Zhan Pingchuan had clearly been charging up right behind Popov, but on the way up, he suddenly saw a grenade thrown their way. On impulse, he braced himself on the stair railing with one arm, used his core strength to swing his body in a full rotation, and kicked the grenade back in midair.
The thing exploded during its fall, shrapnel piercing two guards’ eyes and sending them tumbling down the stairs with screams of pain.
In just that instant, when he leaped up the last step, Popov had vanished before his eyes.
Zhan Pingchuan froze. “Popov?”
No answer, but looking back, the main force was just now surging up.
Lily raised her gun to charge but was yanked back by Lance grabbing her collar. Lance quickly asked Zhan Pingchuan, “What happened?”
“Popov’s gone.” Zhan Pingchuan manipulated his silver threads to slice off a sniper’s head, his expression grave.
Their worst fear had come true—someone had gotten separated while running.
Being isolated on enemy territory was extremely dangerous. No one could cover all bases, and when guards with flashy abilities swarmed them, even the strongest Awakened would stumble.
“Pop… Front-line bro! Where’d you run off to!” Ling Qi shouted at the top of his lungs.
As a recovery-type Awakened, he was responsible for the entire team’s safety. If his delayed assistance caused casualties, it would be his fault. With Popov missing, Ling Qi was nearly jumping with anxiety.
“Big guy!” Fata also called out.
“I’ll go find him!” Abaddon stepped forward, summoning even more beast spirits in one burst. The creatures emerged from his back, floating toward various corridors.
Fortunately, he’d killed many Pouncers in underground cities—these flying little things made excellent scouts.
Unfortunately, his ability had a casting range and couldn’t go too far.
Half of Mudeli’s glasses were shattered. Panting heavily, he swept back guards with his lasers while saying, “Right now we all have the same destination—the second level. I bet when Popov realizes he’s lost, he’ll head to the second level to regroup with everyone.”
Kuhn recalled his playing cards, sweat streaming down his neck. He wiped it away. “Right, let’s head to the second level first!”
The truth was, their stamina couldn’t support a carpet search of the entire prison. The ability pheromones stored in their glands were limited—if they weren’t careful, they might not even reach the second floor.
“Alright, upstairs first!” Zhan Pingchuan hesitated no longer. He took Popov’s charging position, clearing the way forward with Dream Witch while Mudeli and Fata covered the rear.
The main force clustered even tighter as they charged up another flight of stairs.
During the fighting, Lance inadvertently glanced into the left corridor and saw a palm-shaped dark red stain on the gray-black wall, as if a bloody hand had once pressed against it and never been cleaned.
But it was just a fleeting glimpse—he quickly focused back on the battle.
Knowing the entire team’s ability pheromones wouldn’t last much longer, he and Lily collected transparent vials from the guards along the way.
He distributed these vials evenly among the team for emergencies.
Most regrettably, they’d only collected one vial of Li Bang’s invisibility ability, far fewer than fire-breathing, wind-generating, or flight abilities.
This showed that high-level Awakened pheromones were still scarce. What could be extracted in large quantities were ordinary low-tier abilities—which was also why they could break through successfully.
“This should be the sixth floor! There are fewer guards!”
“There’s hope! Push through in one go!”
Resistance suddenly decreased, boosting everyone’s spirits. Mudeli no longer hoarded his pheromones, throwing off his broken glasses and roaring as he pierced through the guards’ bodies.
“Fi… fifth floor!”
Just then, the air ahead suddenly shimmered as if scorched, a heat wave brushing their skin and making all their body hair stand on end.
They all stopped in their tracks. This moment didn’t feel like much—just air that seemed to contain particles that made them uncomfortable.
But Oliver covered his stomach and dry-heaved.
His delicate constitution was most sensitive to discomfort.
“Little blondie?” Dream Witch quickly supported Oliver’s back.
Oliver shook his head gently.
Though his physical foundation was poor, he was still S-level—ordinary abilities couldn’t damage his core.
Lance wiped his lips, brushed by the heat wave, ignored his quickening heartbeat, and said coldly, “That radiation Awakened.”
He saw in the Spirit Realm system that the Outer God had parted the chaos and opened its eyes.
It must have sensed the damage to his body and been forced to wake up, watching this sole passage.
It needed to patch things up when problems arose with the passage—after all, this was a fragile, defective, troublesome, bothersome passage.
But it seemed it wasn’t yet time for repairs, so It just watched the show, disdaining to help this cunning passage.
