Charge!

Dull Puppet: Agility reduced by 3.

Supreme Heaven Blood Seed: All attributes reduced by 10 (no longer in effect). In burst state, all attributes increased by 50. Time remaining: 28 minutes, 36 seconds!

Curse of Weakness: All attributes -3.

These were the mutation buffs currently affecting Xia Lin's attributes.

Taken together, after activating Supreme Heaven Blood Seed, Xia Lin gained 47 points in strength, constitution, and spirit, and 44 points in agility.

Combined with his original attributes, Xia Lin's current attributes should have been:

Strength: 53

Agility: 50

Constitution: 53

Spirit: 57

These attributes had already reached the standard of a level-five Ash Zone Walker, but because he had no skills, Xia Lin would be no match for most level-fives in terms of combat power alone.

The thing was, Xia Lin also had a mutation buff called Feast of Flesh!

Thinking of the Feast of Flesh buff, Xia Lin's eyes turned bloodshot, and he grinned.

The slimy, revolting sensation of flesh entering his mouth was hard to describe.

Because he had lost his sense of taste and his digestive system had mutated, he felt almost no physical nausea. He even felt satisfied.

But Xia Lin couldn't forget the psychological disgust he had felt when he took that first bite.

Humanoid... humanoid.

They had the same proportions as humans...

In short, they were very similar...

"But this wasn't my fault. It wasn't."

"I'd only just arrived, and you were so rude! So rude!"

A fierce wind whistled past his ears.

It was the air kicked up by Xia Lin's high-speed charge.

He hunched forward, pushing off with both feet, his body at a forty-five-degree angle to the ground. Each step left a crater-like footprint and kicked up clouds of dust.

His attribute panel automatically appeared on his retinas.

[Name: Xia Lin]

[Level: 1]

[Class: None]

[Base attributes:]

[Strength: 85]

[Constitution: 85]

[Agility: 82]

[Spirit: 89]

He recalled the slimy sensation of flesh sliding down his throat, as though savoring a bowl of fiery liquor.

Bitter and burning, but with a sweet aftertaste.

The burning twin blades ahead were like a beacon, illuminating his target.

In the firelight, Xie Xiaotian's face looked especially savage and terrifying.

The anger and sorrow in his eyes were plain to see.

He really had been secretly in love with An Yue.

"But what did that have to do with me?"

Xie Xiaotian had not actually lost his head to anger. His combat instincts remained sharp.

From Xia Lin's charge, Xie Xiaotian could tell that Xia Lin's attributes were far beyond what they should have been, well above his own.

This defied all reason: Xia Lin really was just a newcomer.

Xie Xiaotian couldn't figure out how it worked for the moment, but he firmly believed that his combat experience and combination of skills would let him keep Xia Lin occupied until Li Peipei finished her fight.

Once Li Peipei was free, Xia Lin would be as good as dead!

Such was his absolute trust in the human race's Sequence Forty-Three!

As the two drew closer, Xie Xiaotian's gaze burned, and Shadow Blink was ready to activate!

Burning Blade, Shadow Blink, Backstab, Armor Break.

Those four skills had made Xie Xiaotian the Shadow Assassin!

Yet just as the distance between them narrowed to a few meters and Shadow Blink was about to activate... Xia Lin suddenly accelerated!

He had been hiding his abilities!

The attributes he had just displayed had only been around sixty points.

Now, his sudden burst of speed caught Xie Xiaotian completely off guard.

A fierce wind howled toward him. Xie Xiaotian instinctively leaned aside to dodge, only to see Xia Lin smile cruelly, his arm suddenly bending at a bizarre angle.

Acrobatics Master!

Then he seized Xie Xiaotian by the throat with one hand!

Clamping down on Xie Xiaotian's neck, Xia Lin tensed his arm and slammed him hard into the ground.

The thunderous crash drowned out the fierce fighting on the other two battlefields.

The bones and flesh of Xie Xiaotian's back burst apart, and he vomited great mouthfuls of blood as his internal organs shattered.

But Xia Lin did not stop!

Keeping his grip locked tight, he continued charging forward.

He used Xie Xiaotian as a broom to sweep the ground, leaving a straight trail of blood behind him, while raising his head to stare fixedly at Zhang Wen.

"Your turn!"

The ferocity of his killing intent made Zhang Wen freeze for a moment and caused Li Peipei to frown deeply.

She finally realized that their squad seemed to have provoked a lunatic.

But her frown soon smoothed away.

