novelraw Chapter 212: Torment
Chapter 212: Torment
Su Zhan barely forced his eyes open, sensing the opponents' strength.
Three low-threat high-tier Aberrants.
If this were before, he could have casually chopped them into mincemeat.
But now...
Without exposing his Aberrant identity, he had completely lost all combat capability.
Heh...
Truly, a tiger fallen to the plains being bullied by dogs.
Also, why would Aberrants appear at the border?
This was the most unfriendly place for Aberrants - hardly any ordinary people to hunt, extremely dangerous, and because there were few people and most were from the Fortress with official status, it was even harder to hide.
They had no reason to come here.Unless...
Unless they also knew the border would suffer a Mist Surge today!
Damn it.
Those bastards from the Transcendence Society!
Feng Jue locked onto the enemies with deadly focus, shouting sharply without turning his head: "Go! Su Zhan! Get out of here!"
Although all three of them were physically exhausted, compared to Su Zhan...
At least they still had some combat capability, even if minimal.
But Su Zhan... right now he probably couldn't even defeat an ordinary person.
Liu Ziming instantly understood the situation too;
seeing Su Zhan bleeding from all seven orifices, barely able to stand steady, he knew staying meant certain death:
"Brother Su! Stop fucking hesitating! Run! We'll hold them off!"
Xu Hao trembled as he tightened his grip on the dagger: "Brother Su... go! Hurry!"
Su Zhan's vision blurred, his brain buzzing.
The lead Aberrant let out an inhuman laugh, full of mockery: "Heh... foolish sacrificial spirit... such a nauseating yet... delicious emotion, hehehe... none of you will escape, your flesh and blood are nourishment for our power growth!"
"Just merge with us peacefully... struggling only increases the pain..."
One Aberrant lunged forward directly!
Feng Jue's eyes turned cold, his sword light erupting as he met the attack: "Your opponent is me!"
Liu Ziming also roared, hurling weak lightning balls at another Aberrant: "Fuck you! Taste my lightning!"
Battle erupted instantly!
Su Zhan knew this wasn't the time for hesitation. Dragging his weakened body, he stumbled toward the tunnel entrance they had just escaped from!
Liu Ziming glimpsed this from the corner of his eye, both shocked and furious: "Brother Su! Where are you running?! Didn't you say there were Mist Creatures back there?"
Su Zhan didn't look back: "There were then... now... there aren't! Trust me!"
Feng Jue's sword movements intensified: "Ignore him! Kill!"
He could only trust Su Zhan's judgment.
Their only mission now was to desperately tie down these three Aberrants!
Seeing this, Liu Ziming knew he couldn't afford distraction anymore, roaring wildly as he poured his last spiritual energy into the lightning.
Xu Hao used his teleportation to desperately harass the enemies.
Su Zhan stumbled step by step, plunging back into the tunnel entrance, his figure instantly swallowed by darkness.
Behind him came the furious roars and collision sounds of his teammates fiercely battling the Aberrants.
Alone, he fled deeper into the dangerous darkness.
Once out of his teammates' sight.
Su Zhan's nearly broken body suddenly stopped trembling.
Slowly straightening his back.
Those eyes that had been unfocused from pain and blurriness suddenly lit up in the darkness.
They were a pair of cold golden vertical pupils.
Containing no trace of weakness anymore... transformed into bloodthirsty desire returned to instinct!
"Cough..."
Su Zhan coughed lightly, spitting out bloody saliva: "I lied to you all... sorry."
He had deceived them.
He hadn't actually foreseen the Mist Creatures leaving the tunnel.
Quite the opposite - the final fragments captured by his collapsing Future Vision clearly told him.
This tunnel they had just escaped from had several pursuing Mist Creatures.
He chose to retreat here not to avoid the Aberrants, but because... he needed a battlefield where no one could witness him.
A place where he could unleash his true power!