“Damn, I’ve been putting up with him for too long.” Zhan Pingchuan ground his teeth lightly, pulling the MT08 machine gun from his back.
The chamber was loaded with rare lead ore bullets that could break through any ability and reach an Awakened’s vital points.
Based on the radiation’s effect on them, Zhan Pingchuan judged the opponent was probably below A-level.
Actually, if it were just him, he’d be too lazy to bother—it would metabolize in a few months without much impact.
But the little fox was F-level. Who knew if this crap would leave Lance with aftereffects or affect his lifespan.
The thought of some rat in the gutter hiding in shadows and harming his treasure made his teeth itch with hatred.
Zhan Pingchuan stepped toward the area of intense radiation.
Dream Witch tilted her head at a charging Omega guard, lifted her eyes slightly, and said coolly, “Hey, what does your radiation Awakened look like?”
The Omega guard stared into Dream Witch’s eyes, dazedly lowering his gun and saying infatuatedly, “Uh… he wears white robes, his skin is red like he’s been scalded with boiling water, really scary. He was brought by Lord Benbu—everyone Lord Benbu brings wears white robes.”
Dream Witch smiled slightly. “Where is he?”
Omega guard: “He was… just now he was in this corridor.” The guard pointed in a direction.
Sure enough, that corridor was now empty—the guards deliberately avoided that area.
Dream Witch signaled to Zhan Pingchuan, who raised his gun. “Wait for me, I’ll be right back!”
With that, he wrapped silver threads around cell bars, using the tension to pull himself over the crowd and sprint toward the corridor’s end.
“Little idiot!” Lance blurted out in his urgency, pulling Lily as he chased after Zhan Pingchuan.
Rushing into the corridor, his peripheral vision again swept over the dark walls, the dark red handprint flashing through his mind like a slide.
The Omega guard was deeply lost in love, his face flushed red as he shyly rubbed his fingers and asked Dream Witch, “May I kiss you?”
Dream Witch raised her hand and chopped, knocking the guard unconscious. “No, I like blonde Omegas.”
Zhan Pingchuan reached the corridor’s end in seconds and indeed saw a white-robed, red-skinned person using an ability.
This person wasn’t tall, surrounded by a faint red glow. The air around him shimmered like boiling water, and the closer you got, the clearer the sensation of particles striking your skin.
Seeing Zhan Pingchuan’s figure, the man’s pupils contracted. He turned to flee—his ability was better suited for casting from shadows, not direct confrontation.
Zhan Pingchuan snorted coldly, several silver threads shooting toward the man like lightning!
Seeing trouble, the man’s body immediately pixelated like a screen with poor signal reception, separating into mosaic-like fragments. The silver threads struck empty air.
“Hmph!” The flowing mosaic let out a cold laugh, sticking to the dark wall like putty as he shouted, “Old madman, hurry up!”
But Zhan Pingchuan had long anticipated he was an elemental-type Awakened. The best way to deal with someone who could transform their body into elements was a close-range assault with rare lead ore.
Bang bang bang!
Bullets flew from the MT08 in rapid succession, the recoil making Zhan Pingchuan’s shoulder tremble slightly. Ejected shells clattered pleasantly to the ground.
“No—” The radiation man screamed, pupils trembling violently. Before he could finish his second word, he was riddled with bullets in the blink of an eye.
The flowing mosaic coalesced, gradually materializing into solid form. Blood stained his white robes, his internal organs completely shattered.
He stared at Zhan Pingchuan in disbelief, blood gurgling from countless holes in his body.
How could there be a machine gun with such rapid fire rate and such dense, precise bursts? He’d never seen such a weapon—perhaps only the underground armory of Blue Pivot Tower had…
His thoughts cut off as his head dropped heavily, his life reaching its end.
Lance arrived just in time to witness the wall the radiation man had leaned against gradually tilting, as if about to flip that entire section over.
But when the rare lead ore bullets hit the wall, it suddenly returned to normal.
He immediately realized this was the spatial ability Oliver had mentioned—one that could cut space into modules and create visual distortions!
“I know why Popov disappeared. Someone tampered with the stairs. Popov really did reach the upper level, while we only seemed to be going upstairs but were actually running around the same plane. We’re not on the fifth floor, not even the sixth or seventh—we’re still on the eighth floor.”
As soon as Lance finished speaking, the wall at the corridor’s end suddenly became a passable pathway, while behind them, what had been the route to the stairs was now a solid wall.
Lance narrowed his eyes, slamming Black Mamba’s Fang against the stone wall. The blade struck sparks, and lime flaked off.
