Chapter 171
Chapter 171
“Am I going to die?”
A piercing explosion rang in Wu Wujie’s ears, and his world seemed to freeze. Every sound vanished except for a maddening buzz that felt as though it would bore straight through his brain.
Then the world spun around him. His stomach churned violently, as if his entire body had been thrown into a washing machine.
Wu Wujie’s massive frame slammed heavily into the ground, but he wasn’t dead yet. He could clearly feel his skin and flesh melting like wax beneath scorching heat, his entire face convulsing violently. He tried to get up, but his limbs felt as though their strings had been cut. They wouldn’t obey him at all.
No… I can’t go down here…
Through his muffled hearing, he caught the pitch-black Madman’s shrill, deranged laughter. Then a shadow blotted out his vision.
Two figures stepped in front of him, shielding him.
“Rat-tat-tat!”
An Xiaolin yanked the charging handle and unleashed a merciless barrage. The pitch-black Madman tried to raise its pistol, but the hail of bullets sent it crumpling limply to the ground.
“Watch out!”
Ye Que tackled An Xiaolin to the ground. A stray bullet came flying from the right, ripping through An Xiaolin’s pant leg and grazing her calf, leaving a bloody gash.
The thunderous roar of engines rose from below the nearby slope. Four or five motorcycles came into view, their riders’ faces twisted with bloodthirsty frenzy.
One motorcycle charged straight up the slope, bearing down on them from above.
“Get lost!”
The corner of An Xiaolin’s mouth twitched uncontrollably. She tore herself free of Ye Que’s tight embrace, her one remaining eye narrowing to a pinpoint as she aimed at the rider about to run them over.
At the same time, two more motorcycles came charging at them.
After being shoved aside, Ye Que found herself braced against Wu Wujie. On one side was a companion whose survival remained uncertain. On the other was death closing in around them.
Usually a woman of few words, she now erupted with astonishing strength. Shielding Wu Wujie with her body, she leveled her gun at the other Madmen charging toward An Xiaolin.
Bang!
At such close range, she killed one with a single shot.
Veins bulged across her forehead as she slowly forced out a name. “Qingshui…”
“Qingshui-aaaaaah!”
Her eyes bulged from their sockets. The whites nearly swallowed her pupils, and countless blood vessels spread across them as if her eyeballs were about to burst.
You fucking bastard, come baaaaack!
“I’m here.”
The reply was impossibly soft.
Then a gunshot tore through the night.
Bang! Bang!
The bullets struck with deadly precision, blasting apart the heads of the Madmen hurtling toward them.
Ye Que lowered her gun and whipped around. Without caring whether the Madmen behind her might shoot her, she pulled gauze from her backpack and began bandaging Wu Wujie.
Gunshots rang out one after another. Her hands trembled violently, yet she wrapped the gauze around him in steady, even layers.
Behind her, An Xiaolin lowered her gun and looked toward a corner. Qingshui cautiously poked her head out from behind cover, then sprinted over and landed beside them with a great leap.
“Move!”
Ye Que and An Xiaolin immediately hauled Wu Wujie up, and the group hurried forward. Wu Wujie’s face was deathly pale, his entire body shaking like a leaf, but he gritted his teeth and made no sound.
They had to change positions!
Qingshui took the lead, her heart pounding violently against her ribs. She knew they were surrounded. But she couldn’t show fear. She couldn’t give up even the faintest hope of survival.
Not even in a hopeless situation.
Not even–
Her expression froze the next second.
Below the valley stretched a flat, nearly endless expanse of snow. The valley on the other side seemed as distant as heaven itself-visible, yet utterly beyond reach.
She slowly raised her binoculars. Through the lenses, she saw vehicles stationed across the snowfield, blocking every direction. Drones were also steadily closing in, circling like vultures.
She stared at the snowfield, her mind racing.
The straight-line distance from the mountaintop to the valley opposite them was less than two kilometers. But the snowfield was wide open, without any cover. There were four of them, and one was wounded. They couldn’t outrun vehicles. If the Madmen pursued them by car, they would never make it across. A dead end.
The pit wouldn’t conceal them for long. With drones overhead, vehicles below, and Madmen bound to search their way up sooner or later, they couldn’t stay here either. They were running low on ammunition. They wouldn’t survive another wave. Another dead end.
