Parting Ways (3)

The roar alone would have been bad enough, but it was accompanied by a thunderous crash against the door. With just one blow, the steel door caved inward entirely. Zheng Zha could even see most of the Alien's body wedged outside the doorway. Of the three Spiral Thorns he had fired earlier, two had struck their target. One was embedded in the Alien's left chest, while the other had pierced beneath its neck. Both hits counted as vital points, but neither was fatal.

This was Zheng Zha's second face-to-face battle with an Alien. Although the situation was slightly better than last time, it was still far from optimistic. This Alien was a fully matured specimen. It was thirty percent larger than the one he had faced before, and its entire body was pitch-black, thick and solid like black iron. In fact, the Spiral Thorns had only penetrated about a third of their length, leaving a large section protruding outside its body.

Zheng Zha stared at the Alien's savage, terrifying appearance, his entire body trembling. Especially when he saw its tail lash out and punch a huge hole through the steel door. If that strike hit a human body, it would undoubtedly tear open their belly and spill their guts. No matter how much Zheng Zha had been enhanced, he did not believe his body was tougher than steel.

This is the pressure... It feels like I don't even have any consciousness left, only deep fear and endless instinct...

Once again, Zheng Zha felt as if something inside his body had been unlocked. Countless combat instincts erupted from his mind. Among those instincts was even the knowledge of how to use Internal Force more effectively.

He guided the Internal Force out with his consciousness, spiraling it upward from the base of his spine, along his vertebrae and over his scalp, then down the front of his body and along his arm into his right hand. The entire process took no more than a blink. Zheng Zha completely entrusted the circulation of Internal Force to his combat instincts, and it was obvious that under their control, it became extraordinarily nimble.

But as the Internal Force passed over his scalp, something seemed to emerge from the depths of his mind and join it. The two fused together and gathered in his right hand. The instant the Alien smashed through the door and charged in, he let out a shout and hurled the Spiral Thorn. Almost at the same time, the Alien's tail slammed heavily into his stomach!

Zhang Jie and Zhan Lan cried out in alarm as Zheng Zha was blasted into the air. With a muffled thud, he crashed directly into the bathroom wall. The Spiral Thorn he had thrown was even more powerful. It not only pierced through the Alien's head with ease, but also shot into the corridor wall behind it with a hiss. A third of the Alien's head had been sliced away. It swayed a few times before finally collapsing to the ground with a bang. On the wall behind it was a fist-sized spiraling crater.

Zhan Lan no longer cared about anything else. She grabbed some clothes and hastily tied them around her chest before rushing toward Zheng Zha. Her breasts, much fuller than those of an ordinary woman, looked especially alluring. The clothes wrapped around her chest left nearly half of them exposed. Fortunately, of the two men present, one lay on the ground with his fate unknown, while the other was hurriedly running ahead of her. Otherwise, the sight of her upper body alone would have left many men staring dumbfounded.

"How are you? Zheng Zha! Are you all right?" Seeing Zhang Jie standing there in a daze, Zhan Lan immediately began crying anxiously. Still crying, she hurried around him and dropped to her knees beside Zheng Zha.

To her surprise, the moment she knelt down, she saw Zheng Zha lying there blankly, rubbing his head with an idiotic expression on his face. She was instantly furious. Without thinking, she slapped his stomach hard several times. "You scared us to death! You went to ambush that Alien without saying anything. What if you had failed? You would have been... and you would have dragged the two of us down with you! You would have gotten both of us killed!"

After taking several slaps to the stomach, Zheng Zha immediately clutched it and groaned in pain. Only then did Zhan Lan realize her hands were covered in blood. She panicked again and said through tears, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry! I didn't know your stomach was already injured. Sob... I'm really, really sorry..."

Trembling, Zheng Zha slowly moved his hands away. The two of them looked closely and found a bloody hole as thick as three fingers in his stomach. Fortunately, it had only torn through the skin. His intestines and internal organs did not seem to have been harmed.

Zhang Jie hurriedly crouched where Zheng Zha had been standing. Sure enough, he found a clear footprint in the steel floor, its outline already pressed deep into the metal. Zhang Jie stood up and exclaimed in amazement, "Amazing! You jumped backward the instant the Alien's tail hit you. That's why it didn't rip open your stomach. If I'd been standing there, my intestines might have been smashed apart..."

The more Zhang Jie spoke, the more excited he became. He ran over to Zheng Zha in a few steps and vigorously patted his shoulder. "Kid, how did you do that? You were practically divine just now! If I hadn't watched you kill that Alien with my own eyes, I would've thought some martial arts master had done it. Damn, how did you do it? Teach me!"

Zheng Zha sucked in a breath from the pain of being patted again and said with a bitter smile, "You two should help bandage my wound first. At this rate, the blood loss alone will kill me... And someone should probably go fix her clothes..."

Zhan Lan froze for a moment before noticing how she was dressed. Her face immediately flushed red. She shot Zheng Zha a fierce glare, then hurried into one of the bathroom stalls. Zheng Zha also took bandages and hemostatic spray from his ring. With Zhang Jie's help, he finally bound up the hole in his stomach securely.

When Zhan Lan came out of the bathroom stall, Zheng Zha hurriedly said to them, "There's no time to explain the details. Zhang Jie, carry me toward Chu Xuan and the others. No matter what happens to me, don't stop... Zhan Lan, my right hand is completely broken. Help me carry the remaining Spiral Thorn rods, and make sure you keep up with us... Zhang Jie, move!"

Zheng Zha was now certain of his deduction. The secret to unlocking the Gene lock lay in danger and fear. But an ordinary body simply could not withstand the immense power unleashed after opening the Gene lock. Even with a body enhanced like his, his right hand had suffered a shattered fracture after he opened the Gene lock and attacked at full strength. What would follow was pain that felt like death itself. So what about ordinary people?

It was a double-edged sword that wounded both enemy and wielder. Only when facing extreme danger, the kind of despairing terror of a dead end, could the Gene lock be unlocked for a short time. It could be said that unlocking the Gene lock was humanity's final struggle in the face of death!

"...Heh, the only fortunate thing is that I may have found a way to use Vampire energy just now. I just don't know..."

Zheng Zha lay on Zhang Jie's back and spoke with a bitter smile. Before he could finish, that deathlike sensation spread from his internal organs throughout his entire body. Then he began convulsing violently on Zhang Jie's back. The immense pain left him unable even to speak. Every muscle in his body felt as though it were tearing free, and blood streamed from his stomach as the wound that had already clotted split open once more. Blood dripped steadily down his thigh onto the floor...

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