The buildings on either side of the villa district’s main gate, once security rooms, had been repaired along with the gate itself and turned into safe shelters. But now, both the gate and the walls of the buildings had been blasted open by grenades. Refugees inside were either injured by the explosion and lay moaning or, unable to put on their protective gear in time, were choking and coughing violently from inhaling the dense acidic gas in the air.
The explosion had woken the refugees in the nearby villas. Some cowered inside, trembling as they watched the intruders, while others hastily donned protective gear and grabbed weapons, intending to help. However, upon seeing the intruders’ equipment, those who had just stepped out froze.
The attackers had arrived in two armored vehicles, their exteriors painted to match the nanoceramic alloy, resembling mobile anti-acid rain fortresses.
The sunroof of the lead vehicle opened, and a man wearing protective gear but no face mask fired a few rounds into the air with a smug grin.
Some of the would-be rescuers, doubting what they saw, removed their face masks, only to start coughing violently as the acidic air burned their throats. But in the firelight, they got a clearer view: the man was indeed not wearing a face mask, yet showed no signs of discomfort, as if his body had completely adapted to the toxic, acidic atmosphere.
The man tapped the roof of the vehicle with a laugh, and the armored car rolled over the broken gate, entering the villa district.
The vehicles stopped, and seven or eight men climbed out—entirely male, and like the man on the car roof, none wore face masks. All were bald and carried firearms.
One of them, a thin man with a gaunt, sallow face and sunken cheeks, stood out. Wearing only a long white robe over loose white pants—something that resembled hospital scrubs—he didn’t even have protective clothing. His skeletal fingers, blackened and thin like withered branches, held a gun.
The thin man motioned, and another bald man in protective gear dragged over a woman who had managed only to put on her protective suit but not her face mask.
As she struggled, the bald man grinned, stroking her face. “Pretty, aren’t you? And this smooth skin—must mean she has clean water to use every day.”
The woman trembled, trying to cover her mouth and nose with her gloved hands to block the toxic air, but it was useless. With a recent acid rain downpour lasting ten minutes, the acidic gases in the air were at a peak.
The burning sensation wasn’t limited to her lungs; her eyes and face stung intensely. She wasn’t afraid of death, but she dreaded being disfigured or left half-dead.
In a place with scarce medical supplies, injuries to the eyes or internal organs from such corrosion were untreatable, leaving victims to suffer in prolonged agony.
“You’re scaring her,” the thin man spoke, his voice unexpectedly young, even carrying a touch of refined gentleness. “Don’t worry. I only want to ask you a few questions.”
He squatted before her, a smile on his lips, speaking kindly but completely ignoring her pain.
“When did you come here to take shelter?” he asked, raising his gun and pointing it at her mouth.
The woman stared at the dark barrel, too terrified not to answer. “Ten…
cough, cough,
ten days ago…
cough, cough,
” she rasped painfully.
“How are things here? Tell me in detail.”
“We have water and electricity…
cough, cough,
but not much food left. We’re…
cough, cough,
just refugees, we don’t have anything. The people in the upper villas…
cough,
they’re the original owners, they have more food.”
Her breath came in ragged gasps, and her coughing was relentless, but she managed to convey the situation clearly.
The thin man seemed satisfied, his smile widening. “Very detailed. And very clever of you to shift the focus.”
Her heart pounded with fear. Her throat and lungs felt scorched, yet she dared not move.
Those who managed to survive in these dire conditions and settle in this refuge were no fools. Although the thin man spoke politely, she sensed an instinctual dread. This person was far more terrifying than the man who had dragged her over.
Nearby, refugees with combat abilities had come out of their villas. Most of the people living nearby were outsiders. In the past, they had clashed multiple times with the villa district owners over resources, motivated by self-interest rather than pure malice. Now, they had managed to maintain a fragile balance with the owners, primarily due to the force exerted by Yu Xi and Lin Wu.
