Chapter 91: [00:20 / 00:60] （The - has been revised and is now updated）

Chapter 91: [00:20 / 00:60] （The Chapter has been revised and is now updated）

"Give me one, you bastard!"

"Make it last. I’ve only got half a pack left."

"HAHAHA!"

Their laughter echoed through the wet ruins, rough and bubbling with blood.

The big man lay against a shattered wall, caked in mud and gore. Deep cuts covered his body, and a broken arrowhead was lodged beside his shoulder blade. He threw his head back and laughed anyway, his chest heaving.

With his back against the big man’s, the leather-coated man struck a brass lighter and held the flame to their cigarettes. Smoke curled into the damp air, the harsh smell of tobacco briefly drowning out the blood.

The big man blew out a thick cloud and narrowed his eyes.

"Tell me something. What do we do when our luck finally runs out? When death comes calling and there’s no way out?"

The leather-coated man grinned around his cigarette.

"What do you think? We’ve been living on borrowed time since the start. When the debt comes due... we pay it. Every last fucking penny."

"That’s right! Give the bastard his due!"

The big man burst out laughing again.

Hurried footsteps splashed through the mud.

Chen’s rasping shout reached them from across the ruins.

"Fuck me, you two are still alive! I knew you bastards would be too hard to kill!"

He scrambled over a fallen stone beam, grinning with relief. Elena followed in her gray cloak, there was the faintest smile on her lips.

The four gathered among the rubble, laughing and swearing, shoving shoulders and cuffing one another. A hip flask made the rounds. Liquor scorched their dry throats and sent warmth rushing to their heads. The joy of surviving coursed through their battered bodies. Sunlight broke through the clouds and fell warm across their faces.

A damp breeze passed through the broken walls, carrying away the smoke from their cigarettes.

The wind rose to a howl. Moisture gave way to dry, stinging sand.

The warmth and laughter of that day faded on the wind. A harsh desert gale lashed his cheeks, thick with the stench of blood.

A few meters ahead, the enormous wolf’s body collapsed into a hollow.

The head that had once tipped back in laughter was gone, burst apart by a single punch. Blood and brain matter steamed on the sand.

The black-armored man shook scraps of flesh from his gauntlet.

Contractor Diego Silva.

Skull crushed. Dead.

The leather-coated man stood motionless, staring at what remained of his friend, a dull ache tightening in his chest.

The joke they had shared over cigarettes beneath that broken wall had come true, word for word.

His coat snapped in the wind.

His lips twitched, somewhere between a smile and a sigh. He murmured to what remained of his friend:

"...These lives we borrowed from Death..."

[00:14 / 00:60]

"...It’s time to pay them back."

Behind the line, a gray cloak stirred in the wind.

Elena had lowered her eyes. She finished his words in a voice so soft she seemed to be speaking in her sleep.

The liquor they had shared after surviving together seemed to burn in her chest once more, hardening into a resolve to hold nothing back.

Her face drained white. She clenched her teeth and bit through the tip of her tongue.

Blood spurted over the gray crystal atop her staff. A lurid crimson light blazed from the stone.

Elena locked both hands around the shaft. Her hair had come loose, and veins stood out along her neck as she screamed:

"On your knees... ON YOUR FUCKING KNEES!"

[Gravity Art Overload—Tenfold!]

A deep hum rolled through the air.

The sand beneath Lin Yan collapsed several inches, loose grains crushing together into a hard-packed hollow. The gravity bearing down on his armored body doubled—from fivefold to tenfold. His joints gave a muffled crack under the sudden load. His next step stopped short, and his right knee slammed into the sand.

Forced to one knee. ℯℯ𝘭.

But a mortal trying to bind a dragon would have to pay far more than a mouthful of blood.

SPLURT—!

Elena’s eyelids spasmed as the pressure inside her skull surged, bursting the tiny blood vessels behind her eyes.

Thick, dark blood spurted from her eyes, nostrils, ears, and the corners of her mouth all at once.

Blood flooded her eyes. The world before her faded to gray, crumbled, and vanished into utter darkness. Then the shrill ringing deep in her ears abruptly ceased. The roar of wind and sand fell away, leaving only silence.

She could neither see nor hear.

"CHEN——!"

His name tore from her throat through a mouthful of blood. The desperate scream pierced the howling sandstorm, echoing across the shattered concrete fortifications and the empty desert beyond.

Before the echoes faded, she spent the last of her strength on another cry that rang across the battlefield:

"DO IT——!"

...

...

Chen let out a faint sigh.

The wind tore it away almost before it left his lips.

In the center of the hollow, Lin Yan knelt with one knee buried in the sand. The eye exposed by his broken faceplate had already turned toward Chen, fixing him with a cold stare through the drifting smoke.

Their eyes met.

Chen lifted the entrenching shovel from his knees, stood, and took his first step out of the sandbag emplacement’s shadow.

Crack.

As his foot crushed the gravel, a string of sharp pops ran up his spine.

On the second step, his camouflage fatigues split into strips. Thick cords of muscle swelled and tightened beneath his skin, while dark veins bulged across his body.

A third step. A fourth.

He walked into the wind toward Lin Yan, growing taller and broader with every stride.

Bone ground against bone as his frame stretched. Within a few meters, the stocky bald man had grown to well over two meters, his skin taking on an iron-gray cast. Each heavy footfall crushed grit beneath him, and the menace rolling off his body grew with every step.

The entrenching shovel that had once fit his hand now looked like a short dagger in his enormous fist.

They stood in the desert beneath the blazing sun.

[00:20 / 00:60]