Chapter 25

Chapter 25: Pop the Ultimate

“What the hell is going on?!” Zhou Zhou bellowed at Fang Ye. “How is your buddy talking when he’s already dead?!”

Fang Ye looked like he’d been scared stiff—just stood there, eyes bulging, staring at the corpse on the ground.

Zhou Zhou’s temper flared even higher. He strode up and kicked Fang Ye hard, sending him crashing down.

He’d held back, but Fang Ye still curled up in pain and wailed, “It was that monster! That monster… it—it can copy a human voice…”

Feng Ling shot a glance at Huang Fu Miao Miao. “It can do that?”

Huang Fu Miao Miao’s face was paper-white. “I-I… I don’t know…”

Feng Ling said, “Read your area quest again.”

Huang Fu Miao Miao fumbled open her virtual screen and stammered, “D-deep in the pitch-black cave, the monster is already ravenous… You will need sharp judgment and astonishing courage… Silence is the prelude to death, light is the overture to victory. Conquer your fear and you will receive a generous reward—will you accept an A-rank extermination quest?”

“Accept,” Feng Ling said immediately.

Huang Fu Miao Miao blinked. “Huh… h-huh?”

Feng Ling’s stare sharpened. “Accept it. Now.”

Huang Fu Miao Miao slammed confirm.

“I—I accept the A-rank extermination quest!”

A progress bar appeared, cold and merciless: 0%.

Huang Fu Miao Miao’s mood turned into a mess.

An A-rank extermination quest—five or six players minimum even with a party. All those bodies in the cave? Most of them had to be players. Could she and Feng Ling really pull this off?

And Feng Ling loved danger. Loved it.

Huang Fu Miao Miao’s unease thickened into dread. If Feng Ling died here, where would she find another shield?

…Honestly, even if Feng Ling lived, following a Boss like this meant she’d never have a stable day again.

Maybe sticking with Feng Ling in the first place was a mistake…

No. No. No. She couldn’t think that.

Without Feng Ling, she would’ve been tortured to death by that Fatty.

Or grabbed by an inspector and dragged off for experiments.

Tubes everywhere. Needles. Cold metal. A body turned into a test bed.

Huang Fu Miao Miao’s face went from white to green as the images in her head piled up, one nightmare after another.

Feng Ling had no idea what was spiraling through Huang Fu Miao Miao’s mind.

Bone spines slid out from her shoulders with a slick, ugly sound. Two transparent bone blades rose high, eager.

Those bugs earlier hadn’t given her anything. Like eating plain noodles in thin broth—empty, bland, pointless.

This big one, though… this one might be fun.

“Move!” Zhou Zhou snapped, slashing a claw through the air like he owned it. “This is my turf. Back off. Old Master is about to pop his ultimate!”

“Pop your ultimate?” The bone blades on Feng Ling’s shoulders trembled faintly as she studied him. How, exactly?

In the next heartbeat, Zhou Zhou’s shoulders and back ballooned. His shirt tore with a nasty rip. Coarse silver-gray fur erupted from his pores. His head reshaped violently—pupils burning gold, fangs pushing in, six beast ears bursting through skin.

He strangled a roar in his throat and, somehow, turned into a… dog.

“See that?” Zhou Zhou flashed his teeth at Feng Ling, smug as hell. “My ability card—the hellhound card!”

Feng Ling just stared. “…Fine.”

The name was intimidating.

The look was not.

Ugly, for one.

Small, for another.

Sure, his shoulders had sprouted two extra dog heads, but their eyes were shut and they looked half-dead. Hard to know what to call that.

Like an undergrown werewolf.

Feng Ling couldn’t help flicking a glance at Huang Fu Miao Miao.

Even devils were this underwhelming, apparently. So maybe a hellhound card looking like this did make a kind of sense.

Huang Fu Miao Miao froze. Then, like a spark jumped across her skull, she somehow read Feng Ling’s look in a single second. She flared up. “A high-tier card has huge room to grow!!!”

“That’s right!” Zhou Zhou said—rarely, tragically—agreeing with an aberrant he despised.

Feng Ling, caught between them, muttered, “Then show me the upgrades.”

The skittering returned. A wet, crawling chorus.

Everyone shut up at once and tightened into fighting stance.

They expected the polluted entity from above to drop down again.

Instead, blue-black crawlers poured in from every direction.

Zhou Zhou looked like he’d rather chew rocks. He’d take a one-on-one with the polluted entity any day over clearing swarms of filthy, darting bugs.

“Everyone fall back to the passage!” he roared, fur bristling. Then he plunged into the swarm like a living weapon.

His strength and speed jumped into another class. Under his beast claws, insect bodies split like paper. In a few breaths he had shredded three, four—more—pieces flying, ichor stinking up the air.

Feng Ling held the opposite side, covering the Special Assault Team members as they withdrew. Her bone blades were long and nimble, with a wider reach. She barely had to move her shoulders—each sweep cleanly split a lunging bug in two.

“Shit—our detector!” Qin Liang shouted.

One insect monster, drawn by the glow, sprang for the display with black, glossy mandibles wide.

Qin Liang bolted back. He threw an arm around the precious device and yanked it into his chest.

Mandibles punched through his backpack and sank into his back. Qin Liang let out a muffled grunt—hands still locked around the detector, refusing to loosen even a fraction.

“Move!” Zhou Zhou surged in, grabbed the monster, and tore it in half with claws like steel.

Its belly burst. Black-green slime sprayed out, rank and sticky, soaking Qin Liang. Qin Liang didn’t even wipe it off—just hugged the detector and ran for the passage like the darkness itself was chasing him.

Feng Ling glanced at Zhou Zhou. “You’re surprisingly considerate.”

Zhou Zhou’s eyes stayed on the remaining bugs, cold and hard. “My turf. I won’t let anyone get hurt in front of me.”

Feng Ling almost hit him with a cringe, but his voice had dropped, low enough it sounded like he wasn’t saying it for anyone else. More vow than boast. She swallowed the jab.

One by one, the flare sticks died. Darkness crept in like a tide.

Zhou Zhou’s visibility shrank. His impatience sharpened into something close to panic.

The underground caves were far bigger than they’d expected. They needed supplies. They needed air. They needed to get back to the surface—now.

The swarm finally broke. They retreated into the passage and started back the way they came.

The passage grew rougher, narrower, meaner.

Feng Ling remembered an overhanging rock up ahead—the one that had cracked a team member on the head. But they walked, and walked, and never saw it.

Something’s wrong.

Then, up front, Fang Ye screamed.

“What now?!” Zhou Zhou barked from the rear, unable to see past bodies and shadows.

Xiao Li’s voice came tight. “This route is wrong! There’s a pit ahead—Fang Ye and Old Cao both fell in!”

“Fuck!” Zhou Zhou spat.

“Help me! Help me!!!” Fang Ye shrieked, voice ragged with terror.

Feng Ling forced her way forward. The passage ended in a deep pit—at least seven or eight meters down. Fang Ye lay at the bottom, head split and bleeding. Cao Hong Yi was down there too, sprawled out and clutching his shin, his face drawn tight.

Broken?

Feng Ling opened her mouth to ask—

Cao Hong Yi’s eyes snapped to something behind Fang Ye. He raised his gun and fired.

Bang.