Si Ming knew nothing of any systematic swordsmanship. Every skill he possessed had been forged through countless trials and brushes with death during his struggle to survive in other worlds.
Naturally, the combat techniques he had learned and mastered in such circumstances all took the same form.
Fast, accurate, ruthless.
He discarded all flourishes. There was no need for feints or deception. He simply aimed for the target's weak point and struck swiftly and fiercely. This approach had spared Si Ming a great deal of trouble in the past.
And now, on the battlefield of World Two, it was no different.
Shhk—
A head fell to the ground.
The attacker, with its sharp bone claws, never managed to touch Si Ming's shoulder.
—[Killed the Night Demon King, obtained 1 C-rank side quest, and earned 2,000 reward points.]
Weaker than the three-headed hound—as expected.
The total reward points had also landed right on the minimum threshold for a C-rank side quest.
"Hmph." Si Ming chuckled softly, then extinguished the dusky flames on the Profaned Greatsword. The special fire had not even had a chance to show off its effects before Si Ming had already claimed the victory.
The Bone Golem, temporarily drained of its Necrotic Aura, reactivated and returned to the summoning domain with a few minor injuries. The special environment there would slowly mend them. The more these standardized summoned undead units were used, the stronger they became.
That was a little different from the Burrowing Devil Worm, which had been raised as a corpse.
Thump.
The Night Demon King's headless body, still frozen in its attacking pose, fell to the ground.
A strange shriek seemed to echo through the air.
It sounded like the dying cry of a colossal beast, or the helpless squealing of millions upon millions of smaller creatures. A sense of chaos welled up in Si Ming's heart. He seemed to see some enormous machine coming apart, or a taut string suddenly snapping.
The Night Demons were dead.
The collective subconscious of this newly emerged, massive species was dead.
Even if it wasn't dead, it had surely been dealt a devastating blow. The situation probably wouldn't improve much until another Night Demon King was born.
The quiet underground suddenly grew noisy.
The Night Demons, once intelligent and orderly enough to display the beginnings of a social structure, were now like a herd of startled beasts, scattered and helpless.
They charged in every direction.
They let out shrill cries.
Some confused individuals even blundered in from strange corners into this supposedly sealed-off arena, only to be bitten to death in a few quick chomps by the Magic Wolves under Si Ming's command.
There was no longer anything in this city to stop him. Si Ming could now travel freely aboveground or underground, or head anywhere else that interested him.
Good.
The Burrowing Devil Worm beside him began writhing again. Its flexible, sharp mouthparts and tentacles easily tore through the concrete barrier of the abandoned subway station. It didn't dig outward, but downward, burrowing past the man-made ruins of the subway and into the solid bedrock beneath.
A suitable spot came into view. Si Ming stirred the Burrowing Devil Worm's instincts, and the mythical creature sent him more fragmentary information in return. It revealed the city's subterranean structure to him and told him where to dig to trigger a small-scale collapse.
He was very interested. He really wanted to test a theory. In his Dimensional Ring, he had a high-yield nuclear bomb from the AVP world, its parameters already adjusted to the critical limit. It had been his trump card for dealing with unexpected situations.
He had prepared a great many things before entering World Two. And now...
"I really wonder how different Cairo is from New York."
After that, life went on as usual. Robert studied his Compound Six every day. At first, he had been quite careful with the captured Night Demon test subjects, but as more and more Night Demons were brought in, he gradually became less cautious with his experiments. One problem after another was uncovered, and one hurdle after another was overcome. Car after car of Night Demon corpses was casually dumped along the roadside.
Research was progressing remarkably well. Si Ming's daily efforts had, of course, played a crucial part. He rarely slept and went out patrolling whenever he had the time, moving through one enormous or dilapidated building after another, whether by day or by night.
He never counted how many Night Demons had died by his hand.
But Robert thought the number might have exceeded ten thousand.
Sometimes Si Ming took Shizuka Ishikawa out with him to help her build up her nerve and practice shooting. The results weren't exactly impressive, but at least the Japanese high school girl in her JK uniform obeyed him throughout.
She followed every instruction he gave her. She just couldn't do everything well. Asking her to kill a Night Demon on her own might have been beyond her abilities, but as long as Si Ming helped a little—even if all he did was whistle to distract it—she could complete the task he had assigned after a flurry of activity.
