Fate Play (10)

The newcomer raised both hands, then expertly bent his knees and crouched against the tunnel wall.

"Friendly! Don't shoot, don't use Jun Yan... Senior Brother, are you cosplaying Shiryu from Saint Seiya? I've got a trench coat here. Want to throw it on?"

Chu Zihang spun around sharply, his hand immediately gripping the hilt of Sacred Blade Murasame. He had barely sensed the newcomer's approach before they entered within five meters of him, and the effects of his First Blood Rage had yet to fully fade.

"Lu Mingfei?" Chu Zihang's gaze froze. He recognized the newcomer in an instant, and the Jun Yan Domain he had been about to launch abruptly stalled.

Even dressed in an imposing but ill-fitting trench coat, even with an utterly different aura about him, Lu Mingfei's crisp way of raising his hands in surrender let Chu Zihang recognize him at a glance.

Chu Zihang fell silent for a moment, then asked hoarsely, "How did you get here?"

In his original plan... Lu Mingfei should not have been someone to enter Nibelungen. He only needed to keep his identity as a team member and do whatever he wanted somewhere safe. Afterward, the honor of being a team member would make Lu Mingfei the center of attention and give him the confidence he deserved.

Now, it seemed Xia Mi had been right. He had simply taken things for granted. He did not even know what Lu Mingfei himself was thinking...

"It's a long story. Short version: we can talk once we're out. Anyway, I can't get out right now, and I don't plan to." Lu Mingfei spoke slowly, looking at the patches of bluish-black scales emerging from Chu Zihang's bare upper body. He knew Chu Zihang had already activated First Blood Rage.

He tugged down his own trench coat sleeve slightly. After Chu Zihang revealed the black scales on his wrist, he said nothing more. Chu Zihang, unable to look away, stood frozen in place.

"By the way..."

"You..."

Lu Mingfei and Xia Mi narrowed their eyes as they sized each other up, like two dim-witted snow leopards meeting on a narrow mountain pass in a documentary. After staring blankly for three seconds, they simultaneously raised their front paws and hopped backward a step.

"Second Senior Brother! Your hair's all over the place—you look like you just escaped a famine zone. Did the old men at the academy freeze your card?" Xia Mi asked uncertainly.

"Th-this demon, who might you be?" Lu Mingfei asked with solemn respect. What an unbelievably gorgeous girl.

Could this be the real deal standing right in front of him?

Xia Mi jumped down from the maintenance cart and came closer, circling Lu Mingfei. "You look more like a demon than I do, like Ditto from Pokémon. Second Senior Brother, did you go to Korea for some kind of permanent facial makeover and whitening treatment? What beauty clinic has skills this good? Damn!"

"Recommend it, recommend it!"

"So it's Junior Sister herself? Junior Sister, you've got some serious moves to win over Senior Brother Chu... Which city did you attend middle and high school in?"

The maintenance cart rolled forward. Chu Zihang silently watched these two people suddenly become so lively inside Nibelungen, and he abruptly realized that they actually bore a slight resemblance in appearance, especially with both their hair hanging loose.

The maintenance cart had just passed a boundary-marker-like stone, and his attention had been drawn away somewhat by their enthusiastic chatter.

Suddenly, pain made Chu Zihang's eye twitch. He straightened up, standing on the maintenance cart with Murasame in hand as it began accelerating down the tunnel. Behind him, the other two continued talking as they gave chase.

The birthmark near his shoulder blade seemed to be burning. It had turned crimson, as though a coin heated red-hot in a blazing fire had been embedded in Chu Zihang's bones. The mark seemed to be responding to something.

The two who had caught up stopped talking and looked over in surprise. Xia Mi leaped onto the maintenance cart to inspect him.

"Senior Brother, this spot is glowing!" She curiously reached out her hand.

"Wait! We shouldn't go any farther!" Chu Zihang looked at Lu Mingfei and, without time to think, swiftly pulled the maintenance cart's brake.

The maintenance cart stopped, but it was already too late.

