Doomsday Wonderland

The sun was warm on his skin. The yacht swayed gently in the calm waters. There were drops of condensation on the glass of cold beer. Although a relaxing day such as this wasn’t an everyday thing in the doomsday, it was not impossible. Sometimes Maxin thought that rare moments such as this were the reason he kept moving forward in this hellish post-apocalyptic era.

“Wake up,” somebody called him, the voice sharp and unpleasant to the ears.

‘No.’

“Wake up now!” The voice grew impatient.

‘I refuse.’

This time, the voice didn’t come for a long time. Just as Maxin thought the voice had gone away, he felt a grip around his neck, and his airways were cut off. He tried to breathe, but he couldn’t draw any air into his lungs. He woke up with cold sweat crawling down his back. The moment he jerked up and peeled his eyes open, the first thing that greeted him was a meat creature, both huge and red in color.

There were multiple layers of mandibles on the creature’s face. And inside the hair-raising mouthpart, two tendrils were rubbing against each other, emitting the grating voice that he heard just now. “Did your mom ever tell you how difficult it is to wake you up from bed?”

After that, Soulsqn moved her limbs away from his face. Maxin immediately took a few deep breaths of fresh air, his heart pounding fast. Ignoring the fishy stench that lingered in his mouth, he began to take in his surroundings. The white fog still hung heavily around them, and the deep blue, almost blackish ocean continued to splash against the foot of the platform. Groggily, he pulled himself up from the ground, and it was at this moment that he finally discovered another person lying on the ground next to him.

“What happened?” Maxin asked as he stared wide-eyed at the person. Although he knew this person, he had never seen him before. The man had a jowly, almost catfish-like face.

‘He is the person who impersonated Magus?’ Maxin asked inwardly. He somewhat remembered fighting this man before he passed out.

“Nothing much, actually,” Soulsqn answered, stifling a giggle. “When you guys were busy fighting, I gave him a taste of my pheromones.”

“A what?”

“Chemical hormones. It’s a kind of ability only we Souls can use.” The flesh worm became impatient again. She slithered closer to the man as she continued. “Anyway, I don’t think you will understand.”

Maxin was shocked. A chill crept up his spine. He had no idea when the flesh worm had used that kind of ability on them. Although an ability that could mess with a person’s mind wasn’t rare in the doomsday, most of them would, at a minimum, show some signs before they were released. However, that wasn’t the case for the flesh worm; she could deliver her knockout drops without a warning. After reminding himself that he had to raise his guard against Soulsqn, he asked again, “Is he still alive?”

“Of course he is. There is no way I’m going to use him as my human pouch. He is so ugly.”

Hearing this, Maxin heaved a relieved sigh.

After a few minutes, the man woke up. His ability was indeed impressive, for every time he opened his eyes wider, his appearance would change. Even though they had psyched themselves up for what they might see, by the time the man regained his sobriety, both Maxin and Soulsqn were struck so hard by their fear that they couldn’t speak. It was as if they were wild animals that had encountered their natural enemy; they could do nothing but freeze on the ground and wait for their death to arrive.

Fortunately, the man’s ability could do nothing more than intimidate his opponents. Maxin quickly took hold of the man and turned his head, which had Magus’s face, towards the sea. He felt a little more relaxed. Then, with a commanding tone, he boomed, “Did you meet my companion? The girl with long hair?”

Sitting on top of the man’s back, the flesh worm cast a furtive glance at Maxin.

The man spent nearly a minute before he realized who Maxin was talking about. Initially, Maxin thought the man had already gotten rid of Ji Shanqing, but the man said otherwise. Ji Shanqing had fled away!

“When I was walking towards hi—her, she said something, and I stopped,” the man said, seeming a little bit reluctant to talk about this. “Perhaps my expression at that time had given me away, for she turned around and fled.”

“What did she say?”

“She said something like ‘if you think that the thing inside me is more important than me and you’re still going to unwrap me, I don’t want to live anymore!’ It’s weird, but maybe I heard it wrongly.”

Dumbfounded, not even Maxin understood what Ji Shanqing was saying.

‘Anyway, it doesn’t really matter as long as she escaped.’

“Tell us the direction she went. And where are your partners?” More questions flowed into Maxin’s brain once his mind was put at ease, knowing that Ji Shanqing was safe. He fired all his questions at the man. “How did you guys see in this fog?”

“Rize’s ability is about altering “weather” to confuse her opponents, but it will not affect her comrades.” Although they were from the same team, the man didn’t have any psychological burden, and generously gave away the information about his comrade’s ability. “For us, it’s just a little bit foggy. We can still see pretty clearly.”

Right after he answered the last question and before he could move to the next one, he twisted his head slightly.

