The moment she flung the golden crown, the Blue Knight was already rushing forward.
She leapt up from behind Lu Yuan, landed in front of him, and grabbed him by the back of his neck, hoisting him completely off the ground.
Now that they had left the abyss filled with rotating eerie inscriptions, the Blue Knight no longer needed to cling to Lu Yuan.
Before Lu Yuan could even find his footing, he was pulled off the ground, entirely unable to resist.
The Blue Knight dragged him along as she sprinted back the way they came, using her threads to propel herself off the walls of the pipe network layer at breakneck speed.
“Don’t resist,” the Blue Knight shouted at Lu Yuan, who was dangling from her grip.
Lu Yuan, of course, did not need to be told twice.
At this moment, the aura surging from the abyssal rift grew more intense with every passing second. A sickening stench of gold light and flesh churned together, constantly spilling out from behind them. Even a Rank 2 with dull perception like him could sense the extreme danger.
The commotion behind them was unmistakable. Something was pursuing them from the rift, closing in at an incredible speed.
Light blue threads spread out around the Blue Knight like a massive spider web, carrying the two of them forward in a frantic dash.
The rotating eerie inscriptions flashed past on both sides of his vision. This time, Lu Yuan was unaffected, simply because they were moving too fast for him to see them clearly.
Finally, light filtered through the tunnel ahead.
Kraus stood there, his body shimmering with a dark green light. The wounded men who had been before him were gone, clearly evacuated ahead of time, and several lit march lamps hung beside him.
Hearing the noise echoing from the depths of the pipe network layer, he looked up and froze for a moment when he saw the Blue Knight dragging Lu Yuan along in such a bizarre posture.
Before he could speak, he spotted the roiling gold and black aura surging behind them, and he swallowed his words.
Kraus spun around and began running with them.
“What on earth did you two provoke?”
Kraus's voice drifted back from ahead, carrying a hint of irrepressible bewilderment.
The Blue Knight ran at top speed, having absolutely no time to answer him.
Lu Yuan could not speak either—not because he didn't want to explain, but because he literally couldn't open his mouth. Right now, escaping was the only thing that mattered.
The commotion behind them grew louder and louder.
Low growls echoed continuously from the depths of the pipe network layer. The muffled, heavy sounds were saturated with intense malice, making the entire tunnel tremble.
A mass of gold-and-black flesh swarmed out from the darkness, slapping wetly against the walls and floor of the pipe network layer like a rising tide as it pursued the trio down the tunnel.
Kraus glanced back. The green light on his body had flared to life, and bone armor had enveloped him completely at some point.
His speed surged once more, even as he prepared himself to be overtaken and fight on the spot at any second.
“It won't catch up. Just focus on getting out first,” the Blue Knight called out without looking back.
Having made a quick assessment of the situation, Kraus did not reply.
The three of them sprinted through the pipe network tunnel, with Kraus leading the way and the Blue Knight closely following behind while carrying Lu Yuan.
The pipe network tunnel was not particularly long, and the trio quickly reached the exit leading to the surface.
The moment they burst out of the pipe network layer, Lu Yuan's steps ground to a sudden halt.
The entire Bronze City was completely blanketed in a thick white fog.
The fog was incredibly dense and vast, stretching from the ground all the way to the sky. It reduced all the buildings to blurry silhouettes, and the air felt sticky and heavy, making every breath a chore.
Lu Yuan's heart tightened.
The Blue Knight let go of Lu Yuan's collar, and the three of them stood together on the open ground outside the exit of the pipe network layer.
Visibility was barely three to five paces; anything beyond that was completely lost to the fog.
Suddenly remembering something, Kraus pulled out his communication crystal from his waist.
The pale red crystal flickered erratically in his hand, unable to maintain a stable connection.
“All Nightwatchers, listen up! Evacuate all sinkholes! Evacuate all sinkholes in the pipe network layer! Do not hesitate, leave immediately at all costs!”
Kraus's voice carried a distinct note of urgency as he roared into the communication crystal over and over again.
However, in this heavy fog, the crystal was severely interfered with. He had no idea if anyone could hear him, or how much of his message was getting through.
Kraus clutched the crystal and repeated the order several more times. “Remember, this is a full evacuation! Immediately!”
A few muffled responses finally crackled back from the other side of the crystal, but there was no way to know how many people had actually heard him clearly.
Standing to the side, the Blue Knight swept her gaze through the white fog.
Her threads had been completely retracted and hung at her waist. Her expression was grim.
“The flesh didn't follow us out,” she remarked.
Lu Yuan glanced back at the exit of the pipe network layer, his brow furrowing. She was right.
The earth-shattering pursuit that had just taken place in the tunnel had ground to a complete halt once the three of them reached the exit.
The gold-and-black flesh had surged up to a certain point near the exit and stopped expanding, settling there quietly.
But that wasn't the main issue.
The critical problem was that the pipe network layer below was now completely impassable, yet a large number of Nightwatchers, Holy Armored Army soldiers, and Imperial Iron Guards were still guarding the sinkholes down there.
If this flesh spread to those areas, the consequences would be catastrophic.
At that thought, a cold sweat broke out across Lu Yuan's back.
Meanwhile, at an inconspicuous sinkhole in the outer city's pipe network layer...
Not long after returning to his squad from his escort mission, Conrad had been stationed at this nearby sinkhole.
Since the sinkhole was located inside the pipe network layer and had not broken through to the surface, only Conrad and a small squad of Nightwatchers were guarding it. They had set up basic defenses with barricades and sandbags around the perimeter, and a single march lamp hung from a barricade post, casting a bright light over a radius of about ten paces.
