Hysteria

Hysterical

At the critical moment, Mu Xiao decisively switched to telekinesis and locked down the movements of several zombies, preventing An Rongru from being torn apart and devoured.

"What are you still standing there for?! Get back!"

Mu Xiao barked at An Rongru. Holding several zombies in place with telekinesis was quite taxing. After all, his "Mind Force" had not been cultivated at all yet, and his mental energy naturally had its limits. He could not restrain the zombies' movements for long. If he had not absorbed a mutant's blood earlier, it would have been difficult for him to lock down several zombies at once. Moreover, whenever the zombies struggled, he had to increase the force of his telekinesis, rapidly draining the energy within his body.

"O-okay..."

An Rongru knew this was not the time to marvel at having survived. Disregarding her dignified image, she hurriedly scrambled to her feet in a sorry state. But before she could retreat, Mu Xiao opened fire, killing every zombie ahead one by one. The laser beams pierced through the zombies' heads, leaving little gore behind.

But An Rongru had never witnessed such a brutal scene. A chill rose in her heart, and she involuntarily recalled the bloody, horrifying scenes from the past two days. Her stomach cramped again. She could not even vomit, only endure a suffocating, nauseating agony. Her body went weak once more, and she had to stagger to the wall before she could barely remain standing.

Her eyes, soft and alluring as water, looked at Mu Xiao as he approached. She said with heartfelt sincerity, "Thank you."

"Watch what I'm doing now. If you can't bear to watch, then don't follow me, because someone like you is of no use at all." Mu Xiao did not spare her another glance. He drew his military knife and cleanly stabbed it into a zombie's heart, cut it open, swiftly dug out the black-red heart, sliced it apart, and removed the blood beads one by one.

An Rongru looked at Mu Xiao as though she were looking at a perverted demon. Her heart filled with horror and disgust, and she could not help wanting to look away. But when she remembered what Mu Xiao had said, her entire body turned cold. Especially after having truly felt that boundless despair just now, she could no longer avert her gaze. Enduring wave after wave of suffocating nausea, she watched Mu Xiao finish.

"The last corpse is yours. Dig the blood beads out of its heart." Mu Xiao's face was cold as he held the military knife out to An Rongru.

"I... I can't do it." An Rongru's beautiful, gentle face was filled with fear. Tears welled up in her large, alluring eyes and streamed down as she pleaded pitifully, "I'm scared... I really can't... Please let me go, okay?"

"Didn't you say before that you were willing to do anything for me?" Mu Xiao said expressionlessly. "If you can't even do something this simple, and you refuse me with such a weak excuse, then how trustworthy is your promise? Why should I protect you and take you out of here?"

"How can I... how can I..."

She looked frail as she kept shaking her head, her slightly sunken cheeks seeming even thinner. Mu Xiao hardened his heart and said, "As you can see, the world has already become hell. If you can't adapt to the way of survival in this hell, then I suggest you kill yourself immediately. Don't expect anything else..."

"Why are you forcing me... Why are you forcing me... You've always been forcing me!"

Before Mu Xiao could finish, An Rongru's eyes turned vacant and conflicted. Her expression became extreme, stripped of its former gentleness. She suddenly snatched the military knife, lunged at a zombie like she had lost her mind, and wildly stabbed the blade into its heart. As she did, she cried and screamed hysterically, "Are you satisfied now?! Are you satisfied now?! Are you satis—"

Splashes of black blood covered her dress, and her elegant face became stained with dark smears, filled with an eerie madness.

"Looks like I pushed her a little too far." Mu Xiao frowned and stepped forward, grabbing the wrist she kept swinging to stop her from continuing her frenzy. Otherwise, if her mind truly collapsed, then given her current physical condition, she could easily become a mutant.

"Let go of me! Isn't this the kind of perverted thing you wanted me to do?!" An Rongru struggled violently. After being toyed with by Mu Xiao again and again, she shouted as though she had lost her mind, venting the emotions she had kept bottled up to the point of suffocation. "You don't want money because you want my body, don't you?! Take it if you like it! I don't care about anything..."

Slap!

Mu Xiao showed no tenderness toward her and viciously slapped An Rongru across the face. A red handprint instantly appeared on her already haggard face, swelling slightly. Yet she herself abruptly fell silent and still.

"If I wanted your body, I would've forcibly fucked you back in that room. Would I have had the time to play mind games with you?!" Mu Xiao said bluntly. Then he crouched down, gripped An Rongru's haggard but beautiful face, and said fiercely, "I'm a greedy man, but I'm also a practical one. If you were useless, then no matter how good your figure was or how beautiful you looked, you'd be no different from rotten flesh left behind by zombies in my eyes. I would never have saved such a burden. But now, you have the qualifications to be saved by me. That's because you possess the strength to change yourself, and that strength is what I value—for my own use."

The light gradually returned to her eyes. Looking into Mu Xiao's eyes, her gaze was complicated and confused, but also shy and expectant.

Mu Xiao released her face, stood up, and said, "I'll explain this only once. Everything I do has a reason. For example, I told you to dig out the hearts because there's something valuable inside them. It can strengthen the human body and can also be used for healing. It wasn't some perverted thing like you said. Besides, I didn't mutilate corpses like you did. I think you're the more perverted one."