They had reached the end of the subway line, and the end of the labyrinth.

There was no road ahead, and likewise no road back, nor any room for them to pause and think.

A hard, massive rock wall stood on the platform. Golden dust like starlight drifted everywhere in the infinitely vast darkness. Behind them, a brilliant silver-white light shone from above the tunnel. Where the gold and silver lights met, all their faces looked gravely pale.

Rhythmic heavy music began to echo through the air.

The rock wall started to crumble. Huge chunks of stone rolled down, and cracks continuously spread from top to bottom. Lu Mingfei, who had originally been standing at the rear, pondered for a moment before taking two steps forward.

The opening of the labyrinth's gate looked like the twelve Gold Saints reuniting and opening the Wall of Sighs in the Hades arc of Saint Seiya. If Hades jumped out from inside, Lu Mingfei definitely could not beat him.

Honestly, the urge to kill and the urge to retreat coexisted within him... Even he was not sure what he was worried about, which was why he had to move forward. If he kept going, he would find the answer.

"Did we trigger a BOSS battle notification?" Lu Mingfei muttered as he looked up at the wall, feeling that something was off.

Was it because of the music?

He had played quite a few stage-based games before. Most Devil May Cry games changed the music before a BOSS battle, with environmental effects and visual cues. Devil May Cry 3, released in 2005 and playable in 2006, had always been popular in the internet cafés of Binhai Town.

Wasn't this pounding, rock-like sound exactly the entrance theme for a BOSS? The oppressive feeling was simply overwhelming.

A deep roar came from within the cracked rock wall. Something immense and terrifying was about to emerge, and all three of them shuddered simultaneously.

Yellow dust raised by the falling rubble filled the air. Something like a giant serpent swam out from the fissures, its scales contracting like an undulating iron mountain. It let out another low, monarch-like roar, intimidating the dragon slayers.

This was undoubtedly the Earth Lord of the mortal world. No language could describe that ancient, solemn, perfect body. The giant dragon was a noble First-Generation Species among dragons, and the heavy rock music was actually its heartbeat.

A beauty that inspired reverence... that was Lu Mingfei's first impression upon seeing a true dragon.

Its beauty was inconceivable, magnificent and dark.

He should have felt reverence, but after appreciating it, he felt no great stirrings. He merely thought that he ought to have such a feeling.

"Potato Chips... let's play..." The majestic black dragon looked down upon the ants below, extending first its prehistoric-serpent-like neck.

In Lu Mingfei's eyes, an absurdly long red rectangular bar floated above the dragon's head. He rubbed his eyes.

A health bar.

So BOSS units in this game displayed health bars?

He had always thought this game had no such setting as health bars. Now it seemed that creatures like Deadpools simply were not worthy enough to have one.

Seeing a health bar in a dungeon for the first time, Lu Mingfei swallowed and comforted himself. If it had a health bar, it could be beaten. Even a God might be killed if it had a health bar!

People feared things that offered no hope, and they wanted to retreat. If they could watch the health bar decrease bit by bit, the fear in their hearts would lessen too, wouldn't it?

Sitting on the maintenance cart and thinking, Xia Mi stared tensely and absentmindedly at the colossal dragon. Her left hand seemed to touch the cart's brake unconsciously, and the cart began sliding forward again.

Black flames swirled around Chu Zihang, continuously contracting. This was the state before the Jun Yan Domain exploded. As he charged forward, he activated his Blood Rage to the Second Blood Rage without a hint of hesitation.

He had ignited his bloodline and his life, as decisively as the countless dragon-slaying heroes of the Secret Party before him.

A figure moved faster than he did, sharper and swifter than he was even in Second Blood Rage.

"Junior Sister, don't block the way."

Xia Mi, along with the maintenance cart, was sent flying.

Kicking the maintenance cart blocking his path away, Lu Mingfei charged at the Dragon King that had not yet fully emerged from the wall, blade in hand. The alchemical longsword whipped up several yards of black wind.