Chapter 355: 355. Frenzied Hunter
"Pshhh!"
A section of smooth, silver blade swiftly pierced into the body.
The sound of blood being squeezed out of the body was brief and quick.
The beast-transformed patient, panting heavily as he pinned his victim to the wall and kept thrusting the pitchfork forward, revealed a portion of the blade’s tip from his mouth.
The blade tip, unstained by blood, shattered its already mutating teeth and gums.
The beast-transformed patient writhed and jerked with distorted vitality, but as the blade tip was twisted ninety degrees, it collapsed completely.
The dogs corrupted by the beast plague grew large, fierce, and possessed keen senses.
One of the dogs, which had torn off a forearm, detected something amiss and let out a confused whimper.
"Woof?"
But before it could raise its head...
"Thud!"
A boot, reinforced with plate armor, stomped directly onto its neck!
With brutal force and heavy weight, this stomp pinned the dog’s neck against the wall, while the vertebrae made a crisp ’crack’.
The force-crushed and deformed vertebrae punctured through its decaying skin, spewing a foul-smelling blood slurry that splattered on the wall in a spray pattern.
With calm precision, Lann stabbed with a steady thrust and then stomped, breaking the neck of a diseased hound.
The other two simultaneously realized what was happening, dropping the lifeless flesh from their jaws and lunging at Lann.
With a glance to confirm their position, the Demon Hunter clenched his empty hand into a fist... "Bang!"
The iron knuckle studs of his studded leather gloves were driven into the head of one of the rabid dogs mid-air with ferocious force.
The iron nails ripped through flesh, and the fist crushed bone.
"Whine... Crack!"
Halfway through howling, Lann’s fist drove the dog’s lower jaw into the wall!
The lower half of its jaw was completely shattered, dense blood mixed with bone fragments flowing and splattering out.
Retracting his fist, he blocked with his forearm on one side of his neck, just in time for the final rabid dog to collide awkwardly with his steel-armored forearm during the motion.
At this moment, the silver blade finally withdrew from the back of the beast-transformed patient’s head and mouth.
Like whipping, the blade carved a full and graceful arc in the air.
Swinging across the chest, the entire rabid dog was neatly sliced in two by Aron Dite’s blade.
Instinctively, Lann flicked the blade, ejecting the bits of flesh and thick blood with a "splat" onto the ground, leaving the Lady of the Lake’s Sword pristine once more.
Only a section of golden runes on the blade’s surface shone brightly.
The Demon Hunter suddenly opened his large hand to catch something from the side.
A brown glass bottle the size of a beer bottle landed in his grasp, its mouth sealed with a burning cloth strip.
This was a homemade Molotov cocktail.
Those not yet heavily beast-transformed still used tools from their human lives, and their skeletal structure hadn’t yet distorted beyond recognizable human form.
So, to some extent, it’s hard to say whose destructive power was greater compared to patients in later beast-transformation stages.
Without even looking, Lann’s act of catching the Molotov did not deter the recently arrived beast-transformed patients.
There were four or five of them, most wearing shabby top hats or straw hats, seemingly having lived a hard life in Yan’an. They were rapidly mutating in this sudden Night of the Hunt.
Most of them wielded pitchforks, cleavers, or other everyday tools, and one of them held a long-barreled musket.
That was the only thing that caught Lann’s attention.
The Demon Hunter calmly watched them rush in with growls, and at the moment when the musket man pulled the trigger, he threw the Molotov back.
The glass bottle shattered on the musket’s barrel as the bullet exited.
The exploding Molotov in mid-air created a larger area of effect than a direct throw.
The gasoline from the bottle rained upon all the beast-transformed patients.
In Yan’an, people believed that ’beasts should be hunted with fire’.
This notion was nearly an obsession, leading every household to stockpile dangerous flammable materials.
But this was indeed proven advice.
Engulfed in flames, the beast-transformed patients panicked, dropping their weapons before screaming, rolling... eventually turning into charred corpses sprawled on the ground.
"Whistle~ Looks like fire is indeed super-effective, seems they react even stronger than ordinary people being burned."
Lann whistled, having taken into account the trajectory of the Molotov, the timing of the musket shot... and so forth.
He orchestrated all factors into a single Molotov throw, perfectly covering them all.
It gave Lann a sense of satisfaction in achieving his objective flawlessly according to plan.
But it wasn’t over yet; behind the burned beast-transformed patients, a figure stepped onto the ground where the Molotov flames were gradually extinguishing.
A tall top hat, light gray high-collared trench coat, tight-fitting waistcoat underneath, and various belts, metal tools dangling for ease of hunting... undoubtedly, it was a Yan’an Hunter.
His head was lowered, the brim of the top hat hiding his face.
Judging by his attire, his hunting outfit had a ’fashion sense’ belonging to the Victorian Era.
Lann internally named him the ’Stylish Hunter’ for the time being.
"Are you a Hunter out on the hunt?"
The Demon Hunter took the initiative to display friendliness. Although the blood on the other’s coat was terribly thick, Yan’an Hunters often operated in such a manner, so it wasn’t surprising.
Lann gradually approached and then stopped at a safe distance.
This safe distance was mainly determined by the length of the other’s weapon. The Stylish Hunter’s weapon was a stout steel cane, comparable to a Longsword.
The front end was edged for stabbing, while the back was also edged but not very sharp, seemingly meant for striking.
The safe distance Lann maintained was more than sufficient.
Moreover, he had shown himself to be a normal human; on the Night of the Hunt, this almost served as proof of being the same kind.
Yet after Lann spoke, the Stylish Hunter showed no intention of responding.
Instead, he switched the grip on his steel cane to a reverse hold.
Lann’s eyes narrowed slightly at this, the hilt of the sword he had been holding loosely now gripped firmly in his hand.
Sure enough, when the Stylish Hunter lifted his head, most of his face had already begun to grow coarse black hair!
Those eyes had also degenerated into a chaotic mass!
"Swish!"
At the very moment the Stylish Hunter raised his head, the steel cane he held in reverse emitted mechanical sparks, projecting a soft and swift reflection of steel into Lann’s vision.
The Demon Hunter, initially standing laxly, fluidly sidestepped in an instant.
That steel reflection whipped past his armor, slicing through the air!
"Tch, I knew it..."
Lann murmured with a twist of his lips.
"How could a Yan’an Hunter use an ordinary cane?"
The Demon Hunter’s cat-like eyes watched the steel gleam retract into the Stylish Hunter’s grip.
The seamless steel cane had now split into sections, each cut at an angle to be sharp.
Bound together by what seemed more than just steel wire, it had transformed into a flexible sawtooth steel whip.
Earlier, it was beastified townsfolk throwing Molotovs.
Now, it was a beastified, deranged Hunter wielding his hunting skills against a human.