Splat! Crunch!
A black claw plunged straight into his face, sinking halfway in. The running inspector came to a screeching halt.
“Ugh...” His body shuddered, his eyes rolling back as he made a strange, gurgling noise.
Up ahead, Tan Guo, who was running at full speed, noticed the strange sound behind him. His expression shifted slightly as he quickly spun around.
Through his night-vision goggles, he saw his subordinate twitching, a hand embedded deep in the man's face.
Tan Guo's eyes widened slightly, staring in shock at the black silhouette dotted with red in his night-vision display.
The next second, he snapped out of it, raised his pistol, aimed at the black figure, and roared, “The killer is here! Back us up!”
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Muzzle flashes erupted in rapid succession. At a distance of only a few meters, there was no way he could miss.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Five or six bullets struck Xiang Ping's chest, making dull, fleshy thuds as they sank into his skin.
Yet Xiang Ping didn't seem to feel a thing. With a grotesque, twisted expression, he yanked his claw free, bringing a chunk of white brain matter with it.
“Roar!” Opening his mouth to unleash a beastly howl, Xiang Ping lunged fiercely at Tan Guo.
Is this thing even human?! Seeing the dark figure completely unfazed after taking five or six bullets, terror washed over Tan Guo's face.
He retreated while continuing to fire.
Meanwhile, a hundred meters away.
Peng Fei watched as the balding man was hauled away, his brow furrowed in thought. Strange. If this was the killer capable of wiping out armed fugitives, how could he be this weak?
Besides, it had gone too smoothly. The man hadn't put up any resistance at all.
At this thought, he scanned his surroundings and asked, “Where is Tan Guo's team? Why don't I see them?”
“Captain, they're stationed at the very edge of our perimeter. It'll take them a moment to get over here,” one of the inspectors replied.
“The killer is here—”
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The next instant, a furious roar echoed from deep within the alley, followed by a rapid volley of gunfire.
The faces of the inspectors still in the alley went pale.
Peng Fei dashed toward the sound, shouting as he ran, “Everyone, follow me!”
The twenty-odd inspectors remaining in the alley immediately took off.
Although they had patrolled these alleys several times during the day, in the heat of a crisis, the maze of branching paths proved disorienting.
Thud, thud, thud!
Footsteps rushed through the narrow corridors. When Peng Fei finally reached the source of the noise, his pupils shrank. “How could this happen?!”
Through his night-vision goggles, he saw blood splattered everywhere just a few meters ahead, with three corpses strewn across the ground.
The left cheek of the corpse closest to him had been torn off by something incredibly sharp, discarded in a corner.
The eye on that severed cheek was wide open, staring back at Peng Fei with lingering terror.
“Damn it! Are we too late? Find the killer, quick!” Behind him, an inspector's face turned grim at the gruesome sight.
The others quickly bypassed the frozen Peng Fei and rushed toward the branching alleyways.
“Search! He couldn't have gone far in such a short time!” someone roared, charging into a nearby alley.
It wasn't that they didn't see the horrific state of their fallen comrades. In the distance, a young inspector had a massive chunk of his neck bitten off, and his heart lay discarded on the ground further away.
Facing such gruesome deaths in the pitch-black darkness, it would be a lie to say they weren't terrified. They could only vent their fear and tension through furious shouts.
For a moment, the entire network of alleys was filled with the sounds of running footsteps and angry roars.
As the crowd of inspectors fanned out, none of them noticed a figure rapidly scrambling along the wall, heading back in the direction they had just come from.
Its footsteps were completely drowned out by the shouts of the inspectors.
As it passed Peng Fei, he seemed to sense something and whipped his head toward the right wall. A dark silhouette tinged with faint red flashed past his vision.
What on earth is that?! Peng Fei's heart skipped a beat. He had never seen such a bizarre image through his night-vision goggles.
When the dark blur reached a point four or five meters behind Peng Fei, it suddenly lunged downward. Two inspectors were standing right below it.
