Chapter Forty-Four: Massacre

“This time the intel was definitely wrong. With that Corpse King’s bizarre abilities, the difficulty had to be at least four or five stars!” Lü Hao spoke with a furrowed brow.

Recalling the earlier scene, he still felt a lingering terror— that tall, slender figure was simply too horrifying.

Faced with such a desperate situation, the female Awakened couldn’t help but burst into tears, her voice choked with fear. “I... I don’t want to die yet.”

“It’s alright, at least we’re safe for now. Once we’ve regained some strength...” Xiao Wen was about to comfort her, but his words suddenly trailed off.

A sense of foreboding pressed down upon him. As a psychic Awakened, his sensitivity to danger was acute; now, he felt as if something was drawing closer.

Xiao Wen sat on pins and needles, a chill crawling up his spine. He glanced back instinctively, only to find nothing but pitch-blackness behind him.

“Xiao Wen, what’s wrong?” Lü Hao noticed his unease.

Xiao Wen’s brows knit together. “It feels like... something’s gotten in!”

“What?” Those around them were aghast, finding it unbelievable.

“Brother Wen, don’t scare me!”

“Yeah... these walls are so thick, and there’s no breach. How could anything get in?”

“Didn’t you say it was safe just now?”

People murmured in confusion.

“I’m not sure either. Maybe I overexerted myself and my nerves are shot,” Xiao Wen massaged his forehead, unable to believe it himself.

Under extreme tension, hallucinations aren’t uncommon. Maybe his intuition was wrong...

But just as Xiao Wen turned his head back, a slender figure materialized behind him. Dressed in a pristine white shirt, with a cold, deathly expression—it was like the reaper himself had come.

Lü Hao and the female Awakened sat directly across from him and saw the scene most clearly. Their eyes went wide with terror, faces frozen in disbelief, as if they were seeing a ghost. They doubted their own senses.

“H-he... he got in!” The female Awakened stammered in terror.

Xiao Wen looked puzzled. “Who—?”

But as the words left his lips, he realized something was wrong. Everyone’s eyes were fixed behind him, horrified.

There really was something there...

A powerful sense of impending doom rose within him, the stench of death thick in the air. He was too afraid to turn around, fearing that his life would end the moment he did.

But he couldn’t suppress the urge; slowly, he began to turn his head. Yet a large hand was already gripping the top of his skull, passing straight through his cranium and extracting his crystal core.

With the motion of his head, Xiao Wen’s body collapsed to the floor. In his final moment, he caught a glimpse of that white shirt.

The reaper’s figure really had come in...

A last thought flickered through his mind: “Everyone here... is doomed to die...”

Lü Hao’s eyes were wide as saucers. At such close range, watching Lin Dong’s killing technique, he felt a chill run down his entire body. He had experience hunting Corpse Kings, but had never seen anything so uncanny.

What was most disturbing was that, despite the walls being heavily reinforced, Lin Dong had infiltrated without a sound.

It was utterly unsettling.

This was a true Specter Corpse!

The female Awakened was ashen with fear, staring fixedly at Lin Dong’s form, her whole body trembling.

“This tomb is well built...” Lin Dong’s gaze swept the room.

The hotel walls were ten meters thick, giving the interior an oval shape—indeed, like a crypt.

Lü Hao refused to wait for death. “Quick, open fire!”

A thunder of gunfire erupted, muzzles spewing flame, bullets raining down like a storm.

Red light flickered over Lin Dong’s body; he seemed to become insubstantial. The bullets passed through him, striking only the wall beyond.

People were petrified—Specter Corpses really were in a league of their own. Firearms had no effect; a wave of despair washed over them.

Still, they squeezed the triggers, the roar of gunfire deafening, not just to kill Lin Dong, but as a final protest against the cruel world.

Why... why does it have to be like this?

In the next instant, Lin Dong’s Corpse Domain expanded, enveloping the space. The gunfire was snuffed out at once.

The armed men were mere mortals, unable to withstand the pressure. Their bodies burst apart one after another, like watermelons smashed to pulp.

Watching blood spatter around him, Lin Dong was reminded of the “Mashed Garlic” days at the orphanage.

After setting off firecrackers, it was time for dumplings...

Against these battered survivors, it was a massacre—pure and simple.

Lü Hao and the female Awakened, already drained, were empty husks under the weight of the Corpse Domain—agonized and helpless.

The female Awakened gritted her teeth, convinced that, with a Specter Corpse like this, the chance of survival wasn’t 80%, but 99.99999% against them.

“Die!” she shrieked, blood seeping from the corner of her mouth—her body overdrawn, she unleashed her last reserves of power.

From the thick walls, countless steel bars shot forth, slicing through the air like arrows, converging on Lin Dong from every direction.

Because these bars were infused with the energy of Awakened crystal cores, Lin Dong didn’t take them head-on. With a wave of his hand, the power of his Corpse Domain gathered, flinging the steel aside.

In the same breath, he appeared before the female Awakened.

In the depths of her despairing eyes, he reached out and took her crystal core.

Her body crumpled to the ground, only one thought echoing in her mind:

“Whoever gathered that intel and called this a one-star Corpse Nest—may they run into zombies like this every single day...!”

With the female Awakened’s death, the Hunter King Squad was almost completely annihilated; only Lü Hao remained.

Yet his survival instinct was powerful. In the instant Lin Dong’s Corpse Domain was distracted, he unleashed his final surge of energy.

“Armor of Earth!”

With a thought, the earth from the surrounding walls rushed to coat his limbs and body, transforming him in a flash into a giant of soil.

With the earth’s power, Lü Hao’s body swelled to three meters tall, his powerful arms as thick as a grown man’s waist.

He radiated raw strength.

Resisting the Corpse Domain’s pressure, Lü Hao swung a massive fist at Lin Dong, the air whistling with force.

But Lin Dong didn’t dodge. He answered with a punch of his own.

This opponent was interesting enough...

He used eighty percent of his strength.

In the darkness, the air cracked with a sonic boom. His iron fist erupted like a dragon from the depths—unstoppable.

Boom!

The moment their fists collided, it was like two mountains crashing together. The thunderous crash was followed by a sharp crack.

Though the soil giant’s arm looked formidable, spiderweb cracks appeared instantly, spreading and breaking apart, chunks falling away.

In no time, Lü Hao’s real arm was exposed, hanging limply—completely numb.

“So strong...” Lü Hao gritted his teeth, his heart heavier than ever. This Corpse King possessed not only uncanny abilities, but such a terrifying body as well!

He was, quite simply, an invincible monster...

...