This proved the wall behind them wasn’t a visual distortion but solid matter—they’d been separated from their companions!
Zhan Pingchuan shouldered his machine gun again, kicking aside the mangled corpse in the corner. “So he was eager to lure us over and separate us. He just didn’t expect me to bring rare lead ore weapons, cutting off his escape route.”
Lance sheathed Black Mamba’s Fang, somewhat regretful. “I should have noticed earlier. I clearly saw the bloody handprint on the wall by the stairs.”
“Baby, it’s my fault, don’t blame yourself.” Zhan Pingchuan reached out to hug the little fox, gently patting his back. “They have several S-levels over there, they’ll be fine. I’m actually glad you’re with me—otherwise I’d go crazy with worry.”
Lance leaned lightly against Zhan Pingchuan’s shoulder, closing his eyes. He could only rest briefly in this moment—the prolonged fighting had drained most of his stamina.
While comforting Lance, Zhan Pingchuan glanced at innocent girl Lily, who was sticking out her tongue nearby.
He suddenly remembered something.
Xiao sha bi… little idiot?!
“Baby.” Zhan Pingchuan poked Lance’s lower back.
“Mm?” Lance responded softly.
“‘Little idiot’ wasn’t referring to me, was it?”
“…”
“…”
Lance jolted up from Zhan Pingchuan’s shoulder, looking around with an extremely serious expression. “Hubby, did you hear him shout ‘old madman’ just now? What does old madman mean?”
Zhan Pingchuan smiled.
He grabbed Lance by the back of the neck and pulled him back, making Lance look up at him. “Old madman can wait—let’s talk about ‘little idiot’ first.”
Lily bit the tip of her blue hair, thinking, Hey, that rhymes pretty well.
Lance pretended not to understand, tilting his head with particularly innocent amber eyes. “Hm?”
“Stop pretending.” Zhan Pingchuan looked like he’d caught a little red fox stealing chicken legs. He tapped the little red fox’s paw with a half-smile. “I’ve noticed that Bai Falao calls me ‘hubby’ whenever he feels guilty. I didn’t pay attention before, but it seems like you use this trick to divert my attention every time you’re about to be exposed.”
Lance’s Adam’s apple bobbed lightly. He gripped Zhan Pingchuan’s fingers in return, mumbling, “We’ll… talk about it when we get back.”
“Fine, I remember someone saying we’d settle accounts when we got back.” Zhan Pingchuan raised an eyebrow, copying Lance’s gesture by pressing three times heavily on his palm, hinting, “Looks like we really do need to settle accounts when we get back. We need to settle them properly.”
Curious Lily: “What kind of settling accounts? Can I watch?”
Zhan Pingchuan said seriously, “Minors are politely declined.”
Lance coughed softly, ignoring his slightly burning ears, and tapped the wall. “I’m serious—why did he shout ‘old madman’?”
After the brief teasing, Zhan Pingchuan also straightened his expression. “I guess the old madman is that spatial-type Awakened. He had that person move him away.”
Lance looked up at the surveillance equipment at the corridor’s ceiling. The indicator light wasn’t on, and Duma still hadn’t accessed the network, meaning surveillance had been shut down all along.
A trace of confusion flashed in his eyes. “All along our way, the guards have been communicating through radios, even giving orders through radios. But just now the radiation man shouted ‘old madman’ without using a radio—so how could the old madman hear him?”
The old madman not only heard but immediately reacted. If not for Zhan Pingchuan’s quick shooting, the radiation man would have escaped.
Zhan Pingchuan: “Maybe the old madman has some kind of clairvoyant ability to oversee everything, or he drank invisibility pheromones and has been hiding near us.”
Lance shook his head. “No, that’s not right. On our way from the ninth to eighth floor, Popov was also charging ahead, but the stairs didn’t change. When Popov was stabbed four times by the invisible man and was in mortal danger, if he’d disappeared from our sight then, we might not have been able to save him. Why didn’t the old madman trap us on the ninth floor then?”
Zhan Pingchuan raised an eyebrow. “That means he couldn’t make changes then, or rather, below the eighth floor is his blind spot.”
Lance nodded. “And when you suddenly charged over to kill the radiation man, if the old madman could oversee everything, he could have moved away the space you were in beforehand, or transferred the radiation man early. He didn’t need to wait until you were right in front of him to act.”
Zhan Pingchuan smiled coldly. “His ability has limitations—we just can’t figure out what those limitations are yet.”
—
**
(advanced chapters available on kofi)
Sam Williams On TYMIMA Chapter 152