As the mass of blackness crawled closer, the group finally saw it clearly.
It wasn’t a single entity, but a dozen aberrations huddled together, encased in a slimy black membrane with even smaller ones trailing beneath.
Broken bricks, rebar, and corpses of indistinguishable origin were all rolled into their flesh. As they ground their way forward, they left a wet, glistening trail on the ground.
Tang Xuan turned her head and gagged, spitting out her bit of bubble gum along with a trace of blood.
“Aberrations? Dammit, this is actually disgusting.”
Luo Yang stood up, his knees trembling. He used Night Owl to prop himself up, the tip of the blade scraping a white mark onto the bricks.
“This girl could use some manners...”
Behind them, Li Qiang muttered under his breath.
He had climbed his way up from the bottom, doing plenty of dirty and exhausting work, and was only recommended to the academy thanks to his decent innate talent for abilities.
Naturally, he had seen aberrations before. He hadn’t just seen them; he had personally fought quite a few.
Of course, by “fought,” he meant providing buffs to his teammates from the back.
Luo Yang stared at the black tide, turning his head to ask, “By the way, A-Zhi, can you use that move you used on the Heterosequence on these things?”
Yan Zhi looked at the writhing lumps of meat, then down at her hands.
“No.”
“Hmm?”
“That only works on the Heterosequence. They are pure energy with a loose structure that can be directly dismantled and swallowed.”
She raised her hand and made a few slow, sweeping gestures.
“Aberrations are different from mutant beasts. They have flesh, stable cores, shells, and organs. Trying to eat them... would cause an explosion. And... they’re dirty.”
Tang Xuan clicked her tongue. “So how do we fight them?”
Li Qiang swallowed his energy bar in two bites and tossed the wrapper aside. “Looks like we have to do it the hard way.”
“The hard way?” Luo Yang coughed twice, his voice raspy. “The state we’re in right now, we really do fit that description.”
Qiu Shubai had already raised Bloodfall. The bandage on her waist was red again; when the wind blew, the hem of her clothes stuck to the wound, refusing to let go.
She simply took half a step forward, her boot pressing down on a loose brick.
“Are you done talking?”
“Done.”
Luo Yang rubbed the corners of his eyes, wiping away the dried blood crusting around his spectacles. “We can’t avoid them, so let’s fight. Don’t let them surround us. Keep your distance; don’t let anyone get caught in a direct blast.”
The foremost aberration had already lunged forward.
The clump of monstrous meat arched ahead, several slits tearing open across its surface to reveal rings of dark red granulation tissue. It looked like it was smiling, but the sight was utterly hideous.
Qiu Shubai met it head-on, Bloodfall descending first. A white light sliced through the middle of the black membrane, and slime sprayed across half of her leg.
The mass of meat didn’t die. The two sides of the wound twitched a few times and actually began to pull back together.
“Right side!” Luo Yang barked.
Two Grantee Longswords shot out from his space ring. One nailed itself into the aberration’s open wound, while the other scooped it up from the bottom and flung it toward the edge of the ruins.
He had managed to squeeze in a quick nap before the ambulance arrived, so he had recovered a bit of his spirit.
Boom!
The sound of the explosion left their ears ringing.
A heatwave carrying shredded meat surged toward them. Tang Xuan grabbed Li Qiang by the collar and yanked him back.
Neither could keep their footing, and their backs slammed into a broken wall, causing dust to shower down on them.
“Fuck!” Tang Xuan cursed, panting. “Give me a boost, quickly! I can barely lift my arms!”
Li Qiang wiped his nose as silver light radiated from his palm. It first landed on her shoulder before splitting to hit the backs of Qiu Shubai and Luo Yang.
“Use it sparingly,” he said, his voice sounding a bit faint. “I don’t have much left.”
“As if anyone here has plenty to spare!”
Tang Xuan threw her hand out, and white light suddenly expanded in her palm, crashing into the approaching swarm of aberrations.
Light Flame exploded in the middle of the meat pile. The smell of charred flesh immediately rose. Several smaller ones were burned through on the spot, their surface membranes curling up to reveal the pulsing red cores inside.
“Luo Yang!”
“I see them!”
Luo Yang raised his hand, and three longswords streaked through the air, precisely pinning the edges of the cores that were about to detonate and flinging them away, meat, shell, and all.
Three successive explosions followed, toppling half of a factory wall and sending a rain of bricks falling like water.
The moment he released control of Weapon's End, Ember's Birth, a sharp pang shot through his head, like a dull saw being pulled back and forth through his temples. His footsteps faltered, and Night Owl nearly slipped from his grip.
Qiu Shubai happened to be retreating from the front and reached out to steady his arm.
“Are you alright?”
“Stupid question.” Luo Yang gently patted her hand and managed a smile. “It’d be pretty embarrassing to collapse now.”
“You’re still worried about that at a time like this?”
“What else should I worry about? My will?”
Just as he spoke, two more aberrations arched out from behind a pile of broken steel frames on the left.
They were a size larger than the previous ones, their layers of meat significantly thicker and their skin a shiny black. They made a creaking sound as they crushed the ground beneath them.
