The Golden Half-Human

Wu Hen didn't smell anything unusual.

He walked farther into the warehouse and saw a tightly shut door. It was even locked.

He chopped through the lock and pushed the door open.

But as soon as it swung open, a foul stench hit him—and the sight before him made every hair on his body stand on end!

At first glance, the heaps of white grains in those huge baskets looked like washed rice. But a closer look revealed that they were all insect eggs!!!

Good heavens!

That unscrupulous cafeteria contractor—those three worms—had been feeding this stuff to the students on campus!!!

Wu Hen immediately dropped his carefree attitude.

This was terrifying. Truly terrifying.

The campus cafeteria had been taken over by three Insect-Eyed Half-Humans.

That meant that all the food everyone had eaten lately had been laced with insect eggs!

The entire sprawling campus had turned into a giant breeding ground for parasites.

In a few days, the Insect-Eyed Half-Humans could hold a graduation ceremony right here and award these three outstanding cafeteria employees!

Wu Hen hadn't expected Xiao Yi's far-fetched fantasy to actually be on the verge of coming true!

"Let's hope Ming Yi and the others find the Insect Mother Tree soon..." Wu Hen couldn't help praying.

This was shocking!!

Wu Hen had thought that only the people who'd awakened from the parasitic Soul-Resting Trees carried Pupil Worms. He'd never imagined that he was already at the parasites' campus-wide celebration.

Once the larvae's incubation period ended, the monsters would run rampant. The entire Fanshan District might not be enough to feed them. By then, corpses would pile up like mountains, and blood would flood the city.

And the most terrifying thing about parasitic creatures was their ability to reproduce. If Fanshan District had already fallen, could all of Licheng really remain untouched?

"Brother, what do we do now?" Yu Yu panicked.

At the thought that the entire campus had already been infested, she felt as though she were submerged in a suffocating pit of insects.

"It'll take a little time for the eggs to hatch. The advance team in the Wasteland is already looking for the Insect Mother Wood. We just need to hold out a little longer," Wu Hen said.

That was right. They only had to hold out a little longer.

If they really couldn't hold on, Wu Hen would take his sister and leave the air-raid shelter without hesitation. They absolutely couldn't stay here!

"Brother, should we try boiling the herbs into a decoction and have everyone drink it? Maybe it can kill the eggs inside us," Yu Yu suggested.

"Mm, let's go to the Medicine Warehouse now." Wu Hen nodded.

It was their only option. Hopefully, taking it after a meal would still work.

In the Wasteland.

Ming Yi flew through the air, her palm aimed at an Insect-Eyed Ancient Tree whose white roots spread across the earth like coiling dragons. Then she cried out, and a dazzling, terrifying beam of pulsing light burst from her palm!

Like a phoenix's breath, the beam instantly set ablaze the valley, which was covered in white, coiling insect roots. It also destroyed the ancient tree crawling with giant white worms.

Flames covered the ground, and fire burned through the clouds. The woman in her crimson battle robe slowly drifted down to the ground, panting heavily.

Captain Qin and the other team members gave her a thumbs-up. When it came to the aesthetics of violence, Queen Ming Yi was still the best!

"Too bad it wasn't the Mother Insect Tree." Ming Yi wiped the sweat from her brow and sighed. "I wonder how things are going for Wu Hen. I hope he hasn't run into danger..."

"That kid seems pretty reliable." Captain Qin hadn't spoken with Wu Hen, but he could tell that the young man was no ordinary person!

"If there are still a lot of people incubating in the settlements, some cities will be lost completely if we don't get rid of the Mother Insect Tree soon!" said a one-eyed female team member.

"But we don't have any leads right now. If we keep uprooting them one by one, who knows how long it'll take?" Captain Qin was stumped too.

"Why don't we try contacting Wu Hen? If he's found the leader of the Insect-Eyed Half-Humans in the settlement, we could trace it back and find out which insect tree is the mother," Ming Yi suggested.

"Sending a message between the parallel dimension and the settlement consumes a lot of Yuan You," the one-eyed team member said.

"This is no time to be stingy," Captain Qin said, agreeing with her. What if Wu Hen really had a lead?

"All right, I'll contact him right away." Ming Yi nodded, then held out her hand to Captain Qin for Yuan You.

"Didn't you just get one? Use yours first. I'll submit a reimbursement request for you afterward," Captain Qin said irritably.

"I gave that Yuan You to Wu Hen. If you expect someone to work like an ox for you, you can't leave them without fodder," Ming Yi said.

Captain Qin: "????"

What kind of fodder are you talking about?

"Take it, take it. You'd better pay me back whatever energy's left. Don't waste my time with nonsense!" Captain Qin had no choice but to hand over his precious Yuan You.

Licheng, Fanshan Campus.

A man with a Qilin Arm was sprinting toward the foot of the mountain.

His arm had turned a silvery-white, and a layer of shimmering Silver Thunder clung to it.

When Wu Hen and Yu Yu reached the warehouse at the foot of the mountain, they saw a row of Order Maintenance Personnel, each holding a weapon and standing at the ready.

Fortunately, the Medicine Warehouse had been a top priority for the Order Maintenance Personnel from the very beginning.

Spent bullet casings littered the ground, and bullet holes riddled the area. It looked as though an Insect-Eyed Half-Human had tried to force its way in, only to be shot full of holes by the Order Maintenance Force's overwhelming firepower!

As Wu Hen and Yu Yu approached, all the guns swung toward them.

But in that instant, Wu Hen didn't feel much pressure from the threat of death. Instead, a streak of Death Sword lightning appeared dramatically on his right hand. The entire squad of Order Maintenance Personnel had no idea that the guns were pointed at a living King of Hell!

