Wolf

0401 slumped onto the backseat like a deflated ball, his eyes staring blankly at the Blood Moon through the sunroof. Sun Hang, meanwhile, pulled out his phone and opened a web browser.

It was a shame that the internet hadn't existed sixty years ago, or even that wireless communication wasn't widespread. Otherwise, Sun Hang would have liked to see if his phone could pick up any radio signals from that era.

He typed "Blood Moon" into the browser's search bar, then paused and added "Class B Anomaly Number Six" as a footnote.

Sun Hang pressed the "Search" button. After a brief delay, 160,000 search results popped up.

He thought for a moment and added another note: "Calendar Year 4654, September 15th." In the blink of an eye, the search results dropped from 160,000 to just over thirty.

These thirty-odd results were mostly official records from the Xiazhou Federation. Many of the people who had personally experienced that Blood Moon sixty-five years ago were no longer alive. Back then, information was scarce and there was no internet. The clues that managed to survive and could still be found by Sun Hang online were incredibly few.

However, among these thirty-odd records, there wasn't a single one related to Tianfu City.

Sun Hang sighed and changed the search terms to "Tianfu City, Calendar Year 4654, September 15th," removing everything related to the Blood Moon.

"Huh?"

Although the search results still had nothing to do with the Blood Moon, one piece of information caught Sun Hang's attention.

It was a scanned local gazetteer, which recorded that between September 15th and 20th of Calendar Year 4654, 150,000 refugees displaced by anomalies entered Shuzhou from the Yuanmou region.

In that era, Tianfu City wasn't called Tianfu City yet; it still used its ancient name, "Jinguan City." This vast basin centered around Jinguan City was Shuzhou.

At that time, the boundary of human activity extended another four to five hundred kilometers southwest, and the entire Yundian Plateau, including Yuanmou City, was the front line against anomaly invasions.

Just as Sun Hang was about to follow this lead to see if there was any connection between the appearance of these refugees and the Blood Moon, Yang Qi's voice suddenly rang out.

"Something's got its eye on us... I can feel it."

"What is it?" 0401 was startled and immediately sat up straight, gripping the seatbelt in front of him tightly.

"Just some beasts," Wang Xiyi said, pulling back the slide of her pistol and chambering a round.

This was undeveloped wilderness from sixty-five years ago, with no signs of human habitation or roads. The SUV drove over the rugged, uneven ground. Sun Hang looked out the car window and saw a few glints of crimson light flash by in the darkness before immediately disappearing from view.

"Looks like wolves," Sun Hang said.

"There haven't been wolves near Tianfu City for many years. If it weren't for the anomalies, this news would probably be on the front page of the Tianfu Daily tomorrow," Yang Qi quipped.

"Can we kill them? Will it violate the wildlife protection law?" Sun Hang asked.

"When the Blood Moon appears, the wildlife protection law is automatically suspended," Yang Qi replied.

"Good then."

"However, try not to shoot if you can avoid it. I'm worried it might alert something else," Yang Qi said, then pressed harder on the accelerator. "I'll speed up and try to shake these wolves."

"It's too late, we're surrounded," Wang Xiyi stated calmly.

A dozen crimson points of light appeared directly in front of the SUV... no, not just in front, but also on the sides and behind. If we count two points per wolf, there were at least nearly fifty wolves surrounding them.

"So many?" Yang Qi frowned slightly.

Fifty wolves – that number exceeded the size of most wolf packs. Even in areas very suitable for wolves, with abundant food and few predators, wolf packs rarely exceeded thirty.

"Even sixty-five years ago, there wouldn't have been such a large wolf pack in the Shuzhou region, right?" Yang Qi asked, puzzled.

"No, they aren't one pack, but many..." Wang Xiyi's nostrils flared slightly. "I can smell it. These beasts belong to several different packs, but they've gathered together under the influence of the Blood Moon..."

"Is this all the wolves in the area? Why aren't these wolves looking for other groups?" 0401's face was pale.

"Because there are two Anomaly Hunters in this car, it's only natural that we'd be targeted," Yang Qi said, her hands gripping the steering wheel tightly. "Everyone hold on tight. I'm going to accelerate and break through... If they block the road, don't blame me for running them over!"

The SUV's engine roared deafeningly. The needle on the tachometer spun wildly to the right, and the car's bumps became more violent as its speed increased, giving the impression it might fly off at any moment. 0401's head had already made two "intimate" contacts with the roof without warning.

The distance closed. Under the headlights, Sun Hang finally got a clear look at the wolves blocking the road ahead.

They were a whole size larger than the adult wolves Sun Hang remembered. These wolves were generally over two meters long. If they stood on their hind legs, they could easily reach the roof of the SUV.

"Are you sure these wolves just became more agitated and aggressive?" 0401's voice trembled slightly.

The eyes of these wolves emitted a piercing red light, just like the Blood Moon in the sky. Nocturnal animals' eyes "glow" because the back of their retinas has a special reflective layer that gathers faint light from the environment and reflects it back, creating glowing spots like will-o'-the-wisps in the darkness.

This reflective effect wasn't obvious in bright light, but now, illuminated by the headlights, the crimson glow in the eyes of these wolves seemed to pierce through the headlights, blindingly bright.

Facing the speeding SUV, these wolves didn't move aside; they lunged forward! Their bodies, weighing hundreds of pounds, slammed heavily against the windshield, causing the bulletproof glass, capable of stopping 7.62mm rounds, to dent. Spiderweb cracks spread from the impact point to the edges of the window.

Two wolves were flung aside by the impact, but another hooked its front claws onto the roof rack and clung to the window, repeatedly smashing the already shattering glass with its head.

"These beasts have been strengthened by the Blood Moon," Yang Qi frowned. "This kind of situation... is rare."

Sun Hang noticed that the wolf's body was expanding rapidly. Its fur was torn apart by the rapidly growing muscles, and the bloody subcutaneous tissue was forcefully pushing out from these tears, like an uncontainable tumor.

"Strengthened? This is a mutation!" 0401 stammered, his voice unclear. "This... this wolf has already become an anomaly, hasn't it?!"