The snakeskin sack slipped straight out of the hands of the woman in the floral padded jacket.
She felt as though a bulldozer had been pressed onto her back, and her knees slammed hard against the ice.
The agony of her shattered kneecaps made her open her mouth wide, but she could not make a sound.
The old man carrying the birdcage fared even worse, pitching headfirst to the ground.
The birdcage shattered. The Chinese hwamei inside did not even flutter before the terrifying mental pressure killed it outright.
As for the young people squatting by the wall.
The yellow-haired youth, who had looked so disdainful a moment earlier, now lay sprawled in a snowdrift. The cigarette in his mouth had jammed straight into his nostril, burning it with a foul, scorched smell.
His eyes bulged, his mind utterly blank.
The line of several thousand people collapsed into a living hell in an instant.
The woman who had refused to leave a moment earlier now scrambled back, wailing as she fled.
"I'm not leaving! I want to go home!"
"There are ghosts out here! I want to go back to the Underground City!"
Her silk quilt fell into the snow and was trampled into filthy pulp beneath countless feet. She did not even glance at it.
That was how people were. In extreme terror, their only instinct was to crawl back into whatever refuge they felt was safest, even if that refuge was about to become their grave.
The soldiers maintaining order were also bent beneath the pressure. Some crouched halfway, bracing themselves on their guns and gritting their teeth as they held on.
But at that moment, the veterans played a crucial role.
"Get the fuck up, all of you!!"
The squad leader braced both hands against his knees,