Chapter Ninety-Two: Clues

“Xiaoye!” Han Shuqing cried out in terror as she rushed out.

“Woof, woof, woof!”

Only a dozen seconds later, Xiaoye burst out barking furiously, every inch of it bristling with rage, its gleaming fangs bared in a savage snarl.

“Woof!”

Then its body began to swell again, returning to the same fearsome form it had taken when it had charged into battle with Cao Fusheng and Huo Bingran at the chemical plant.

Its size was now on par with the giant ape.

Barking wildly, it hurled itself at the ape, knocking the once-composed brute flat on the ground in a single impact. Then it went to work with a frenzy of bites and tears.

It seized the giant ape by the neck and ripped, tearing away a huge slab of flesh, which it chewed up and swallowed on the spot.

“Roar!! Squeak, squeak, squeak...”

The giant ape let out a miserable howl of pain. With both hands it grabbed at Xiaoye, rolling and thrashing on the ground. Then it lifted Xiaoye high and hurled it far away with a thunderous crash.

Undeterred, Xiaoye charged back again. A patch of fur had been torn from its body, leaving raw flesh exposed to the air.

Cao Fusheng knew all too well that Xiaoye could not sustain this state forever; in the end, it would be the one to suffer for it.

Looking at the huge battery box still embedded in the giant ape’s back, Cao Fusheng suddenly came to his senses.

Even though the thing had mutated and grown far stronger, so strong that even its skin could not be pierced, the wound there had not healed.

It was still oozing blood and pus, and especially when it was moving violently, Cao Fusheng could even hear liquid sloshing around inside.

It was probably the twisted mess of intestines and organs.

But now that it had mutated further, it could no longer feel that pain, which was why it could keep fighting with such terrifying energy.

Cao Fusheng looked at the more than ten grenades left in his dimensional storage. If he could just throw them into that wound, wouldn’t that be the same as detonating them inside its body?

Even if it did not kill it outright, it would not be far off.

“Xiaoye! Carry me so I can get close to its back!” Cao Fusheng shouted to Xiaoye.

The struggle between the two aberrations had gradually shifted toward the haystack, which was where Chu Wei was hiding.

The ape’s long tail lashed out repeatedly, slicing away layers of hay each time, while Xiaoye met it head-on, carefully avoiding the sweep of the tail.

On the other side, Zhao Cong hurried over as well, moving toward Chu Wei’s hiding place.

Chu Wei suddenly emerged from a haystack that had been flung aside. It turned out she had already been struck earlier; she had merely survived thanks to the thick haystack.

She had not been cut in half, but she had been sent flying and had lost the ability to move.

Zhao Cong was rushing over to save her.

Xiaoye heard Cao Fusheng’s shout, but it had no way to break free and get over to him. The giant ape had it locked down tightly.

“Zhao Cong! Get out of the way! Move, now! Behind you... no!!” Chu Wei’s shrill scream rang out.

It made Cao Fusheng turn his gaze over again. Zhao Cong was struck by the ape’s tail, yet for some bizarre reason he froze in place.

It was as if he was still trying to make sense of Chu Wei’s words. Even when the tail swept across his body, he still had not reacted.

Chu Wei covered her mouth and began sobbing softly. She could no longer bear to look at Zhao Cong, who had been torn into two pieces, and forced her face away.

At the moment the tail swept past, its overwhelming force and piercing power sliced Zhao Cong’s body apart in an instant. Because it happened too quickly, he himself never even realized he had been cut in half.

Even in death, his lower body remained in the posture of running toward Chu Wei, while the upper half with the head had already collapsed somewhere in the endless grass.

Chu Wei had lost the ability to move. Though she had been lucky enough to survive that blow, she was in no condition to breathe easy; at the very least, several of her bones must have been broken.

Taking advantage of the brief opening when the corpse ape had flung out its tail with full force, Xiaoye finally ran up to Cao Fusheng and lowered its body so that he could mount it.

Cao Fusheng pressed himself tightly against Xiaoye’s body to avoid being struck by the ape.

“Argh...”

The ape swung a fist at Xiaoye’s flank. Xiaoye howled in pain, but it still clung doggedly to the corpse ape’s shoulder, while Cao Fusheng smoothly leapt onto the ape’s own shoulder.

“Goodbye, you filthy ape!”

Cao Fusheng opened his dimensional storage, held out his palm toward the opening in its back, and then dumped in a pile of grenades with their pins already pulled.

In that fleeting glimpse, he could even see its intestines and organs. Many of them had been smashed to pieces by the battery box.

Wait...

Why did the name on that battery box look so familiar?

A battery box from ZM City? This ape had carried it all the way here from ZM City?

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“Detected the host has killed a [prototype corpse beast]. Reward: 300 gene points.”

So it really was only a prototype. Just as expected, it was exactly like that synthetic corpse strain; it must have come from the same hand.

Cao Fusheng slumped against the side of the vehicle, the hand holding his cigarette trembling faintly. It was a natural reaction after long years of strain.

Whenever a life-or-death battle broke out, his nerves would be drawn taut to the breaking point, and when it was over, his hand would tremble without him meaning it to.

It was the aftereffect of a burden suddenly being lifted.

Everyone present looked grim. Gao Yi and Shen Dong had long since exhausted themselves to the point of collapse. In the old era, people used to put on monkey shows, and there were even monkey performers roaming the streets and alleys.

In the ruined era, the world had turned upside down. These days, it was the monkeys putting on the show with people.

Cao Fusheng passed the cigarette pack around, and everyone lit one up, even Chu Wei.

Perhaps Zhao Cong’s death had hit her too hard; her only companion had died such a brutal death. Or perhaps her injuries were so severe that she needed the cigarette smoke to numb herself.

Cao Fusheng roughly examined her wounds. Two ribs were broken, and she had some internal bleeding. If she was not treated in time, she would eventually die from her injuries.

“Mm...” Xiaoye’s mournful whimper came from Cao Fusheng’s arms.

It had fought the ape and suffered no small number of injuries itself. By now it had lost all its energy, lying in Cao Fusheng’s embrace and drifting toward sleep.

“All right, Xiaoye... it doesn’t hurt, okay? It doesn’t hurt.” Cao Fusheng gently stroked its fur and softly comforted it.

Among the group, Han Shuqing was the least injured, mainly because she had not taken part in the fight directly.

Still, that was not her fault. Though she had gone through a drastic change and her personality and sense of independence had gradually hardened, battle strength was not determined by temperament.

Forcing her into close combat with a monster like this would have been no different from sending her to her death.

So for now she had taken on the role of sentry and battlefield nurse, keeping watch on the surroundings while also helping Chu Wei, who was the most badly injured, set a splint and immobilize the fractured bones.

As for Cao Fusheng, Shen Dong, and Gao Yi, they were simply spent beyond their limit. They truly did not have the strength to get up and do anything else.

“Captain Cao, is this the power of an aberration? This is the first time I’ve fought one of these things in more than a year, and every bone in my body feels like it’s about to come apart. If that ape hadn’t gotten carried away showing off, I’d probably have been done for today.” Gao Yi’s voice was full of lingering fear as he took a deep drag on his cigarette to steady himself.

Cao Fusheng nodded at Gao Yi, but all he could think about was that battery box.