Before tonight, these people had been labeled by the villa owners as villains, robbers, and rioters. They didn’t care—in fact, some of them took pride in these labels. In the chaos of Fan City, where strength ruled, being a villain or a robber was better than waiting helplessly to die in a crumbling house.
To survive, one had to fight and seize.
But in five minutes, they would witness what real villains, robbers, and rioters looked like—acts that bordered on demonic cruelty.
The thin man had already noticed the people observing from around the area, but he paid no mind. He lifted the woman’s chin gently with his gun and spoke again, “One last question. Listen carefully and answer well.”
The woman, tense, murmured a quick response, too afraid to meet his gaze. His gaunt, sallow face, twisted with that eerie smile, was more terrifying than any zombie or skeleton. She feared that if she looked at him, she wouldn’t be able to utter a single word.
“Tell me, is there a woman here named Bai Yu?”
“Are you talking about a very young, beautiful female college student named Bai Yu?”
“Mmm.” He hummed in gentle affirmation.
“We call her Sister Yu. She lives in Villa 35, higher up. She’s close with the leader of one of the refugee groups here. That group arrived early and secured some of the better villas.” As she spoke, she heard the man in front of her chuckle softly.
“No matter where she is or what the circumstances, she always knows how to live well.” His voice, though soft and laced with laughter, held a chill that felt like a cold, unrelenting wind.
Sensing the danger, the woman instinctively struggled to escape, but it was too late. The man pressed her head down, forcing her face onto the dark, sticky ground.
The acid rain, left undiluted, had made the air highly acidic, and the ground even more so, with a corrosiveness far surpassing that of the air.
She felt her face begin to burn, a searing pain as the skin sizzled. She could even hear the flesh crackling.
Her agonized screams filled the air, while, at the same time, the thin man’s companions dragged people from the shattered buildings, tearing off their protective gear and pressing their bare faces, hands, and bodies against the acid-soaked ground, laughing as they watched them writhe and scream.
The observers in nearby villas were horrified by the sight. Some felt a surge of anger and rushed forward to help, while others instinctively stepped back.
The intruders had acid-proof armored vehicles, firearms, an uncanny immunity to acidic gases, and a level of brutality beyond what the locals could handle.
Predictably, those who attempted to intervene were quickly overpowered. The intruders didn’t kill them but stripped off their protective suits and forced them down onto the acidic ground, laughing at their screams of pain. The gruesome display brought others who were coming down from the upper villa area to an abrupt halt.
One of the bald men, surrounded by several adults, dragged out a child—a boy around five or six. The child had been fiercely protected until then, wearing full protective gear. Inside his mask, his terrified eyes stared at his captor as he began crying for his mother.
“My child, my child!” A woman without a mask rushed forward, but the thin man intercepted her. Still smiling, he made a shushing gesture and pressed her down with his foot.
Suddenly, without warning or spoken threat, a gunshot rang out, and the bald man holding the boy had his entire arm blown off at the shoulder.
Before he could react, his shoulder exploded in a spray of blood, and his severed arm, still clad in the protective suit, fell to the ground. The little boy, now freed, ran to his mother.
The thin man who had been stepping on the boy’s mother felt a surge of alarm and quickly retreated, taking cover behind the armored vehicle’s door. Just as he moved, a volley of bullets struck the car door—if he hadn’t pulled back in time, they would have punched holes through him.
Yu Xi’s eyes blazed with anger as she sprinted forward, aiming her air-powered electric gun at another bald man who raised his weapon to retaliate. With two precise shots, both of his arms were shattered.
“Be cautious. They likely have heavy weapons,” Lin Wu said, one hand holding a shield, the other gripping a gun, struggling to keep up with her pace. His reinforced iron rod had been upgraded several times, now capable of full-spectrum defense.
Back in the parasite world, Lin Wu’s weapon shield had only provided a semicircular defense field. Now, it had evolved into a 360-degree protective sphere, just like those he’d seen other advanced mission players use in the meteorite world. As long as he stayed near Yu Xi, the shield could block any weapon attack, including high-powered firearms.
Yu Xi recalled that this shield had a time limit; once the defense threshold was reached, it would deactivate.
