CHAPTER 265: VICTORY OF THE LIVING DEAD

A Brute roared, swinging a slab-sized fist; I sidestepped, let the blow pass, then buried the bastard sword under its jaw, twisting free in a spray of gore. The gap it left was all I needed! Because the Commander was right there, climbing over the last corpse ramp.

I raised the blade high, spirit power flooding the steel, the edge humming with killing intent.

And then I froze from the sheer pressure.

As if the weight of a mountain slammed down on me, thick and suffocating, like standing beneath a collapsing building.

My muscles locked as the air itself seemed to tighten around my chest. The strange Qi was both dense and murky, like a swamp. The level was close to mine, no higher even! But lacked the same finesse and technique.

It was wild like an untamed beast.

The dark aura enveloped my body, wrapped my limbs and somewhere in the smoke... hidden by the horde, a new silhouette stepped into view.

A man I once knew.

Now he was nothing but a twisted monster with lifeless Yellow eyes.

[Mutated Human | Stage Six | Parasite-Type]

Name: Lao

Estimated Attribute Average: 15

Strength: 20+

Danger: Extreme

The moment the blue panel flashed red in my eyes, I knew something was wrong... To have a danger level of extreme, even after reaching my current state, wasn’t good. Whether I let the girls fight or not, with a twenty Strength, he could kill them almost instantly.

***

His stench hit me first.

Even under the rot and blood of the battlefield, Lao’s scent pushed through, sharp, sour and metallic while tinged with something foul. I remembered him before, still human—a smug grin, fast movements and the kind of man who wouldn’t end a fight midway.

Now there was no grin, no humanity. Just a hunched predator, his flesh warped into a grotesque armour of bone and exposed muscle.

One arm, his right, remained vaguely human, twisted and filled with thick black veins, but functional. The left was no longer recognisable. A curved black, dense as my thigh, jutted from his shoulder down to the wicked point that reached below his knee.

It gleamed wetly under the flames and moonlight, the colour of old ivory wrapped in vines of blackened flesh.

He didn’t rush to take action.

The horde pulled back from him in an unnatural wave, leaving a twenty-metre circle of flesh around us. The Command Type seemed reluctant. Although wounded, it dragged itself away without breaking eye contact.

My bastard sword felt heavy, almost slipping from my grip. Just knowing what I would face caused me to endure the pressure.

"Lao..." I muttered, half to myself... the other wanting to awaken something inside him.

His head twitched at the name, jerking slightly with insect-like movement. Those eerie yellow eyes narrowed, focused on me and for a heartbeat... I thought something human remained.

That’s when he moved.

With a single slash, his curved blade swept across the sky, the force splitting a Brute’s corpse in half without slowing... like a hot knife through butter. I barely got my sword up in time to catch it.

’What the Hell!?’

The impact rang like a bell through my arms, rattling my teeth.

Sparks shot off the meeting edges, and my boots slid a full meter across the stone before I locked my stance.

Without pause, he pivoted, swinging again, forcing me to twist my blade vertically and press my second hand against the blade to reinforce my defence. I tried to parry the blow, make it glance instead of taking it full on. The deflected blow carved a trench in the stone at my side.

He’s faster than before.

I lashed out with my gauntlet, shells humming.

Boom-Boom-Boom-Boom!

Four shots in a heartbeat, each blast of buckshot hammering into his torso.

The recoil jarred my elbow, the smoke thick in my face. Lao staggered, but his momentum didn’t break, and he twisted in the smoke, reappearing at my flank.

"Shit....!"

I threw myself forward, sword arcing backwards over my shoulder in a blind slash. Steel met bone-blade again, the clang reverberating up my spine.

"Come on then!" I roared, driving my boot into his chest. He slid back, bare feet tearing through flesh and bodies beneath him, and then crouched.

He shot at me with a low stance, then up, blade first, a sweeping uppercut that threatened to split me from groin to crown. I dropped my weight, blade horizontal, catching the edge and angling it away so it tore past my side. Even so, the bone tip ripped through my body suit’s flank, hot blood blooming across my ribs.

Zao sniffed the air and snorted like a beast...

His lips twisted into a strange, inhuman smile, crooked and emotionless.

I answered with the other gauntlet.

