The ghouls tensing for their pounce slowed to a crawl.
Muscles contracted frame by frame, and the tendons in their hind legs tightened like coiled springs, storing power bit by bit.
Lu Yuan saw it all with absolute clarity.
The position of every creature, the angle of every impending leap, and every exposed weakness.
He raised his revolver.
First shot.
The nearest ghoul had already dropped its prey, its mouth agape, preparing to lunge.
He pulled the trigger.
Flame blossomed from the muzzle, and a silver-plated bullet wrapped in a faint crimson tail-flame spun outward, then slowed down.
Like sinking into deep water, the bullet drifted slowly toward that wide-open maw.
The hammer rebounded, and the cylinder rotated.
Second shot.
Two paces to the right, another ghoul had its hind legs off the ground, mid-leap.
The muzzle shifted, centering on its chest, at the junction where the split mouth met the torso, the most fragile connection point on its entire body.
He pulled the trigger, and the second bullet drifted out slowly.
Third shot.
To the front-left, a larger individual pounced toward Bo Er.
He turned his body, the muzzle tracing a short arc to align with its ribs.
Fire.
Fourth shot.
Fifth shot.
Sixth shot.
Six silver-plated bullets hung in the air, trailing faint crimson flames like six slow-moving meteors drifting toward their targets.
The cylinder spun on empty, the hammer falling on a spent chamber.
Click.
Timekeeper deactivated.
【Sanity: -1...-1...43/120】
The world snapped back to normal speed.
Bang bang bang bang bang bang...
Six gunshots erupted almost simultaneously.
The first bullet entered the open mouth, pierced the upper palate, shattered the brain cavity, and exploded out the back of the skull.
The second hit the center of the chest, the silver-plated slug fragmenting inside while enchanted flames burst from the wound, tearing the tissue on both sides of the split and separating the upper and lower halves of the body in mid-air.
The third entered from the side, passing through the ribs and striking the spine. The moment the vertebrae snapped, all four limbs lost control, the entire body falling apart and slamming heavily onto the ground.
...The sixth.
Every single one was a precise hit.
Not a single shot was wasted.
Six ghouls, six corpses, hit the ground almost at the same time, the sounds of impact echoing one after another.
All of this took less than a second.
Bo Er and the other Nightwatchers were still holding their weapons in firing positions, not even having time to pull their triggers.
Lu Yuan stood in place, his revolver hanging at his side, faint blue smoke still drifting from the muzzle.
But his expression remained unchanged.
Because the six that had fallen were only the closest group.
In the shadows further away, even more ghouls were dropping the prey from their mouths.
Snarls rose from all directions, growing increasingly dense.
Lu Yuan opened the cylinder, ejected the empty shells, and took silver-plated bullets from his belt, pressing them in one by one.
His movements were fast but steady.
Behind him, the sound of crawling from the hole was also growing louder.
Lu Yuan snapped the cylinder shut, and the rotation clicked into place.
"Bo Er."
"Here," Bo Er replied, his voice heavy.
"We can't hold this position."
Lu Yuan raised his gun, scanning the shadows closing in from all sides.
"Retreat south."
The sound of the six corpses hitting the ground had not yet faded.
Lu Yuan was already reloading.
His thumb flicked the cylinder open, empty shells hit the ground, and silver-plated bullets were pressed in one by one.
The six nearest ghouls had been cleared.
But in the shadows further out, more grey-red figures were dropping the prey in their mouths.
The snarling grew thicker.
Behind them, the crawling from the hole intensified.
If they stayed here, both groups of ghouls would drown this circle of light within three minutes.
The light could hold them back for a moment.
But it couldn't stop the starving main force.
Lu Yuan closed the cylinder.
It clicked into place.
"Go!"
His voice wasn't loud, but everyone heard him.
Bo Er turned his head.
"Open a path and retreat south."
Lu Yuan raised his revolver, pointing it at the very center of the ghoul line blocking their original path, where they stood with prey in their mouths.
"Stay close to me."
He didn't wait any longer.
He stepped forward.
He pulled the trigger.
Bang!
The first ghoul blocking the middle of the road was pierced through the head by a silver bullet, its body flipping to the side as the half-eaten arm in its mouth flew out.
Bang!
The second one.
Bang!
The third one.
Three bullets tore open a gap less than two meters wide.
Lu Yuan didn't stop, charging straight through the opening.
Bo Er roared from behind him.
"Keep up! Breakthrough formation!"
The eight grey-cloaked figures instantly closed ranks, turning into a sharp blade as they followed Lu Yuan through the gap.
The front row held copper swords, slashing left and right to force back the ghouls trying to close the hole.
The gunners on the flanks fired into the shadows, silver slugs erupting into bursts of fire in the darkness.
The path was being constantly torn open.
And it was being constantly filled back in.
For every one they killed, two more surged out from the side alleys.
They were no longer the scrawny vanguards from before.
These were larger, with fuller muscles, and veins pulsed like earthworms beneath their grey-red flesh membranes.
The main force.
The true nest guardians.
"Run!" Lu Yuan shouted back. "Don't get bogged down in the fight!"
The nine of them switched from a combat formation to a running one.
They no longer tried to clear the area, focusing only on moving forward.
Kill whatever blocks the path.
Ignore what doesn't.
They sprinted along the route they had come from.
The ground beneath their feet gradually changed from rotted black back to alloy plates with a bronze luster.
The fungus layer was very thin here.
The remains of the sandworm oil fire wall still smoldered on the walls, its residual light barely illuminating half the street.
But the footsteps behind them, or rather, the sound of claws scraping the ground, drew closer.
The ghouls were chasing.
Not just a few.
A whole pack.
They surged from the alleys on both sides of the street, moving on all fours with arched backs, far faster than humans.
Their mouths were wide open, three layers of teeth reflecting wetly in the dim light.
There were no more snarls.
They were silent when hunting at full speed.
Only the scratching of claws on the ground remained, along with the sizzling sound of the bronze searing the ghouls' flesh.
"We can't outrun them! We'll be caught eventually!" Bo Er's voice came from the side.
His judgment was accurate.
A ghoul's speed was at least twice that of a human at full sprint.
On the open street, the distance was closing every second.
"Rear guard, alternating fire!" Lu Yuan shouted as he ran.
As the words left his mouth, the two Nightwatchers at the back turned simultaneously, dropping to one knee with their firearms raised.
Bang bang bang bang...
A dense volley of silver bullets tore into the pursuing pack.
The two ghouls at the front were knocked over, and those behind them tripped, slowing their speed slightly.
But it only lasted for two seconds.
More grey-red figures stepped over their fallen kin and continued the chase.
The two rear guards stood up and sprinted.
Ten paces ahead, another two had already crouched down to take over the shooting.
Alternating cover.
A textbook retreat tactic.
But ammunition was finite.
And the number of ghouls seemed limitless.
The suppression from the bronze was clearly insufficient in the short term.
If they kept running like this, no one but himself would escape.
Rate on N.U.
