"Why are you all shivering? Are you cold?" Lü Xing asked, looking at everyone. He was slightly panting, his face flushed, eyes sparkling. "Why do I feel hot? Are your bodies that weak?"
"Lü Xing, something's off about you." Wu Yong finally noticed something strange about Lü Xing. He walked up from the back of the group, grabbing Lü Xing's clothes. His hand inadvertently became smeared with fresh blood, but he couldn't see it.
Lü Xing broke into a grin, his mouth resembling a line cleaved into a ripe pomegranate in the autumn, revealing a viscous mass of fleshy bumps with white nodules. "I'm off? No, no, no. I feel great. My mind is so clear like never before."
"Wu Yong, control your man." Old Du, up front, also stopped. He sensed an eerie aura radiating from Lü Xing. There were no exceptions in the zoo: the uncanny was synonymous with haunted. "If you can't handle it within five minutes, leave with him."
"Understood." Wu Yong nodded, patting his waist and approached Lü Xing. "Lü Xing, calm down, think about it, did you get contaminated by something strange?"
"Something strange? No, no, no, nothing." Lü Xing quickly shook his head, his gaze fixed on the gradually closing-in Wu Yong. "I feel like you guys are the strange ones... what are you afraid of?"
"Lü Xing, just like you said when you joined our team, whoever exhibits abnormalities needs to be thoroughly examined." Wu Yong moved in front of Lü Xing, with a concerned countenance. However, his right hand swiftly drew out a dagger, and with a backhand grip aimed for Lü Xing's waist.
"You!" Lü Xing exclaimed, but his face didn't look surprised at all. His left hand turned into a blade, deflecting Wu Yong's wrist, causing the dagger to rise. Lü Xing's right hand immediately pushed on the dagger hilt, directing it towards Wu Yong's chest.
"What!" Wu Yong didn't anticipate Lü Xing to be that fast. He managed to squat and dodge the dagger tip at the last moment, but it still left a cut on his shoulder, soaking his white sportswear red in an instant.
Lü Xing let out a weird chuckle, bent over and darted from left to right, moving like a boxer, his back against a tree as he stared at the crowd. His eyes were wide open, and he was muttering, "Just as I thought... you want to kill me. You all want to kill me, hahaha, I've figured it out..."
Once finished, he looked warily at Old Du, and noticing Old Du's hand was on his machete, he cried out, "You want to kill me too! Why? You think you can kill me?"
Old Du ignored him, just pulling out the machete from his waist and began to slowly move towards him. His face was stern, and his aura was gradually more intimidating than Wu Yong's.
Lü Xing twisted his face, and just like a four-legged spider, quickly climbed up the tree. It was only after he felt safe that he looked down on everyone and said, "You can't kill me, none of you can! I feel fantastic, just a bit hot. It's so hot here!"
With a powerful leap, he jumped to another tree. He moved swiftly from tree to tree in the dense forest and quickly disappeared. The anonymous cries of the birds in the forest echoed, and the rustling leaves finally quieted.
"This guy..." Wu Yong took his eyes off, raising his arm...
In his team, besides Lü Xing and a woman, there was a doctor. On cue, the doctor stepped forward, cut off the piece of Wu Yong's coat at the wound, and from his bag took out a bandage to bind it.
"Not sure what got him." Old Du picked up the conversation. He glanced at Wu Yong's wound and made a judgment, "His condition is off. He'll die soon."
He had seen the short bout between Wu Yong and Lü Xing just now. By rights, Wu Yong shouldn't have lost, but the ecstatic Lü Xing was able to suppress Wu Yong easily.
All power comes with a price, especially the power that comes with a haunting.
"If he could just die simply, that would be best," said Wu Yong helplessly. "His speed is so fast, the runes won't work."
Won't work?
Yu Liang was puzzled, not understanding this. Noticing his confusion, Old Du elucidated: "Normally, the effective range of runes is within five steps, and it requires locking the target with one's gaze. It also takes time to flip through the pages and select the rune. The current speed of Lü Xing is extremely high. Common runes like 'Shatter' won't kill him in one hit, thereby putting one's safety at risk."
"I see." Yu Liang understood and noted this, reminding himself that his runes are mainly for assistance. In this zoo, he was still a frail common scriptwriter.
The concept of 'one hit kill' that Old Du referred to was indeed intriguing. On careful thought, "Shatter" and "Break" were different. The former referred to damage and fragmentation, while the latter meant completely breaking into fragments.
