The beam of light from the shelter was right in the square of this urban village, illuminating the entire square. Tom and his two companions drove the electric car that had just been knocked over by the security guard, passing through two buildings. Suddenly, everything was extremely bright, and their entire field of vision became clear.
Looking at the square in the center of the large plaza, there was actually a square house. It was too far away to determine its size, but there were large lights on its top. The bright pillar of light they had seen from afar was projected by these lights, and there were also large lights on all four sides of the house, shining diagonally in different directions, making it even more conspicuous.
The square was so bright at this moment that it felt like daylight to the shrunken Tom and his companions. A tram approached from a distance, and when they met, they realized it was Cheng Fuhua and Little Gao. After putting down the people they were carrying, they came to find Tom.
It was dangerous outside, yet they still thought of coming to pick up Tom, which touched him a bit.
The two cars couldn't stop and accelerated forward. If they stayed in place, there might be insects flying over to harass them.
The two cars drove side by side, and Cheng Fuhua controlled the speed, loudly saying, "Uncle An, that's indeed a shelter. The walls are made of very hard metal, and the doors can be closed from the inside. We put down the others and came to find you."
This relieved Tom's hanging heart. Although he didn't know who built such a shelter, at least it was safe, and there should be sufficient supplies inside.
As the shelter approached, Tom handed the accelerator to Li Qiang and stood up to survey the shelter.
The shelter, apart from the unearthed large lights, looked like a square box from a distance, but up close, it was rectangular, with no curves on the entire exterior. It was about three stories high, which might be around thirty centimeters in height. The width seemed a bit wider, about three times the height.
"This shelter can accommodate quite a few people!" Tom said, "But I wonder if it was built by the government."
"Impossible!" Liu Lian said, "If the government knew about this situation, there's no reason they would only build one. Even if they couldn't stop it, they could have gathered the people earlier. There's no need to build such a small shelter in such a remote place. Even if they did build it, they shouldn't have just built one for the entire urban village."
Tom nodded, agreeing with Liu Lian's point. The current situation, where people were shrinking, insects and beasts were starting to eat people, and the appearance of gems giving people extraordinary abilities, already exceeded the scope of existing scientific theories. Now there was this so-called redemption shelter, which only displayed lights on the sixth night, prompting people to go there. At exactly 12 o'clock, there was even a message: "Good luck to you."
This just didn't seem right. Tom thought to ask Liu Lian, "Do you remember that 'good luck' message?"
"Yeah, why?"
"You've played a lot of games. When you hear that phrase or similar ones, what comes to mind?"
"What?" Liu Lian thought for a moment. "Like in chicken-eating games, or movies like The Hunger Games... This seems more like a large-scale reality show, making everyone run through dangerous circles to reach a safe place. That 'good luck' message is like... damn... are we in some kind of reality show organized by those bastards?"
After Liu Lian said that, Tom suddenly felt his breath tighten.
Who caused all this, and what is their purpose?
"Is it because of these gems?" Tom thought, taking out a gem from his backpack. This was a sapphire found only inside the flies.
"How do these four gems work? How can they give people various strange abilities?" Tom frowned and touched the sapphire with the red gem on his arm. "Perhaps..." Suddenly he had a strange feeling, a feeling of wonder.
"Could it be that these two gems combined can also have new effects?" Tom quickly found a piece of cloth from Liu Lian and wrapped the sapphire around his left wrist.
Perhaps, just like in a game, there would be further hints in that suddenly appearing shelter.
Just as Tom was thinking about what might be waiting for him in the shelter, suddenly a shadow descended from the sky, and with a bang, their car was flipped over, and the three of them were thrown out.
Struggling to get up and look, Tom saw an orange shadow crouching in front of him.
"Meow!"
It was Ah Huang!
Tom recognized it.
Compared to the majestic Ah Huang just now, its yellow fur was messy, stained with blood, and some of its fur was stuck together. It was unclear whether these bloodstains were its own or from the mutant giant rat.
"Tom!" Liu Lian and Li Qiang were thrown in another direction, watching nervously as Tom was caught by Ah Huang, very worried.
"Leave me alone, run!"
"Meow?" Ah Huang turned its head and then suddenly jumped up.
"Quick..." Tom's word "run" wasn't finished, and Ah Huang landed in front of Liu Lian, patting Liu Lian away. Then it licked its paw, and its paw, shining with a cold light, was already stained red with blood.
"You! Bastard!"
Tom saw through it. This cat actually knew that he cared about Liu Lian and Li Qiang, so it directly went to attack Liu Lian and then licked its paws on the spot, staring at Tom with eyes full of satisfaction.
There was no doubt that Ah Huang was retaliating against him, so it attacked Liu Lian.
Li Qiang had already been frightened out of his wits, but he still hurriedly ran over, grabbed Liu Lian's collar, and dragged him away.
Tom was furious, his hands emitting a red light, rushing towards Ah Huang.
With a punch from Tom with three times the strength, unfortunately, the difference in size made it impossible for Tom's flesh fist to move it in the slightest.
