Decaying World-Chapter 35

The mass of black wooden shacks was scattered irregularly, like black stones strewn across a beach.
Faint moans could still be heard from within some of the shacks, sounding like the death throes of those tormented by illness for a long time.
Lin Hui and Deng Mingchao walked carefully into the gap between two black houses—one carrying his sword, the other holding his blade horizontally.
Piles of black mud mixed with filth were compressed in the corners; a faint stench wafted through the air—the foul odor of rotting protein.
The two moved forward. Within seconds, they discovered a female corpse in the corner to the right, more than half-rotted and black-brown in color.
Much of the flesh on the corpse's upper body had been gnawed away by something unknown, exposing white bone beneath the skin.
She sat slumped against the wall, eyes lifeless and purple. Slender, milky-white maggots burrowed from the corners of her eyes into her nostrils from time to time.
She was still wearing a tattered brown cloth skirt, her right hand clutching an object that seemed to be a stone.
"Must have been dead for a while. The night here didn't devour her completely?" Deng Mingchao frowned and stepped forward, gently poking the corpse's thigh with the tip of his sword.
"Junior Brother, look at this corpse. Here, people with tumor-ridden lesions cannot receive Myriad Blessings Meat, so any food here is extremely precious. And corpses, under normal circumstances, would not be discarded outside at will, except for one possibility..."
"What possibility?" Lin Hui asked, frowning as he endured the stench.
"The person died from the illness," Deng Mingchao said in a deep voice. "Otherwise, a normal corpse would be dragged away and treated as food reserve here."
"..." Lin Hui was speechless. Looking at the corpse on the ground, suspicion rose in his heart. "There is no obvious barrier between here and the suburbs. Why don't the people here run to the suburbs to snatch food?"
"How do you know they didn't? How do you know there isn't something like a barrier over there?" Deng Mingchao asked in return. "The road we just came down is filled with a special power that ordinary people cannot sense. The closer one gets to the mist zone, the weaker it becomes; the closer to the urban area, the stronger. In fact, it is precisely because of this power that the mist has always been blocked outside."
"Senior Brother means that the invisible force blocking the mist blocks these patients as well? Making them dare not approach the inside?" Lin Hui asked.
"Precisely. But it is undeniable that if there are too many patients, it will also threaten the safety of the surrounding residents, so we are mobilized to clean up every once in a while. We are just one of the cleaning forces," Deng Mingchao explained. "There are quite a few other forces that have also taken on cleaning tasks and will come regularly to deal with the patients."
"Next, let's see why the patients here require us martial artists to clean them, and why even the Head Constable acts so cautiously." Deng Mingchao retracted his sword and exhaled.
Suddenly, he slashed to the left, wielding the sword like a saber to chop vertically at the dark shadow on the left.
At the same time, within that darkness, a point of red light approached rapidly. Soon the red light revealed itself—it was, shockingly, a human eye.
A one-eyed man, wearing tattered black hemp clothes, his exposed gray-white skin covered in festering ulcers. Roaring, face hideous, he lunged through the air at Deng Mingchao, only to meet the edge of the slashing longsword perfectly.
Puchi.
The one-eyed man and Deng Mingchao crossed paths. A spray of blood bloomed in the air.
Immediately after the blood hit the ground, the one-eyed man fell heavily and breathed no more.
"One," Deng Mingchao said calmly. "A Blood-Eyed Afflicted."
"Very fast. Compared to ordinary people, those who haven't trained would probably find it hard to react in time." Lin Hui's face condensed slightly as he evaluated.
"This is just the lowest level Blood-Eyed. According to intel, beyond the Blood-Eyed, there are the Blood-Body Afflicted. Let's go, continue inward." Deng Mingchao flicked the blood off his blade and walked slowly inward.
Behind him, a slit slowly cracked open on the head of the one-eyed man's corpse.
"Just now, that wasn't the Nine-Section Swift Sword, right?" Lin Hui asked in a low voice.
"Of course it was. I just slightly modified one of the moves, turning the point into an extended slash. Sword moves are flexible and mutable, not static," Deng Mingchao answered.
The two continued forward. This time, before they had walked ten meters, two more patients with eyes glowing blood-red appeared.
This time, it was an old and a youth, both male, actually wielding farm tools like hoes.
"Meat... eat meat!! I want to eat meat!!" As soon as these two patients saw Deng Mingchao, they lunged over ferociously.
"One each." Deng Mingchao dodged sideways, jumping to the only empty space, pulling the old man away.
Leaving a teenager for Lin Hui.
In an instant, that teenager pounced in front of Lin Hui, the two less than two meters apart.
The opponent's hands were already clawing toward Lin Hui's face.
"Try not to get touched, to avoid infection."
The Head Constable's previous warning flashed through Lin Hui's mind.
He retreated a step, the blade in his hand unsheathed instantly.
Chi!
The silver sword tip stabbed precisely into the opponent's throat the instant he lunged close.
Then the tip slashed upward violently, slicing the opponent's entire windpipe and chin in two with a
chi
sound.
Black blood sprayed.
The teenager sustained such a heavy injury, yet he didn't even scream. He continued to lunge closer, trying to grab Lin Hui with both hands.
Puchi.
Just then, Lin Hui followed up with a second sword.
The Clear River Sword retracted, then thrust again, piercing straight through the opponent's right eye socket and out the back of the head.
This sword finally made the teenager completely immobile.
