CH 86

Chapter 86 – Hunting

Old Song’s voice echoed on the platform, he glared and coughed violently.

At first, everyone thought he was knocked by the butt of a gun, but he coughed and coughed, several teeth fell out, his skin fell off, and his pupils were gradually covered with silver.

He gritted his teeth and said, “Lu—Ting—han—!”

“He mutated!” someone shouted, “Shoot!”

The soldier behind Old Song was taken aback, subconsciously stepped back a few steps, and pulled the trigger! The gunshot rang, and the bullet penetrated Old Song’s abdominal cavity, but it was not blood that exploded, but feathers.

White, holy feathers.

At the end of the tunnel, the mighty song sounded again, and the human-faced bird spread its wings and rushed towards everyone. And more than a dozen figures appeared on the track, all with feathers on their faces. Looking at the epaulettes, they belonged to the No.13 Vanguard with Old Song.

An hour ago, the 13th Vanguard was defeated in Western District, and all the soldiers were infected.

Old Song’s consciousness wandered between monsters and humans, and he actually led his comrades all the way here.

A team of them dragged a walking corpse-like pace, followed by the human-faced birds, their limbs twitching from time to time.

The scene was very chaotic, with gunshots, roars, and songs mixed together. Shi Yuan saw that not far away, the two soldiers lost their minds and stabbed each other bloody with knives.

‘Where is Lu Tinghan?’ Shi Yuan thought. He should be very close to him, less than 20 or 30 meters.

The feathers flying in the sky obscured the line of sight. He cocked his tail and kept scaring away the human-faced birds, wanting to go to Lu Tinghan’s side.

Another human-faced bird was so scared by his tail that its feathers burst and fled.

It flew away, revealing the person behind it—

Old Song’s head was surrounded by feathers, and his facial features couldn’t be seen clearly, like a hairy spore.

“…I saw it,“ he said in a dumb voice, “Cough—Major Ke and I both saw it. You made it through a whole city of butterfly thunderstorms unharmed, and you were still talking to that monster woman. Major Ke inquired and found that Lu Tinghan often takes you to the front line and to outposts. You…cough, you are definitely not human.”

The feathers of his head were flipping, and Shi Yuan inexplicably felt that he was crying.

Old Song said: “Major Ke is dead, my comrades-in-arms have died, and I will soon become a monster. I walked so far and came here just to accomplish two things. The first thing is to expose Lu Tinghan’s lies, and the second thing is that I want to solve the hidden dangers, the hidden dangers of mankind.”

He said softly: “You are a monster who bewitched him. As long as you die, everything will pass and everything will be back on track. He is still our commander-in-chief-I have always, I have always admired him the most.”

He raised his gun to Shi Yuan and pulled the trigger!

From the time he raised the gun to the sound of the gunshot, there were not even two seconds.

No one, including Shi Yuan, expected Old Song to be able to use a gun when he was infected like this, and he was still so obsessed.

Afterwards, Shi Yuan thought back, if only he had turned into a black mist and escaped at the first moment he bumped into Old Song; or if only he had reacted faster, crouched down, and hid in the darkness.

But he was worried that he might be infected with human-faced birds and would not turn into black mist. He was also not an experienced soldier, enough to react instantly. There was no “if” in the world.

He could only watch as the bullet came out of the dark muzzle and headed towards his heart.

—Will I die?

Shi Yuan thought so at that moment.

He had never seen the death of an abyss, and he didn’t know what kind of existence he was when he became a human. He had been injured, scratched, bruised, and also shed blood. His body was very fragile, with human feelings, and he also had their weaknesses. This was the price that must be paid.

But would he really die?

The bullet spun and pierced the wind.

“……!!”

With a heavy weight on Shi Yuan’s shoulders, the world turned upside down. Someone flew and knocked him down. The two rolled on the ground two or three times, covered in dust and soil. Then the man pulled the trigger and fired a few crisp shots, each of which hit Old Song’s eyebrow.

The feathers flew wildly, and Old Song knelt down softly, fell to the ground, and died.

