Ashley saw through their formation. Coleridge huddled together with three ability users—two handled defense while one focused on offense—forming a turtle tactic.
Although taking out Black Bee would turn them into a turtle that could only take hits without retaliating, Black Bee never left the defensive circle, and breaking the turtle shell was even harder.
Coleridge’s guard team naturally had more than just these few people. When the guard captain was still alive, he had commanded over a dozen tactical squads.
Even after the Card Court Society eliminated some, their numbers remained substantial.
However, when combined, they wouldn’t have more than five complete abilities—perhaps even fewer.
This was because the greater the ability, the greater the appetite.
Take the Tribunal, for example—even the Investigation Department couldn’t equip every team with a complete ability and had to fill the gaps with King Insect Technology enhancers.
No matter if the weekly salary was 6 pounds or 600 pounds, it didn’t matter. Mundane things could no longer satisfy the extraordinary; the only ways to get extraordinary powerhouses to show up for work were either through contribution points to exchange for stronger tech warriors or by forming their own forces and attaching themselves through cooperation to obtain privateer licenses.
If even the Tribunal couldn’t achieve such high configuration, Coleridge certainly couldn’t.
—
The first to arrive weren’t Coleridge’s reinforcements, but the Card Court Society’s monsters!
Pop pop pop!
The media tycoon Dulles Woolf lay on the ground, his body stretching like a dachshund, his mouth opening into a funnel shape, turning into a massive flesh megaphone as he held his own conscience in his hands.
There was also a woman with a spine arched backward like a harp, her hair serving as strings; a man with wind-generating membranes under his armpits, his chest hardened into a bone plate riddled with air holes, sprouting four arms and dozens of fingers, flapping his limbs while playing his own pipe organ; and a woman using the taut skin between wriggling conjoined infants as hand drums, constantly drumming away…
These musically gifted monsters connected through pink polyps and bizarrely writhing abdominal feet, forming a composite orchestra monster performing beneath a curtain of flesh!
Misty fog swirled, demonic music reverberated, and Ashley immediately felt a sharp pain eroding into her skull.
Coleridge’s side was similarly caught in the AOE and could only shrink their formation, gritting their teeth to resist.
Bang bang bang!
Heavy footsteps echoed from another corridor as Cleft-Head Monsters, vortex worm monsters, ruminating toothed stomach monsters… all dripping with scarlet bloody slime, charged forward!
The monsters surged like a tidal wave, their shrill howls rising one after another!
Vicky glanced over, trembling in fear, squeezing her eyes shut and not daring to look, her voice quivering. “If it’s really no good, just leave me behind. I’ll only hold you back…”
“Sweet sister, have you heard the story of the three little pigs? As long as the house is sturdy enough, it can block the monsters.” Ashley revealed a mysterious smile.
“Huh?” Vicky didn’t understand.
Ashley took out a key, opened the door to the Slanted House, and slipped inside with her. The entrance contracted behind them until it vanished.
Since “Grandma’s Sweater” wasn’t a spatial ability, and Coleridge’s guards had all analyzed abilities, even hiding right in front of them left the enemies with no recourse.
“Wow, it’s actually a little house!”
Vicky looked around in surprise, seeing bookshelves against the walls filled with novels, comics, and magazines. In the four corners stood a yellow block mini-fridge, a basket full of fruit, a dazzling array of liquor at the bar counter, and a long sofa.
Her gaze returned to the center of the room, where a kotatsu sat on tatami mats, giving off a cozy vibe.
“But it’s slanted!”
Vicky sensed the subtle tilt and grew puzzled.
She soon understood.
“Take off your shoes.”
The Blue-Haired Loli first set Vicky down, helped her remove her shoes, and curiously pinched her soft, floppy little feet, which lacked Achilles tendons.
“So pitiful.”
“Mmm…”
With her toes gathered in small hands, Vicky’s face flushed as red as if blood would drip from it.
Being pitied by a girl younger than herself filled her with shame and embarrassment; she felt utterly mortified, on the verge of fainting.
Ashley stood up, hooked her finger under her shoe heel, and slipped off her little shoes with a pop. Her dainty feet, wrapped in fluffy white cotton socks, took light steps toward the wall.
The closer she got to the wall, the steeper the tilt became, until it reached a full ninety-degree right angle!
Yet she didn’t stop; she walked right onto the wall!