Tang Xuan went to raise her hand, but her arm shook, and the Light Flame flickered out halfway through.
“Shit.”
Cursing, she simply swung her hand back and pulled an incendiary grenade from her waist. She bit off the safety ring and hurled it out with a flick of her wrist.
A few seconds passed in a flash. The aberrations were clumsy and had no time to dodge. Flames exploded across the ground, knocking the two aberrations off balance.
This was her trump card, a specialized model she had sourced from the black market. The fire produced by its special materials had a potent burning effect even on Punishers, and each one cost her a fortune.
Qiu Shubai boldly cut in while they were tilted. Bloodfall pierced the greasy layers of meat and pulled hard, creating a wide, deep opening before everyone’s eyes.
The cores inside were exposed.
“Luo Yang!”
“On it!”
This time, two Cloud-piercing Spears flew out.
The spears were heavy, and the sound of them cutting the air was even deeper. They arrived in the blink of an eye.
The first spear pierced the foremost one, and the second followed it in, crushing the core. Then, both spears exerted force simultaneously, pinning the massive aberration against the base of the abandoned blast furnace, where it exploded into a sickening rain of putrid meat.
It was the exact same method Luo Yang had used to rescue the members of the Third Combat Section.
The group retreated at the same time to avoid the spray of corrosive fluids.
The base of the blast furnace shattered completely, and red-hot iron scraps mixed with meat fragments were swept out. The power of this aberration’s self-destruction was even greater than they had anticipated.
Luo Yang already had three lacerations on his back. This blast sent more fragments into them, making his knees buckle from the pain. He only avoided kneeling by bracing himself with one hand on the ground.
Yan Zhi crouched beside him, reaching out to support his shoulder.
“You are bleeding more.”
“Thanks for the reminder.”
“Do you want to rest?”
“No.” Luo Yang looked up at the front. “Do they look like they’re going to wait for me to catch my breath?”
The black mass of aberrations was still arching forward.
A swarm of small ones had died, but five or six large ones remained, followed by a dozen new ones emerging from behind.
They were like flies drawn to the scent of blood; the more they were killed, the more they gathered. The ground was covered in slime, making their boots slip.
Li Qiang coughed twice, a trickle of blood leaking from the corner of his mouth, which he quickly wiped away.
“I’ll give you one last round.”
The silver light was much dimmer than before, almost fading as it landed on them.
Tang Xuan took a breath, and white flames reignited in her palms. A lock of hair on her forehead curled up from the heat.
“Miss Chief, open a gap. Leave the small ones to me.”
“Alright.”
Qiu Shubai charged again with her sword.
Her movements were noticeably slower now, her boots dragging half an inch across the ground as she landed.
Yet her sword strikes remained perfectly steady. Her first strike sliced through the front row, the second knocked away a small aberration lunging at her, and the third stabbed straight into the side of a large one, tearing away an entire layer of meat.
Tang Xuan’s Light Flame followed immediately after.
The white flame, slightly weaker than before, tunneled into the wound. The meat inside immediately bulged and crackled, and the smell of char instantly filled the ruins.
“Old Luo!”
Tang Xuan shouted instinctively, having completely discarded any notion of respect.
“Don’t rush me!”
Luo Yang used his power to levitate five longswords and two daggers, his mental pull forcing them forward.
The weapons hummed and vibrated as they stabbed deep into the burned-open aberrations, then yanked outward simultaneously.
The cores were exposed.
Tang Xuan gritted her teeth and slammed her last cluster of white flames into them.
Boom, boom, boom—!
The first aberration to be detonated acted like a shell hitting an ammo dump, triggering a chain reaction of explosions among the gathered monsters.
A violent shockwave spread out, and the searing air currents briefly dispersed the heavy stench of rot.
The group immediately retreated several steps, finding the nearest cover to avoid potential splash damage.
The area was blasted clean.
As the heatwave receded, no one moved immediately. The only sounds left were the wet thuds of meat hitting the ground and the faint crackling of the blast furnace’s glowing red opening.
Luo Yang stood up, leaning on Night Owl. His vision was slightly dark, and his nostrils were filled with the scent of rust.
Qiu Shubai walked forward a few steps. Her boot hit something, and she looked down to see half a lump of meat still twitching slightly.
She raised her hand and pinned it through with her sword.
Tang Xuan sat directly on the broken bricks, her chest heaving violently. She didn’t even bother to curse, only raising her hand to give Luo Yang the middle finger.
Li Qiang leaned against a broken wall and slowly slid down until he was sitting, his head thumping against the bricks as he panted heavily.
“Is it over?” Tang Xuan asked.
“...Pretty much.” Luo Yang said it, but his eyes never left the darkness ahead.
The wind picked up again.
The slime on the ground flowed into the cracks toward lower ground, dripping with a sound like someone slowly clapping in the dark.
Yan Zhi suddenly looked up.
“There is more.”
“Which way?” Luo Yang turned instantly.
Yan Zhi didn’t point forward, nor did she point left or right.
She looked deeper in, toward the darkness blocked by half a collapsed building and a broken conveyor pipe.
“Inside,” she said. “Something is still moving.”
Rate on N.U.