"He's an Order Keeper sent from above. Lower your weapons," said a female member of the Order Maintenance Personnel.

Everyone lowered their guns, sparing their own lives.

"How's the Medicine Warehouse? Was it damaged?" Wu Hen asked.

"They really were after the Medicine Warehouse. It's thanks to your timely warning that we didn't have to redeploy our personnel. Otherwise, the warehouse would've been destroyed," the woman said.

"That's good. There's no time to waste. Have someone boil these herbs, then give the decoction to everyone, including your Order Maintenance Personnel. It can clear the parasites from our bodies," Wu Hen said.

"Everyone?" the woman asked in surprise.

"Come on, you can't check everyone one by one. That'd be an absurd amount of work. It's better to have everyone drink it and kill the parasites all at once!" Wu Hen said.

Yu Yu understood, too, and nodded enthusiastically.

The siblings were genuinely afraid that if they told the truth, all the Order Maintenance Personnel would be scared witless!

It was better for just the two of them to know that the entire campus had become an infested breeding ground.

"I... should I help boil the herbs?" Wang Rui asked.

"Then I'll help too," Yang Qin said.

She and Wang Rui weren't any good at fighting, but they could at least help with a job like this. Yang Qin had finally learned how to prove her worth to the team.

"Mm, hurry!" Wu Hen nodded.

Yang Qin had made a major contribution this time. If she hadn't seen what happened in the kitchen, Wu Hen wouldn't have realized just how terrifying things had become.

He'd have to give her a set of premium diapers later. Then she wouldn't have to worry about running out of pants on the road again.

"Ahhh!!!"

"Help!!! There's a monster!!!"

"Run!!!"

Just then, another round of screams and cries for help rang out from a nearby building.

Another Insect-Eyed Half-Human was clearly causing chaos. The Order Maintenance Personnel had hardly any people left to send, and the female officer was frantic. She couldn't bear to see the young students brutally killed.

"Brother, are we going to save them?" Yu Yu nudged Wu Hen's arm and asked.

Wu Hen glanced back, then turned his gaze toward the vicious Insect-Eyed Half-Human in the building.

"Of course! We're living bodhisattvas!" Wu Hen declared, fired up.

More importantly, Xiao Yi was clamoring to be fed.

With that, Wu Hen charged toward the building with his sister and began hunting the Insect-Eyed Half-Humans.

Inside the Medicine Warehouse.

Wang Rui looked around the storeroom until he finally spotted the herbs Yu Yu had written down.

"These are the ones. Bring down a whole crate," he told the Order Maintenance Personnel behind him.

"Looks like they're all here. I wonder if there'll be enough to make decoction for everyone," said the strong, burly male officer.

"It should be fine if it's a little diluted, as long as it works... It's pretty heavy, so be careful," Wang Rui said.

"I'll help." Yang Qin squeezed her way in, showing strength no delicate woman should have as she helped the male officer carry down the whole crate of herbs.

"Yang Qin, since when are you this strong?" Wang Rui couldn't help laughing.

The next second, Wang Rui's smile froze!

He saw Yang Qin's entire head suddenly open up like a giant Venus flytrap. Then, with horrifying speed, she swallowed the entire crate of herbs into her body!!

"Parasite..." The officer beside them realized what was happening and hurriedly raised his gun to shoot.

But golden fungal threads sprouted from Yang Qin's arm. In an instant, they became a golden spear, which she drove straight into the officer's chest!!

Blood poured out. The officer couldn't even make a sound. He could only watch as more blades grew from the spear of golden fungal threads inside him, tearing his organs to shreds!!

Wang Rui was so scared he collapsed to the floor, but his survival instinct made him scramble backward as fast as he could!

"You and Wu Hen are close. If you shout, I'll kill you. If you stay quiet, I'll spare your life and keep you as a hostage." Yang Qin's grotesquely opened body quickly returned to normal. Then she stared at Wang Rui with a strange smile.

Wang Rui immediately covered his mouth and nodded frantically.

He was a man of ironclad resolve, and he was willing to be a hostage!

Yang Qin's abdomen churned violently. She needed only a few seconds to digest the entire crate of herbs. They could harm insect eggs and larvae, but for someone like her, who had already evolved into a Golden Fungal Body, they were no more than a crate of urea—just a little foul-tasting.

"Gurgle~ Gurgle~~"

But the process of digesting such a large amount was proving a little more difficult than Yang Qin had expected. She felt terribly uncomfortable inside.

That shouldn't be happening...

At that moment, Yang Qin stared coldly at Wang Rui. She had a feeling he wanted to say something.

"Speak!" Yang Qin's face was covered in golden fungal threads, giving her an evil yet noble air, like an empress in a tomb wearing a mysterious, ancient mask.

(Chaos: A reader enthusiastically suggested keeping track of how many lives it took them to read this book.)

(Most readers died at the hands of Meiqing Muxiu in the very first arc. The two death polls together have nearly a thousand likes. A thousand readers have already admitted to dying at Meiqing Muxiu's hands; the rest were prepared or are too stubborn to admit it.)

(In the second trial, a whole lot of people died on Scar-faced Uncle's side, too. Everyone thought the team had escaped, but they nearly got wiped out...)

(So, in this third trial with the parasites, how many people died at the hands of Cha Cha—Yang Qin? I'll leave a note on the last line of this chapter saying, "Like if you lost a life," or you can just comment "1." Let's see if anyone managed to clear the whole book with one life!)

Recommended: a new book by the great urban fantasy author Lao Shi: