Chapter 15
Chapter 15
He hadn’t left himself a single fallback.
Zhao Xiuming used the key to open the final door and stepped onto the rooftop in the dark.
The wind howled toward him. He narrowed his eyes.
It felt so pleasant that he couldn’t help growing a little sleepy.
After a yawn, he ambled along.
Behind him, the sound-activated light abruptly shattered. Something followed through the darkness with a soft rustling.
An unknown black, funguslike substance covered the walls, forming a carpet for the main body to move across.
That body consisted of silent lumps of flesh, which made sticky sounds as they rolled.
Around its edges, countless fine filaments like insect feelers dug into the ground.
Within the flesh, innumerable tendrils tangled together, some binding the heads, others burrowing into their flesh. Only the faces remained intact.
The three faces held high above it were animated, their eyebrows raised, their narrowed eyes now wide. Their eyeballs darted wildly inside their sockets, rolling back and forth.
A closer look revealed fragments of limbs and organs mixed into the mass, trying to form a new human body under the feelers’ direction.
Where its “hand” should have been, the feelers held a white shirt: Assistant Li’s.
The monster filled the entire stairwell. Its three faces drew closer and closer to Zhao Xiuming. “You smell so good…”
“Brother, you… smell so good…”
Zhao Xiuming loosened his limbs and dodged the instant the monster crashed toward him.
He wasn’t delicately built, yet his movements were light, seemingly careless and utterly precise.
He always found a gap between the feelers, always slipped clear of the snapping mouths.
No weapon. An ordinary human body.
However nimble he was, he couldn’t withstand that all-encompassing strangling net forever. Besides, the monster wasn’t relying on physical stamina.
Within a few breaths, foul-smelling blood stained his white uniform.
He sprang onto the rooftop parapet. Flesh squirmed toward him from ahead and all around. Suddenly, the three heads leaped free of the feelers.
They burst open in midair. Feelers sprouted where their faces met their ears, making them resemble crawling insects. Mouths open, they lunged for Zhao Xiuming’s face.
His expression grew peculiar. For the first time, he didn’t dodge. He reached out and slapped one of the faces.
After the exceptionally loud smack, the head flew away, its feelers shooting outward.
A dozen or so feelers along its cheeks seized his arm and pulled the head back like a slingshot. It opened its mouth to bite.
He couldn’t shake it off. Its teeth sank into his wrist, and he hissed in pain.
At the same time, he leaped at an almost unbelievable angle, avoiding the mass of flesh hurtling toward him. His waist bent at an astonishing angle.
The System sounded a little helpless. [What were you thinking just now?]
Zhao Xiuming wasn’t remotely embarrassed. [Don’t tell me you didn’t think it, too.]
The System’s boyish voice grew serious. [I did.]
[I’ll transfer you some points. Buy an item.]
Zhao Xiuming looked down at the head hanging from his right hand and met the bodyguard’s eyes.
He could feel the feelers threading through his flesh. His entire right hand was numb and swollen, darkened veins showing beneath the fair skin.
He smiled, as though he’d seen something interesting.
He started running. With another evasive movement, he landed on the parapet at the rooftop’s edge again.
It was dangerous, deliberately putting himself in a position with nowhere left to dodge.
The three-headed monster believed victory was certain. Its two other detached heads scuttled along the wall like insects.
The huge mass of flesh let out a joyful whale-like call and surged around him, trying to swallow him whole.
Delight filled Zhao Xiuming’s mind. He smiled at the head on his right hand. “You know what? Ha-ha. My Mermaid Princess will be here to save me soon.”
He let himself fall back, dropping over the edge.
To the monster, it looked like suicide after giving up the fight.
For Zhao Xiuming, falling was a thrill. The descent would take only a dozen seconds or so.
It was too fleeting to feel very much.
He only knew it felt incredible.
Inky darkness filled his eyes. The space before him burst like fireworks, silver splitting apart. A figure appeared in the light: someone in dark glasses, falling alongside him.
