Chapter 198
Chapter 198
In the darkness, Yin Minmin’s eyes snapped open, her pupils contracting to pinpricks.
Her sudden, corpse-like awakening was terrifying in the tunnel refuge, a place that had not seen daylight in years.
Qin Ying leaned back warily. Feng Meiyu, who had been holding up a scrap of cloth to cover Yin Minmin, shrieked and dropped it in fright.
Black Seven and his men had just leaned against the wall to catch their breath. The commotion made them jump.
When they turned and saw what was happening, they immediately went on guard.
Black Seven yanked the gun from his pocket and blurted, “I knew anyone who could survive something like that couldn’t be normal.”
As he spoke, Yin Minmin rose like a Wooden Puppet jerked upright by its strings.
Beneath her open hiking jacket, the brilliant red, machine-embroidered dragon-and-phoenix wedding jacket, a product of twenty-first-century industry, was revealed.
This time, not only Black Seven and his men, but even Zhao Jixian and Feng Meiyu were badly startled.
Black Seven’s hand began trembling like a leaf. Qin Ying barked, “Put the gun down!”
Judging by Zhang Yuqin’s condition, Qin Ying knew Yin Minmin had merely fallen under an evil influence after coming into contact with the Yellow Springs Eye Stone.
She could stand by and let Zhang Yuqin suffer the consequences of her own actions, but she would not allow Black Seven to hurt Yin Minmin.
Sensing her intent, Di Shang, who utterly detested the smell of rust, was forced to wriggle silently over her arm.
“My colleague was ambushed during a mission. Put the gun down.”
Black Seven snorted. “That’s just your word. What proof do you have?”
“There are so many of us here. You can’t expect us to risk our safety just because you say so.”
“You owe us an explanation.”
Black Seven was a street thug through and through. Rallying others to his side came as naturally as breathing.
He was trying to use everyone’s safety as leverage.
Licking his lips, he made an outrageous demand. “Unless you tell that little bird to protect us for now.”
The men behind him instantly took the hint and voiced their agreement.
Even the one who was so badly wounded he was on the verge of death twitched twice at just the right moment.
Amid the clamoring and troublemaking of the seven or eight thugs, Qin Ying suddenly relaxed her tightly furrowed brow.
In an amiable tone, she asked, “Any other demands?”
Zhao Jixian, who had been about to mediate, glanced between them. Sensing something was wrong, he quietly backed away.
Black Seven could not tell whether she was serious, so he tested her further. “And whatever’s in that bag of yours. Let me take a look.”
He studied Qin Ying’s jade-pale face beneath the light and broke into a grin.
Before he could voice his third demand, the smile vanished from Qin Ying’s face.
A murderous glint flickered in her luminous eyes, and the tiny vermilion mole at the corner of her eye looked red enough to drip blood.
Black Seven sensed danger. Instinctively, he raised his hand and pulled the trigger.
His shoddy, crooked-handled pistol usually jammed, but perhaps his lucky stars were shining today, because a bullet actually fired.
Qin Ying grabbed Yin Minmin with one hand and Feng Meiyu with the other. “Thunderbird.”
Whenever Qin Ying held the greater force, she never bothered preaching fairness to unreasonable people.
The moment the gunshot rang out, a streak of lightning shot forward.
But something else arrived before Thunderbird: a ricocheting bullet.
The bullet fired from Fatty Black Seven’s homemade pistol missed Qin Ying and struck the concrete wall of the tunnel refuge instead.
It then bounced back at an uncanny angle.
With his astonishing luck, Fatty Black Seven managed, against odds comparable to winning the lottery, to catch his own bullet squarely between the eyebrows.
There was a muffled splat.
Half of his hair-covered occipital bone went flying through the air. Fatty Black Seven collapsed with an astonished expression still plastered across his face and twitched twice.
The turn of events was so sudden that even Thunderbird faltered in midair for a moment before plunging into the mob of thugs.
Lightning flashed several times. When it faded, people lay strewn across the tunnel refuge alongside two corpses.
