The starfish anomaly perished in this bizarre manner, its demise swift and absolute.
This was primarily due to Duan Chen activating his True Sight early on, pinpointing the anomaly's fatal weakness. Without this, such a rapid termination would have been impossible.
After killing the starfish anomaly, Duan Chen found it difficult to calm down.
His anger stemmed not from the anomaly itself, but from the countless students and lives it had consumed. This rage had driven him to ignore his spiritual energy expenditure and activate True Sight, revealing the anomaly's vulnerable spot.
Upon discovering this weakness, a moment of relief washed over him.
Who would have imagined that an anomaly's fatal flaw would be the very faces it conjured?
Only by destroying all of its vulnerable points could it be truly killed; otherwise, it would have been granted a chance to recover.
Duan Chen was fortunate that his extreme anger had spurred him to action at this moment.
Otherwise, it would have been given an opportunity to rise again.
He stood before the anomaly's corpse, lost in thought for a long time. Even in death, the faces on its surface remained, now a ghostly, ash-white hue.
Each face was frozen in an expression of terror and despair.
These were undoubtedly the final moments of their owners.
A profound pain resonated within Duan Chen.
He sighed, then shook his head, and in a hushed voice addressed the multitude of faces.
"I'm sorry."
This apology was for his delayed arrival.
If he had discovered this large-scale anomaly zone forming in Sucheng sooner, perhaps such a tragedy could have been averted.
But alas, there was no such thing as a time machine.
Duan Chen stood there, composing himself before stepping over the anomaly and proceeding further. This time, he entered the teaching building with purpose, no longer drifting up the stairs in a daze.
It was then, as Duan Chen activated True Sight and found no other environmental anomalies, that he finally breathed a sigh of relief, his agitated thoughts calming.
He suddenly realized that his earlier state, like boiling water, might not have been his true thoughts, but an influence from the anomaly itself.
He rarely experienced such intense rage; such uncharacteristic impulsiveness was not like him.
Furthermore, his thoughts had been fragmented and discontinuous.
Thankfully.
Duan Chen let out a breath of relief.
Thankfully, he had successfully eliminated the starfish-like entity.
With a sense of caution, he entered the main teaching building alone, bypassing the stairs. The phantom stairs in the earlier illusion had instilled a degree of fear in him.
He decided to begin his exploration on the first floor.
Within the main teaching building on the first floor, Duan Chen's eyes scanned like X-rays, searching for any signs of other anomalies.
To maximize his ability to detect anomalies and eliminate them quickly, he kept True Sight activated, disregarding his spiritual energy consumption.
Fortunately, he had already integrated Wang Qi; otherwise, such intense expenditure would have been far beyond his capacity before.
However, it was regrettable that whether all the anomalies here had been consumed by the strange starfish, or if this starfish was the sole anomaly, he couldn't tell. He searched the entire first floor, even ascending to the other floors, but found nothing amiss.
No one was present, nor any anomalies.
Even with True Sight operating at its peak, there was no discovery.
Duan Chen couldn't help but furrow his brow, feeling that he had overlooked something.
Just then, he detected a faint, familiar fluctuation.
Wang Zihao!
Duan Chen leaped directly from the window, a fall from the fourth floor with no hesitation, heading straight for the male dormitory.
This fluctuation was unmistakably Wang Zihao.
He couldn't be mistaken.
Having replicated Wang Zihao's abilities, he was the most familiar with the energy signatures of his powers.
"Damn it!"
Unaware that his instructor was on his way, Wang Zihao struggled, using books condensed from ancient texts to block the anomaly's claws.
No, this wasn't a rare anomaly, but a sea monster.
He gritted his teeth. While he had anticipated the presence of sea monsters here, Sucheng being a major hub for them, he hadn't expected his luck to be so dire.
"Little brother, stop resisting. Just give me your heart, and perhaps I'll be merciful and grant you a less painful death, considering how handsome you are."
The sea monster facing Wang Zihao, with its crimson nails, playfully touched its face, smiling coyly.
It was dressed in a teacher's uniform.
A white shirt, a black pencil skirt, black stockings, and impossibly high heels, wielding a whip, it exuded a seductive aura.
But Wang Zihao had no inclination to appreciate the sight.
He was being increasingly constricted and entangled by the tentacles extending from behind the sea monster.
The books enveloped him, but they were powerless against the sea monster's grasping tendrils.
The current situation was that he was encased within the books conjured by his ancient text scripture, while the sea monster's tentacles wrapped around both him and his summoned defenses.
When his spiritual energy ran out, he would be directly exposed to the sea monster's close-range attacks.
At that point, he would be a defenseless puppet.
His heart would be ripped out.
Wang Zihao closed his eyes in despair, never expecting to be the first to perish here. The defensive power manifested by his summoned books was his strongest shield.
However, it also consumed a substantial amount of spiritual energy.
He estimated he could hold on for at most two more minutes.
But what could two minutes achieve?
This woman's power level was that of a Sea Monster Priest.
How could a Sea Monster Priest exist in Sucheng? It defied logic. His instructor likely hadn't anticipated such a development either.
Wang Zihao gently closed his eyes, a bitter smile gracing his lips.
His life was likely to end here.