Chapter Twenty-Nine: A Flood of Tears
Wang Chui saw through the trap of being surrounded on three sides, narrowly escaping, when a terrified voice came through his watch—Niu Piaopiao shouting, “Boss, the rat tide—the rat tide has broken out!”
“What?” Wang Chui’s voice shot up an octave, almost shrill.
Qin Ming and the others turned pale.
“From where we just were, thousands of gray-furred rats are pouring out, and more are appearing all around!” Niu Piaopiao spoke breathlessly, “Run, don’t stop for anything. And Huo Chong just showed up behind the three-headed wolf pack. That last trap—it was definitely set by them. Three waves of fierce beasts clashing made too much noise, it must have stirred up and drawn the rats! And in the distance—my god, on all sides, there are hordes of gray-furred rats appearing.”
She spoke at a breakneck speed, the whistling wind in the background suggesting she was running with all her might.
“Go!” Wang Chui growled, low and suppressed. “Remember—if anyone falls behind, no one is to turn back. It’s useless, it’ll only add to the casualties. If we get separated, run for your life alone. A rat tide—numbers mean nothing. Remember, seize every chance to escape!”
The thing they feared most had finally happened.
Even Qin Ming’s face turned ashen.
Gray-furred rats seemed weak alone, but in numbers, even a war god would retreat—caught by them, anyone would be killed.
They had barely run two kilometers when they saw an eighteen-story building ahead swaying, about to collapse. On its walls and windows, gray-furred rats were everywhere!
“The building’s coming down, move!” As soon as Wang Chui spoke, the building crashed to the ground. Though it didn’t bury them, the billowing dust completely obscured them from sight.
Their way ahead was blocked.
“Follow me—cough, cough!” Wang Chui grabbed Qin Ming, who was right beside him, and, judging by the situation, changed direction.
No sooner had they escaped the dust, than a pack of gray-furred rats appeared ahead—seventy or eighty of them.
“Damn beasts, break through!” Wang Chui cursed, taking the lead. His left arm raised a shield, his right swung a great hammer. Every blow crushed a rat into pulp.
“Uncle Wang, what about the others?” Qin Ming slashed his blade, not pausing.
“If it were any other beast tide, we could fight together, but a rat tide? If we’re scattered, it’s every man for himself,” Wang Chui said helplessly. “Trying to regroup at all costs is the stupidest thing you could do!”
They had just broken through when another wave of rats jumped out, blocking the way ahead and flanking them on both sides.
Wang Chui’s lips trembled.
Qin Ming’s expression was grim.
With heads bowed, they pressed forward, hacking a path. They couldn’t stop, couldn’t turn back.
There was only forward—if they couldn’t break through, they’d become rat fodder.
Once more, Qin Ming stared into the eyes of cruel reality.
Just then, a figure darted around the corner ahead.
“Huo Chong…!” Wang Chui halted, recognizing the man at once.
Whether it was because of the direction they’d just taken, he didn’t know, but here they were, face-to-face.
“Wang Chui, disaster is upon us. Let’s set our differences aside and fight together!” Huo Chong called as he hurried over, eyes wide with fear, his sincerity seemingly genuine, no hint of deceit.
Wang Chui retreated, still wary.
Ahead, a swarm of gray-furred rats was charging. Another group closed in from behind.
“Fine, together!” Wang Chui gritted his teeth.
In this situation, cooperation meant survival. Old grudges could wait until they escaped. There was no time to think it over.
“In the face of wild beasts, in the face of death, any prejudice can be set aside! Captain Wang, I knew I could count on you!” Huo Chong said, pulling a grenade from his pocket and tossing it forward.
But as the grenade left his hand, his finger hooked, sending it arcing toward Wang Chui and Qin Ming.
“Damn!” Qin Ming, who’d been watching Huo Chong closely, saw it coming and lunged, bashing the grenade away with his shield.
Boom!
The explosion knocked Qin Ming backwards.
“Huo Chong!” Wang Chui roared in fury.
