Chapter 283

“Trying to run, you dog bastard?”

Magnus Specter had just killed the bat. He’d fallen hard after it, lost his angle, and smashed face-first into the dirt. Ate a mouthful of dust. His skull still buzzed like a cracked bell. He was already in a filthy mood.

He turned back toward Lightwater Residences just in time to see Cliff Baxter and the others fighting that giant snake.

There were plenty of them, and the snake had rolled enough to show its belly. Weak spot wide open. In just a few minutes, the thing died the same way Magnus had dealt with one before—

A grenade got shoved right under its gut.

Troop carriers, infantry fighting vehicles, modified long-haul coaches, and two light tanks—more than a dozen vehicles in all—roared straight into the rat horde.

Magnus sped up. He crushed a fresh Nature Crystal in his grip, lit it, and charged forward. Both hands locked around the round log, holding it across his chest and up through the air in front of him.

Maybe there were just too many living people around now. This time, the rat demon beasts didn’t all pile onto him. He sprang over a few rat corpses, chased the tail end of the convoy, caught up to the first infantry fighting vehicle, swung the log once and set it ablaze, then spun around and ran back.

Behind it came two long-distance buses. The road was cluttered with junk, so the buses just slammed through everything with the throttle pinned. Magnus ran straight at them. When he got within a meter and a half, he jumped, planted a foot on the slanted windshield, kicked up onto the roof, lit it, then turned and leapt without a pause to the other bus.

One after another, the dozen-plus vehicles blew.

The blasts shook the air so hard it felt like the sky had cracked. Even the giant apocalypse beasts around them gave way, fleeing dozens of meters to avoid the edge of it.

The shockwave shoved Magnus several meters and slammed him to the ground. Still, he had both arms wrapped around the fresh Nature Crystal he’d just crushed. He rolled once and sprang back to his feet.

The beasts around him came back to their senses and surged in again.

Using the firelight from all sides, Magnus rolled up from the ground and swept his gaze around.

Less than fifty meters off to one side...

Oliver Bright?

Magnus locked onto him in one glance.

This bastard had tricked him last time. That score still hadn’t been settled.

“Fuck.”

He cursed under his breath, pulled out a grenade, yanked the pin, and charged straight at Oliver Bright.

At that same moment, Oliver saw him too.

His memory was sharp, and Magnus had left a deep mark on him. He recognized him at once and immediately started shouting for the men around him to stop Magnus.

“Move! Move! Stop him! Don’t let him get over here!”

The soldiers around him had all used Metal Crystal. But seeing Magnus charge at them alone, they all felt their nerves tighten. None of them had the guts for it. And besides Magnus, more and more apocalypse beasts were closing in from every side.

Panic spread through them.

They all wanted to get back in the vehicles and run.

Not one listened to Oliver’s orders.

Six seconds. Seven. Eight...

Magnus counted the grenade time in his head.

At eight seconds, he threw it.

It dropped right into the crowd around Oliver.

Two seconds later—

Boom.

Seven or eight soldiers around Oliver were blasted into the air. Magnus had been watching Oliver the whole time. The instant he saw him lifted by the blast, Magnus stamped the ground, jumped up, caught him in midair, landed, then grabbed one of his legs and dragged him backward at speed.

At the very least, he had to hand-feed this bastard to the chickens himself. Only then would his mood improve a little.

Oliver had Metal Crystal active. Once he got swallowed whole and sat in a chicken’s gut, waiting to be digested bit by bit...

Magnus had tasted that kind of despair himself.

That feeling was better than torture.

And right now, there was no time to torture him anyway.

“Let me go! Let me go! Magnus Specter—I know it’s you! It’s you! Let me go! I’ll give them to you! I’ll give you Crystals! We have more than forty thousand Crystals! I’m the only one who knows where they are!”

Magnus was too fast. Oliver might have Awakened once, but his strength was nowhere near Magnus’s. With one leg being dragged like that, he couldn’t use any force at all. He could only flail from side to side and scream.

More than forty thousand Crystals?

Magnus stopped dead.

His left arm still braced the round log wrapped in blue flame. With his right hand, he yanked Oliver up by the ankle, swung him in a half-circle through the air, and smashed his face into the ground.

Oliver had Metal Crystal active, so he didn’t die.

“Oliver Bright!”

Magnus stepped forward and drove a savage kick straight into his temple.

He had Awakened twice. Four times strength. That kick was brutal.

Oliver’s body spun on the ground like a compass needle, his belly as the pivot, turning several full circles.

“Heard the story about the wolf crying at the door?”

After Oliver spun a few rounds, Magnus said it coldly and stepped up to kick him again.

“The first time I believed you, fine. Call that me being simple.”

He kicked him a second time.

“But if I believe you a second damn time, then I’m the fucking idiot. You understand?”

Oliver’s head was spinning so hard his brain felt like mush. He could vaguely hear Magnus speaking, but he couldn’t think. Couldn’t piece anything together.

Then all at once, a chill crawled up the back of his neck.

Pure instinct.

He let out a scream, just noise, no words.

The Metal Crystal time was almost up.

His body suddenly felt light, too light. Reflex made him blurt something, and right after that he wanted to beg. But his head was still reeling so badly he didn’t even know what he was begging for.

With that blue-burning log in Magnus’s hands, the animals nearby didn’t rush them. They went after others instead—especially the soldiers still running out from the buildings.

Magnus looked around. No vehicles were trying to flee now either.

Nothing else to do.

He bent a little, grabbed Oliver’s ankle again with his right hand, and suddenly heaved, drawing another half-circle through the air with Oliver’s body.

“Talk. Where are those forty thousand Crystals you mentioned?”

“I’ll talk! I’ll talk! I’ll talk! Just don’t hit me again!”

Oliver was soaked through with cold sweat.

Only he knew the truth—

He had less than five minutes left on his Metal Crystal.

If Magnus kept smashing him around like this, once the time ran out... he didn’t even dare imagine what would happen.

He struggled to turn over on the ground and lay flat on his back, both arms hugging his head. His voice was twisted with pain.

“Let me go... let me go first... if you let me go, I’ll tell you...”

Magnus gave a cold laugh.

“Heh. You didn’t hear what I just said?”

He stepped forward another half-step, bent down, and reached for Oliver’s ankle again.

Oliver jerked back in terror and shouted, “What did you say? What did you say? I—I didn’t hear it clearly!”

“Then listen the fuck up.”

Magnus bent, seized his ankle, and with another burst of force swung him in a half-circle through the air again, then slammed him back down hard.

“I said if I believe you one more damn time, then I’m the fucking idiot!”

Then he kept going.

Still gripping Oliver by the ankle, Magnus whipped him around again and again.

He didn’t know whether the time on Oliver’s Metal Crystal had already ended or not. He couldn’t even tell from the body weight. Right now he was just venting, pure and simple.

He dragged Oliver across the ground and smashed him down without restraint, then swung his body into a car beside them.

Crack. Crunch. Crack-crack.

Metal twisted. Glass burst.

Magnus didn’t care.

A few days ago he hadn’t gotten the chance to personally butcher Kevin Ward, and that had already left a knot in his chest. Now Oliver Bright had walked right into his hands.

So he vented it all on him.

But after swinging him and smashing him a dozen times or more, Magnus suddenly noticed something.

Oliver Bright’s skull... looked like it had cracked open.