Dual Blades Zhang Zhe

[Heart Energy exceeded level 1 alert threshold.]

[Heart Energy exceeded level 1 alert threshold.]

In particular, the warning about Heart Energy exceeding the alert threshold had already appeared nearly ten times.

And that warning probably meant the conditions for attracting Oddities had now been fully met!

Thud!

Someone who had rushed out of the protected area crashed heavily to the ground.

He fell without warning, and there had been no sign of any attack before he went down.

He was too far away, and a layer of red mist obscured the view. Xu Le could only vaguely make out a dark shadow flashing across his body.

But Xu Le knew exactly what had happened.

Most likely, the person who had fled the safe zone had emitted intense Heart Energy, attracting an Oddity.

He had just been killed by Five Heads, or a ghost-type Oddity like it.

His death failed to give the others enough warning.

Large numbers of students still fled out of the safe zone.

They ran frantically, cried for help, and then fell.

They fell one by one, group after group.

Once enough people had died, those behind them began to hesitate.

But by then, it was too late to stop.

Inside the classroom, Zhang Zhe had already swiftly slain two black-fleshed Oddities with his greatsword.

When he rushed out of the classroom and saw the scene before him, his expression turned utterly grim...

"Damn it! Damn it, why did this have to happen?"

Zhang Zhe's expression was somewhat savage.

Seeing him like that, Xu Le instinctively offered a reminder.

"Stay calm, sir."

If anything happened to Zhang Zhe, everyone here would probably be finished along with him.

Many of the students who had fled began backing away, fear creeping into their eyes.

Some of their expressions had even begun to look strange.

But they were shrouded in the crimson moonlight, making it impossible to see clearly without looking closely.

Xu Le watched the crowd. As they retraced their steps, rushing back in panic, a bad feeling rose in his heart.

[Someone within the safe area has been affected by Guyinduo Pollution and will mutate into a level 1 Oddity in 9 minutes and 56 seconds.]

This notification also appeared many times.

Xu Le knew it was referring to the crowd before him. Some of them had already been polluted, and there were a great many of them.

"Mr. Zhang Zhe, I think you should stop them from coming in. Now that they've been outside once, you have no way of knowing who's clean and who isn't. There are still plenty of students in the classroom. You're a retired Night Watcher. You should understand what I mean."

Zhang Zhe understood every issue Xu Le had raised. Although he couldn't see the Oddities' current state, he could read people's hearts.

After these people had rushed outside, some of them must have been polluted.

That was inevitable.

If he let them rush back in like this, Zhang Zhe didn't even need to think to know what would happen once the polluted people returned to the crowd.

They would slaughter people, and students would die. There were probably about three hundred students left in this lecture hall.

If he let that crowd outside come in, and a quarter of them mutated...

Probably fewer than half of those three hundred students would survive.

And the resulting Heart Energy effects would become completely uncontrollable.

"Xu Le, what do you think I should do?"

"You already have an answer in your heart. Why ask me?"

Did Xu Le know what Zhang Zhe was thinking? Of course not, but he couldn't take the blame for this.

His own judgment could no longer sway Zhang Zhe, so it would still come down to Zhang Zhe's own decision.

Just as Xu Le finished speaking, a sense of understanding arose in his heart.

That makes one! Is this what a correct prediction feels like?

"Ah!"

Zhang Zhe was clearly wavering. Watching the students fleeing toward the classroom, he hesitated.

His experience as a retired Night Watcher told him he should kill all these students now.

Better to kill the innocent than let a threat escape-that was the Night Watchers' creed.

Yet his years as a teacher made him hesitate at this moment.

He was a teacher now, not a Night Watcher.

He understood the reasoning. It was like knowing that even if money was spent treating a critically ill elderly person, they wouldn't live much longer.

Many people would still spend everything they had to save them.

Understanding and acting were two entirely different things.

"Xu Le, perhaps we could have them gather in a corner of the classroom for now."

Hearing this, Xu Le immediately shook his head.

That was probably the worst possible decision, almost no different from letting these people rush in unchecked.

He knew he could no longer persuade Zhang Zhe. At this point, Zhang Zhe wouldn't listen to him, and there wasn't enough time anyway.

Xu Le turned toward Wang Man, who had slipped out and was now following beside him.

Seeing Xu Le staring at her, Wang Man looked a little guilty.

"Xu Le, what is it?"

"I need something from you."

"Huh? What?"

"You have a gun, right?"

Expectation showed in Xu Le's eyes, while Wang Man silently lowered her head, hiding her expression from him.

Xu Le frowned slightly. They were almost out of time.

Since Wang Man wasn't willing to give it to him, he wouldn't say anything more.

Everyone had their own need for safety, after all. He could understand that.

But to his surprise, a moment later, Wang Man pulled a compact ladies' revolver from somewhere and pressed it into Xu Le's palm.

The revolver held four rounds and still carried Wang Man's body heat.

Xu Le stared at the gun, a little stunned, because there was a hair on it!

"What are you looking at? Here are the bullets. Stop staring."

Wang Man's face was flushed. She was clearly trying to hide something.

But looking at the curly hair caught on the gun's grip, Xu Le wondered whether there was any point in hiding it.

I'm guessing it's an armpit hair, right?

"Thanks."

He could only use his thanks to ease the awkwardness between them.

Still, he could understand Wang Man's behavior. Weapons were forbidden at Lighthouse University, after all.

