Chapter 104: The Maiden Under the Moon and Hope

Jiang Wan’s skin was as white as snow, with tiny, sporadic scales drifting from it. These scales were so light that the slightest movement was enough to defy gravity, causing them to rise quietly into the air.

The scales danced like snowflakes, reflecting the moonlight that peeked in through the window. They made the moonlight beautiful, their iridescent colors accentuating the girl's flawless purity and adding subtle hues to her alabaster face. The light scattered by the crystal-like prisms was truly mesmerizing.

She was clearly lying still, yet one could easily imagine her dancing, so graceful were her posture and features—a face too beautiful to belong to this mortal world.

And so, the world had granted her a single imperfection: two tentacles, each the thickness of a pinky finger, grew from her forehead. The roots of these tentacles had a slight curve, which became more pronounced as they extended, curling until they spiraled at the very tips. They looked somewhat like the proboscis of a butterfly.

But Chen Qing knew they were certainly not those of a butterfly.

He gritted his teeth, his fingertips tearing at the mass of pure white cocoon threads before him. As he pulled the silk apart, her pristine body was revealed. What a perfect form it was; her silhouette followed the golden ratio, and the wings tightly curved and wrapped behind her back were enough to make the rest of the world pale in comparison.

Yet, his trembling fingertips betrayed his true state of mind.

No, this was not beautiful.

He swallowed hard and reached once more into the pocket where he had once kept the chocolate.

But there was nothing inside.

Nothing at all, just like the hope of saving her.

He pinched the bridge of his nose. Jiang Wan’s metamorphosis did not seem to be ending soon. The cocoon he had torn was slowly repairing itself; countless white threads were secreting from her pores and skin, as if possessing a consciousness of their own, beginning to encase the girl once more.

He touched the pendant on his chest, and the figure of Bu Zhaozhao emerged from mid-air. She stretched, her face etched with a look of agony.

"Sleeping was so painful..." She rubbed her shoulders and forehead, her expression failing to improve. She lowered her head, only for her face to stiffen in an instant.

"Hey..." Her outstretched finger trembled, not out of fear, but from genuine exhaustion. "What have you done? How did she... how did she transition into a physical entity!"

Chen Qing was silent for a moment before asking, "Is there a way to save her?"

"There is..." She didn't finish, but meeting Chen Qing’s gaze, she shook her head. "And there isn't. E-500 could save her. But her transformation has already begun; where are you going to find E-500?"

"E-500?" He looked up and waved his hand. "What does it do?"

"It’s a panacea."

"A panacea?"

Bu Zhaozhao nodded and glanced at Jiang Wan with concern. "It can reverse all negative states of the consumer, eliminate all hidden ailments in the body, and restore one to the healthiest state of a 'human'."

"Have people from the Grace Church used it?"

She looked puzzled. "Of course they have."

"What are the traits?"

"Negative effects are significantly reduced, and abilities are restored to their peak."

He fell silent, his gaze shifting to a pen lying quietly in the room, as if it were the protagonist of the space. He moved forward silently, picked up the pen, and, to Bu Zhaozhao’s stunned and bewildered gaze, pressed it against his own heart.

The next moment, blood mixed with ink splashed across the room, coating the walls and every inch of the desk.

In the following second, an immense, insatiable hunger surged within him—a bottomless void in his stomach and mind. It was the feeling of a man trapped in a desert catching sight of a bottle of water. Instinctively, he rushed to the door. The blood remaining on the table followed, writhing as if under his command. A second later, the stray blood crawled out from under the door, and when it returned, it had turned a vivid, deep crimson.

"You... how?" Bu Zhaozhao’s face was frozen in shock. She stared at Chen Qing’s ability, stunned. "You! You consumed E-500?! Does this Backroom actually produce E-500?"

"It was that chocolate..." He kept his head lowered and asked, "Does E-500 have an effect in the Backrooms, too?"

She let out a soft sound of affirmation, though her face was filled with complex emotions. "The panacea is one of the very few items that can manifest its power under the rules of the Backrooms, even without being taken out. Because of this, most entities in the Backrooms also hunt for and consume it."

Listening to this, Chen Qing turned his head to look at Jiang Wan. "How much longer until her transition is complete?"

"Seven hours," Bu Zhaozhao floated down, drifting before Jiang Wan. She touched the girl's stunning face with a hand that could not make contact, adding precisely, "Seven hours and thirteen minutes. By the time her face is completely covered in scales, even the panacea won't be able to save her."

He nodded and asked, "Can you deduce the entry rules for this Backroom?"

She frowned and shook her head.

"I encountered three entities in the Backrooms, and they brought me..." He paused, struggling to describe it. "It was a face floating in mid-air. The feeling... it was very strange."

Upon hearing this, Bu Zhaozhao’s expression changed instantly. "Smilers?!" She looked at Chen Qing, then back at Jiang Wan, her tone filled with both pity and awe. "You actually managed to come back alive... damn, you really are something."

Before Chen Qing could ask, Bu Zhaozhao began to speak on her own.