Like the others, they hadn't thought to look up. They stood back-to-back, facing away from Peng Fei as they vigilantly scanned the path ahead.
“Get out of the way!” Peng Fei's roar suddenly exploded from behind them.
Before the two inspectors could even react, a bizarre sound echoed from right above their heads.
Splat! Splat!
Following two dull thuds, the heads of the two inspectors tumbled to the ground, their eyes still wide with confusion.
“Roar!”
“I'll kill you!”
The last sounds they ever heard were an inhuman growl and Peng Fei's enraged shout.
His face contorted in rage, Peng Fei aimed his pistol at the tattered, humanoid silhouette standing before him.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Having no time to wonder why the figure appeared so dark through his night-vision goggles, he opened fire, and gunshots shattered the silence of the alley.
The other inspectors who had run off to search for the killer rushed back the instant they heard Peng Fei's roar.
Seeing Peng Fei shooting at a dark figure, the inspectors in the lead did not hesitate and immediately fired.
The alley was only wide enough for three people to stand abreast. The inspectors at the back could only watch helplessly, fearing they would hit their comrades if they fired.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
Over a dozen bullets pierced Xiang Ping's body. One even tore through his neck, spraying a stream of black blood.
Yet Xiang Ping acted as if nothing had happened. He easily drove his black claws into the brick wall and hoisted himself up, rapidly scaling it.
In less than a second, he braved the hail of bullets to reach the top of the wall. Moving as effortlessly as if he were on flat ground, he sprinted along the ledge toward the crowd of inspectors.
Click! Click!
One inspector repeatedly pulled his trigger, but his gun only clicked, empty. He stared at the dark figure as if he had seen a ghost. “What kind of monster is this?! He took so many hits and didn't even flinch!”
Watching the dark figure charge along the wall despite the bullets, Peng Fei snapped out of his rage and bellowed, “Get back! Don't get close—”
But when the shadow got within a meter of him, it suddenly pounced.
This pounce was far faster than the previous one. Peng Fei's pupils contracted violently as he scrambled backward.
Yet no matter how fast he was, he was no match for an inhuman Ghoul.
Splat!
Xiang Ping flashed past Peng Fei. Clutching a large chunk of torn flesh in his claw, he charged toward the other inspectors without looking back.
“It's coming! Fall back! Fall back!”
Bang! Bang!
“Ahhh!”
Furious roars, gunshots, and agonizing screams erupted behind him.
But Peng Fei was in no state to pay attention to any of it. Shaking, he lowered his gaze to the right side of his abdomen.
A massive gash yawned open, blood gushing out like water from a broken pipe. A section of his intestines was already spilling out.
Thud!
Peng Fei collapsed to his knees, desperately pressing both hands against the gaping wound in his abdomen to keep his internal organs from spilling out.
He forced his head around only to see seven or eight of his inspectors already lying dead on the ground.
In the narrow alleyway, their numerical advantage was completely useless. When the people in the back fired, they only ended up hitting the ones in front.
By now, the inspectors had descended into sheer panic. The humanoid shadow before them had taken dozens of bullets, yet it continued its relentless slaughter.
Every time its claws lashed out, an inspector's neck or chest was ripped open. Their bulletproof vests were as useless as paper before its sheer strength.
One inspector slumped against the wall, staring down at his own chest. A half-meter-long gash ran across it, revealing his beating organs.
“A monster... This is a monster... None of us can kill it... No one can...” he muttered in utter despair. His voice grew fainter and fainter until it faded away completely.
Within this short stretch of alley, barely twenty meters long, the ground was stained crimson with blood, littered with corpses.
A kilometer away from the Yuankou District, on a quiet street.
Zhao Jin walked calmly toward the Yuankou District. I didn't expect the Ghoul to bring me such a pleasant surprise today.
The Destiny Force inside his mind continued to rise.
His Destiny Force, which had dwindled to six threads over the past day, had now surged to thirty-six threads.
The massive influx of Destiny Force allowed him to faintly perceive a golden glow streaming toward him from the direction of the Yuankou District.
Rate on N.U.