Before he could react, he heard something shatter beside his ear.
A deafening crash rang out, accompanied by the three-headed monster’s roar.
Zhao Xiuming felt no pain. He clutched his head because he was dizzy.
The biker in black riding gear stood on the ground, the pavement shattered beneath his feet.
The tall man’s face was hidden, but his arms were exceptionally strong.
His powerfully built legs remained bent. Only as the dust cleared did he straighten.
The cold dark glasses and mechanical-looking helmet made him seem hard and unapproachable.
Yet this very man held a certain reckless “doctor” cradled in his arms.
Zhao Xiuming wasn’t short, but the difference in their builds made even him look slender.
He pressed his head against the biker’s shoulder in distress, then abruptly covered his mouth with his left hand. “Going to throw up.”
“Ha.” He drew a breath, lifted his head, and hooked his left arm around the biker’s neck.
His long, defined fingers trembled slightly. “Hi, Mermaid Princess.”
The biker’s displeasure was unmistakable. Zhao Xiuming seemed unable to sense it.
He laughed with genuine delight. “Ha-ha-ha-ha!”
Suddenly, he closed his hand against the biker’s neck and let his smile fade.
Slipping his fingers beneath the man’s mask, he brushed his Adam’s apple and asked slowly, “Angry? Really angry?”
“Why?”
“What right do you have to be angry with me?”
“Why don’t you kill me?”
Even the biker’s breathing stopped for an instant. Zhao Xiuming’s words were provocative, but there wasn’t a trace of emotion in his eyes.
The biker shook his head, then set him down.
He took Zhao Xiuming’s right arm and examined the head attached to it.
The bodyguard’s eyeballs rolled wildly. The feelers spread rapidly, intent on eating as much as they could.
The biker pushed his gloved fingers into the bodyguard’s eye sockets, then suddenly paused.
He gently bumped his helmeted head against Zhao Xiuming. The instant Zhao Xiuming looked up, he tightened his fingers, crushed the anomaly’s head apart, and threw it away.
The little bump had only been a distraction. He hadn’t wanted Zhao Xiuming to see.
The remaining feelers wouldn’t be so easy to deal with. Just as the biker took out a healing item to treat him,
Zhao Xiuming spoke leisurely. “Don’t.”
“I want to keep them. They’ll be useful.”
If he was playing an anomaly NPC, he ought to show a little dedication. He wasn’t afraid of being contaminated at all.
Or rather, he wanted to know what becoming an anomaly felt like. “Would it be like schizophrenia? Or would another consciousness try to take my body? Or would my own consciousness change?”
“But I already have a System in my head. If I get contaminated, will he get contaminated, too?”
Tilting his head, Zhao Xiuming moved his right hand. There was only pain. He hadn’t lost control of it.
He really did look like an anomaly now: a bloodstained white coat, a right hand wrapped in feelers, reckless behavior, and inexplicable remarks.
The biker tucked the medicine he’d purchased into Zhao Xiuming’s pocket. His fingers moved inside, then brought out several hidden pieces of dried meat.
Zhao Xiuming lowered his head and bit into them, taking the meat into his mouth.
Cheeks bulging, he asked, “Are you a widow?”
The biker held the dried meat up for him to eat and shook his head.
Zhao Xiuming tried again. “All right, then. You’re not human.”
“From now on, you’re a little girl.”
“Give yourself a name. I can’t really keep calling you Mermaid Princess.”
The System’s clear voice sounded in his head, playful and curious. [Mermaid Princess?]
Zhao Xiuming explained, [He saved my life.]
[He can’t speak.]
[Maybe he traded his voice for a chance to see me.]
[Just like… you, System.]
Unable to reveal too much, only offering covert hints.
Appearing out of nowhere, drawing people into bizarre stories.
Nudging fate. Guiding them toward the truth.
Mysterious, and asking for a punch.