Chapter 22: Ancient Array Reborn: The Star Map of the Demon Clan’s Teleportation

The phone screen flashed with a green light. The moment Shen Yan pressed his thumb down, the entire sewer seemed as if someone had flipped a power switch.

A tremendous force surged up from the ground, lifting him half a foot into the air. It wasn’t an explosion, nor an earthquake—it felt more like someone had pressed the “Initiate” button inside his body, causing his internal organs to vibrate in sync with some ancient rhythm.

“Warning: External protocol injection detected. Source identified as ‘Star-Shattering Token: Dark Side’.” Red text scrolled frantically across the terminal interface, code pouring into his meridians like a torrent. “System entering forced synchronization mode—countdown: three, two…”

“What the hell! This isn’t a connection request—it’s a phishing link!” He tried to pull his hand back, but his fingertip was stuck to the screen like a welded USB drive that couldn’t be unplugged.

The ground cracked open, and glowing runes with an eerie blue luster rose from the fissures, layer upon layer, forming a massive circular array. He recognized the pattern—it was a simplified version of what the cat-eared woman who saved him inside the glowing tree had carved last time.

A star map projection rose from the center of the array, slowly rotating, its central point aimed directly at the northern mountains.

“The Sword Sect’s Forbidden Land? The Abyss?” Shen Yan’s pupils contracted. “Who the hell navigated me straight to the ancestral graves?”

Before his words faded, ripples spread through the air, and a translucent figure materialized before him.

Clad in black-gold combat attire, a blood-colored scythe hovering behind him, half of a bronze mask cracked open, revealing a familiar eye and the same dimple at the corner of his mouth as Shen Yan’s.

Ye Shi’er.

But this time, he didn’t attack or mock. He simply stood there, watching quietly, his gaze as complex as a pile of error-reporting code.

“Don’t go there,” he spoke, his voice seeming to come from a great distance. “You’ll see truths you shouldn’t.”

Before Shen Yan could react, the figure reached out toward the center of the teleportation array, as if trying to sever the energy flow.

“Interfering again?” a cold voice snapped.

Luo Li flashed out from the side, her purple-red hair flowing without wind, cat ears perked up. Her demon tail instantly coiled around Shen Yan’s wrist, while her other hand formed a hand seal, hurling a blazing ball of demonic fire at the fading shadow.

“Boom!”

The shockwave shook the entire underground passage, sending debris raining down. Ye Shi’er’s shadow wavered but didn’t retreat or attack. He remained in place, his gaze fixed on Shen Yan’s face, as if confirming something.

“This formation recognizes your bloodline!” Luo Li gritted her teeth, her demon power surging as she erected a translucent shield around the two of them. “We can’t break it! Otherwise, we’ll both be torn apart by spatial turbulence!”

Shen Yan felt his wrist burning from the tight grip. Looking down, he saw Luo Li’s tail coiling tighter and tighter, as if afraid he might suddenly vanish.

“This move of yours… is a bit too intimate, isn’t it?” he quipped, but his hands didn’t stop moving. Enduring the searing pain in his meridians, he accessed the terminal’s deep-level permissions.

The “Stabilization Anchor Program” had been written long ago, but it had always lacked a key variable—an emotional anchor.

Now, he had it.

He closed his eyes for a moment, and several images flashed through his mind: Pei Yue’s tracking cinnabar embedded in his wrist bone, the faint glimmer of Ye Zhao’s sword qi brushing past his cheek, the strawberry talisman paper Yu Xiaotang secretly stuck to his backpack…

And now, this foolish girl before him, who’d rather expose her half-demon identity than let him fall.

“Alright then, you can all be my anti-crash patch.”

His fingers flew, simulating the auras of the four women into data modules and forcibly injecting them into the program’s core.

“Binding method: Bond Simulator v1.0, loading complete—run!”

In an instant, the entire ancient formation resonated with a thunderous roar.

The Star Map’s brightness surged violently, blue light churning like tidal waves. The runes on the ground rearranged themselves, and within the ancient Demon Script, several lines of fine, needle-like green Code emerged, as if someone had stitched a program into the thousand-year-old formation with an embroidery needle.

“What did you do?” Luo Li asked in shock.

“Installed a smart meter in an old house.” Shen Yan grinned, only to cough up a mouthful of blood the next second from the backlash. “But it seems to be overloaded…”

Before he could finish, space began to distort. The manhole cover overhead twisted as if gripped by an invisible hand, the iron bars bending and deforming one by one. Ye Shi’er’s faint silhouette swayed violently in the blue light, finally speaking in a voice so low it was almost inaudible:

“Brother… run…”

“What did you say?” Shen Yan froze.

But the figure had already begun to dissipate. In the final moment, he seemed to see the other’s lips move, as if saying, “She’s not…”

The rest of the words were swallowed by the chaotic spatial currents.

“Don’t mind what he said!” Luo Li shoved him forward forcefully. “Hold on tight! It’s about to begin!”

Shen Yan wanted to ask more, but his body was no longer under his control. His Source Code Spiritual Root spun wildly, like an overloaded Server. His consciousness began to blur, and snow-like noise appeared at the edges of his vision.

“Warning: Source Code overload. Core temperature has exceeded the Safety Threshold.”

“Activate emergency Protocol?”

He lacked the strength to type. Instead, he bit his finger and drew a streak of blood in the air, inputting the Command:

“Override all Protocols. Binding target—Luo Li.”

The Terminal fell silent for a moment.

Then, the cold Notification Tone shifted, taking on a hint of human-like fluctuation:

“Detected cross-species symbiosis Protocol. Activating dual-core Driver mode. Synchronization Rate between Source Code Spiritual Root and Demon Power core increased to seventy-three percent. Optimizing transmission path.”

The blue light abruptly contracted, forming a spiral pillar of light that enveloped the two.

Shen Yan felt as if he had been stuffed into an old-fashioned fax machine—every inch of his skin was being scanned, disassembled, and reassembled. He forced his eyes open and saw Luo Li’s face close to his. Blood seeped from her temple, her lips pale, yet she gritted her teeth, maintaining her Demon Power output.

“Hey,” he rasped, “if this formation collapses, do you think we’ll merge into the same person?”

“Shut up.” She glared at him, but her tail coiled tighter. “Keep talking, and I’ll throw you into the Spacetime turbulence so you can go flirt with your twenty-years-younger self.”

“That sounds pretty exciting. After all, I was still a slacker back then…”

Before he could finish, his chest tightened violently, as if a Data Line had been yanked out.

His consciousness began to fall.

The last Image he saw was a new pattern emerging at the center of the formation—no longer a purely Ancient Demon Clan Formation, but a strange structure fused with programming Logic and Demon Mark totems. It resembled a segment of breathing Code, flowing quietly in the darkness.

Luo Li’s voice came from a great distance:

“Don’t fall asleep… Promise me, once we get there, you must wake up…”

Shen Yan wanted to nod, but his eyelids were too heavy to lift.

He could only instinctively grip the Demon Tail coiled around him, his fingertips trembling slightly, as if tapping an invisible Enter Key.

The pillar of light exploded with a deafening roar.

The abandoned garden returned to silence.

Outside the iron fence, the phantom of the Star Map slowly closed, the night wind sweeping away the last trace of blue light.

The lingering Formation patterns on the ground still flickered faintly. Upon closer inspection, among the ancient Demon Script, several lines of green Code, as fine as needlework, were strikingly embedded.

One line was clearly discernible:

“if(survive)continue;elserebootwithlove.”

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(End of Chapter)