Not perfect, but as a rookie, she was already far better than every other East Sea Team newcomer Si Ming had encountered in these two worlds.
Maybe there are some good points to people from Japan in the Heisei era after all. I just hadn't met any before.
With that thought, Si Ming stopped raising his expectations of Shizuka. He figured he might come across more suitable East Sea Team rookies in the future. Then he'd have time to consider how best to make use of them. For now...
Shizuka's cooking is pretty good.
That was the truth.
Robert and Sam both thought highly of Shizuka Ishikawa's cooking. The colonel praised her almost every time he ate, while Sam's tail wagged furiously as soon as Shizuka walked into the kitchen.
Si Ming thought it was pretty good too. It was a little strange, but he really could taste a hint of home in Shizuka's cooking. Maybe it was an illusion, or maybe he was simply imagining it. Either way, Si Ming had to admit that Shizuka was more valuable at the base, cooking, tidying up, and helping Robert, than she was out hunting Night Demons with him.
Time flowed by, slow and smooth. Reincarnators had to survive for a total of fifteen days, and two weeks wasn't all that long.
Anna swallowed nervously. As she drove the SUV fitted with ultraviolet lamps into New York City, she suddenly felt that coming here might have been a terrible mistake. She saw one Night Demon skeleton after another lying by the roadside, even though Night Demons, with their rapid metabolisms, never wasted a scrap of meat.
Something was wrong with New York.
But...
"Anna, are we slowing down?" The little boy riding in the passenger seat looked at her obediently.
His name was Ethan. He was an orphan, the youngest child in their settlement. He and Anna had brought the settlement's hopes with them to this place.
They should have arrived half a month ago. Three weeks earlier, the people hiding in their mountain settlement had finally repaired their only radio, which had been broken but not beyond repair. Through it, they had received a signal from survivors in New York. A man who called himself Robert Neville, apparently well known in the early days of the disaster, had shared news of a shelter in New York. It was exactly what their settlement needed.
They could no longer hold out. The Night Demons were getting hungrier, and food was running out in the mountains. The survivors had managed to scrape by because the KV Virus became dormant in cold environments. But with the food crisis growing worse, they knew they had to make a decision.
So Anna, the most harmless-looking and best at negotiating, volunteered to go. She brought Ethan, the youngest, along with her. They were going to New York to ask for help. And if the New York shelter turned out to be less than they hoped, then at least Ethan, the youngest, could reach somewhere he might survive.
They should have left twenty days ago, but a sudden North American storm had delayed them. By the time the skies cleared and the roads began to improve, half a month had already gone by. Fortunately, the broadcast from New York had continued the whole time, giving them both confidence and hope.
Until...
"Don't look outside, Ethan. Don't look..."
Her heart pounded wildly. Anna had no idea what kind of monster was lurking in New York to hunt down the seemingly endless Night Demons with such abandon. Every cell in her body screamed at her to turn around and floor the gas pedal. But...
She had to find out.
Deep down, a glimmer of hope was beginning to stir.
Maybe the shelter in New York wasn't run by just one person, but by a whole group. Maybe they had powerful weapons and could hunt Night Demons as casually as killing chickens.
The little boy reached out and gave her sleeve a gentle tug.
Then, in the next instant, her heart nearly stopped!
"Hah—" She sucked in a sharp breath. Her hands and feet went cold as a human skeleton, stark white, appeared right in front of the SUV as it rolled slowly through the city!
No, it wasn't a skeleton. It was an undead monster. It moved, and it was charging toward the SUV!
Her fingers trembled violently as terror seized her heart. She tried with all her strength to press the gas pedal, but her once-nimble legs wouldn't obey her!
"Anna... Sis..." Ethan stammered, his voice trembling with fear.
She turned her head with difficulty. The car had somehow stopped moving—but no, it hadn't stopped. It had been lifted into the air by some tremendous force, its wheels no longer touching the ground. The SUV's four wheels spun uselessly in the air, and a human skeleton with eerie flames flickering in its eye sockets stood beside the vehicle.
The skeleton's jaw opened and closed as if it were trying to communicate something. A broken sound came from the spinning wheels, filled with an unsettling, incomprehensible quality.
Like a curse, like madness.
With a faint gulp, she passed out in her seat.
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