Before weapons had been banned, shootings had been a frequent occurrence at Lighthouse University.

These were extremely serious incidents on campus, and the Lighthouse authorities had dispatched large numbers of experts to be stationed at Lighthouse University because of them.

The students were the Lighthouse's future, after all. Protecting those young minds was the highest priority of all.

The fact that Wang Man had managed to hide a gun was already quite impressive.

A four-shot revolver, plus two extra clips.

That meant he had twelve bullets.

"Twelve bullets. That number..."

Xu Le's heart grew heavy. The situation was far worse than he had imagined.

As he tightened his grip on the ladies' revolver, the fleeing students had already begun crossing the defensive barricades.

They were human, smarter than Oddities like Living Corpses.

So when crossing the barricades, if one blocked their way, they would naturally move it aside.

That was the first thing to go wrong! It was also the beginning of the disaster.

The barricades were meant to defend against Oddities. Once people moved them aside, they would leave an open passage.

Zhang Zhe naturally noticed this too. He glanced toward Xu Le, whether deliberately or not, but Xu Le remained silent and showed no intention of speaking to him.

Seeing the first person rush toward the classroom, Zhang Zhe struck without mercy.

The student's head was instantly severed, blood spraying everywhere. The sight made many of those behind him hesitate.

But their hesitation did nothing to slow the Oddities' attacks.

The next second, the slaughter began again.

Watching the students fall soundlessly to the ground, Zhang Zhe hesitated once more.

"Sir, save me!"

A student fell at Zhang Zhe's feet, only to have his soul reaped by an Oddity right before Zhang Zhe's eyes.

Dusted with Oddity bone ash, Five Heads flickered in and out of sight before Zhang Zhe.

It had killed Zhang Zhe's student, and it had also killed his last shred of reason.

Seeing this, Xu Le could only frown slightly, once again thinking of that so-called prediction.

I'm afraid Mr. Zhang won't be able to make the correct prediction.

Perhaps Zhang Zhe lacked sufficiently good judgment. Perhaps he wasn't a sufficiently rational teacher.

But as a retired Night Watcher, Zhang Zhe's fury toward Oddities was beyond doubt.

"Night Watchers Team 11, Dual Blades, Zhang Zhe!"

Zhang Zhe pulled a bottle of liquid from inside his clothes. After gulping down several mouthfuls, he spat it onto his sword.

He twisted the mechanism in the sword's hilt, and the greatsword actually split in two, transforming into a pair of large sabers.

Gripping both blades, Zhang Zhe charged straight into the Oddities and the crowd.

Flames clung to the flashing blades like a death sentence. Wherever he passed, Five Heads screamed and crumbled to ash.

Xu Le wasn't quite sure what the flames on Zhang Zhe's blades were, but the fighting power Zhang Zhe displayed had clearly surpassed anything he could imagine.

"Fuck, he's only level 2. How can he be this strong?"

Golden Toad hadn't shown many abilities earlier.

By comparison, Zhang Zhe now seemed as absurdly powerful as a god or demon in Xu Le's eyes.

Those level 1 Five Heads fell to Zhang Zhe in little more than two or three strikes each.

"This is off-the-charts ridiculous."

"Hah!"

With an enraged shout, Zhang Zhe's shirt burst apart.

His body, covered in centipede-like scars, shocked many of the students. What battles and slaughter had Zhang Zhe gone through as a Night Watcher to leave scars like those?

Some people were stunned, while others hesitated.

Some students had already retreated from outside. Without Zhang Zhe holding them back, they quickly rushed into the crowd.

Some students in the crowd also realized that this might cause problems.

But like Xu Le, they were ordinary students. Without enough strength to restrain anyone, they had no way to argue against these people who had fled back.

After all, helping others was perfectly normal in the Dark Age.

They wouldn't be that rational-at least, not as rational as Xu Le.

Xu Le silently watched the crowd behind him.

"Something's going to happen."

Beside him, Wang Man looked at him in confusion.

"What's wrong? Didn't everyone make it back? What's the problem?"

"Think carefully about what might happen now that these people have come back."

"What might happen?"

Wang Man still hadn't worked it out. Xu Le frowned slightly. Why was this woman so dense?

"Pollution."

Wang Man jolted and immediately turned to look behind her. Of course!

What if those people who had gone outside had been polluted? Now they had all rushed into the classroom and crowded together. If they mutated...

"Xu Le, what do we do now?"

"Come here."

A returning student rushed toward Xu Le. Barely suppressing the urge to draw the gun and shoot immediately, Xu Le pulled Wang Man behind him.

The person who had just run past was already polluted.

Seeing Xu Le's somewhat protective gesture, Wang Man smiled. Xu Le still cared about their old friendship after all.

"Heh!"

Xu Le ignored her. While watching Zhang Zhe fight up ahead, he also had to keep an eye on the people who had barged in behind him.

It wasn't that Xu Le hadn't considered explaining everything, but he quickly abandoned the idea.

If he spoke up now, not only would no one believe him, someone who had been entangled with an Oddity...

He might even cause chaos inside the classroom and immediately trigger a riot.

As for running outside alone... that was an even stupider idea.

Weren't the people now fleeing back for their lives the very ones who had run outside?

So this was what it meant to be caught between enemies on both sides.

In a situation like this, what would count as a correct prediction?