When the sudden calamity struck, it was as if the Soul-Reaping Emissary had paid a visit to the tunnel refuge alcove.
The badly wounded thug gave one last kick, his black cloth shoe scuffing a streak through the dust, and then he croaked.
Still shaken, Qin Ying rubbed her ears, which ached from the gunshot.
The sight of Black Seven’s corpse on the ground made her nauseous for a moment, but she quickly pulled herself together and regained her composure.
Feng Meiyu climbed to her feet, trembling with fear. Even now, she still had a death grip on the bamboo basket of edamame.
The stench of blood filled the entire alcove. Qin Ying had a vague sense that something was wrong and was about to find something to block the entrance.
Then, with a wet splat, something like a blob of jelly fell from the ceiling.
Electricity flashed across the Thunderbird, charring the fallen object halfway.
The rich aroma of roasted meat spread through the air.
A scorched Human-Faced Flesh Mass lay on the ground.
It had barely landed when countless Human-Faced Flesh Mass creatures began raining down from the ceiling one after another.
As they gathered together, their vaguely human faces looked unspeakably sinister.
They swarmed toward the corpses on the ground and the gang of thugs who had been shocked unconscious.
They piled up in heaps, forming hills of flesh over the bodies. What happened to the people trapped underneath went without saying.
The creatures were wary of the Xuncao Flower Water, so they did not approach Qin Ying’s group.
Even so, this place could no longer be considered safe.
Afraid that more and more of the creatures would squeeze in through the ventilation ducts, Qin Ying ordered, “Let’s go!”
With that, she grabbed Yin Minmin by the wrist, picked up the kerosene lamp, and left first.
Zhao Jixian hurriedly called to the stunned Feng Meiyu, “What are you staring at? Hurry and follow them.”
At least he had enough conscience to let Feng Meiyu go first.
But just as Zhao Jixian was about to bring his trailing foot out of the alcove, he stumbled and fell.
He looked down along his trouser leg and saw a pitch-black Shadowy Figure gripping his ankle.
Its short, stout build made it obvious that it was Fatty, Black Seven.
Zhao Jixian screamed repeatedly and kicked with all his might, but he could not shake it off.
Just as despair took hold, Qin Ying reached over, seized the coal shovel whose edge had been honed sharp from use, and swung it down.
A sharp sound rang out, and the Shadowy Figure recoiled into the darkness.
As Qin Ying helped Zhao Jixian up, Feng Meiyu shouted from ahead, “Big Sister, your colleague is leaving!”
Qin Ying looked over and saw Yin Minmin tiptoeing forward like a sleepwalker.
She had already gone some distance and was about to disappear into the darkness.
With no time to worry about anything else, Qin Ying hauled Zhao Jixian to his feet and hurried after Yin Minmin.
At this point, Zhao Jixian would have had to get up even if his leg were broken.
He limped after them, staggering with every step.
Qin Ying caught the ghostlike Yin Minmin. Gritting her teeth, she raised her arm and slapped her across the face.
The crisp smack echoed through the tunnel.
Yin Minmin’s eyelashes fluttered, but she did not wake.
Qin Ying slapped her again.
After the second slap, Yin Minmin went limp like a strand of cooked noodles and slid down the wall.
The black markings covering her face faded by roughly a third.
Qin Ying thought ruefully that if she had known this would work, she would have started slapping her much sooner.
Leaning against the wall, Yin Minmin made a faint, breathy sound.
Qin Ying took out her water bottle and gave her a little water.
Only then did Yin Minmin’s eyelashes tremble, and she slowly opened her eyes.
The first thing she did was call out, “Zhang Lang.”
Then she saw Qin Ying’s face and burst into tears.
“Sister Ying, I finally made it out.”
But as soon as the words left her mouth, she seemed to realize that the lighting was wrong.
Yin Minmin looked around. When she saw that she was still inside the tunnel, despair filled her face.
“How can this be?”
“Why am I still here?”
“Does this mean the others can’t get out?”