Boom-Boom-Boom-Boom!

Eight shells in ten seconds, both arms numb from the exchange. The sudden concussive blasts threw him back a step, shredded flesh peeling from his abdomen. But the parasite’s body moved differently; the wounds didn’t bleed normally, dark tendrils squirming to pull themselves back together.

Parasite-Type regeneration.

This wasn’t going to be an easy battle...

No. I cannot be weak; remain confident, John!

I pressed forward anyway, trying to convince myself. Every step into him was a step he couldn’t use to reposition. I brought the bastard sword around in tight, powerful arcs, rising slash to keep his block high, then a diagonal cut meant for his leg. He parried the first with his manti-blade, but my follow-through forced him to shift his stance.

His right — the human arm — shot forward, claws extending unnaturally. I caught it on my gauntlet’s reinforced forearm plate, sparks flaring as bone scraped metal, then snapped my elbow up into his jaw.

The hit rocked his head back, just long enough for me to drive my boot into his knee.

With a crack, it bent backwards.

He fell sideways with a guttural hiss, but before I could capitalise, that mantis-blade swept my legs in a horizontal arc. I jumped, boots finding the sticky back of a corpse mid-fall, then kicked off, bringing my sword down in a plunging strike.

Clang!

Sparks burst out.

Bone met steel again, but this time the sound was different; a deep crack followed. His weapon-arm flexed under the blow, a thin fracture spreading along the edge.

Lao shrieked as if I had just cut out his heart.

It wasn’t a human sound, nor an animal... something twisted and alien.

I staggered back, driving the blade in a half-circle to keep him from recovering. "You don’t get to walk away from this," I shouted in rage.

He responded by lunging straight at me, shoulder-first, with no fear, using his superior weight and strength to slam me back. My boots left the floor before skidding until my heels caught on something.

A corpse, maybe?

We went down in a heap, his blade stabbed down, missing my skull by inches as I rolled to the left.

My gauntlet barrel pressed to his ribs.

Boom! Boom!

Point-blank. The shockwave blew him sideways, chunks of bone and parasite-flesh spraying across the bloodied stone.

For the first time, he hesitated.

The horde, focused on the walls, suddenly stirred... their groans as if reacting to his screams.

I struggled to my feet, breathing hard... My own blood seeped from the various wounds under my bodysuit, and my ribs burned where he’d cut me. His yellow eyes locked on mine again, and this time I saw a flicker of something strange.

Recognition.

It lasted only a moment before the parasite consumed it, and he roared, charging again.

We met in the middle, steel and bone screaming as they collided.

I forced him back step by step, every blow driving deeper into the fracture along his mantis-blade. My strikes came faster, tighter, not giving him room to swing fully.

A rising cut caught the underside of the weapon arm and crack! The bone split wider, a jagged line opening toward his shoulder. Lao reeled, his left arm shooting out, but I caught it on my gauntlet and twisted hard, hearing ligaments tear.

His roar faltered into a snarl.

"This ends now!" I surged forward, sword glowing with spirit-infused heat, and swung in a brutal diagonal. The strike bit deep into his collar and ripped downward, nearly severing the arm entirely.

He stumbled, parasite flesh twitching wildly as he fell to one knee.

I planted my boot on his chest, blade raised for the killing blow.

For a heartbeat, it felt like the tide had shifted.

Then his body convulsed.

A wet, ripping sound filled the air as blackened tendrils burst from the wound, writhing like snakes, spraying foul ichor in every direction. The blast of parasite flesh forced me back a step, and in that instant, his silhouette vanished into the haze.

I spun to avoid...

Too late.

Pain tore across my back as something hit me from behind with bone-splitting force, hurling me face-first into the mound of corpses.

Then a voice... almost human, yet warped by hunger, hissed in my ear, its breath reeking of mould and spoiled milk.

"Still too slow... John."

A heartbeat later, fire lanced through my body as several black tendrils punched clean through my chest and abdomen, lifting me off the ground. Their slimy, barbed lengths writhed inside me, and the stench of rot and curdled air filled my lungs.

Somewhere beyond the ringing in my ears, distorted voices screamed — voices I knew. Roulan. Wei-Wei. Yifei... and Lan’er...

All calling my name.