Bottom Line
The question of gender was just a fleeting thought. Ren Chenxi’s attention quickly returned to the scene below the window.
The men were still talking.
“You idiot! At a time like this, you’re still worried about whether she’s pretty or not!”
“But Big Bro, that broad1 is really pretty! Way better looking than these ones, anyway. Since she’s so tough, why don’t we…”
The man’s voice trailed off, and whatever else he said was too quiet for Ren Chenxi to hear. All she knew was that as the two men spoke, one of the two remaining yellow dots2 on her mini-map3 suddenly turned red.4
Huh? Just because I’m better looking than her, she’s hostile toward me?
Ren Chenxi was baffled.
Ignoring the woman who had suddenly ‘defected,’ Ren Chenxi kept her eyes glued to the window. Soon, a head popped up again, but it ducked back down before she had a chance to act.
“Hey! Woman!” another man’s voice called from below. “Seeing as… seeing as you’re a woman, and an esper,5 we don’t want to make things difficult for you. We don’t want to be your enemy, either. How about this: raise your hands, walk a little closer, and we can have a nice chat.”
Hearing the man gaining an inch and wanting a foot,6 Ren Chenxi’s lips curled into a sarcastic smile. She complied, raising both hands and taking two steps closer to the window.
After she did, the head that popped up from the window lingered a little longer before sinking back down. “Throw away the rock in your right hand, too!”
Just the rock in my right hand? Can’t they see the card pinched between my left index and middle fingers? Or do they just not care about a card that looks completely harmless?
Ren Chenxi didn’t have time to dwell on it. She obediently tossed the rock aside. At the sound of it hitting the ground, two heads appeared in the window at once. They gave her a satisfied nod, but their gazes grew bolder, their smiles turning lewd.
“That’s more like it. I’d advise you not to fight us. We have a Fire-System Esper7 and a Strength-Type Esper.8 And my ability? It’s to harden9 my entire body! Don’t think a single rock from you can do any damage to me!”
Tsk. What an idiot.
Ren Chenxi frowned in disgust. With a flick of her left hand, the Flash Card10 spun through the air, flying straight toward the bald man11 on the left. But the two men in the window acted as if they hadn’t seen it, their leering smiles fixed on her.
“Aaargh—my eyes!!!”
Another intense flash of light erupted, followed by a chorus of screams from inside. The two heads in the window ducked down again.
Ren Chenxi had kept a distance of about seven meters between herself and the window, so she was completely unaffected. But before she could make her next move, the door of the bus beside her slid open with a whoosh. The “Corpse-Collecting Girl,” who had been hiding inside all this time, charged toward the open supermarket entrance, a Big cleaver in hand.
“Watch out, you only have 20 seconds!” Ren Chenxi shouted a reminder to her.
The Corpse-Collecting Girl didn’t look back. She ran straight into the supermarket, and after a few more blood-curdling screams, she emerged, pushing four girls out ahead of her. She was holding a bloody cleaver and urged them to get on the bus quickly. Among them was the red dot.
Ren Chenxi gave the girl marked as a red dot on her mini-map a long, deep look before slowly walking toward the supermarket entrance. When the Corpse-Collecting Girl saw her approach, she gave her a grateful nod. Ren Chenxi waved her hand, signaling for her to step back.
Calculating the time… the blinding effect should be wearing off soon. Ren Chenxi stood a few steps from the supermarket entrance and glanced sideways into the store. She saw that the men who had been cowering under the window had retreated in the chaos to a corner on the other side. From her angle, her gaze met the bald man’s ferocious stare. She didn’t miss the faint red glow gathering in his right hand. Moving a step faster than him, Ren Chenxi threw another Flash Card.
After the game update, the system had added a new Combat Mode12 for players. Not only could Ren Chenxi see the enemy’s health bar,13 but she could also lock a targeting cursor14 on them, which automatically displayed the distance between them.
Right now, the distance between her and the bald man was six meters. As he was blinded once again, Ren Chenxi showed no mercy, continuously hurling sharp rocks at his head. Every single one struck him squarely. After five seconds, his face was a bloody mess, and the health bar above his head was nearly empty.
Smack! Another rock, the size of two fists, smashed into him. That round, bald head finally caved in. At the same time, his body slumped against the sturdy man beside him, who was still clutching his eyes in agony. The health bar above his head was finally empty.
The sturdy man, blind to what had happened, shoved the body away in a panic the moment it leaned against him. He had just boasted about his full-body hardening ability, and right now, his entire form was covered in a thick, brown, rock-like layer of skin for protection.
Ren Chenxi wasn’t afraid of this hardening esper, nor was she afraid of the Strength-Type Esper with the Shamate15 hairstyle next to him. As long as she took out the bald man who could attack from a distance with fire, the remaining three espers in the room would be easy to deal with.
Yes, there had originally been three men, but the other two, who were likely normal people, had already been dealt with by the Corpse-Collecting Girl’s cleaver.
“Lao… Lao Er!16 You bitch!!!”
When the blinding effect wore off, the sturdy man naturally saw the dead bald man. His eyes instantly turned red with fury as he charged toward Ren Chenxi.
“Come on! Laozi will fight you to the death!17 You really think your rocks are harder than my fists?!”
