Chapter 103
Chapter 103
In the dimly lit fire escape stairwell, Zhang Lang, who had been hunched over and cowering like a good-for-nothing moments ago, slowly straightened his back.
He was tall to begin with. It was only his habit of shrinking his presence that made him look so timid and furtive.
But the instant he took off his trench coat, his entire body seemed to unfold.
As the right side of his body underwent Monstrous Beast transformation, he rapidly shot up in height.
The right half of his body, now covered in bone-like armor, grew fine, granular scales, and fuzzy gray fur sprouted swiftly between them.
At the same time, Zhang Lang’s upper and lower jawbones thrust outward and sharpened. In the blink of an eye, they had turned into a falcon-like beak.
The transformation sounded lengthy when described, but in truth, it happened in the blink of an eye.
The Feile hound Zhang Lang had flung away slammed heavily into the wall and slowly slid down.
Even with its powerful muscles, one of its paws had still snapped.
But this kind of fighting dog, trained specifically to kill, had a very low sensitivity to pain. It staggered up from the ground and, dragging its injured leg, lunged at Zhang Lang again.
Huang Zezhong’s scream echoed through the fire escape stairwell.
Only this time, the thing he was afraid of had become Zhang Lang.
Lin Yicheng’s face had also gone deathly pale. With his back pressed against the fire door, he blurted, “What the hell is that?”
For a pampered young master like him, seeing a man transform alive was a bit too stimulating.
In his terror, all the strength went out of his body.
Yin Minmin, who was doing everything she could to brace the door, could not afford to care about anything else anymore. She lifted her foot and kicked Lin Yicheng.
“No matter how scary he is, he’s on our side. If the dogs inside get out, we’re finished.”
Lin Yicheng may or may not have taken it in, but he pressed himself against the fire door again, stopping the dogs crashing into it from getting through.
As for Huang Zezhong, while he was still howling at the top of his lungs, Qin Ying slapped him across the mouth.
“Shut up, or I’ll leave you here.”
Qin Ying was not saying it out of anger. That really was the dark plan forming in her heart.
Huang Zezhong was no good thing. If necessary, using him as a sacrifice to cover their backs would be more than appropriate-that was Qin Ying’s line of thought.
On the other side, Zhang Lang seized the Feile hound as it lunged to bite him.
Only, compared to the life-or-death danger of the previous exchange, the situation had now completely reversed.
The Feile hound’s thick, muscular neck was clamped in Zhang Lang’s mutated hand.
The Feile hound lowered its head, its sharp teeth biting down on the granular scales on the back of Zhang Lang’s hand, producing a nerve-grating creak that made one’s teeth ache.
Bare-handed, Zhang Lang gripped the Feile hound’s neck and twisted. With a crisp crack, it went utterly still.
Zhang Lang set the dog’s corpse on the ground, then instinctively raised a hand to hide his abnormal face.
But Qin Ying patted his arm and praised him, “Nice work.”
Then she asked seriously, “Can you beat the one upstairs with the single horn?”
Zhang Lang covered his face with his hand and shook his head honestly. “No.”
The Monstrous Beast genes fused into that one-horned dog were of a very high rank, and its degree of fusion was also extremely high.
Meanwhile, the Monstrous Beast Zhang Lang had fused with was an armadillo. It had a keen sense of smell and was good at digging holes, but it had not been born for combat.
After hearing his answer, Qin Ying could not really say she was disappointed. She only said, “It’s fine. We’ll go down one floor.”
Of course, before going down one floor, they first had to make sure this floor’s door was shut tight.
Lin Yicheng and Yin Minmin were already exhausted. It was obvious they were about to lose their hold.
Zhang Lang walked over to help.
The door that Lin Yicheng and Yin Minmin could barely hold shut together was pinned in place by Zhang Lang with just one hand.
Outside the door, the Fierce Hound sniffed and snuffled near the bottom of the door, letting out one low growl after another.