“Let’s make this quick. These people are strange, seemingly unaffected by acidic gas. There’s a bald guy guarding the thin skeleton—he might be the leader. Leave two or three alive; the rest you can deal with as you see fit.”
She had never been this furious. In her previous apocalyptic missions, she had seen countless deaths. But acts bordering on sadistic cruelty like this—she’d only witnessed them once, in the meteorite world. Back then, the perpetrator had been a foreigner, a mission player with psychopathic tendencies.
But here, the societal order had only collapsed for two weeks. The conflicts among survivors, at their core, were about the struggle to live a little better.
Yet these people—they weren’t afraid of acidic gases and could live far better than the average survivor. And yet they were twisted enough to target even women and children—fellow citizens of the nation—without mercy.
The two men who had their arms blown off screamed in agony, collapsing to the ground. The others, stunned and horrified, scrambled for cover and began firing back.
Their aim wasn’t great, but firing together, with one of them holding an assault rifle in rapid-fire, they figured they’d hit their targets eventually.
But the two figures coming toward them remained unharmed, as though protected by an invisible barrier.
Two more shots rang out, shattering the cover of another man, who fell back into a pool of blood.
“Damn it! This is insane!” In the blink of an eye, two of their group were dead, two were gravely injured, leaving only four.
In reality, they were just ordinary people. Without their prior encounter, they would likely have been trembling inside some dilapidated building, just like the people they’d tormented moments ago.
But the difference in their experience led them to believe they were chosen, empowered by their cache of firearms and acid-resistant armored vehicles, which had emboldened them to act without restraint.
Now, with the situation reversed, they were overcome by a fear that dredged up memories of past traumas.
“Why be scared? We’ve already cheated death once! We’re chosen; we are the light of humanity, the only ones who can survive in this world!” the thin man proclaimed, leaping onto the armored vehicle. A moment later, he emerged through the sunroof, wielding a rocket launcher.
“Rescue them!” Yu Xi moved quickly, pulling all the injured and screaming people close together. Lin Wu positioned himself in front, gripping his iron rod with both hands and planting one end firmly into the ground. He maximized the defense mode.
In an instant, a three-meter-wide light shield sphere unfolded, enveloping everyone behind him.
The rocket shot forward, colliding with the shield and exploding in a blinding flash, lighting up the surrounding area.
The thin man, convinced he had hit his mark, laughed maniacally.
However, as the smoke cleared, the people behind the shield emerged completely unharmed.
“How is that possible?” he muttered, hastily trying to reload, only to feel a weight on his shoulder. He looked down to see a gun barrel pressed firmly against his sunken cheek.
“Let go.” A cold, clear female voice sounded above his head. Somehow, she had already climbed onto the roof of the armored vehicle. With a strong tug, she pulled him out of the sunroof, lifting and pinning him down on the car’s roof.
He was like a helpless chick caught by the throat, hoisted out and pressed against the roof. The rocket launcher tumbled back through the sunroof into the vehicle as he struggled to turn his head, catching sight of his captor in the glow of nearby flames. It was a woman, her lower face obscured by a silver-gray mask.
Though he hadn’t interacted much with her before, he recognized her immediately—perhaps because of the proximity, or maybe because she wore no protective mask aside from the silver-gray one. After a few seconds of eye contact, a grim smile tugged at his lips. “Oh, so it’s Miss Yu.”
Yu Xi scrutinized the thin, haggard face before her. After a brief pause, her brows knit tightly. “Cheng Yuan.”
As Yu Xi moved swiftly to restrain the thin man atop the vehicle, Lin Wu, using a combination of his air-powered gun and a handheld weapon, destroyed the cover of the remaining three attackers, disarming them in quick succession.
The entire fight, from start to finish, lasted only a few minutes.
The sudden invasion forced the various groups in the villa district to put aside their differences for the first time, working together to clean up the aftermath, tend to the wounded, repair the gate, relocate those who had been living in the security rooms, and interrogate the intruders.
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