“Be careful!!!” The Corpse-Collecting Girl, standing by Ren Chenxi, grabbed the back of her shirt and pulled her back. “His whole body is petrified!18 His defense is really high!”
His whole body is petrified? How high is his defense? In Ren Chenxi’s eyes, she could see not only the sturdy man’s health bar but also the level next to it. A 3rd-Order Esper.19 Well, treating him like a 3rd-order zombie should be about right, then.
Using the force of the Corpse-Collecting Girl’s pull, Ren Chenxi took a few steps back. At the same time, an Explosion Card20 appeared between her right fingertips. Perhaps because of his full-body Petrification, the sturdy man wasn’t very fast. He had just charged out of the supermarket entrance when the Explosion Card in Ren Chenxi’s hand spun through the air and shot toward his head.
BOOM!
After the explosion, the sturdy man’s headless body fell heavily to the ground.
So the Explosion Card can ignore the defense of not only zombies below the 3rd-order, but espers below the 3rd-order as well.
“Long… Long-ge—21”
Witnessing the sturdy man’s stone head explode, the only one left in the supermarket, the Shamate esper, was so terrified he dropped to his knees. Long-ge had been the strongest esper on their team, but now… he’d been so easily headshot by this woman?
The Shamate’s gaze toward Ren Chenxi was filled with terror. Their team of five espers had basically walked all over everyone on their journey here. Who would have thought they’d run into such a hard iron plate22 today? Even though his brothers were all dead, the Shamate didn’t want to die!
“Wo- no, Big… Big Sis…23 I’m sorry, please don’t kill me… It’s my fault, I had eyes but didn’t recognize Mount Tai…24 Spare my life, Big Sis! No, Great-aunt,25 I’ll kowtow to you…” The Shamate sobbed as he began banging his head on the ground. Thump, thump, thump.
Ren Chenxi ignored his kowtowing, her gaze cold as she stared at him and asked a single question:
“Have you eaten people?”
Even in the apocalypse, Ren Chenxi believed a person had to have their own bottom line.26 If they crossed it, she could no longer see them as human.
“Ah… I… no, I…”
Faced with her question, the Shamate stammered, never daring to give a straight answer.
“He has!” the Corpse-Collecting Girl behind Ren Chenxi answered for him.
“Not only has he eaten people, but even when they had plenty of food, this group of beasts27 still insisted on eating people!” Another girl got off the bus, glaring at the Shamate with hatred. Gritting her teeth,28 she added, word by word.
This girl was still a yellow dot on the mini-map. But what concerned Ren Chenxi more was the long, freshly scabbed scar on her face. She wore tattered, grayish-brown clothes, torn in many places and covered in loose threads. The gray was the color of accumulated filth, not the original color of the fabric. Even her beautifully shaped eyes were filled with an ashen despair.29 Seeing her like this, Ren Chenxi knew she must have been through too much to ever trust anyone again. Whatever. At least she isn’t hostile toward me right now. That’s better than the red dot hiding by the bus door.
“These people stole our food, took our water, and my friends… Along the way, whenever they played a girl to death, they would eat hot pot30 that same night. They ate in front of us, and they even praised the taste in front of us, saying how fragrant, how tender, how delicious it was… Why don’t you tell us what kind of meat you were boiling in that hot pot!”
“I… I…” Meeting the yellow dot girl’s murderous gaze, the Shamate trembled with fear and fell backward, scrambling away on his hands. “I didn’t want to… It- it was Long-ge! Long-ge and the others forced me to eat with them…”
“Hah. Forced you? But you seemed so happy, so delighted to be eating it!” the yellow dot girl sneered.
“I- no, that’s not it, I was pretending… If I didn’t act like that, I… I… Long-ge would have killed me…”
“But along the way, you killed plenty of girls yourself, didn’t you? You’re a Strength-Type Esper. One little ‘accident’ and someone dies! You knew your own strength, but you kept doing it, again and again. First, you’d ‘accidentally’ break the girls’ arms and legs, then you’d crush their ribs, and finally, you’d watch with satisfaction as they coughed up blood and died in agony! You were doing it on purpose!!!”
With every sentence, the yellow dot girl’s voice grew louder, until by the end, she was practically screaming.
After hearing her accusation, the Corpse-Collecting Girl muttered softly, “That’s basically sadistic murder,31 isn’t it? He’s really sick!”
As for Ren Chenxi, she was already looking at the Shamate esper as if he were a dead man.
“N-no… I didn’t mean to… I, I, I, I…” Seeing the blatant killing intent in Ren Chenxi’s eyes, the Shamate could only be thick-skinned and shameless,32 refusing to admit his crimes. “L-let me go! I was forced, I was forced, I tell you…”
“Forget it. Why waste your breath33 on him? Just kill him, right?” The Corpse-Collecting Girl shot the Shamate a disgusted look and turned to ask Ren Chenxi.
Just then, the yellow dot girl spoke again.
“Can I be the one to kill him?”
✨ Unlock Early Access to Chapters! ✨
Choose your perfect membership at bamboopandatl.net:
📚 Full Access ($4.99)
• Advanced chapters of ALL ongoing novels
• Access to complete finished novels
• Ad-free reading experience
📖 Single Novel Access ($1.49)
• Advanced chapters of ONE specific novel
• Ad-free reading for chosen novel
PayPal is the only current payment option!