Monster

Monster...

When those two words came from Steve Rogers's mouth in a tremor that sounded almost like a sleepwalker's murmur, mixed with immense shock and disbelief, Chu Hang felt as though an icy current from Siberia had been forcibly poured into the gaps of his spine. It shot from his tailbone to the top of his skull, making every hair on his body stand on end in an instant.

Something was seriously wrong.

It was not the word "monster" itself that was so frightening. For soldiers like them, who had crawled through piles of corpses, battlefield limbs blown into mangled shapes by artillery shells were far more terrifying than any monster.

What was wrong was that the person saying those words was Steve Rogers.

Captain America—the man who dared to charge headlong into an army even when facing thousands alone. The man whose will was as indestructible as the Vibranium Shield in his hand. Chu Hang had seen him advance through machine-gun fire, leap from buildings dozens of meters high, and throw grenades back like baseballs. It was as if the word "fear" did not exist in this man's dictionary.

Yet now, this very man had merely glanced through a palm-sized observation window and worn an expression as though his entire worldview had been overturned and his faith shattered in an instant. His face was bloodless, and in his azure eyes, the flame of confidence that always burned there seemed to have been doused by a bucket of ice water. Only violently contracted pupils and hollow horror remained.

What in the world was locked behind that door?

Chu Hang's mind buzzed. Countless classic images from horror movies and horror games he had seen in his previous life surged forth like floodwaters through opened gates. Was it an Alien dripping acid? A zombie beast with a gaping maw? Or some Cthulhu-like ancient god that could melt one's sanity and send their SAN value plummeting with a single glance?

Instinctively, he wanted to retreat. Every cell in his body screamed the most primal warning: Run! Get away from that door! Curiosity did not just kill cats—it could kill a transmigrator who only wanted to live peacefully until the end of World War II!

But his feet seemed welded to the cold metal floor, too heavy to lift.

A desire stronger than fear, mixed with a death-seeking impulse and extreme curiosity, shrieked madly in his heart like a devil's whisper.

That was Captain America! Was there really something in this world that could scare him like this? If he missed this, he would regret it for the rest of his life! This was exclusive news, hidden plot even the movies had never shown!

Just one look! One look! With the Healing Factor and the Super-Soldier Serum as a foundation, even if he fainted from fright, he should wake up again, right? At worst, he would run after looking—run faster than anyone else!

Chu Hang fiercely wrestled with himself, trembling as he tried to bolster his courage. Then, like a petty thief sneaking over to peek at a neighbor bathing, he softened his footsteps and inched toward the heavy circular metal door.

Steve remained frozen in that rigid posture, like a puppet whose soul had been removed. He showed no reaction at all to Chu Hang's approach.

Chu Hang carefully moved around him and reached the door. He first took a deep breath, trying to calm himself, but the stench—a mixture of thick blood, formaldehyde, and metallic rust—nearly forced the compressed biscuit he had just eaten back up.

He gritted his teeth. To hell with it!

He closed his eyes, then abruptly opened them and pressed his gaze to the palm-sized round observation window.

The next second, his breathing, his heartbeat, and every thought in his mind completely stopped.

Behind the door was a circular laboratory so enormous it defied imagination.

The entire space resembled a gigantic hollowed-out white can, at least a hundred meters in diameter. The walls, ceiling, and even the floor were covered in white alloy with a cold sheen. Countless sophisticated instruments blinking with multicolored indicator lights and thick pipes like giant pythons converged from every direction toward the center of the laboratory. Dozens of researchers in fully enclosed white protective suits and heavy gas masks moved, recorded data, and made adjustments at various control panels like a swarm of busy, silent ants.

Yet all of that was merely background.

What truly made Chu Hang's soul tremble was the thing at the center of the laboratory.

It was a gigantic cylindrical glass container more than ten meters tall, like a specimen jar for a giant taken straight out of mythology. It was filled with viscous liquid that emitted an eerie green glow. Bubbles slowly rose from the bottom, flickering in the green light with sinister beauty.

And immersed in that green liquid was a... thing.

For a moment, Chu Hang's mind could not even find an appropriate word to describe it.

Its main body resembled a human torso forcibly matured and enlarged to the absolute limit. Its skin was a lifeless, corpse-like pallor, like a body soaked for far too long, and it was semi-transparent. Chu Hang could clearly see dark bluish-black blood vessels thicker than fire hoses beneath that thin layer of skin. Like sleeping giant pythons, they slowly rose and fell with the movement of the liquid.

Its chest cavity was completely open, with no skin, ribs, or muscle to protect it. A heart far larger than an off-road vehicle tire lay naked in the green liquid, connected to countless electrodes and tubes, beating heavily and powerfully, once... then again.

Thump... thump... thump...

With every beat, Chu Hang could see an invisible shockwave spread through the liquid, making the entire container tremble slightly. So this was the source of that heavy sound like the heartbeat of some ancient beast.

The enormous torso had no legs. Its lower body had been severed, replaced by a tangled mass of complex supports and hydraulic pipes gleaming with cold metallic light, rooted deep into the base of the container like tree roots. Its arms were reduced to short stumps, densely pierced with metal probes emitting faint red light, making it look like a pincushion that had been used beyond repair.

Most horrifying of all was its head.

That head was completely disproportionate to its enormous body, like a deformed fleshy tumor inflated to its limit. There was no hair, no eyes, no nose, no ears—only a gigantic mouth that looked as though it had been brutally split open by an axe. It hung open silently and despairingly, as if it were letting out an eternal, agonized wail at the world.

Chu Hang's stomach churned violently, and his throat burned. He bit down hard on his lip to stop himself from vomiting on the spot.

What the fuck was this thing?!