She had seen plenty of lunatics. Few people who spent their time in the Ash Zone weren't crazy.

And dealing with a lunatic was quite simple.

Just kill them!

Her blade flashed again. After a brief wait, Dragon Flash Dance was off cooldown and could be activated once more.

The faint sound of a dragon's roar rippled from within Li Peipei.

Silvery-white light flashed in an instant.

The Nether Breath Hound, already battered and miserable, let out a howl as a ghastly wound appeared on its neck out of nowhere.

Just as blood began to spray, the silver light leaped rapidly toward Xia Lin!

The next second, it burst into a brilliant flash!

But Xia Lin strangely retracted his neck, his entire head almost disappearing into his chest-Acrobatics Master again.

The light of Dragon Flash Dance struck empty ground.

At the same time, Xia Lin shifted his footing. Like a circus clown, he changed direction without slowing down, veering away from the flashing silver light and continuing toward Zhang Wen.

The silver light flashed again.

This time, however, it struck the Nether Breath Hound in front of Zhang Wen.

When facing multiple targets, Dragon Flash Dance apparently couldn't attack the same target consecutively.

The Nether Breath Hound opened its bloody maw and howled without end.

But the monster's howls were merely a backdrop. Everyone present knew that the focus of this clash lay with Xia Lin and Li Peipei alone.

This time, the silver light flashed toward Xia Lin's waist.

It was too fast, and hard to dodge.

Yet Xia Lin gave a savage grin.

He twisted at the waist, pulling the half-dead Xie Xiaotian directly in front of the blade.

The sound of cloth and flesh tearing rang out. Xie Xiaotian was cut in half at the waist in an instant, but Li Peipei did not hesitate in the slightest. Her blade continued downward, slicing through Xia Lin's waist and carving a deep sword mark into the ground.

Xia Lin felt a searing pain in his waist.

After taking a direct hit from Dragon Flash Dance, even though Xia Lin had not been cut in half, he was held together by little more than skin and flesh, a gruesome sight.

But his charge did not slow, and he had already reached Zhang Wen!

A bloody wind rushed into her face.

Zhang Wen could only watch Xia Lin's devilish face draw closer and closer, until they were face-to-face.

A pair of iron arms wrapped around her waist, and the tremendous force drove Zhang Wen backward. Then she felt the ground vanish beneath her, and she fell into a slimy place.

It was the Nether Breath Hound's mouth!

The howling Nether Breath Hound fell silent and paused in surprise. It was just about to bite down when it discovered that the foreign object in its mouth had already gone deep inside.

Inside its mouth, Zhang Wen smelled both sulfur and foul breath rushing at her, while the force pushing against her from the front surged again.

Xia Lin pressed against Zhang Wen with one hand while swinging the other like an oar, taking her farther into the Nether Breath Hound's body!

Li Peipei's muffled roar came from outside.

"Don't you dare! Don't you dare!!"

This time, she was finally furious!

Because the inside of the Nether Breath Hound was the best hiding place on this battlefield for avoiding Dragon Flash Dance!

Three strikes remained in this round of Dragon Flash Dance.

But Xia Lin had already become one with the Nether Breath Hound Zhang Wen had been facing.

The silver light flashed three times in succession, killing the Nether Breath Hound Li Peipei had been facing, but it wasn't enough to take the other hound's life.

Li Peipei appeared again, staring ahead as she gripped the greatsword in her hand tightly.

Three members of the five-person squad were dead, and another's fate was unknown.

But they should never have suffered such heavy casualties!

This expedition should have been a sure thing, yet because of one lunatic newcomer, they had been reduced to this!

"I will kill you."

After extreme anger came calm.

Li Peipei slowly voiced her vow of vengeance, seemingly forgetting that they had been the ones to do evil first.

Such was hatred.

One act of vengeance led to another, and the grudge only grew deeper.

Fortunately, Xia Lin was not someone who repaid malice with kindness, either.

The Nether Breath Hound suddenly let out a howl and fell to the ground, convulsing. Already gravely wounded, it began bleeding from all seven orifices, its breath growing weaker and weaker.

White Dragon True Eye allowed Li Peipei to make out a blurry human figure moving rapidly inside the Nether Breath Hound's abdomen, seemingly devouring something.

Li Peipei couldn't make sense of what was happening inside.

Then came a wet squelch.

A bloody hand punched through the Nether Breath Hound's side. A bloodstained figure slowly crawled out, dragging another bloodstained figure behind him, and finally stood before Li Peipei.