After a brief exchange, the two poor bastards had more or less sorted things out and reluctantly accepted each other’s brand-new personas.
The lazy, big dude who spent his days scratching his balls, slacking off, and doomscrolling short videos had actually crawled out of the mud pits of Central Lands as an elite paratrooper, and was a stone-cold special forces killer.
anwhile, the young lad who dread every night of working hard on his certificates and exams had turned into a full-on superpower user who could talk to phones all of a sudden.
The fact that the tiny Mainland Auto Shop managed to gather these two hidden talents made it so seriously blessed feng shui place.
“So it’s her?” Lu Feng asked as he finished checking his ammo.
“Yeah. At the very least, she’s in charge,” Ji Jue replied. “Be careful. These things aren’t human anymore.”
Lu Feng nodded as he slowly loaded shells into the shotgun. “I know.”
Even if he hadn’t known at first, after killing a few, he definitely knew now.
“I’ve seen plenty of this kind of crap in Central Lands. All kinds of freaky shit. Hit it with a coastal gun, and it dies just as easily.” He racked the gun, then asked, “Scared?”
“Of course I am.” Ji Jue nodded without hesitation, then shot back, “But does being scared help?”
“If you’re scared, go out first and wait in the car. If I ss up, at least there’s a chance you can run.” Lu Feng glanced back at him. “These things have power and connections. If we don’t wipe them out, we’ll never have peace in Cliff City. You get that, right?”
Ji Jue didn’t answer. He felt that his life had probably already been completely changed. Not today, not even this morning, but yesterday afternoon, the mont that old bastard had turned into a monster and ramd him with a tricycle.
He’d only realized it now. The red eyes, hunger, mutations, beasts, blood, organs... These things weren’t quite human or ghost. Once they set their sights on you, there would be no peace ever again. If he didn’t clear away these obstacles, he had no future.
However, since there was a chance...
In that brief daze, Ji Jue looked up at Lu Feng. When they saw the sa calm understanding in each other’s eyes through their masks, it felt like gazing into a mirror.
They had to kill them all. But sothing wasn’t right. Ji Jue hesitated. For a mont, there was a voice in his head, sothing between conscience and weakness. It kept telling him, Don’t do this, Ji Jue. Don’t rush it. Calm down. Killing won’t solve everything. At the very least, you still have to burn the place down.
If machines could talk and tell him the truth, then corpses might have sothing to say to others too. And souls? Did they really exist? Would the dead turn into ghosts? Would they linger?
To be safe, he had to kill them all, drain their spirit matter with the watch, burn the bodies to charcoal, grind them to dust, flush them down the sewer, set a fire and torch the scene. He was going to disperse the crowd, then use gas to blow this cursed nightclub sky-high.
After that, he would wipe every cara along the way. He and Feng could grab a drink sowhere and stir up a little trouble, preferably under the caras at a police station or so gang’s turf, and fake an alibi. Only then could they go ho and sleep in peace, and only then could there be a tomorrow.
However, no matter which path they chose, no matter what they did, there was only one prerequisite. Those monsters had to die, all of them.
“There are fourteen inside. Four in the side room. One at the entrance, one in the car, and one more in the trunk.”
Ji Jue said, “The woman on the left by the door, the one next to her, and the one in the car are all monsters. Hitting the heart won’t work. Even if you blow their heads off, they might still struggle. Can you handle it?”
“Bit of a hassle, but I can try.” Under the mask, Lu Feng bared his teeth, like a beast reduced to a show animal finally sharpening its claws again. He rummaged through the gear in his bag and said, “Pull the switch for in a bit.”
Ji Jue reached out and pressed his hand against the outlet below. “When?”
Lu Feng strapped a well-worn night-vision device onto his face, carefully adjusted the fit, and once it was secure, began counting down. “Five, four, three, two...”
The numbers echoed through the silent and dark stairwell and corridor. They were carried by the blood-scented air, drifting into the distance. A crimson light lit up on the indicator, like a beast awakening.
Eventually, the countdown reached its end.
“One!”
Snap!
Blinding electric sparks burst from the outlet, as if, in a flash, every soul had been thrown into the flas and ignited.
Driven harder than ever before, Ji Jue’s spirit matter surged forward through his fingertips, gone without return. His consciousness tore itself free from his body as it travelled along the circuits into a massive form he was unfamiliar with, filling every nook and cranny.
As though he had expanded into a giant puppeteer, Ji Jue could feel the current racing through countless cables, surging through the enormous building like blood through veins.
The speakers roared, and neon lights flickered. Massive ventilation fans spun silently in the dark. In the machine room, innurable cables crossed and tangled, their data flowing like an ocean.
Then, in an instant, it all vanished. As Ji Jue clenched his fist, the giant’s heartbeat stopped dead.
Boom!
