Who Would Have Thought He Was Still Alive Before He Died

After Li You had collected all the guns, Ying said in a low voice, "I've done as you asked. Now we can talk..."

Before Ying could finish, Bai Ye cut him off with a savage grin. "I tell you to do something, and you do it? What the fuck are you, a dog?"

Bang!

[Breath of Bones] erupted with a thunderous roar. Firelight and bloody light howled forth together as a crimson bullet struck Ying squarely in the right knee.

He let out a muffled groan and dropped to his knees. Pain drained his face white, and cold sweat beaded across his forehead. Even so, he clenched his teeth and refused to cry out.

This revealed the difference between Ying, a genetically modified human, and an ordinary person. If an ordinary person had taken that shot, their whole leg would have been destroyed. Yet Ying only had a thumb-sized bloody hole in his leg. Though he could not use his right leg for now, at least it could still be treated.

The soldiers' expressions changed drastically, and they were about to rush forward to seize the gun when Ying raised a hand through the pain. "Don't act rashly!"

After stopping the soldiers, he turned his head with difficulty and looked at Bai Ye.

"You didn't kill me outright, which means there's still room for negotiation between us. I was presumptuous earlier. I didn't know there was such a powerful Transcendent hidden among your group. This time, I admit defeat. Name your conditions. As long as you spare my life."

"Now you know how to admit defeat? Wasn't it you who said you were giving me a chance?" Bai Ye's gaze was arrogant and violent, the metal barrel fixed firmly on Ying's head.

"I'll give you a chance too. I've never seen one of those high-and-mighty city lords kneel and beg forgiveness from a wastelander. Kowtow until I'm happy, and maybe I'll spare you."

Ying's face turned hideous. Making him kowtow to a wastelander was even more unbearable than killing him.

"A man of honor may be killed, but never humiliated—"

Bang!

Ying's head burst open. He fell stiffly to the ground, his yellow-brown hawk eyes filled with shock and disbelief.

Until his death, he had never expected Bai Ye to strike the instant he said he would.

"You actually killed Ying?!" the worm-like officer screamed, his voice warping out of shape.

Bai Ye shrugged helplessly. "You can't blame me for that. He said it himself: a man of honor may be killed, but never humiliated. So I granted his wish."

The officer's eyes nearly split open. "How dare you! How dare you?! Ying was one of the Zodiac! The Company won't let you get away with this!"

"Fuck!" Bai Ye walked over and kicked the officer in the face, sending blood pouring from his nose.

A vicious light flashed in his eyes as he bent down. "Why the fuck are you as stupid as a pig? Gotten used to acting tough? You're already at death's door, and you still dare run your mouth?

"I'm not just killing him. I'm killing you too!"

The officer woke as if from a dream, cold sweat streaming down his entire body. "No... no, you can't kill me. If I die, the Company..."

"Fuck your Company!" Bai Ye flew into a rage and kicked the officer several more times, knocking out his front teeth.

"Got anything else to say? If not, you can die now."

"Don't... don't kill me! Please, don't kill me! As long as you spare me, I'll do anything! I'm willing to kneel and kowtow to you!" the officer shrieked indistinctly. Despite having lost all four limbs, he used only the strength of his abdomen and neck to slam his head into the ground again and again.

"Hahaha..." Bai Ye laughed wildly and said to the stunned wastelanders, "See that? The high-and-mighty lords of Dawn City you fear will kowtow to wastelanders too!"

Among the hundreds present, no one answered. Only the youth's wild, unrestrained laughter echoed through the wind.

Li You glanced at the officer who was still kowtowing, then at Ying with his head blown open. He swallowed unconsciously, his eyes full of disbelief.

Everything had happened too fast—so fast that it felt like a dream.

His mind was still stuck on the moment when Bai Ye said he was about to make a move. Only now, seeing someone as important as Ying die, did he finally come to his senses.

"B-Bro Ye, someone important just died like that?"

Even with the facts right before him, he still found it unbelievable. The gap in status between city people and wastelanders was unimaginable—so vast that he had never dared imagine someone so important dying so casually before his eyes.

Bai Ye sighed. "Yeah. Who would've thought he was still alive before he died?"

Li You: "???"

"Don't worry. He didn't die for nothing." Bai Ye grinned.

Ying's death had value. It gave him quite a bit of vital energy. The vital energy provided by one Ying was roughly equivalent to that of ten gray sparrows, strengthening his physical abilities a little further.

"Spare me! Spare me..." The officer was still kowtowing, not stopping even though his face was covered in blood.

Bai Ye glanced at the restless soldiers nearby and formed a plan.

His original intention had been to use the army's strength to reach Black Mountain. Now, it seemed threatening the officer at gunpoint and making him lead the way to Black Mountain would work too.

The process was a little different, but the result was the same.

"Alright, stop kowtowing. I'll give you a chance to live. Escort me to Black Mountain."

The officer was ecstatic at first, then froze. "Y-You want to go to Black Mountain?"

Bai Ye shot him a glance and said coldly, "What? You don't want to?"

The officer's heart trembled. "No, no, I do, I do! What are you standing around for? Hurry up and get the vehicles ready! Escort this lord to Black Mountain!"

The soldiers exchanged looks, but no one dared act rashly. The unfathomable Ying had been shot in the head, and their own commander had been dismembered in an instant. Even with guns, they did not think they could handle a Transcendent like Bai Ye, much less now that they had no guns.

Just as they were about to move, a shrill scream suddenly erupted from the crowd of wastelanders.

"Ah! A snake!" A ragged wastelander jumped up as though shocked by electricity. A small pitch-black snake was coiled around his left arm.

The man flung his arm about like a madman, but he could not shake off the Black Snake biting into his flesh.

In just two seconds, a dark bluish color crawled from his arm to his cheeks. The wastelander's scream abruptly stopped as he fell stiffly to the ground, foaming at the mouth, his eyes bulging as he died.

The sudden change sent everyone fleeing in all directions. But after running only a few meters, they discovered in terror that the ground was writhing!

Small mounds bulged up across the earth. Amid faint sounds of soil breaking apart, Black Snakes burrowed out from underground one after another.

Snakes!

Snakes everywhere!

They raised their triangular heads high, their crimson tongues flicking continuously as they surged toward the crowd like a black stream.

The friction of scales gathered into a scalp-crawling tremor. There were so many that anyone with trypophobia might have died of fright.

"Mutated beasts—Black Snakes!!" the officer sprawled on the ground screamed.