Chapter 635: Illusions and Clarity
Before Xiaoyun could think of a reason, the ground below them suddenly started to shake.
Red tentacles were breaking out straight from the ground, right near the area where the ball of flesh was.
Soon, more and more tentacles were starting to pop up from the ground, getting closer and closer to where the car was located.
"Shit! That thing wasn’t the core! Driver! Why are you not moving?" Xiaoyun yelled as the car remained in place.
"I can’t! I pressed the gas pedal, but it’s not moving!"
"Fuck! Everyone off the trucks! We’re going to run back on foot!"
As Xiaoyun and the soldiers near him hopped off the pickup truck, the soldiers in the other two trucks quickly realized what was happening.
They immediately hopped off as well, running right after them as the truck drivers gave up trying and started catching up.
"You all keep running, I’ll cover fire!"
Some of the soldiers in the front hesitated for a second as they saw their commander running in the opposite direction.
But those behind didn’t hesitate—they turned and fled, forcing the rest to follow as they continued running down the road.
Soon, all nineteen soldiers disappeared in the dense fog. Xiaoyun was the only one remaining behind, firing his rifles right at the tentacles.
The bullets fly right through its body, barely hindering its movement as it slides through the flesh floors.
There was a total of thirty, no hundreds of tentacles, all chasing. Way more than Xiaoyun had ever imagined.
All the ones near the buildings were activated, gathering more and more onto the road as they were now ten steps away.
"Take this!"
As a grenade appeared in Xiaoyun’s hand, he quickly pulled the pin before throwing it right behind himself.
His leg instantly bolted forward, running as fast as he could as the explosive went off, creating a loud bang right behind him.
Turning around, there were still tentacles chasing after him. But nowhere near as many as earlier.
An idea suddenly popped into his mind. One that could be crucial in resolving this crisis.
With zero hesitation, Xiaoyun puts it into the plan.
He quickly runs around the slow-moving tentacles, heading straight to where the ball of flesh was killed.
The remain was just a pile of burnt flesh, riddled with bullet holes and mysterious liquid on the floor.
"Just a little bit..."
Xiaoyun’s hand quickly gathered some of the burnt flesh into an empty glass vial before catching some of the liquid on the floor into a separate glass vial.
With the two samples put into a small ziplock bag he had just made, he quickly took a look at his surroundings, only to find himself stuck in an intersection.
In all four directions, there were waves upon waves of tentacles heading right towards him, barely any gap in between them.
"Shit."
An entire sword appeared in his hand as he rushed forward, slashing it right towards the tentacles that blocked his way.
It sliced right through it, but more tentacles quickly replaced it as he swung his sword again and again.
His wrist couldn’t stop for a single second. His legs kept running, stepping over the tentacles’ flesh as more and more tentacles flooded in.
After just twenty steps forward, his progress was completely halted as tentacles started appearing directly below him.
A weird, cold feeling held onto his leg, like falling into quicksand as every movement he tried to do only made it even firmer.
"Fuck!"
As Xiaoyun swung his sword right in front of his leg, he was finally freed to move once again. But the tentacles in front of him immediately took this opportunity to attack.
Fortunately, he was able to create a dagger just in time in his other hand, cutting the tentacle that tried to wrap around his chest.
"Ouch!"
A whip from the back instantly created a hole in the back of his hazmat suit, with the air canister’s pipe cut as the pressure valves fell to zero.
There was zero direction that had space to maneuver around, with his back now against the wall as he struggled to cut through the overwhelming numbers.
"Crap crap crap."
With the breakthrough plan failing, Xiaoyun made his last decision to lunge through the open door, straight into the flesh building.
Once inside, he looked around his surroundings, only to find himself at some sort of apartment building with only one way to go.
The flesh staircase.
---
As Xiaoyun arrived at the roof, his head started to feel a little sleepy, and he collapsed onto the ground.
"Wake the fuck up!"
Biting his tongue, the pain instantly woke him up as he stood back up and walked over to the edge of the building.
Although he couldn’t see what was below through the dense fog, he was certain that the tentacles had surrounded the entire street.
At this point, there was nowhere to go other than to stay put and fight, hold off the tentacles at the small roof entrance.
Just as he was about to make his last stand with a grenade in hand, his brain suddenly had a little idea pop up.
He immediately unzipped his broken hazmat suit, throwing it aside as the dense fog immediately rushed in to be on top of his skin.
The drowsiness started to get even stronger, but he kept himself awake as he quickly created an invisible cloak for himself.
Putting it over himself, he was able to turn it on before his leg ran out of strength to remain upright.
The last thing he could see was tentacles arriving right at the roof entrance as his consciousness faded to black.
---
When Xiaoyun woke up again, his head still felt a sharp pain. But he no longer felt sleepy anymore.
Looking around, he was still on the rooftop, the same place where his legs had passed out and fallen onto the floor.
The invisible cloak on his skin had run out of power, with the black dot in the sky rather than the usual red dot like earlier.
"How long was I asleep for?"
As he slowly supported himself back up against the wall, his brain suddenly realized something.
The red filter in the air was completely gone. What was suppose to be a dense fog had completely disappeared.
The floors and the walls were no longer made out of red flesh. It was almost as all the things he had witness earlier was just a facade.
A layer that tricked the human eye. Looking out the roof, he could see the buildings in the distant clearly.
"What the hell?"
Taking out the ziplock bag, it was still as red as he had witness earlier, reminding him that all these flesh wasn’t just a illusion.
"What the fuck is happening?"
Examining his body, there was nothing different about it. At least physically he was still the same on the outside.
"Did I gain resistant to the fog?" Xiaoyun wondered as it seem to be the only logical explaination in his head.
After making sure there was no tentacles in the streets or in the staircase, he headed back downstairs with his sword in hand.
On the streets, not a single tentacle body was on the floor. Even thought his memory could remember he had killed at least hundreds of them.
The only proof left was a pool of myserious red liquid, which he quickly created a glass vial before catching some of it in.
"Why does it feel so empty?"
As he walked down the road, not a single living thing was in sight. Not a single tentacles were on the streets like earlier.
The entire city was looked oddly normal, with concrete walls and shattered store windows.
He could even see some of the loots within the stores, like a bottle of wines and the coffee tables.
Not a single thing was corrupted by flesh of any sorts. The roads and the cars parked on the streets were all perfectly fine.
"Is this all an illusion?"
Walking further down, he could see black dot in the sky starting to change color, getting brighter and brighter until it changed to normal
The moon was back up in the sky, shining brightly as he seemed to have walked out of the what was previously the dense fog area.
"Huh... This doesn’t make any sense at all——"
"Who’s there! Raise your hand where I can see them! We’ll not hesistate to fire!"
As a person yelled out in the distance, Xiaoyun’s mind finally let out a small sigh of relieve after seeing their uniform.
"I’m your commander in chief!"
The moment the voice traveled down the road, the soldier still didn’t lower their weapon. Instead, they raised it up and aimed forward.
"Woah! What’s this for? Do none of you guys reconganize your own commander’s voice?"
Xiaoyun questioned as a weird feeling started to tickle in his head. Something was clearly not going right.
"You’re not our commander."