This was Hydra's secret? This was Red Skull's trump card? They had actually been secretly creating a biological weapon stitched together from flesh and machinery beneath these remote mountains?

If this thing were released, forget a division—even an entire corps might not be able to stop it! It was practically a slaughter machine that had crawled out of hell!

The movies had never mentioned this thing at all! Had his tiny butterfly wings accidentally flapped the entire plot a hundred thousand miles off course?

Just as Chu Hang's mind went blank from the incomparably horrific sight before him, his vision—enhanced to the limit by the Super-Soldier Serum—caught a detail he had overlooked.

At the far end of the laboratory, on a main control console surrounding the container, a row of glaring red warning lights flashed madly at an extremely high frequency. Beside them, a massive LCD screen displayed a line of bright red numbers constantly ticking downward.

00:03:17

00:03:16

Oh no! They were counting down!

Chu Hang's heart sank sharply, and a sense of danger even stronger than when he had first seen the monster swept through his body. From the looks of it, Hydra's mad scientists were clearly about to perform some critical operation on that monster. Were they preparing to activate it? Or destroy it?

Either way, it was absolutely not good! In three minutes, something earth-shattering was bound to happen here!

"Captain!" Chu Hang spun around, grabbed Steve's arm as he still stood there like his soul had left his body, and shook him with all his strength. "Wake up! Something's wrong! Very wrong!"

Shaken by him, Steve finally seemed to snap out of that tremendous shock. He sharply drew in a breath, his eyes refocusing, though deep terror still lingered within them.

"What is it?"

"They're counting down!" Chu Hang pointed at the heavy metal door, speaking as rapidly as a machine gun. "I saw a countdown inside! There are less than three minutes left! They're definitely going to do something to that monster! We have to stop them!"

Steve's expression instantly turned extremely grim. Fighting back his nausea, he leaned toward the observation window and took a quick glance. He immediately understood the severity of the situation.

"Damn it!" he cursed under his breath, his voice full of urgency and anger. "We have to get in now!"

But how? That door looked sturdier than a bank vault. With just the two of them, let alone three minutes, even thirty minutes might not be enough to open it.

Just as the two were panicking like ants on a hot pan, their minds racing for a solution, something neither of them expected happened.

"Woo—woo—woo—"

A shrill, ear-piercing alarm suddenly rang out from the laboratory beyond the door, echoing through the entire underground complex!

Chu Hang and Steve looked at each other, both seeing deep shock and confusion in the other's eyes.

Something had happened! Not because of them—the laboratory itself was in trouble!

The two once again leaned toward the observation window at the same time. The laboratory, which had been orderly just moments ago, had now become complete chaos. The scientists in white protective suits ran around like hornets whose nest had been smashed. Several control panels sprayed sparks and belched thick black smoke from operational mistakes.

And the gigantic monster soaking in the green liquid seemed to have received some intense stimulus. It began struggling wildly with an unprecedented force!

Its massive body twisted and slammed against the container, each impact making the thick special glass groan under unbearable strain. Visible pale cracks, like spiderwebs, began spreading across the container's surface!

Thump! Thump! Thump! Thump! Thump!

The enormous exposed heart beat at least twice as fast as before! The heavy, rapid pounding sounded like death drums on a battlefield, battering against their eardrums until they felt their own hearts might explode with it.

Then something even more terrifying happened.

The circular metal door they had believed to be indestructible suddenly let out a heavy, distinct click.

Immediately afterward, the thick locks around the door, each as wide as a bowl and shaped like giant gears, began retracting into the walls one after another with hissing bursts of released hydraulic pressure!

The door... was about to open!

Chu Hang's mind buzzed, instantly going blank.

He understood. Those terrified scientists inside had opened the door from within so they could escape!

"Run!"

Steve's reaction was as fast as humanly possible. Without the slightest hesitation, he grabbed Chu Hang, who was still stunned, and sprinted down the corridor they had come from!

At that moment, stopping the monster and completing the mission were thrown completely out of his mind. Only one primitive thought remained: survive! Once that door opened, they would face a group of scientists driven completely mad by their desperation to live, along with a terrifying monster that might break free at any moment—one even he had no confidence in fighting!

The two pushed the speed granted by the Super-Soldier Serum to its limit, nearly becoming two blurred afterimages in the narrow metal corridor.

"Creeeak—"

Behind them, the metal door weighing dozens of tons emitted a teeth-grinding screech of metal against metal and slowly began opening inward.

A blinding white light and an even stronger, more nauseating stench burst through the opening like a flood through a breached dam!

"Quick! Back to the electrical room!" Steve shouted at Chu Hang as they ran. "Notify Logan! Execute Plan B! Now!"

Dragged along by him, Chu Hang stumbled as he ran, not daring to look back even once. He could only place all his hopes on his ears, enhanced to their limits, to judge what was happening behind them.

He could hear terrified screams, curses, and sounds of fighting as the scientists fought over the exit. They were surging toward the doorway like a tide.

Yet beneath all that chaotic noise was another sound that sent a deeper chill down his spine.

"Crash—crack—"

It was an incomparably crisp, yet incomparably heavy sound.

The sound of glass finally being forced apart and shattering completely!

Then came the sound of liquid pouring out like a tsunami and smashing heavily onto the floor!

Then... every sound fell silent for a moment.

Only that sound continued.

Thump... thump... thump...

That massive heartbeat was still sounding.

But this time, it no longer had the muffled quality of coming through liquid and glass. It had become incomparably clear, incomparably real, filled with savage, violent power.

As if... that giant heart had been completely exposed to the air!

Chu Hang's pupils shrank to pinpoints.

As he ran for his life, he used every ounce of strength in his body to let out a heart-wrenching scream filled with endless terror at the blue figure racing ahead of him.

"It's out! It's behind us!"