My Rules

When they reached the gathering point, everyone was already there. Night fell like ink splashed across the sky. Four teams stood in silence, torchlight flickering and casting every face into alternating brightness and shadow. Wang Quan merged with his people, the entire process accompanied only by footsteps and restrained breathing.

The patrol route was the same as always, heading west along the base of the city wall. They had not gone far when several stiff figures lurched out of the wild grass. Their skin was blue-black and their movements sluggish—the lowest-grade unfinished zombies. Wang Quan did not act, merely signaling Shi Zhu and the others to deal with them. After several dull thuds and brief howls, a few headless corpses lay on the ground. The air was thick with the stench of decay.

Slain a low-grade walking corpse, obtained 1 Skill Point.

Slain a low-grade walking corpse, obtained 1 Skill Point.

Slain a low-grade walking corpse, obtained 2 Skill Points.

Alerts rang out in Wang Quan's mind one after another. He frowned. Zombies were appearing far too frequently in this area, as if something had drawn them here. Could Killing Intent be gathering nearby? Was this the prelude to some great calamity? He secretly kept his guard up.

Just as the team finished clearing out the zombies and was preparing to move on, a teeth-grating slithering sound suddenly came from the shadows ahead. Three thick, elongated shadows emerged from behind the scattered rocks, their scales gleaming coldly in the moonlight. They were the three Snake Demons they had dealt with before.

The leading Snake Demon swept its cold, vertical pupils across the team before finally pinning its gaze on Wang Quan. Its forked tongue hissed as it spoke, irritation utterly undisguised. "You, Blood Food. Get over here."

Wang Quan did not move. He merely raised his eyes to look at it.

Seeing that he remained still, the Snake Demon grew even angrier. Its voice suddenly rose, accompanied by a shrill hiss. "Did you hold anything back last time? The more I think about it, the more wrong it feels! No matter how greedy that Pig Demon was, it couldn't have delayed this long!"

At that moment, one of the team members behind Wang Quan could not hold back. Mustering his courage, he spoke in a trembling voice. "M-Master Snake, everything we said last time was true. We wouldn't dare deceive you..."

Before he could finish, the Snake Demon's thick tail whipped violently through the air, lashing into the team member like a whip amid a vicious gale. With a dull bang, the man was sent flying like a broken sack before he could even cry out. He crashed heavily into a pile of rocks several yards away, followed by the sound of bones snapping.

"Did I give you permission to speak?" The Snake Demon retracted its tail and spat contemptuously. "Was I asking you?"

In the distance, the team member curled up among the rubble, his body trembling violently. His teeth bit deep into his lower lip, blood spilling from the corner of his mouth as he forcibly swallowed his groans of pain. Only a suppressed wheezing sound escaped his throat, while his eyes brimmed with humiliation and hatred he did not dare reveal.

Wang Quan watched this scene without any expression on his face. He set off and walked step by step toward the leading Snake Demon, neither hurried nor slow. The Snake Demon looked down at him from its superior height and was just about to speak again when Wang Quan suddenly struck!

Fast—so fast that only a fading afterimage remained! A hand covered in fine keratin, blue veins faintly visible beneath the skin, clamped around the Snake Demon's thick neck like an iron vise with pinpoint precision!

The Snake Demon's enormous body stiffened abruptly. Its vertical pupils shrank into slits, filled with shock and disbelief. It tried to struggle, but the power transmitted through that hand was terrifyingly immense. Its neck bones creaked beneath the pressure, and it could barely breathe. Its tail thrashed and flailed wildly in the air, yet it could not budge that arm in the slightest.

"You...!" Only then did the other two Snake Demons react. They howled in rage and shock. "A mere piece of Blood Food dares to rebel? Release our Big Brother! Who gave you the nerve to do this? Don't you know the rules?!"

Wang Quan did not even look at them. His gaze remained fixed on the Snake Demon in his hand, whose eyes were gradually reddening from lack of oxygen. With his other hand, he slowly drew the Blood Drinking Saber from his waist. The blade was dull, yet it shimmered with a bloodthirsty glint.

