# 1655
Chapter 1655
Chang'an City.
"These guys are mine. You deal with the other replacements."
Chloe's gaze swept across the devastated ruins. Dense waves of soldiers continued surging toward every street, the flames turning the dark night sky bright as day.
"These thirty thousand people are scattered throughout Chang'an's streets. Can you handle it alone?" Lin Qiye frowned.
Chloe glanced at him, her fiery red hair swaying gently in the wind. She smiled faintly:
"Merely thirty thousand... Don't underestimate the Holy Sovereign's messenger."
Seeing this, Lin Qiye said no more. His figure blurred and he shot toward the imperial palace at breakneck speed.
Chloe leaped lightly, drifting down onto the broken eave of a ruined building. Her eyes scanned the surroundings—over ten thousand replaced soldiers surged through Chang'an like a tidal wave, the chaotic screams and howls ringing from every direction.
Chloe took a deep breath. A faint glint flickered in her eyes, and her fingertips slowly rose beneath the night sky:
"Evening wind, grant me slaughter."
The moment the words fell, the air around her fingertips twisted violently. A blade of wind, no thicker than a millimeter, shot through the night sky with a piercing shriek!
That blade of wind swept across the street, splitting from one to two, two to four, four to eight... They divided at astonishing speed beneath the night sky—thin and transparent, even after splitting into thousands upon thousands of fragments, they remained virtually invisible to the naked eye!
These wind blades seemed to have eyes of their own, scattering in all directions through the air. The ear-piercing shriek instantly drew everyone's attention in the city.
"What's that?"
A soldier gripping a torch suddenly looked up at the sky—nothing but the vast darkness, nothing else.
"Some little monsters went that way! Stop them!" several hundred meters away, another soldier cleaved down a man fighting desperately, suddenly shouting.
As the man stalled the soldier, several children rushed terrified from the burning houses, wailing as they fled toward the other side of the street.
The soldier with the torch narrowed his eyes. He casually tossed the torch into the building beside him, drew his blade, and glared at those weeping children fleeing toward him before surging forward!
Swoosh—!!
A shriek exploded behind him, instantly passing from behind to in front, then fading into the distance... The soldier stopped in bewilderment, about to turn and look back, when his vision began dropping uncontrollably, finally thumping onto the ground.
His consciousness gradually faded. One eye blocked by the earth, the other eye saw a headless body gripping a blade, standing frozen in place.
That's... me?
The moment this thought crossed his mind, his pupils completely glazed over. The headless corpse froze momentarily on the spot before toppling rigidly to the ground.
The children frantically fleeing witnessed this scene and froze completely. The shriek passed by their ears, and the next moment, the soldier behind them also had his head hurled high into the air, tumbling down with a wet thud.
All of this happened too fast—within less than two seconds, a single wind blade swept across streets several miles long, the heads of hundreds of soldiers floating up one after another.
Like crimson dandelions, swept into the sky by the gentle evening breeze.
And scenes like this unfolded on every street in Chang'an...
Thirty thousand troops, annihilated in an instant!
At this moment, before the highest palace hall of the imperial palace, a figure in imperial robes watched those crimson dandelions drifting through the city. His eyes slightly constricted.
Emperor Wu of Han stood before the hall, silent for a long while, his expression somewhat complex:
"Li Ying."
"This old servant is here." Old Eunuch Li stepped forward immediately, respectfully lowering his head.
"Tell me... does anyone in this world truly possess such divine power?"
Old Eunuch Li stared blankly for a long moment, then slowly spoke: "Whether anyone possesses divine power, this old servant cannot say... All this old servant knows is that to control a pack of fierce wolves, one must let a wolf king emerge among them."
Emperor Wu of Han gazed at Chang'an City shrouded in blood and fire, his brow furrowed tightly.
...
Lin Qiye darted through the streets at high speed. Vermillion-red palace walls gradually came into view.
Just then, a familiar voice called out from beside him:
"Brother Seven Nights!"
Lin Qiye stopped abruptly, turning to look. Wu Quan was hurrying toward him from the other end of the street.
Seeing Wu Quan, Lin Qiye's first instinct was to step back half a pace. He frowned and asked:
"Why are you here?"
"We were originally waiting for you at a dance hall drinking tea. When curfew was about to start, we just found a place to rest temporarily. We didn't expect the outside to suddenly descend into chaos." Wu Quan's expression was grave as he spoke.
"I flew up into the air and正好 saw Brother Seven Nights heading toward the palace gate, so I rushed over to join you."
"What about Yan Zhong?"
"He saw those soldiers' armor—the ones killing people—and his expression suddenly changed. He rushed out in a panic, and I don't know where he went."
Watching the calm Wu Quan before him, Lin Qiye didn't relax in the slightest. Instead, he began studying him carefully.
From what he understood now, even the replicas created by the smoke would think and act exactly like the real person, with virtually no flaws. Moreover, the Red Star seemed able to manipulate their actions by modifying the replicas' perceptions.
The thirty-thousand-strong army outside was a perfect example—they had seemed perfectly normal during the day, but after the Red Star's glow shone at night, they perceived ordinary people as monsters and killed their way into the city. Whether they were real or fake could now be determined through behavior alone. But Wu Quan was different.
Wu Quan had also been enveloped by the iridescent smoke. While he hadn't displayed any extreme behavior so far, that alone couldn't rule out his suspicion.
In other words, unless Lin Qiye drove a blade into Wu Quan's heart right now and turned him into a corpse, it would be difficult to determine whether the young man before him was Wu Quan or a Cthulhu Faction creature that had taken his place.
"Brother Seven Nights?" Wu Quan noticed Lin Qiye's strange expression and spoke疑惑ly. "What's wrong?"
"To you, what am I?"
Hearing this question, Wu Quan's eyes filled with confusion. He stared blankly for a moment, then uncertainly answered, "You're... um... Director Lin? Senior? Brother?"
"I mean, do you think I'm human, or a Cthulhu Faction creature?"
"Brother Seven Nights, what are you saying? How could you be a Cthulhu Faction creature? Wasn't your replica already dead?"
Lin Qiye's expression relaxed somewhat, though he didn't completely let down his guard. He didn't know if the Red Star could freely manipulate a replica's perception. What if Wu Quan's current response was a disguise, or what if the replica Wu Quan's perception would only be modified after some time passed?
"...Nothing."
Lin Qiye contemplated for a moment. "I need to go into the imperial palace. Stay with me."
"Okay." Wu Quan agreed without hesitation.
Of course, Lin Qiye couldn't simply kill Wu Quan. If he killed the replica, that would be fine, but if he killed the real Wu Quan... In any case, Lin Qiye couldn't gamble with Wu Quan's life.
The best approach now was to keep Wu Quan by his side. If he really was a replica, Lin Qiye would inevitably expose some vulnerabilities from time to time, and eventually the replica wouldn't be able to resist making a move.