Conrad stood at the edge of the sinkhole, holding a silver-plated short-shotgun with the barrel pointed downward.
He had six Nightwatchers guarding the post with him.
The sinkhole was not large—about five paces wide and four paces long—but its depths were pitch-black and seemingly bottomless.
Conrad found the situation rather strange.
Earlier, greater ghouls had been continuously surging up from below, with as many as a dozen appearing in a single hour at their peak. Conrad and his men had dealt with them one by one, piling their corpses around the sinkhole in a small, gruesome ring.
Yet, starting just a moment ago, the ghouls had suddenly stopped appearing.
Conrad crouched behind the barricades, his eyes fixed on the dark opening.
It was unnaturally quiet down there; even the faint, scratching sound of claws scraping against stone had vanished.
A Nightwatcher beside him leaned in and whispered, “Captain, it seems to have stopped. Are there no more ghouls coming our way?”
Conrad kept his eyes glued to the sinkhole, offering no reply.
Silence was rarely a good sign, especially when dealing with the eerie. More likely than not, something massive was brewing.
Right then, the communication crystal at Conrad's waist suddenly lit up.
He pulled it out. The light on the crystal's surface flickered erratically, clearly suffering from eerie interference.
Holding the crystal to his ear, Kraus's fragmented voice crackled through.
“...full evacuation... do not hesitate... immediately...”
The rest of the message was completely unintelligible. Conrad waited a moment longer, but only static and white noise remained.
Clearly, Kraus had realized the interference as well and could only say that much. The crystal was likely useless now.
Conrad slipped the crystal back into his belt and stood up.
“Retreat. Everyone, pull back.”
His voice was quiet, but his tone carried absolutely no hesitation.
Since Kraus had issued an evacuation order, they had to retreat. There was no need to ask what was happening or why.
Though the six Nightwatchers were somewhat confused, they immediately began packing up.
They abandoned the defensive barricades and sandbags, taking only their weapons.
Conrad took the lead, scouting ahead to ensure the escape route was clear of ghouls.
The group retreated in an orderly fashion along their pre-planned safe route.
Still clutching his short-shotgun, Conrad had only taken a few steps when the ground beneath them began to vibrate.
This tremor came incredibly fast and with immense violence, leaving Conrad and the Nightwatchers struggling to keep their balance on the shaking floor of the pipe network layer.
Sensing something, Conrad abruptly halted and spun around to look back.
A muffled, heavy sound rumbled from the sinkhole, as if something deep underground was surging upward.
Following the sound, a foul, stench-ridden draft erupted from the opening.
Though Conrad was not particularly close to the opening, his transcendent pathway was already screaming in panic, urging him to flee immediately.
Snapping to his senses, he roared a warning to the men ahead.
The other Nightwatchers reacted instantly, sprinting forward and ignoring the violently swaying ground.
But it was already too late.
Mass after mass of flesh erupted from the sinkhole, spilling outward in great, heavy folds.
The dark red flesh, interlaced with black veins, slammed against the ceiling of the tunnel before tumbling down. In an instant, it swept over the barricades and sandbags, dragging the march lamps and the copper posts into its mass.
The lights flickered once within the writhing flesh and then died completely.
The two Nightwatchers at the rear of the line didn't even have time to scream before they were dragged into the mass.
The moment the flesh touched them, it instantly enveloped their legs.
The two struggled desperately, firing their weapons repeatedly into their own legs, but it was in vain. The flesh spread with terrifying speed, completely cocooning them in a heartbeat.
Conrad watched in horror as their faces contorted in a desperate struggle.
Their skin bloated at a visible rate as the invading flesh forced its way along their blood vessels, burrowing between bone and muscle to bloat their bodies from the inside out. Their blood and internal organs were rapidly assimilated by the encroaching mass.
Their eyes were still rolling, proving they were still conscious, but their bodies had ceased to obey them entirely.
A third Nightwatcher tripped and fell backward into the oncoming tide of flesh.
The mass surged over him from all directions, wrapping him in a suffocating embrace.
His right hand remained exposed, fingers splayed as he clawed desperately at the empty air, but his fingers were swallowed one by one by the flesh until nothing remained.
Witnessing this, Conrad knew that he was going to die.
He turned his head to look at the remaining brothers beside him. Only three were left. None of them had dropped their weapons, though their faces were filled with a mixture of grief and despair, and their lips trembled.
“Throw the mithril! Fight!”
Conrad's voice was steady.
He reached to his waist, retrieved his last two bottles of mithril, uncorked them, and flung the contents at the encroaching flesh.
The silver liquid splashed onto the dark red mass, and with a sudden roar, it ignited into silver-white flames.
The moment the flesh met the flames, it hissed and crackled, flinching back for a fraction of a second as if it possessed sentience. But in the next instant, it surged forward again in a frenzy.
The silver-white firewall, built from their remaining mithril, was completely snuffed out by the overwhelming tide of flesh in the blink of an eye.
The advance of the flesh showed no sign of slowing down.
Conrad looked down at his boots.
The flesh had already crawled onto them, climbing up his shins at an alarming speed. It felt warm—a sickening, tepid heat.
He averted his gaze from his legs and looked back at the pipe network tunnel behind him.
He still clutched his short-shotgun, but he no longer had the strength to pull the trigger.
Soon, the sinkhole lost all semblance of its original shape. Everything in the vicinity was devoured clean by the flesh, leaving behind only a writhing, dark red expanse.
After one final gunshot, the pipe network layer fell completely silent, devoid of any sign of life.
Rate on N.U.