They had no terrain advantage and no heavy weapons. Fighting head-on would be suicide. Yet another dead end.
She opened her eyes and gazed out over the snowfield.
Three paths. Every one of them a dead end.
Then she thought of a fourth.
So this was as far as they would make it?
Qingshui’s heart was as still as stagnant water. Calmly, she swept her gaze around them before finally fixing on a hollow farther down.
“There!” She slid down quickly and urged the others onward in a low voice.
The three behind her struggled to follow. Ye Que crawled into the hollow first, with Wu Wujie close behind. An Xiaolin and Qingshui slipped in last.
The dense forest above them drooped under the weight of its branches. Leaves and limbs laden with lingering snow intertwined overhead, perfectly concealing them from view.
Expressionless, Qingshui began rapidly reloading her magazines. As she fed in the rounds, she asked Wu Wujie, “How are you?”
“Dizzy,” Wu Wujie whispered. He wasn’t dead, but one of his ears had been blown off along with his helmet, completely destroying his sense of balance. The world still looked tilted to him.
For a moment, the four of them fell silent.
Yet there wasn’t much despair on their faces, only an almost numb calm. They looked as though they were simply taking a break instead of waiting to die.
They had tried so hard. So incredibly hard to survive in this hellish world.
Looking at their exhausted faces, Qingshui suddenly felt she should say something to keep them from breaking down too soon.
She lifted the corners of her lips in a slightly stiff smile. “Don’t be so pessimistic. Maybe the Madmen down there will kill each other. Maybe we’ll survive again.”
An Xiaolin, Wu Wujie, and Ye Que all froze.
Those words sounded nothing like Qingshui. If anything, they sounded more like something…
Chen Yuhui, Chu Jingchu, or Xu Wenlie would say.
Ye Que smiled too. Her huge eyes narrowed into slits, her lips pressed tightly together. She looked a lot like An Xiaolin, with the same youthful features, but her brows and eyes had a more valiant air. When she smiled, she looked spirited and fearless.
“We’ll hide,” she said with a smile. “Then they… won’t be able to find us.”
But An Xiaolin heard the tremor she was desperately suppressing. She didn’t care about that at all.
“So what are you planning to do?”
She looked at Qingshui. Everything about her-the look in her eyes, the air around her-conveyed the same message.
She was going to her death.
Qingshui secured every weapon on her body and finished loading each one. Then she raised her head and smiled.
“I’ll draw them away.”
At last, this wasn’t a situation she had been forced into. This time, it was her choice.
An Xiaolin’s eyes began to tremble violently. She seized Qingshui’s hand, her nails digging deep into the flesh. Her voice shook, but there was madness in her eyes.
“Don’t you dare die. If you die, where am I supposed to find you? You promised me.”
“If you dare die, I’ll–”
Before she could finish, Qingshui pressed a finger to her lips.
“I want all of you to live.”
More than she wanted to live herself.
An Xiaolin’s lips trembled.
“Xiaolin. No matter what you see me as or what you think I am, I know that as long as you keep the desires in your heart under control, you’ll always be the same An Xiaolin.” Qingshui paused, as if making sure she was listening.
“The incredible An Xiaolin has never changed. She never has.”
She reached out, gave An Xiaolin’s fingers a brief squeeze, then let go.
“And you know about my…”
Please live on, and take my secret with you.
Wu Wujie lay on the ground, his lips moving. His voice was so weak it was almost inaudible. “I’ll… go… You stay… You’re strong…”
Qingshui said nothing.
At that instant, Ye Que suddenly lunged toward the opening, but Qingshui reacted in a flash and caught her by the collar.
Ye Que stared at her with eyes stretched wide, as if she were looking at a lunatic. “Don’t order me around–”
Qingshui merely said, “Xiaolin.”
An Xiaolin abruptly reached out and pinned both of them down. Her expression was hidden in shadow. She didn’t look at Qingshui, only lowered her head as if making some kind of decision.
“Hey!”
Ye Que was dumbfounded. She tried to struggle, but she couldn’t break free of An Xiaolin’s nearly suffocating hold.
Then Qingshui gave them one last, lingering look and climbed out of the hollow.
Wind and snow struck her full in the face.
She gazed into the distance and thought of so many people. Wei’an. Yuhui. Wen Lianfeng. Chu Jingchu…
And at last, she thought:
So choosing to die could feel this easy.