Chapter 115 – The Unnameable Invaders

Chapter 115 – The Unnameable Invaders

Invaders.

Honestly, even before hearing those words, Yu Sheng’s mind was already churning. When he learned that Twilight Angels could appear in the Real World, when he heard Song Cheng use the phrase “another planet,” he had already realized that those twisted beings bearing the name “Angel” were likely far more bizarre and powerful than he’d imagined. What he hadn’t expected was that those things might actually be… invaders from beyond the world.

He had always assumed they were like the entities in the Otherworld—some kind of strange phenomenon native to this world, at most a more dangerous variety of “super-entity.”

“…No wonder Little Red Riding Hood warned me to stay away from Twilight Angels as much as possible.”

Yu Sheng murmured under his breath.

Song Cheng heard Yu Sheng’s muttering but said nothing, simply continuing to place more files on the coffee table before them. “I’ve also brought the dossiers on several other Twilight Angels, though not all of them. Some Twilight Angels possess the property of generating ‘leakage’ merely by having their names known, and can only be mentioned and studied within the Special Operations Bureau’s ‘safe houses.’ Others have been classified as forbidden for various reasons—even I don’t have clearance to access those. But you’re welcome to look through these ones. Simply reading them poses no danger.”

Yet unlike before, Yu Sheng didn’t immediately reach for the files on the coffee table. Instead, he suddenly threw out a curious question: “Why are you so invested in me? I’m guessing you wouldn’t normally lay out this level of classified material for other Spirit Detectives—even if they’d already encountered a Twilight Angel.”

Song Cheng thought for a moment. “Because we suspect you have the power to banish ‘Angels.'”

Yu Sheng instinctively sensed this might be one reason, but not the whole reason.

He didn’t press the matter, though, and simply offered a very earnest rebuttal: “That big eye back in Night-shrouded Valley wasn’t banished by me—it left on its own.”

“But it left after seeing you. Granted, you weren’t the only one present at the time, but you were the most special among them,” Song Cheng said, a note of helplessness in his voice. “I know that argument isn’t very convincing, but the truth is—we really are that powerless against Twilight Angels.

“No one has been able to identify their weaknesses or behavioral patterns, and no one can communicate with those things. To this day, looking across the entire world, whether inside or outside the Borderland, cases where a descended ‘Angel’ was successfully banished are exceedingly rare, and none of them provide useful reference for each other. Every time an ‘Angel’ departs, it seems to be simply a matter of ‘it stayed long enough and left on its own.’ So all we can do is take shots in the dark like this. Perhaps that ‘eye’ leaving really had nothing to do with you, but… what if it did?”

At this, Song Cheng paused briefly, then added: “This is also Bureau Chief Baili Qing’s assessment. Without her approval, I wouldn’t have been able to bring you these files.”

“Baili Qing?” Yu Sheng raised an eyebrow, and his gaze finally fell on the new files.

He didn’t read through them carefully, though—just picked them up and gave them a quick scan.

“They really are… all sorts of bizarre,” Yu Sheng couldn’t help but marvel, looking at the strange and outlandish images on the files—images that could only be described as abstract and chaotic—along with the notes beneath them. “A shadow, a ball of fire, a massive cube silently flying across the night sky… and why is there a sphere?”

“Its diameter is approximately four thousand kilometers.”

Yu Sheng’s expression went blank. “…What?”

“You heard correctly. ‘Star of Heka’—named after its original discoverer and victim. Approximately four thousand kilometers in diameter, it is the largest Twilight Angel confirmed by physical size to date. Its surface is uniformly covered in countless hexagonal honeycomb structures resembling crystal lattices, with intense life signatures detected within. It suddenly barges into star systems where life exists, and from a safe distance continuously ‘broadcasts’ strange radio signals. Though there’s no definitive evidence, we believe the Star of Heka’s broadcasts cause intelligent beings to gradually descend into madness. Many infamous wars and terrorist coups may be linked to the Star of Heka’s approach.”

Yu Sheng set down the files and stared at Song Cheng with an expression of utter disbelief. “You want me to fight that thing? Seriously?”

“No, no, of course not,” Song Cheng quickly waved his hands. “Something of that scale can’t be ‘fought.’ We simply hope to… give you a broader understanding of Twilight Angels. Just in case it proves useful someday, right?”

Yu Sheng pursed his lips and moved right past the topic. “Let’s talk about something else. What else do you know about these ‘Angels’?”

“Regarding their influence,” Song Cheng said gravely. “Although Twilight Angels come in all manner of forms, each with different characteristics, nearly all of them share one commonality: their connection to the Otherworld, and their effect on it.