And another reason... to intercept these pursuers, reducing pressure on his teammates.
Killing two birds with one stone.
Deep in the tunnel, shadows writhed.
Scuttling sounds rapidly approached!
Several massive Mist Creatures appeared.
Soul-devouring Spider Demons with compound eyes flashing greedy ferocity.
And several swift-moving Shadowblade Hunters appeared!
They smelled the scent of fresh flesh.
They roared, eagerly lunging forward to tear this isolated prey to pieces!
Facing this deadly encirclement.
Su Zhan instead revealed a ferocious smile.
"Perfect... I need to replenish some nutrients anyway."
Amidst the sound of scales scraping.
Su Zhan's body underwent aberration.
Jet-black scales madly erupted from beneath his skin, instantly covering his entire body.
His limbs stretched slightly, nails transforming into sharp claws.
A tail covered in the same black scales tore through his clothes from the base of his spine.
Thick gray-white mist seeped from all his pores, coiling around him, making his figure indistinct and adding an eerie quality.
Su Zhan seemed to transform into a monarch emerging from the depths of the mist, radiating terrifying energy that shared origins with those Mist Creatures yet felt more noble.
His golden vertical pupils coldly locked onto the charging monsters.
"ROAR—!!!"
He moved!
So fast he became only a blurry black shadow.
His massive tail whipped out violently!
"BOOM!!!"
A Soul-devouring Spider Demon charging at the front, along with its hard carapace and disgusting compound eyes, instantly exploded from the impact!
Splattering mucus and fragments everywhere!
"SHREEEEEK!"
A Shadowblade Hunter couldn't even see the movement before being cleanly sliced in half!
Su Zhan needed no techniques whatsoever - pure power, pure suppression.
The battle became an efficient slaughter.
Those ferocious Mist Creatures.
Before Su Zhan in his unleashed true form, couldn't even offer decent resistance before being rapidly torn apart and devoured!
The entire process produced almost no significant noise.
The final monster turned to dust.
Su Zhan stood in place, breathing slightly heavily.
Spiritual energy wouldn't replenish from the life essence of Mist Creatures.
After all, Mist Creatures and Awakened individuals followed different paths.
But mental energy could recover a small portion.
At least now his head didn't hurt or feel dizzy anymore.
Su Zhan glanced toward the exit direction where faint fighting sounds came from, his expression complex and difficult to read.
Save them?
Feng Jue, Liu Ziming, Xu Hao... they were still outside fighting desperately, choosing without hesitation to stay and face three terrifying Aberrants to buy him a chance at survival.
They treated him as a comrade they could trust with their backs, prioritizing his chance to live in this desperate situation!
His current power, though far from peak condition, was more than sufficient to deal with those few low-threat Aberrants.
But he couldn't save them!
How could he save them?
In what identity would he appear?
He had nothing to disguise his appearance and identity right now!
If he showed himself, how could he explain it?
The transformation from comrade fighting side-by-side to a monster of different kind - this change was harder for him to bear than death.
Even if he had something to conceal his identity...
The timing was too coincidental!
He just escaped inside, and suddenly an Aberrant emerges to help?
That coincidence itself was unexplainable.
That would truly leave him unable to defend himself no matter what he said!
Cold reason told him that hiding, lying low, surviving - that was his only choice.
He couldn't afford the price of exposure.
But...
The better they treated him, the more they trusted him, the heavier the sense of betrayal and guilt became now.
He had deceived them, hiding here alone.
While they were outside bleeding for him, possibly even... dying.
Su Zhan clenched his fists so tightly his nails dug deep into his palms, yet he didn't notice the pain.
Saving them meant exposure, eternal damnation.
Not saving them meant surviving alone, bearing the sacrifice of his comrades and lifelong torment of guilt.
Whichever choice he made, it seemed like a road leading straight to hell.
The fighting sounds outside seemed to intensify, then suddenly weakened somewhat... as if someone had fallen...