By then, Huo Chong had smashed through the wall on the right and slipped inside. His voice echoed out, “Wang Chui, you’re as naive as ever. Don’t you know—with a rat tide, all you need to do is outrun the next guy!”
As he spoke, the opening filled with rats.
In that moment, Qin Ming and Wang Chui found themselves surrounded.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!
The gray-furred rats leapt as high as ten meters. They closed in from every direction—even above.
“Damn it! I said never to trust people easily, but in crisis, I still believed in damned human nature!” Wang Chui cried out in pain. “Xiao Qin, stay close!”
He charged forward, shield slamming, hammer swinging.
Qin Ming followed, guarding their sides.
Neither uttered a word.
Wang Chui’s hands and face were soon slashed. Even his battle suit began to tear.
Qin Ming fared better, perhaps because of the mysterious cultivation method he’d practiced. His bones were as tough as alloy, his skin shockingly resilient. The rats’ claws left only white marks, but with repeated attacks, blood began to seep.
“There’s a bridge ahead!” Wang Chui exclaimed, joy lighting his face. “Qin Ming, fight with me to the bridge!”
They hacked their way to the bridge, where Wang Chui blocked the entrance and shouted, “Qin Ming, go, go, go!”
“Uncle Wang, we leave together!” Qin Ming shook his head, blade weaving a deadly net. Soon, a pile of rat corpses grew before him.
“I’m losing too much blood, I can’t go on!” Wang Chui shook his head, not bothering to wipe the blood from his face. “I’ll hold them here—you might still escape. If we both stay, we both die. Go!”
“Uncle Wang, the river below is wide—shouldn’t we try to escape by jumping in?”
“Jump? Qin Ming, remember—unless there’s absolutely no hope, never jump into the river! The beasts in the water are even more vicious, and we lose all advantage there!”
“But—”
“Promise me one thing! If you get out alive, someday—listen, someday—kill that bastard Huo Chong for me.”
“I promise!” Qin Ming’s voice trembled.
“And kill a few more beasts for me, as a tribute!” Wang Chui roared, “Now go—get out of here!”
The gray-furred rats surged like a tidal wave, repelled only by his shield and great hammer.
One man held the passage, and not a single rat could break through!
“Uncle Wang, is there anything else you want to say?” Qin Ming gritted his teeth and turned to flee.
His eyes reddened, his voice shook.
He knew, once he left, he’d never see Wang Chui again.
“Hahaha! Just kill that bastard, and a few more beasts for me!” Wang Chui’s voice rang out. “I have no family, nothing to hold me back—just this body!”
“After decades of solitude, I’ve longed for death!”
“Back in the Great Cataclysm, the whole nation was fleeing!”
“I’d just gotten married, my wife was newly pregnant, but we had to flee from wild beasts!”
“I remember that time so clearly!”
“Heh! That memory—I’ll never forget it, not even as ashes!”
“We were all on a truck, taken over by bandits who tied us up so we couldn’t struggle!”
“The beasts chased us, and to slow them down, the bandits threw us off one by one!”
“I watched my father, my mother, my wife—all thrown off the truck in turn!”
“I hated them!”
“I ground my teeth to dust!”
“But it did no good!”
“Just as I was about to be thrown off too, a military unit arrived and saved me!”
“I reached the base—by then, martial arts were spreading. I buried myself in training, became a martial artist!”
“I hunted down those bastards—crippled every single one!”
“I got my revenge, but my life lost all meaning!”
“From then on, I became a hunter!”
“I swore I’d kill every last beast!”
“I knew I couldn’t—but I’d give everything I had to kill as many as I could!”
“In the wild, in the ruins, my parents’ spirits linger, my wife’s memory endures, and my unborn child…”
“Qin Ming, I see my parents—I see my wife—and I… I think I see my child…”
Wang Chui’s voice broke off.
“Uncle Wang!” Qin Ming turned in time to see Wang Chui buried beneath a sea of gray-furred rats, his great hammer still pounding.
He could not hold back—he burst into tears.