Shi Yuan was stunned for a few seconds: “Lu Tinghan!”

Lu Tinghan paused for a while before standing up, whispering, “Follow me.”

The two of them got under a pillar and used it as a cover. It was very dark everywhere, there were bursts of singing, and occasionally, there was the terrifying roar of crazy soldiers. Lu Tinghan fired his gun, and the human-faced birds fell one by one, smashing to pieces. The people of the No.13 Vanguard, still walking like corpses, were also killed by him and gained the peace they deserved.

After nearly 10 minutes, this wave of attack was almost over, and the gunshots stopped one after another.

“They all seem to be dead,” Shi Yuan said, looking out, “We can continue to find their ‘leader’.”

Lu Tinghan didn’t answer, his breathing was a bit heavy.

Shi Yuan felt something was wrong, and when he looked back, Lu Tinghan had a cold sweat on his forehead. Shi Yuan’s hands on the ground were wet, he raised it up and took a look, his hands were full of warm scarlet blood.

Shi Yuan froze all over.

He leaned forward to look at Lu Tinghan, blood was gushing from his abdomen, and stained his military uniform, dripping on the ground. In an instant, Shi Yuan understood: This was the shot fired by Old Song.

He was not shot because Lu Tinghan helped him block the bullet.

Shi Yuan’s hand was shaking, as if he had been hit by an electric current, and he was so scared that he didn’t know what to do. As if returning to the day when the “Heavy Hammer” fell, Lu Tinghan was also lying in a pool of blood.

Now the nightmare repeated itself.

It was the comrade-in-arms who once admired him who hit him. The bullet was originally aimed at a little monster.

“…Shi Yuan, don’t be afraid,” Lu Tinghan was still comforting him at this time, “You go find someone to come over and get the first aid kit.”

Shi Yuan ran away, stepping on the corpse of the human-faced bird, stumbling, and finally found Adjutant Bing and several other soldiers.

This was the only survivor of the team, who was also injured and had limited mobility. The medic also died, and Adjutant Bing left a few wounded people to take care of each other, and hurried to Lu Tinghan’s side with a first aid kit.

Old Song used a small-caliber gun, and Lu Tinghan wore military armor, the kinetic energy of the bullet and the stopping effect on the human body were greatly reduced. If you changed it to large-caliber ammunition, a bullet in the abdomen would cause significant damage in the abdominal cavity, causing fainting and heavy bleeding, and anyone would die within a few minutes.

Adjutant Bing was shocked. After briefly confirming the injury, he took out sterile gauze to cover the wound, filled the gauze strips and bandages, and then pressurized the bandage.

He said: “I have contacted the support forces, you lie flat and don’t move.”

Lu Tinghan said, “Give me painkillers and stimulants.”

“I’ll get the painkillers right away,“ Adjutant Bing said, “But you shouldn’t need stimulants.”

“Their ‘leader’ must be hunted,” Lu Tinghan’s face turned a little pale, but his eyes were very bright, “If I miss it this time, I won’t be able to find it again. Only I can find it.”

“What are you talking about!” Adjutant Bing frowned, “You are already injured like this!”

Shi Yuan grabbed the corners of his clothes next to him, listening to their argument, staring straight at the blood on the ground, his whole body was still numb.

“So I want stimulants,” Lu Tinghan said.

Adjutant Bing pressed the first aid kit tightly, “The support troops will be here soon, and they will continue to fight.”

“It’s too late,” Lu Tinghan sat upright with support, “The next round of attack is about to begin.”

Shi Yuan said, “I will scare them away.” He grabbed Lu Tinghan’s hand and looked into his eyes, “I will scare them all away.”

“…” Lu Tinghan smiled silently, “Shi Yuan, we both know that’s impossible.”

He looked at the two people in front of him and said, “The situation is irreversible, I’m already here.”

In order to speculate on the behavior of monsters, Lu Tinghan had been to the front line and had close contact with monsters.

But it was not like this now. He personally led the crippled team to chase the leader of the monsters in the fallen station. As a general of the Alliance, such a desperate act should never be done by him.

Unless he had no choice.

Lu Tinghan took a deep breath, and the blood penetrated the gauze a little bit.

He said, “The city won’t necessarily hold up if the leader dies, but it will definitely fall if it doesn’t. We don’t have time to wait for support, only us, only me. I had given all command to Lieutenant General Fu Xiu before the chase began, and he is commanding according to my instructions.” He took a few deep breaths again because of his injuries, “That monster must die.”

Shi Yuan had been guarding the Second Military Region for a long time, and he had no idea that the battle situation had reached this point.

Adjutant Bing gritted his teeth, and the blue veins in front of his forehead popped up and throbbed! He paused for two seconds, flipped through the first aid kit, and took out painkillers and stimulants.

After swallowing the pill, the translucent liquid flowed into the vein along the needle… Lu Tinghan’s state was visibly better to the naked eye.

He stood up with the help of Shi Yuan and the adjutant. He said: “If you go any further, you will find it right away.”

Adjutant Bing said, “I will go with you!”

Lu Tinghan: “Okay, let’s go.”

Shi Yuan helped Lu Tinghan, for fear that something would happen to him. However, military stimulants, coupled with Lu Tinghan’s extraordinary willpower, made his actions almost the same as before.

…except that the blood in the abdomen was slowly oozing out.

This was definitely a fatal injury, he was running out of time.

Shi Yuan gritted his teeth.

He had a thousand words to say, such as ‘Lu Tinghan, you must not die’, and ‘if only I had reacted faster just now’, and ‘I caused you to become like this’, and all kinds of self-blame apologies, and, ‘I might not die at all’.

But he knew that it was not the moment to say these words.

Lu Tinghan could obviously give everything for the sake of mankind, and he must not die. Lu Tinghan knew this better than anyone else. When he flew towards Shi Yuan, he had already made his choice.

Adjutant Bing was holding a gun, and the light from the flashlight could not penetrate the surroundings. Shi Yuan wiped his face and walked into the deep darkness side by side with Lu Tinghan.

The ground was full of corpses, the blood of humans and monsters was mixed, and the song from the ground sounded again, holy and elegant.

On this dark abandoned platform, along the old track, there were the last remnants of the defeated army.

Moving forward.

Until the end.

In the sound of footsteps, Adjutant Bing asked in a low voice: “General, is what that person said just now…is it true?” He smiled reluctantly, “He has been infected like that, he probably has hysteria, nonsense. Hahaha, we didn’t take it seriously.”

Lu Tinghan replied: “It’s true.”

“…” The adjutant’s eyes widened and his breathing stagnated.

He murmured: “How could it be, this turned out to be true.” He looked at Shi Yuan, “Then, then he is…?”

“He’s not human,” Lu Tinghan said, “But he is my lover.”

For a while, the adjutant’s expression was complicated.

He didn’t say anything in the end, just asked, “Are you on the side of mankind?”

“Always have been.”

“Then I trust you.”

After walking for about ten minutes, Shi Yuan drove away two or three groups of human-faced birds, and they arrived at the “Wangshan Terminal”.

It was a very large station, where people used to come and go, and where trains were parked, as if the tired birds were returning to their nests.

The main control room of the underground station was also here, and was converted into a sentry station. The soldiers of the outpost all died, they killed each other with a calm smile in the fortress-like outpost, hearing the song coming from the nine heavens.

They did not die from the fangs and sharp teeth of monsters, but died from the swords and guns of their own people – mental infections were always so terrible, which was why people cared about the Abyss Watchers.

Adjutant Bing couldn’t help frowning when he saw this tragedy.

Lu Tinghan looked around and saw several human-faced bird corpses. He smelled the smell of blood and decay in the air, and looked at the end of the terminal.

He said: “It’s right there.”

A golden feather, riding on the wind, fluttered in. At the end of the station, the human-faced bird had the face of a woman, and she was beautiful, with her eyes lowered as if in sorrow.