"Meow!" Ah Huang exclaimed, swiftly patting Tom on the head, making him dizzy, then giving him another push, causing him to stagger and almost fall.
The people hiding by the shelter door were very nervous, including three others who had arrived here earlier than Tom's group. They were afraid and shouted for Li Zexin and the others to hurry up and close the door.
Li Zexin, who had always been selfish, unexpectedly guarded the switch, along with the surviving security guard, not allowing the others to close the door.
"Our people are still outside, we can't close the door!"
"But that cat will eat him, and then it will come in to eat us!"
"Deal with it later!" Li Zexin was very scared. It was already rare that he could guard the door. He was not willing to go out to save Tom.
Xiao Mei and Zhao Yingying were both very scared, but when they saw Li Qiang desperately dragging Liu Lian, they couldn't ignore the danger and ran out to help Li Qiang.
Li Qiang wanted to leave Liu Lian behind and go back to help Tom, but Tom struggled to get up and waved at them, signaling them not to come over.
Ah Huang's actions were obvious; it was playing. Just like a cat catching a mouse and not rushing to bite it to death, it would give the mouse a chance to escape, then catch it again, repeating this process until it got tired of playing and would then bite or eat the mouse. It enjoyed playing with its prey more than eating.
Tom struggled to run towards the door, but before he could take two steps, he was knocked down by Ah Huang's paw at lightning speed, rolling twice. He got up, and Ah Huang teased him again, gesturing for him to continue running.
Xiao Mei and the others, who were dragging Liu Lian, cried, but they were helpless and could only watch Tom being tortured by Ah Huang.
Tom fell heavily, feeling pain all over his body as if he were falling apart, but he wouldn't give up, letting Ah Huang bite and eat him.
He took out the green gem from his backpack, trying to press it against Ah Huang's leg.
"Liars, little treasure. Liars! Fun, want to eat."
"It's you who ate little treasure!" Tom was furious. This cat was simply unreasonable.
"Ah Huang didn't eat little treasure, Ah Huang loves little treasure! All humans, eat up, eat up! Revenge for little treasure!"
Ah Huang raised its paw, and Tom flew out, and the green gem slipped from his hand.
"Damn it!" Tom struggled to get up. Was three times the strength not enough to fight against this mutant cat?
What about the blue gem?
The communication with Ah Huang just now seemed to have angered it. It opened its big mouth and lowered its ears. Tom knew it was about to deliver a fatal blow, which meant it was going to eat him.
What to do?
Unwilling!
Looking at the wide cat mouth, Xiao Mei collapsed directly on the ground, and Zhao Yingying even covered her eyes.
"No!" Li Qiang shouted loudly but dragged Liu Lian to the shelter door. It was the first time he hated his own powerlessness. If he could activate his power, he could share the burden with Tom.
Beside the door, Li Zexin shouted for Li Qiang to hurry up and then muttered, "Tom, it's not that I, Li, am ungrateful. If you're about to be eaten, I can't help but close the door!"
Ah Huang bit Tom and brought him down.
However, the next moment, Ah Huang found that it couldn't break this fragile body. It was puzzled and tried to swallow him.
But when it raised its head, its throat was unbearably painful. Under intense pain, it spit out Tom.
As Tom got up, his whole body emitted a faint yellow light, leaving everyone watching stunned.
"An... An'ge, you... also turned into a human light bulb?" Li Qiang couldn't believe what he saw.
"What's going on? What's going on?" The three onlookers were puzzled.
While others didn't understand what was happening, Tom understood very well.
His entire body's skin had become incredibly hard at the moment, hard enough that even Ah Huang's teeth couldn't bite through.
Although his body emitted a yellow light, the blue gem wrapped in a cloth on his left wrist emitted a blue light, and the red gem on the ring on his right hand flashed red light, blinking regularly.
"First... enhanced strength... then... enhanced defense?" Tom gasped for breath, looking at his hands.
Ah Huang was furious and swatted Tom again.
This blow sent him crashing into the outer wall of the shelter, but he didn't feel any pain at all. It seemed that strengthening his defense was quite effective.
"Meow!" Ah Huang, seeing Tom unharmed and extremely angry, was about to pounce on him. However, it didn't expect a black shadow to suddenly appear behind it, biting it on the back.
"Wo-meow..." Ah Huang turned its head, and its paws flew at the black shadow at a speed invisible to the human eye.
"Tom, run! Run over here!" Finally dragging Liu Lian back to the shelter, Li Qiang shouted loudly at Tom.
Seeing the light from the blue gem disappear, Tom knew he had no energy left. Now that the black shadow helped divert Ah Huang's attention, he quickly ran back to the shelter.
He sprinted, carrying his shrunken backpack, heading swiftly towards the door.
Ah Huang, having finally knocked the black shadow away, turned around and pounced on Tom. It wouldn't allow its prey to escape.
"It's no use, the cat's coming. If Tom can't catch up, it's not my fault!" Li Zexin shouted, slamming the red button hard, and the heavy iron door of the shelter slowly closed.