn't it inconvenient to refine a reactor hidden within the organs?"

Erin: "..."

Seeing that she wasn't "cultivating," Yu Sheng boldly walked over: "So what were you just doing?"

"Spacing out, pondering."

Yu Sheng: "Pondering?"

Then, he saw the fox girl solemnly picking up two glowing golden objects from the bed and presenting them with a serious face: "Savior, White Cut and Salt Roasted are looking stranger by the day... Is this how chickens grow in this world? How come they look less and less like the ones free-ranging in the valley?"

Beside him, Erin, who had just snapped out of her speechlessness, looked up and exclaimed: "Whoa! What the heck is so bright!"

This time, Yu Sheng also took a closer look and then really stared—stunned for a full half-minute.

He saw Hu Li presenting two chickens with golden wings, jade crowns, long necks, slender tails, and a majestic demeanor... ah, chickens.

In fact, they hardly looked like chickens anymore, except for those fighting chicken eyes still resembling their original appearance. Otherwise, these two former "little chicks" now completely exuded an aura of having absorbed excess spiritual energy, ready to transform and ascend at any moment.

Moreover, their size was noticeably larger than their valley siblings—not just a bit bigger. Although Hu Li could still hold them steadily, the long tails now glimmering with rainbow light almost hung down to Hu Li's folded legs. And visibly, their current appearance was not yet their growth limit. A vague "childlike" aura surrounded them, suggesting that with time, they would continue to grow into this outrageous form...

"My goodness..." Yu Sheng squeezed the words into a sentence after a long pause, "Are these still White Cut and Salt Roasted?!"

"Yes, it's them," Hu Li nodded enthusiastically, "They've been growing quickly lately, but their appearance has changed too much this time. Initially, I took them out to give them some sun, but when I took them out, I saw them glowing on their own and was startled."

What could Yu Sheng say? After all, he was also startled...

At that moment, the two "Divine Birds" in Hu Li's hands suddenly seemed restless, spreading their wings and fluttering up, effortlessly soaring, and started to gracefully circle around the demon fox girl—while circling, their wings hardly flapped, and they traced a slightly luminescent path in the air, as if walking on spiritual energy—after circling twice, they landed on Hu Li's shoulders, still watching Yu Sheng with their fighting chicken eyes.

There was a beauty to a Nine Heavens Mysterious Bird being hit with a Stupidity Technique.

Hu Li was amused by the sudden flight of these "chicks", her eyes gleaming with joy. "Wow, you can already fly...by the way, can chickens fly?"

Yu Sheng was at a loss for words, only the corner of his mouth twitched: "..."

Did this fox still think she was caring for these creatures according to chicken-rearing procedures? The species has changed!

Erin tugged at Yu Sheng's pant leg, the little puppet looked up, puzzled: "Yu Sheng Yu Sheng, what's the principle here?"

"How should I know," Yu Sheng slapped his forehead, "Anyway, one thing's certain, these two are no longer edible, given how they've turned out."

Hu Li instantly grasped this, hurriedly turning her head: "Oh, indeed, given their spirituality, they shouldn't be eaten so lightly... what should we do, Savior?"

"What else can be done, you can let them be your wingmen in the future," Yu Sheng sighed, "You now have two more Left and Right Guardians—at first, you said you kept them for a great purpose, now it does seem they will have great use..."

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