Carried by the momentum of his lunge, he fell heavily in front of Lin Hui.
"Phew... no sense of pain?" Lin Hui withdrew his longsword, looking at Senior Brother Deng Mingchao, who had also finished his battle on the side.
"Yes. The afflicted possess increased speed and strength and feel no pain. Their only weakness is the head. Even if you chop up the other limbs, it's useless; they can still attack and live for a long time." Deng Mingchao's expression was low. "So don't be careless. Try to kill with one blow."
He glanced at the wound on the teenager's corpse on the ground and nodded.
"You did very well. Next, we might encounter Blood-Body Afflicted. The speed, strength, and defense of this type of patient are much stronger than the Blood-Eyed. Once we start fighting, I might not be able to protect you. Be careful and hold on to yourself; I'll come to assist you after I resolve my battle."
"Rest assured, Senior Brother. I won't drag you down." Lin Hui nodded solemnly.
The two said no more, carrying their swords deeper inside.
The cramped alley wound deeper. Before long, they encountered two more Blood-Eyed Afflicted, which were easily resolved by the pair.
After killing so many in one breath, Deng Mingchao paused to rest slightly, wiping the dirty blood from his sword to prevent rust, then continued leading Lin Hui deeper.
Only this time, they hadn't walked twenty meters.
A freak, completely different from the previous Blood-Eyed Afflicted, appeared in front of them.
On the ground of the pitch-black alley, a bald man whose entire body was blood-red stood quietly in the middle of the road, hands hanging down, motionless.
The bald man wore no clothes, and the skin over his entire body seemed to have been peeled off, revealing the muscles and tendons underneath.
"This is the Blood-Body Afflicted... back off a bit." Deng Mingchao lowered his voice and reached out to stop Lin Hui behind him.
"Watch the perimeter for me." He instructed, lifting his sword and approaching slowly.
Lin Hui agreed, holding his sword and looking around alertly.
But his line of sight only flickered for an instant before he lost track of his Senior Brother and that Blood-Body Afflicted.
Clang!
Clang clang clang clang!!
Five consecutive sounds rang out in an instant; five sparks splashed in the alley.
Deng Mingchao and the Blood-Body Afflicted were engaging in close combat in the blink of an eye.
Both were extremely fast, attacking more than ten times a second, clashing madly like the wind.
Attack, block, attack, block.
No dodging.
Also no time to dodge. Under this high-speed mutual attack, the goal was to seize the initiative. Once one dodged, they would lose the initiative and fall into a vicious cycle of purely defensive evasion.
Deng Mingchao's face was hideous. The Nine-Section Swift Sword was pushed to the limit. The sword shadows blurred, faintly giving the illusion of wind.
Gray sword shadows flew constantly toward the opposite side, only to be blocked at high speed by the Blood-Body Afflicted's hands.
The afflicted's weapons were the pitch-black fingernails on both hands. Those nails were like ten black spikes, sharp and obviously toxic.
For a time, violent collisions rang out constantly, accompanied by sparks.
Lin Hui retreated another step. In this dim environment, his eyesight could no longer see the specific situation of the two fighting.
Deng Mingchao's Nine-Section Swift Sword was more skillful and refined than his, and his moves were steadier and stronger. If he didn't use special effects and the sealing toxin, he felt he wouldn't last a hundred moves under this sword speed.
But the Blood-Body Afflicted could actually withstand the sword shadows for so long. This instantly raised Lin Hui's assessment of its threat level to extremely high.
Not long after.
Puchi!
Deng Mingchao beheaded the Blood-Body Afflicted with a single stroke, chopping off its head.
His sword seemed to have been modified; it wasn't just suitable for stabbing, but also for chopping.
At this time, he was also panting slightly, flicking the filthy blood off his sword.
"Did you see? This is the Blood-Body Afflicted. Normally, within our temple, without strength in the top ten, you wouldn't last ten seconds in front of them. This is also why the Emergency Suppression Squad has such high standards for strength."
"Understood..." Lin Hui looked at the corpse on the ground with dread. "Are there many afflicted like this? What is the ratio?"
"Of course not many. Roughly one Blood-Body mutation occurs for every twenty or thirty Blood-Eyed. This depends on the afflicted's constitution before death." Deng Mingchao explained.
He checked the Blood-Body Afflicted corpse, confirmed it was dead, then stepped over it.
"Let's go, continue."
"Need a rest?" Lin Hui worried.
"No need..."
"Junior Brother Deng, it's better to rest a bit..."
Suddenly, a familiar voice drifted from not far behind.
Deng Mingchao and Lin Hui's expressions changed slightly; they both recognized whose voice it was.
Mu Qiaozhi!
"Senior Sister Mu, I'll call you Senior Sister one last time. Aren't you assigned to another squad? Why didn't you go clean up patients, but ran over to our side instead?" Deng Mingchao's face tightened, a faint premonition of bad luck rising in his heart.
"I just had nothing to do and wanted to see how my former junior brothers are doing. And also wanted to let you see my attainments in the Black Dragon Gate martial arts I've newly entered..."
Mu Qiaozhi's figure suddenly emerged from the darkness behind.
She wore a dark Suppression Squad uniform, carrying a black sword on her back. Her right hand wore a set of black metal gauntlets, and the five fingers also bore sharp metal claws. Her style had changed completely.
"Junior Brother Deng, Junior Brother Lin, what was the purpose of your previous martial arts practice?"