The black air currents swirled like living things, not in a gentle embrace, but more like a predator swallowing its prey.
Xu Mo looked down at his arms. Where the black mist touched his skin, it began to harden, forming patches of hideous armor plates.
The plates overlapped one another, spreading upward from his fingertips to his wrists, forearms, elbows, and shoulders.
Clang, clang, clang—
Every interlocking piece was accompanied by the tooth-aching sound of grinding metal.
The black mist paused for a moment when it reached his chest. That void-like heart gave a sudden, powerful throb, and then all the black mist seemed to ignite, surging frantically across his entire body.
In just a few seconds, Bai Feifei’s slender frame had completely vanished.
Standing in her place was a humanoid figure entirely shrouded in pitch black.
His height had shot up to over 1.9 meters. He was covered in ferocious black armor, with barbs at the joints and asymmetrical pauldrons on his shoulders.
The helmet encased his entire head, leaving only two narrow slits for eyes. From within those slits, nothing but pure darkness peered out.
“Heh...”
Xu Mo was a bit surprised himself.
“Not a bad look... Approved!”
He could feel that this suit of armor wasn’t just for show. It was constantly drawing power from that phantom heart.
The scale of this all-around enhancement depended entirely on how much the user’s body could withstand.
“Alright, that’s enough. Any more and her body will burst.”
Xu Mo looked up.
“That old aberration has been sucking the heart’s power for so long, he’s probably already surpassed Hong Jiu and Wan Qianhong...”
He muttered to himself, his voice raspy, sounding like metal scraping against metal.
As he spoke, he recalled what Bai Feifei had said to him before she lost consciousness.
“You certainly have a heart for the world...”
“Don’t worry. Since you helped me get such a great start, I’ll remember what I promised you!”
With those words, he slightly bent his legs, his body like a tightly coiled spring, and then he suddenly launched himself upward.
He used no technique, only raw, brute force.
The black figure slammed into the fleshy rock wall above, producing a dull, heavy thud.
Boom!!
It didn’t feel like hitting stone, but rather like smashing through a layer of rubber dozens of meters thick. There was resistance, but in his current state, that resistance was negligible.
Xu Mo rampaged through the meat walls. Amidst a series of continuous explosions, every obstacle was smashed to pieces!
He was close.
Then, he heard laughter.
It was Li Gui’s laughter. It could be heard even through ten meters of flesh, and it was incredibly grating—so much so that a murderous intent welled up within Xu Mo.
“Hahahahaha—”
Before the laughter could even fade, Xu Mo’s figure burst through. The sound of his entrance merged with the laughter, echoing through the mountain in a chaotic roar.
...
A few minutes earlier.
Wan Qianhong felt as if her blood were on fire.
This wasn’t just the sensation of increased power, but the agony of being scorched by an open flame—the side effect of her Word Soul.
And today, she had used her Word Soul far too many times in succession.
First, she had buffed Aries Hong Jiu, then she had controlled Li Gui’s blood, and then she had protected the surrounding Scavengers.
Every activation of her Word Soul overextended her body.
And now, she was still forcing herself to use her ability to bolster Yang Shuo’s defensive capabilities so he could shield the others amidst the ruins.
“Chief.” Yang Shuo’s iron-gray back was already battered and pitted, and his voice was much weaker than before. “I can’t hold on much longer!”
Wan Qianhong gritted her teeth, her fingers forming a strange hand seal as the veins on her forehead bulged.
She couldn’t withdraw.
Behind Yang Shuo were all the remaining people from the East District—several heavily injured and a few low-ranked ones. If she withdrew her ability, this group wouldn’t be able to survive even a single attack from Li Gui.
Hong Jiu’s situation wasn’t much better.
Aries Hong Jiu’s bare upper body was covered in wounds—hideous, green-fluorescent wounds that looked particularly terrifying.
Li Gui was currently a full rank higher than him. It was truly a miracle that he had managed to fight this far.
“Damn it...”
He spat out a mouthful of bloody phlegm and looked up at the monster before him, which had completely lost its human form.
“Dammit, if I were a Prophet right now...”
“Stay behind and become a part of the Real World...”
Li Gui’s voice emanated from all parts of his body simultaneously, raspy and low, with an eerie, skin-crawling layered echo.
He raised over a dozen arms, and an earthy yellow light glowed in the palm of each hand—his original ability.
The rocks throughout the underground space began to tremble.
Wan Qianhong’s face turned deathly pale. Realizing what he was about to do, she shrieked:
“Everyone, look out! Get behind Yang Shuo! Now!”
It was too late.
Hundreds of sharp stone fragments shot out from all directions simultaneously. It didn’t look like one person casting a spell; it looked like a mountain had suddenly exploded!
The fragments carried Li Gui’s aberrant aura, their edges glowing with a faint green light, tearing through the air with ear-piercing shrieks.
As the stones shot toward them, many of the exhausted Scavengers felt despair rising in their eyes, powerless to fight back.
Several fist-sized fragments whizzed past Yang Shuo, heading straight for Ye Yu.
Ye Yu’s eyes widened as she stared at her own impending death.
The stones rapidly grew larger in her vision. With her Sanity plummeting, her mind went blank, and she instinctively raised her arms in front of her face.
Am I going to die...?
Boom!!!
A loud explosion rang out, but it wasn't the sound of her being hit.
Accompanied by the blast, a black shadow surged out from the ground, appearing beside her with near-teleportation speed and yanking her away.
Ye Yu only felt a black claw grab her shoulder before she was dragged off the ground by an irresistible force and tossed behind a piece of cover.
Then, the incoming stone fragments exploded in mid-air one after another.
Immediately following that, a black whirlwind violently swept through the cramped space.
The whirlwind swept past every person who was on the verge of being struck by the fragments, snatching them from danger and setting them down on the ground.
The entire process took less than a second.
By the time she reacted, she was already sitting on the ground. Before her were Wan Qianhong, Yang Shuo, and several other rescued Scavengers.
Everyone was there.
Li Gui’s sudden explosive attack had actually failed to cause a single casualty!
Ye Yu dazedly patted her body, seemingly shocked that she was still alive.
Then, she instinctively looked up. Many of the other Scavengers around her were doing the same.
In the center of the clearing, the black whirlwind slowly subsided. A ferocious black figure, looking as if he had just charged out of hell, stood tall with his hands behind his back.
Rate on N.U.