But unexpectedly, when Zhang Lang pressed one hand against the door, the Fierce Hound that had been constantly ramming it with its head actually whimpered and backed away.
Taking advantage of the opening, Qin Ying looked around and spotted a fire equipment cabinet in the corner.
She hurried over and pressed the handle twice, only to find it jammed tight.
Who knew if this dump had ever passed a fire safety inspection.
Qin Ying turned and shot Huang Zezhong a glare, then bent her elbow and slammed it into the glass cabinet door.
It had been a long time since she’d trained. The blow made her elbow throb with pain, but all it did was crack the glass in a spiderweb pattern.
Qin Ying had no choice but to keep at it. After several more strikes, she finally smashed the glass on the fire equipment cabinet.
Inside were a fire axe, a fire hose, two gas masks, and a roll of escape rope.
Qin Ying took them all, whether they would be useful or not.
The fire hose was just right for tying the two handles of the fire door together and sealing it shut, in case the fighting dogs kept on this floor got out.
Zhang Lang had just finished knotting the fire hose when, suddenly, a tremendous impact came from the fire door upstairs.
Everyone’s heartbeat stopped for half a beat.
Qin Ying reacted instantly, grabbing Huang Zezhong by the back of the neck and choking the cry he was about to let out right back down his throat.
The door only sounded that once, then fell silent.
But Qin Ying knew they would never get off that easily.
After giving Zhang Lang, Lin Yicheng, and the others a look, Qin Ying handed the fire rope to Lin Yicheng and shoved the gas masks into Yin Minmin’s arms.
She herself picked up the fire axe and motioned for them to head down.
Zhang Lang took the lead as usual. Before going downstairs, he picked up the Black Trench Coat from the floor, along with the trembling mother dog inside it.
He bundled them up and hung the bundle against his chest.
Yin Minmin might have been timid, but at critical moments, she was a hundred times better than Huang Zezhong.
The group moved silently toward the fourth basement level.
Huang Zezhong’s hands and feet had gone weak, and he fell to the very back.
Yin Minmin was about to help him, but Qin Ying turned back and shook her head at her.
In a dangerous moment, taking care of yourself was enough.
When everyone was facing the same danger, there was no need to waste energy and drag yourself down for someone who couldn’t stand up and didn’t know how to save himself.
Only then did Yin Minmin draw her hand back.
Just as Qin Ying and the others reached the fourth basement level, another thunderous bang came from upstairs.
Accompanied by the scalp-prickling sound of metal twisting, Qin Ying could almost picture the fire door warping under the impact of that cold, gleaming horn.
The instant they entered the fourth level and shut the fire door behind them, the massive impact sounded again.
The door above wouldn’t hold for long. It was only a matter of time before it was smashed open.
“Move things over and block the door!”
At Qin Ying’s command, Lin Yicheng stepped forward and used the fire rope to lash the fire door shut from the inside.
The kid had clearly done plenty of extreme sports; his knot-tying speed was first-rate.
Zhang Lang dragged over a number of empty iron cages and piled them in front of the door.
At their movements, the dogs locked up around them all began barking wildly.
Fortunately, most of the dogs here were kept in iron cages and were old, weak, sick, or disabled. There was no repeat of the attack from the floor above.
After they had blocked the door up tight, Qin Ying asked Huang Zezhong, “Isn’t there an iron door on this floor that leads to the karst cave?”
Huang Zezhong stared blankly with his mouth open.
After everything that had happened, he looked as if he’d been fished out of water. Panic had scattered his wits, leaving his mind completely blank.
Seeing him like this, Qin Ying’s intolerance for stupidity flared up. She slapped him twice across the face. “Answer me!”
Huang Zezhong saw stars from the blows. Only then did he say, “I don’t know. You’d have to ask the people on this floor.”
“They usually rest in the office beside the Incinerator.”
Qin Ying looked in the direction he indicated.
Just then, the lights overhead abruptly went out.
Everything before their eyes went black, and they were plunged completely into darkness.