If one had to say, "Break" had a higher chance of killing in one hit. Yu Liang believed that there were creatures in this zoo that couldn't be killed even if broken into pieces. The current Lü Xing, however, was not one of them. He felt that Lü Xing was just a person in an abnormal state.
Without much discussion, the hidden intent of killing Lü Xing swiftly dissipated. The unwritten rule among the tourists was killing the other tourists possessed by a curse, and it was neither condemned nor sanctioned.
The group moves hurriedly through the dense fog, with Yu Liang always in the center. He can feel an invisible pair of hands pushing him to keep moving forward, and he can sense that the group is becoming more compact, not because of a decrease in numbers, but because the distance between individuals is shrinking.
He looks to the side of the road, the increasing density of the fog reducing visibility drastically. He can barely make out the regular shadows of trees lined up like sentinels on both sides of the road. With each step he takes, the shadows seem to recede at an even pace, as if every fifth step propels yet another dark silhouette behind him.
One, Two...
However, Yu Liang finds that now a tree shadow appears after only two steps. This sudden break in the pattern makes him pause in shock, immediately realizing that an extra shadow has appeared between two trees.
"Be careful!" He dodges and shouts a warning at the same time.
The dark shadows attack with the swiftness of the wind, two sharp branches lunging down from above. But Yu Liang has already jumped aside in advance, and the branches thrust into the ground, shattering the stone beneath into pieces.
The dark shadow is Lv Xing. Seeing Yu Liang sidestepping, he instantly changes his target and thrusts his broken branch at Xiao Zhize on the other side.
Looking at Xiao Zhize, he seemingly hasn't recovered from the sudden change, and by the time he snaps back to his senses, he sees Lv Xing attacking. He's so scared that he can't speak, his feet seemingly glued to the ground, immobile.
In the blink of an eye, Old Du, at the front of the group, pulls out a knife from his waist. Before he moves, the knife goes first, then with a quick slide, he positions himself in front of Xiao Zhize, slashing at Lv Xing along the way.
"Crack — " The wooden stick is severed, the momentum of the blade intact as it slashes across Lv Xing's chest leaving a deep bloody mark.
"It hurts ... it hurts so bad!" Lv Xing screams. His body contorts due to the pain, his hands shake uncontrollably, and the broken branches slip from his grasp.
He staggers backwards, his malicious gaze landing on Old Du, cursing incessantly, "Why? I didn't want to kill you, I never wanted to kill you. Why do you want to kill me, why, why, why!"
"Without blood, I'll die, we'll all die, red blood, hot blood, scalding blood, I need blood." Lv Xing talks rapidly, repeating the same words, with no care. He suddenly bites his own forearm, sucking at the wound, but then spits it out as if he had just tasted something disgusting, his voice breaking as he cries, "It's no use, my blood is cold, I'm useless now."
He yells something that no one can understand and then fades into the white fog, disappearing slowly and steadily, like a piece of chocolate sinking into a glass of milk.
The group watches as Lv Xing leaves. Some sigh with relief while others worry. But Yu Liang is pondering Old Du's swift yet somewhat unnatural slash, experiencing a strange sense of unease.
The slash was swift and silent, but Old Du's movement was far from being fluid. Typically, the force should have originated from the body moving the right arm and the wrist twisting the knife, but Old Du had swung his knife when he was still four or five meters away from Lv Xing. The motion of the knife seemed to propel his body forward. On closer thought, it seemed strange.
Yu Liang contemplated, a similar scene comes to his mind -- a frail woman restraining a large dog tugging fiercely at its leash, its excitement causing the woman to lurch forward continuously.
The slash made by Old Du gave him a similar feeling, as though the knife was the main body of this operation, leading Old Du's body forward. When he thought about it, it seemed odd.
"Old Du, you really are something." Wu Yong lets out a sigh of relief. He was worried that Old Du might not be able to handle Lv Xing, which could have put them all in danger.
Old Du just gives a slight nod, his countenance unchanged. "Now we are going to shrink the group. He could launch a successful sneak attack on any of you, I can only do my best to save as many as possible."
"Understood."
"Let's get out of here first."
Others in the group respond in agreement, and after a ten-minute march, they spot Lv Xing, naked and lying under a tree.
There's still a bloody hole on his back, but the oozing blood has turned into red ice crystals. His face is as pale as death, yet he wears a bizarre smile on his face.
Lv Xing has been dead for quite some time.