“As I mentioned earlier, while Twilight Angels can appear in the Real World, they tend to ‘descend’ more frequently within Otherworlds. Under their influence, an Otherworld that suffers an Angel’s ‘parasitism’ becomes activated—entities grow more dangerous and frenzied, the operating rules of the entire Otherworld shift, and even its depth changes. You should still remember what happened in Night-shrouded Valley, right?”

“Oh, I remember that all too well,” Yu Sheng threw up his hands. “Hunger Entities that theoretically only spawn one at a time suddenly appeared everywhere across the mountains. Eventually, the entire valley itself transformed into one enormous ‘entity’—thank god we got lucky.”

“In most cases, people trapped in an Otherworld don’t have that kind of ‘luck.’ That’s why very few who encounter a Twilight Angel survive. Even if the ‘Angel’ itself doesn’t attack them, victims die at the hands of entities or Otherworld rules due to the catastrophic environmental changes triggered by the Angel’s descent,” Song Cheng said solemnly. “We’ve been studying the behavioral patterns of Twilight Angels. Regarding the phenomenon of them appearing far more frequently in Otherworlds than in the Real World, some scholars theorize it’s because something within Otherworlds ‘attracts’ them, or…”

“Or?”

“Or because the Otherworld itself constitutes some kind of ‘weak point in spacetime’ within our world. In an Otherworld, the forces of order are feeble, which gives these ‘Angels’ an opportunity to worm their way in. As I said before, Twilight Angels are ‘invaders’ from beyond the world. They bore holes into our world, and the Otherworld, for these invaders, may be something like… a ‘natural hole.'”

Yu Sheng fell into thought. Just then, Eileen, who had been sitting quietly to the side listening for a long while, suddenly spoke up: “So tell us about those ‘Angel cultists.’ Why would a bunch of lunatics willingly follow these freakish ‘Angels’? These ‘Angels’ can’t even communicate, and presumably don’t answer their followers’ prayers, right?”

“We’ve captured many Angel Cult followers. You might not believe this, but these ‘lunatics’ are far more widespread than you’d imagine. They’re not limited to the Borderland—essentially, anywhere a Twilight Angel has ever descended, these maddened followers appear under its influence,” Song Cheng’s expression darkened noticeably as he spoke of this. “Some of them fell gradually through obsession with power and forbidden knowledge, but the most core and fanatical among them insist they were ‘guided.'”

“Guided? Guided by whom? By these…” Yu Sheng gestured toward the files on the coffee table. “These abstract Angels? I thought they couldn’t communicate?”

“They can’t communicate, but the cultists insist they truly can hear the ‘voice’ of the Twilight Angels—and not the kind of chaotic, meaningless noise you’d expect. Real ‘guidance’ and ‘teachings.’ I’ve interrogated some of the hardliners. Most of them describe the ‘guiding voice’ they heard like this:

“Gentle, tolerant, filled with compassion and mercy. The voices showed them the ultimate fate of all things in the universe, yet firmly encouraged them, telling them how to find a way out, and how to work side by side with the ‘Angels’ in seeking salvation.”

Song Cheng paused here to organize his thoughts, then continued: “Through analyzing the mental states of those cultists and conducting hypnotic induction on them, we’ve been able to roughly reconstruct the process by which Twilight Angels exert their influence. This ‘guidance’ process appears to be extraordinarily immersive. Vast, sustained hallucinations completely drag a person’s mind into an inhuman ‘perspective,’ through which they experience the passage of eons. An ordinary person’s psyche simply cannot withstand this kind of influence. By the time the guidance ends, they’ve been completely converted—still human on the outside, but their minds have long since become something inhuman.

“This is also the most puzzling point for scholars. Twilight Angels come in all shapes and forms, differing in both abilities and appearance, looking nothing like members of the same species. Yet the cultists—regardless of which specific Twilight Angel they follow—all seem to hear roughly the same ‘guidance’ when under an Angel’s influence. It always includes a ‘twilight apocalypse’ and ‘a path to seek salvation,’ and the details within these two elements are highly consistent. This has forced us to reexamine two questions: ‘Do Twilight Angels actually possess intelligence?’ and ‘Are the Twilight Angels actually a unified species?'”

“Sounds like that line of research must be pretty dangerous,” Yu Sheng remarked with a sigh after listening to Song Cheng’s account.

“Yes, extremely dangerous. The biggest difficulty is that you can’t go too deep in your research on Twilight Angels. A superficial understanding won’t unlock their secrets, but if you learn too much, you’ll unknowingly fall under their influence. Even in the process of interacting with those cultists, it’s possible to accidentally ‘see’ the ‘guidance’ lurking in their minds. Many scholars who were originally fighting against the Angels have been subtly and gradually converted into new Angel Cult followers this way.”

(End of Chapter)