Vicky’s mouth hung open in shock as her gaze followed upward. She saw a board game table on the adjacent plane—not fixed, but placed on what was now the “wall.” Ashley stood steadily on it like a nail.
On the nearby shelf, hundreds or thousands of intricately crafted wargame pieces stood in formation, stacks of cards piled high, and a rack hung with board game blueprints and periodicals.
The scene utterly defied the laws of physics, leaving Vicky dumbfounded. As her eyes shifted, she realized all six surfaces of the room could function as separate spaces! Space utilization maximized!
Vicky gradually realized that the gravity here was extremely peculiar—no tilt felt at the plane’s center, but it sloped more severely toward the edges, allowing one to walk directly onto adjacent planes.
It didn’t stop there. The Slanted House had eight rooms that could rotate like a Rubik’s Cube.
Oxygen came from submarine-style ‘oxygen candles,’ power from a steam generator—plenty of extraordinary materials for long-term heating. Trash was simply dumped into the external void. Water and sewage used purification tanks and black water tanks, with waste gas and black water also vented into the void.
This was just the ‘Slanted House’; the ‘trick’ was something else.
Ashley, who knew the password, could manipulate this giant Rubik’s Cube. Even if enemies invaded, a single misstep would send them into the void.
Though she wanted to crawl into the warm kotatsu and eat oranges, it wasn’t the time. Ashley walked to the window to observe the outside.
The battle was fierce. Black Bee was a very strong ability, forming a sleek, aerodynamic body like a queen bee—black-and-yellow banded extraordinary carapace creating superior aerodynamics with minimal air resistance. Even at high speeds, it could deftly change direction with short bursts, blooming shockwaves.
Its form flowed gracefully as its arm-extended twin stinger swords spun elegantly, repelling monsters one after another.
The defensive buffs from “Forced Blade Reversal” and “Ding Fish Curtain Yan” made it even more at ease.
“Huh?”
Ashley suddenly noticed something off—the window was slowly moving!
After a moment’s thought, she understood: the Slanted House’s anchor point was space, not the ship.
The ship was still drifting, while the Slanted House’s position was fixed, causing relative motion.
No more spectating, then—time to slip away.
Once they entered the adjacent cabin, Ashley exited the Slanted House, pocketed the key, and left Vicky inside.
She advanced quickly along the corridor, Metal Lifeform in her left hand, Human Balls in her right. Any flesh organs protruding from the walls or monsters were simply sliced apart.
The Human Balls were extremely effective—whether Flesh Spiders, Cleft-Head Monsters, or flesh hyenas, a stab drained their moisture and compressed them into meat balls, industrialized slaughter.
Just as she was unstoppable, a tall figure suddenly appeared ahead!
Pointed ears, protruding brow bones, pale skin, sunken eye sockets… Night Devil!
Ashley froze for a moment, then turned and ran!
It wasn’t cowardice; she just couldn’t think of a good way to deal with him temporarily.
The tricky part was that failure to instant-kill would lead to mutual destruction—even a clip to her limbs would cause prolonged disability, plunging her into unpredictable peril.
The perfect solution was using her teacher’s ability: correct her own timeline to before the injury while charging into the “Time Sequence Heterostructure” range to kill him.
But the cost was high, the gain low—after killing, the ability would return, and a new Night Devil would be on the way.
Ashley hadn’t run far when she realized Night Devil was relentlessly pursuing her from behind!
“Hey! Aren’t you here to kill Coleridge? Why are you chasing me?” Ashley asked in confusion.
“Everyone… must die!”
Night Devil carried a storm lantern fueled by human waste, burning within octagonal glass. As he strode forward, the iron chains rattled like the call of death, clinking ominously.
Ashley instantly understood: the ghost ship incident couldn’t leave survivors, or the truth would come out.
Night Devil’s mobility was terrifying—each ground kick propelled him, his figure vanishing from the spot only to reappear twenty meters away!
Ashley was gradually caught up, but she remained utterly calm. Glancing back with the corner of her eye, she calculated his speed. As she rounded the corner, her finger casually smeared along the wall.
She stuck the Metal Lifeform to the wall and issued a simple command.
As Night Devil sharply turned the bend, a silver-gray blade suddenly sprang out before him!
His pupils contracted sharply, but it was too late to dodge. With his forward momentum, he was bisected at the waist!
