Choices

"What the hell are those things behind us?"

Lin Wanqiu glanced at An Ning in the passenger seat. Her face was filled with terror, and her body trembled uncontrollably.

"I... I don't know either." An Ning curled in on herself, her voice trembling slightly too.

"I can't quite describe the feeling those things give me..."

"But their presence is definitely much stronger than that of the monsters back in Changchun Village."

At those words, Lin Wanqiu lost her composure too.

Song Shiya had told them about Changchun Village two days ago. Only then had she learned that Tier Two Eldritch had been hiding there.

And now An Ning was saying the things chasing them were stronger than Tier Two Eldritch. Didn't that make them at least Tier Three?

She had never seen Tier Two Eldritch, but the fact that the Rock Carriage Team had nearly been wiped out was enough to make their horror unimaginable to her.

If even Tier Two was that terrifying, what would Tier Three Eldritch be like?

The thought sent goosebumps across her skin, and she floored the accelerator.

When the Volvo at the head of the convoy began accelerating, Shen Ye and Song Shiya floored their accelerators too.

But their vehicles had limits. Even with the Huolala pushed to its top speed, Song Shiya could barely keep the Volvo's taillights in sight.

Shen Ye's cumbersome RV fell even farther behind.

Only because Lin Wanqiu deliberately held back her speed could he just barely keep the taillights in sight from the RV.

Before long, the RV and the Huolala had fallen to the rear of the convoy.

The slower vehicles had been swallowed by the gray fog almost immediately.

Those vehicles hadn't made the slightest sound before being swallowed, as though neither they nor the people inside had ever existed.

Shen Ye glanced at the rearview mirror, his brow tightly furrowed.

His experience over these days of the apocalypse told him that Eldritch were undoubtedly lurking inside the gray fog.

"It seems the higher the Eldritch's tier, the faster this gray fog moves."

But this was his first time encountering fog that moved so fast.

Whatever was inside probably far surpassed every Eldritch he had encountered before.

Watching the mass of gray fog that kept trailing them a hundred meters away, Shen Ye couldn't help regretting his decision to switch to this RV.

Sacrificing speed for comfort now seemed particularly unwise.

Fortunately, the situation didn't last much longer.

Sometime after two in the morning, they finally left the gray fog behind.

"Looks like these Eldritch can't maintain high speeds for long periods the way machines can."

When the convoy reached a fork, the Volvo at the front suddenly slowed, then came to a steady stop in the middle of the junction.

"What's wrong?" Shen Ye rolled down his window and looked at An Ning inside the Volvo.

An Ning's eyes had turned deep purple, and she was looking back and forth between the two roads branching off in different directions.

After a long while, she finally spoke timidly. "Shen Ye, I... I don't know which way to go."

"You're the leader. Just decide for yourself which way we're taking," Shen Ye replied with a frown.

"No, Shen Ye, that's not what I mean." An Ning waved her hands, her tone flustered.

"I mean neither road is safe. But the situations are different."

Hearing that neither road was safe, Shen Ye lost his composure too.

The people in the other vehicles also began raising their voices in varying degrees of agitation.

Shen Ye ignored them and looked at An Ning again. "What exactly are we dealing with?"

An Ning raised her left hand and first pointed at the main road on the left.

"There's a very indistinct but extremely dangerous presence up ahead on this road. I can't make out exactly what it is, but I feel certain something is waiting for us there."

"Whatever it is, it's definitely not something we can handle at our current level."

After a pause, she turned and pointed at the narrower road on the right. A blue road sign stood to the right of its entrance, bearing the words "Qianxin Village" in large characters.

"Over here, I can see a lot of Eldritch presences. They're packed just as densely as they were in Changchun Village, but I don't know exactly how many there are."

"But none of their presences are particularly powerful. They're even a little weaker than those Tier One Snake Demons."

After listening, Shen Ye fell silent for a few seconds, his mind racing as he analyzed their situation.

Even An Ning's Eye of Perception couldn't clearly discern that indistinct presence on the main road to the left.

That meant the Eldritch lurking there was beyond the tier her ability could detect.

It had to be at least Tier Two, possibly even Tier Three.

Meanwhile, there were many Eldritch in the direction of Qianxin Village on the right, but they were all low-tier.

Even so, that hardly counted as good news for him.

As for turning back, the gray fog behind them had only just disappeared. Who knew whether those things were still there?

From that perspective, turning back or continuing along the national highway would both mean certain death.

The side road leading to Qianxing Village was also extremely risky, but he was confident he could handle it himself. It offered at least a slim chance of survival.

"We're taking the road to Qianxin Village," Shen Ye decided at once.

"Wait, didn't Captain An say there were lots of Eldritch on that road? Why are we still taking it?"

"Yeah, are you insane? If you want to die, don't drag the rest of us down with you!"

"Go yourselves if you want. I'm not taking that side road."

Soon, many people in the convoy stuck their heads out of their windows and voiced their objections.

Clearly, not everyone could keep a clear head in such an intensely stressful and dangerous situation.

Shen Ye had no obligation to explain himself to these people.

Besides, when they joined the Dawn Convoy, he had already stated that the convoy was only responsible for leading the way, not protecting them.

An Ning exchanged a glance with Shen Ye and understood what he was thinking. She likewise wasted no words.

Lin Wanqiu started the Volvo again and turned onto the road on the right.

Seeing this, Song Shiya couldn't quite bear to leave them behind. She leaned out and offered a warning to the convoy members who were still hesitating. "If you want to live, stop arguing and follow us."

With that, the Huolala started moving too, following Shen Ye's RV.

The convoy drove along the side road for roughly half an hour.

The road grew narrower and narrower, and the concrete gave way to dirt. Fortunately, it hadn't rained recently, so the road wasn't particularly difficult to navigate.

Soon, the surrounding scenery began to change as well. More and more trees lined the road, all growing in bizarre shapes.

The faint light of the Red Moon filtered through gaps in the canopy, casting twisted tree shadows onto the road like withered hands reaching out of the ground.

Shen Ye stared at the trees sliding past outside the window, unable to shake the feeling that something was wrong.

There seemed to be something on their trunks watching him-even smiling.

He focused his gaze and soon saw something that made his skin crawl.

Creases had split open across the trunk of every tree.

Those creases slowly writhed and drew together, gradually forming indistinct human faces.

There were eyes and mouths, and even the distorted outlines of facial features.

The tree trunks with faces stared fixedly at the passing convoy, their features finally twisting into smiles.

The next second, the trees' roots tore themselves out of the soil.

Clods of earth flew as thick roots supported the massive trunks like legs, lifting them upright. Step by step, they closed in around the convoy.