Sensing his movement, Maxin gave the man a warning look. After ascertaining that he wasn’t going to move anymore, Maxin urged, “Continue.”

“They are all waiting outside. I’m the only one that came in,” the man said in a husky voice. “Please don’t get angry with me. Even though your friend escaped from me, she won’t be able to run away from my comrades.”

Maxin frowned. Just when he was about to press on, he saw the man twist his head again. His movements were subtle, and it looked as if he was relaxing his muscles. But the problem was that he was pinned firmly on the ground, and such movements would do him no good other than straining himself.

The first thought that came to Maxin’s mind was that he was looking for an opportunity to fight back.

Scoffing, Maxin said to Soulsqn, who was lying on top of the man’s back, “If he refuses to cooperate with us, you can wear…”

No sooner had he finished his sentence that a growl interrupted him. It was the man. The man was looking at his right side, his face ashen white. “Please wait… I…”

Somebody was there!

Maxin spun his head around instantly, but before he could get a view, he felt a sense of weightlessness, and the next thing he knew, he was falling.

The platform was gone.

As he was falling, he heard faint footfalls from the fog beside him. The three of them brandished their arms helplessly in the air, trying their best to stop the fall. The man seemed to have anticipated this before them. He delved into his pocket as he desperately tried to pull something out. Maxin felt like his brain had stopped working, yet at the same time, it was spinning strangely fast. Seeing the man’s movements, he shouted at Soulsqn.

Maxin had no idea whether or not Soulsqn could understand his words, for he was so overwhelmed with fear that his words slurred. But the flesh worm miraculously grabbed the man tightly.

Towards the end of their fall, the man and Soulsqn were caught in a plastic film. The flesh worm immediately twisted her body, attempting to catch Maxin, but she was too late. The plastic film failed to catch him, and he fell straight into the billowing sea.

Grabbing the man with one of her “arms”, Soulsqn froze when she saw Maxin fall into the sea. Right at the moment Maxin disappeared from the surface, she stretched a tendril into the sea. Still badly shaken, the man shouted, “What the hell are…” But he didn’t have the chance to finish his sentence.

Soulsqn fished Maxin out of the water.

Surprisingly, Maxin’s body was dry. There weren’t any water droplets on his body, let alone the yellow shadows. With a pallid face, he pulled himself onto the plastic film. As he talked, he grasped tightly at the mermaid tail, “I thought you didn’t hear what I said.”

Had he not created a whirlpool with the mermaid tail to give himself more reaction time, he was certain that he would have already become part of the yellow shadows.

“I’m very sensitive to language,” said Soulsqn, but she did not finish her sentence.

The man’s countenance was pale. He looked at the two people in front of him and then at the sea. It appeared that this plastic film was a Special Item, as it could carry the three of them without sinking. Maxin took a few deep breaths to calm himself down. Then, he scoffed. “They wanted to kill you. Do you still want to work with them?”

“What happened? Why did the platform suddenly disappear?” Soulsqn asked, as she still couldn’t come around to her senses.

Perhaps he realized that he wouldn’t be able to intimidate the two anymore; the man put on his hood before answering Soulsqn’s question.

“Zeus has stated that anybody who successfully enters the opposing camp has the right to make one of their platforms disappear,” the man said bitterly. “Yes, I lied to you. All of us are here. The fog is not going to kill you—it would be great if it could do—but… Anyway, with the fog, we can easily enter your camp and remove your platforms.”

In other words, Ji Shanqing might have already broken through.

“But your comrade sabotaged you. One life for two, a great bargain, isn’t it?” Maxin said coldly. “Who was that guy?”

“He is Arlo,” the man said, lowering his head, “The long-haired hippie you first saw.”

“How many platforms have you guys removed?” Maxin asked sternly. He and Soulsqn were groping their way in the fog earlier, and it was a miracle that they hadn’t fallen into the ocean or encountered any members from the white camp.

“I have removed five,” the man was more cooperative and docile after cheating death, “We have a time limit, and we can only remove one platform each minute.”

Even with the time limit, Ji Shanqing wouldn’t have enough time to remove all the platforms before they lost the game. Simply put, they had to stop and eliminate all of the members from the white camp if they wanted to win the game and see Lin Sanjiu once more.

“Understood.” Gritting his teeth, Maxin stood up from the plastic film. “Can you paddle this film over there?”

“Which way? This is a one time use Special Item. It can only last for two minutes.”

“That’s more than enough.” Maxin pointed towards his right. “From now on, you will be our eyes. I want to go to the platform where Arlo is. He cannot remove any platforms in the next minute, so now is the b

est time for us to retaliate. Soulsqn, do you think Arlo is ugly?”