By the end, Mu Xiao wore a faintly mocking smile.

An Rongru came back to herself and saw the mangled corpse beside her. Her face turned deathly pale. She immediately spun around and began to retch violently, her body trembling without stop.

The pounding against the law firm's front doors gradually weakened. Mu Xiao knew that his mental power had finally shielded this place, and the zombies outside had lost interest in it.

Mu Xiao used telekinesis to collect all the blood beads, opened a room's window, and tossed all the corpses out through it. After closing the window again, he went into the corridor and found that An Rongru had recovered. However, blackened blood covered her from head to toe, making her look somewhat uneasy.

"I..." An Rongru wanted to explain her earlier loss of control, but for a moment, she did not know how to continue.

Mu Xiao understood just by looking at her. Some things had to be explained clearly, or she would not be able to give up her hopes.

Sometimes, hope was a kind of poison. Once that hope shattered, it could poison someone to death.

"Earth has already lost all order. No one can save us; only we can save ourselves." Mu Xiao saw that she wanted to ask something, yet seemed too frightened to voice what was in her heart. He could tell what she wanted to ask, so he said, "Don't count on people coming from the moon. What happened to Earth has everything to do with the moon."

"Why?" An Rongru could not suppress the anxiety in her heart.

"You're familiar with the New Human Plan, right?" Without waiting for An Rongru's response, Mu Xiao continued, "The New Human Plan is actually a massive conspiracy—a conspiracy targeting humanity on Earth. Those zombies outside, and even more terrifying mutant creatures, were all caused by the New Human Plan. We're lab rats in a cage, experimental subjects for those gifted monsters and mad scientists on the moon..."

Only after explaining the general important details did Mu Xiao stop speaking.

"Impossible..." An Rongru murmured despairingly, as though even that last glimmer of hope had been extinguished.

"Nothing is impossible. Take the ability I used just now to hold those zombies still... You've seen plenty in your life. Have you ever seen anyone with an ability like mine?" Mu Xiao used telekinesis to lift the military knife beside her and retrieve it. "This kind of power only exists as a superpower in movies."

Mu Xiao sheathed the military knife in the holster strapped to his thigh and said, "I now possess a superpower, proving that I'm a New Human. And you should have felt that your body is different too. Think about the speed at which you ran just now—could you have done that before?"

Only after Mu Xiao reminded her did An Rongru realize that in that short time, she had already run all the way to the depths of the second-floor corridor. As she carefully sensed her body, she found that she truly was no longer as weak as before. Though she was still extremely hungry, it felt as if some new change had taken place within her. Even her senses had become sharper than before, and she could clearly perceive the faintest movement of the air.

"Then I'm a New Human too?" An Rongru asked joyfully. Setting aside that despair, she seemed to understand that if she wanted to live, she could only rely on her own strength.

"If you weren't a New Human, do you think you'd be qualified for me to save you?" Mu Xiao did not want her getting carried away, so he said, "New Humans are divided into ranks as well. And when you were in the most critical danger just now, you still didn't unleash an offensive-type superpower. That proves your innate ability isn't an attack type. It's probably a support type. As for exactly what ability it is, you'll have to discover it yourself later."

An Rongru wanted to ask more, but Mu Xiao cut her off. "You'll naturally understand more about evolution as time goes on. If necessary, I'll tell you."

"Mm." An Rongru wisely did not ask further. She also understood that, for now, she still had to rely on this man.

Suddenly, Mu Xiao's expression turned cold. The killing pressure of his former advanced evolution level erupted at once, flooding the entire corridor like a vast, surging tidal wave—heavy and immense. His emotionless gaze looked down from above at An Rongru, who sat on the floor, as though judging whether she was truly qualified to become his helper.

At that moment, An Rongru was filled with panic. She did not understand why Mu Xiao had become so terrifying. It was as though an invisible mountain stood before her, its crushing weight making it difficult to breathe. He was even more terrifying than the zombies from before. It felt as if, with the slightest pressure from that aura, she would be unable to summon any will to resist and would simply shatter apart.

Death close enough to touch...

An Rongru clearly felt the endless terror hidden within the man before her.

"I said I'm a greedy man. Now tell me—are you willing to dedicate everything to me, including your life?" Mu Xiao's eyes were cold and piercing, and a raging storm seemed to loom behind him.

Cold sweat streamed down An Rongru's face. She wanted to say something, yet could not find the words. In the end, she silently lowered her head, as though offering up her body and dignity, and said weakly, "I'm willing to become your woman."

"Very good."

Mu Xiao replied blandly, withdrawing his pressure at the same time, but he had no intention of correcting the way An Rongru spoke.

Strictly speaking, whether she was his subordinate or **partner, it could not change the fact that she belonged to Mu Xiao. So why bother correcting her?

An Rongru had thought she would surely feel ashamed, but after hearing Mu Xiao's reply, it was as if the greatest worry and burden in her heart had been lifted, as though her life had been guaranteed.

"Is this what security feels like?"

She murmured inwardly.