Without the slightest warning, the tip of the blade plunged into the Snake Demon's chest! With a wet splurt, hot demon blood sprayed out. A few drops landed on Wang Quan's face, but he did not even blink.

The surroundings fell deathly silent. Only the crackling of the torches and the injured team member's heavy breathing could be heard in the distance. Everyone held their breath, able to hear the thunderous pounding of their own hearts.

"The rules?" Wang Quan spoke, his voice unusually calm, a bizarre contrast to the viciousness of his movements. "My rules are the rules." He twisted his wrist, churning the blade inside the Snake Demon's body with a teeth-grating squelch. "There. Now you can all go see that Pig Demon together."

His voice was not loud, yet it crashed into the ears of every living creature like shards of ice. Each calm sentence was accompanied by another merciless stab. Under his hands, the sturdy Snake Demon's body was quickly reduced to a bloody mess.

At first, the Snake Demon struggled desperately, its thick tail beating the ground and leaving deep furrows, but the hand clamped around its neck remained utterly unmoving. Gradually, its struggles weakened, and the light in its vertical pupils rapidly faded.

The other two Snake Demons stood rooted to the spot, stunned by the sudden turn of events. It was not until Wang Quan abruptly pulled the Blood Drinking Saber from the corpse and casually flung it that they reacted. The saber became a streak of black lightning. With a wet thrust, it pinned one Snake Demon's head directly to the ground!

Almost the instant the saber left his hand, Wang Quan's figure blurred. Like a ghost, he appeared before the last Snake Demon. The Snake Demon had only just raised its claws when Wang Quan's hand was already pressed against its skull. His five fingers closed. Crack! The sound of its skull shattering rang out clearly, red and white matter oozing between his fingers. The Snake Demon collapsed limply without even managing a groan.

Wang Quan released his hand and watched the dead Snake Demon hit the ground with a heavy thud. Then he turned to the team members standing frozen in place and spoke as casually as if he were ordering them to handle some everyday chore. "Take care of the corpses."

The team members' bodies were stiff as wood, their minds blank. They could not comprehend what had just happened. It was not until Wang Quan's icy gaze swept over them that they jolted back to their senses and hurriedly sprang into action. Flustered, they began dealing with the three enormous Snake Demon corpses, fighting back their nausea as they extracted the Monster Cores.

Wang Quan walked over to the Snake Demon pinned to the ground, reached down, and pulled out the Blood Drinking Saber. He shook the blood from the blade. "Now you don't need to look for it anymore. You've been reunited directly." He glanced at the busy team members. "Move faster. We still have to continue patrolling."

The team members kept their heads lowered, not daring to look at him. It was the same face they knew, yet at this moment it felt utterly unfamiliar. At last, Shi Zhu could not hold back. He raised his head, his face flushed crimson. His lips trembled for a long while before he finally forced out a question in a quavering voice. "W-Why?"

Wang Quan looked over in confusion. "Why what?"

Several team members flushed even darker. Their eyes widened, and their chests heaved violently. Why had he suddenly attacked? Why had they been confronting one another one second, only for him to butcher three Snake Demons like livestock the next? Why had his face remained so calm while he acted, when he had still been different just a few days ago?

This was completely beyond their understanding. Shi Zhu forcibly suppressed the turmoil in his heart, swallowed, and asked hoarsely, "Why did you kill them? Aren't you afraid the Demon Race will surround the city? Or... do you already have a way to deal with the trouble ahead?"

"What solution?" Wang Quan furrowed his brow, seemingly finding the question strange. He said indifferently, "I didn't want to lie, but I also didn't want to let it keep asking, so I chose a compromise that would satisfy everyone."

"T-That... that counts as a reason?" Shi Zhu drew in a sharp breath.

Seeing that Wang Quan had no intention of explaining further, he wisely shut his mouth and lowered his head to continue processing the corpses. Yet the shock and confusion in his heart remained. It had only been a short while since they had last seen him, but they could no longer understand this lord at all.