The power equipnt on the rooftop erupted with a thunderous blast, and thick smoke billowed upward. The backup power failed as well, and all music was cut off at once. In the split second of silence, light vanished.
Darkness surged like a tide, swallowing everything.
In the silence, Ji Jue collapsed to the floor, gasping for breath. Sticky nosebleeds spread beneath his mask, and he could not see anything. All he could sense was that, in the faint breeze, the figure beside him was already gone. And amid the growing clamor spreading through the garage, a shriek rang out.
“What the hell is going on?!” Zhu Hong flew into a rage, instinctively turning to the smirking man beside her. In the dimness, she saw that he, too, had frozen in place, his face blank with confusion.
Soone tried to pull out a phone and turn on the flashlight, but just as the phone was raised, the sound of a heavy object hitting the ground rang out.
The only one illuminated was the figure who had just been standing there holding a box. Now, as the box fell, that person collapsed to the ground, with only a torrent of crimson spraying from their neck.
The dying person twitched violently. He reached out, trying to grab the hem of a companion’s pants, but a figure slowly erged from behind the light, like a lurking monster. A dagger slid across the phone holder’s throat, and the pale light was stained red with blood.
The phone fell, swallowed by the growing pool of blood.
“Careful. Sothing’s wrong.”
Those who reacted quickly began to retreat at once. Soone shouted, “Lights! Turn on the lights!!”
The people groping in the dark, feeling along the walls, could not find the switch. Their hands only t a face covered by night‑vision goggles.
Then ca a crack. Soone’s neck was twisted.
In the sudden chaos, the entire underground garage turned into a boiling pot of oil. The stench of blood mixed with sewage, blending with the rotting reek of open drains and making people gag. It was so vivid. Ji Jue could sll it—the scent of death.
Now he finally understood how Lu Feng had managed to slaughter so many people by himself earlier. He had never talked about his specific experiences in the military. Only sotis, while drinking or chatting, he would say that what he did had no conscience, that it was filthy work that gave you nightmares.
This was what that naless airborne battalion had taught him. This was the role he had played while moving through the Middle East. His job was to slaughter. Even a few seconds of darkness, a fleeting mont of chaos, was enough for him to kill all six people along his route. He never even broke stride, nor did he even fire a gun.
Ji Jue couldn’t help nodding. He thought, So damn impressive. The two of us are just slaughtering everyone left and right.
“Car! The car!” soone scread. “Turn on the headlights!!!”
The stunned driver finally seed to react, fumbling as he started the engine. Blinding light burst from the headlights, illuminating a blood‑soaked figure. Standing right in front of the beams, he turned back. The insect‑like night‑vision goggles fixed on the pale face behind the windshield. The pistol ca up, and the trigger was pulled.
Behind the shattered window, a cloud of blood mist erupted. Then, the muzzle was swung around, and the figure pulled the trigger again and again as he aid the gun at those people frantically scrambling toward the door.
“Go get the guns, kill him!” the man beside Zhu Hong roared. From a blind spot near the truck, people imdiately lunged forward.
Lu Feng casually swung the muzzle and pulled the trigger. The bullet flew out, burying itself in the enemy’s chest.
But the opponent began to swell violently.
Like a balloon being inflated, warped flesh grew wildly over bone. In the blink of an eye, the opponent’s flesh returned to normal, and he beca even faster than before. What was aid at him next was the gaping black mouth of a shotgun.
Behind the mask, Lu Feng’s face was expressionless as he pulled the trigger.
The man was blasted backward. Flesh exploded from his chest, exposing shattered bones and organs. A foul stench spread, but once again, he regenerated rapidly and opened his mouth to retch.
Bizarre tentacles stretched out from his mouth, wrapping around the barrel of the gun before tightening their grip. Lu Feng kept pulling the trigger until the man on the ground was reduced to a lump of pulp.
Only then did he sense the chill at his back. Behind him, in the shadow of the truck bed, soone had crawled out on all fours like a rabid dog. Their speed was unbelievable as they ricocheted between wall and ceiling, seizing the perfect mont. Sharp canine teeth spread wide, snapping toward his neck.
Bang!
A dull blast erupted, and a spray of blood burst from that twisted face. The left eye exploded as the bullet punched through. Then, in that fleeting instant, the right eye burst as well.
In less than a heartbeat, three shots happened in very quick succession. What they finally tore free was the monster’s skull, and blood splashed everywhere.
The deford corpse fell down.
A sniper? No...
From the surge of icy dread, Lu Feng suppressed the urge to roll away and look for cover, snapping his head up toward the direction the bullets had co from. What he saw was an utterly unexpected figure.
Ji Jue!
At the stairwell exit, the young man hidden in a dark corner had sohow already raised his weapon. Without the slightest hesitation, he pulled the trigger.
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