System, Upgrade!

[The problematic parts have been fixed. Enjoy!]

[Thanks to all the readers who pointed them out!]

"Ha! Heh-heh! Hahahaha-"

Qin Mao laughed bitterly as his body slowly slid into the broad esophagus of the Eight-Eyed Ice Weird Spider.

Its mouthparts snapped shut, and that sliver of daylight outside vanished abruptly, leaving only endless silence.

The weird apocalypse had descended across the globe, and the land had fallen.

Led by Sequence Transcendents, the survivors had been forced to flee into the ocean.

At this moment, twenty-two-year-old Qin Mao was on an unknown island, betrayed by Su Miaomiao, his close friend and companion who had fought alongside him to survive the apocalypse!

He had risked his life to save her.

Yet she had turned around and shoved him into the weird creature's mouth.

"Qin Mao, dying obediently right now is the greatest value you can offer me!"

"Thank you... for helping me so much along the way!"

She showed not the slightest regard for the three months they had spent fleeing together after the apocalypse descended, staying by each other's side and fighting shoulder to shoulder.

Nor did she care about the trust and deep friendship they had struggled to build amid the intrigue and treachery of the apocalypse.

Qin Mao slowly closed his eyes.

He could not forget the sight of Su Miaomiao calmly and decisively pushing him into the weird creature's mouth.

"Heh-heh!"

"I thought that after awakening the [Upgrade] System, things would finally get better, but now I'm about to die."

If only everything could start over. How wonderful would that be?

Then...

Even if he had to be ground to pieces, he would return to the fleet and make that bitch Su Miaomiao pay for her crimes in blood!

"Rumble-"

The ice spider's mouthparts opened and closed.

Qin Mao sank deeper and deeper into its stomach...

"Su Miaomiao! I hate you so much-!"

Seeing the bone-chilling cold and bubbling digestive fluids slowly rise through the stomach sac,

he suddenly opened his eyes wide and let out an anguished cry.

"No, I can't give up!"

"Even if I'm going to die, I have to try first!"

He forced himself to calm down and looked around. He found himself standing on half of a flat boulder, surrounded by a stomach sac built from blocks of ice.

With no time to think, he pulled a shark knife from the small of his back and hacked at the stomach sac with all his strength.

"Clang-"

The knife struck the ice with the sound of chopping a block of ice.

The stomach sac shed only a few ice chips.

But the knife bent outright.

Qin Mao was overwhelmed by despair.

He was like someone trapped in an ice cellar, imprisoned tight by layer upon layer of ice.

Not far away, an old woman was desperately stabbing at the ice with a pair of scissors. It was just as useless.

In this weird apocalypse, ordinary people could barely touch weird creatures. Even the few weird creatures with physical bodies that could be touched had strange forms, just like this Eight-Eyed Ice Weird Spider.

Was he really going to die here?

"I still have my system!"

A final sliver of hope flared in Qin Mao.

He had awakened the [Upgrade] System yesterday.

After some experimentation, he had discovered that killing things earned him Kill Points.

He could use Kill Points to upgrade items through the system.

He could not kill weird creatures just yet, while killing tiny fish and shrimp earned him nothing.

Only fish weighing two or three jin or more earned him around ten Kill Points.

At that moment,

with an intensely anxious heart, Qin Mao placed all his hopes on the shark knife.

He was about to upgrade it, but suddenly stopped.

"Wait, I have another option..."

He quickly pulled a lighter from his pocket and weighed it against the dagger for three seconds.

Finally, he made his decision and shouted,

"System, upgrade!"

[Ding-Straight-flame lighter detected. Repair or upgrade?]

"Upgrade!"

[Ding-The host has 680 Kill Points. Spend 500 Kill Points to upgrade the straight-flame lighter?]

"Yes!"

Yesterday's catch had been plentiful. These were all the Kill Points he had earned since awakening the system by volunteering to help gut fish aboard the fleet.

The ocean was full of contaminated fish, and the odds of catching normal fish were absurdly low.

The system only counted normal fish as Kill Points.

[Upgrading...]

A small whirlwind appeared out of nowhere and circled the lighter three times.

[Three-Minute-Heat Lighter]

[Description]: A straight-flame lighter capable of unleashing a low-level transcendent flame. It can burn for up to three minutes, but the lighter itself is not fireproof.

"Three minutes should be enough, right?"

Without another word, Qin Mao aimed the lighter straight at the icy stomach sac and pressed the ignition button!

Click-

Boom-

A thick blue flame suddenly erupted, illuminating the entire icy stomach sac in an instant.

The ice, which had been hard just a moment ago, melted beneath the flames, opening up a huge hole.

"It works!"

The appearance of the hole was like a straw clutched by someone on the verge of drowning.

Qin Mao was reinvigorated.

The icy stomach fluid surged beneath his feet, almost swallowing the boulder he was standing on.

It was less than five centimeters from his feet.

There was no time to lose.

Using the lighter to clear a path, Qin Mao angled downward and quickly crawled into the hole.

The blazing flame melted the ice spider's body as quickly as a hot knife cutting through butter.

Just as the stomach fluid surged toward him, he finally made it all the way into the ice tunnel!

"Young man, don't you know to respect your elders? Hurry up and save me!"

The old woman with the scissors dragged one frozen leg behind her and hopped unsteadily in his direction, shouting anxiously.

Qin Mao ignored her.

He crawled forward quickly on his elbows, not even looking back.

Not long after he left, the cold and weird power in the stomach sac mixed together, and the ice tunnel behind him began to heal rapidly.

At that moment, he was like a tiny bug trapped in amber.

"Faster, faster!"

There was no oxygen in the tunnel.

He could only rely on the breath he had held before the entrance closed, raising the lighter as he crawled forward with all his might.

Fortunately, the flame was transcendent; otherwise, it would have gone out long ago without oxygen.

He had no idea how long he crawled.

With no oxygen, his lungs felt ready to burst.

"I still... can't stop!"

Dazed from the lack of oxygen, Qin Mao continued crawling mechanically, one movement at a time.

One meter, two meters, three meters...

"No..."

"Am I going to suffocate to death..."

Just as that despairing thought surfaced,

a sea breeze suddenly blew in from outside and brushed against his face!

Then, in the endless ice tunnel before him, a light unlike that of the lighter suddenly flashed into view!

On an unknown island.

A tiny, barely noticeable hole had melted through the rear of the twenty-meter-tall Eight-Eyed Ice Weird Spider, whose entire body was made of ice and snow.

An inconspicuous figure crawled out.

The Eight-Eyed Ice Weird Spider had just noticed something was off when the survivors fleeing ahead of it drew its attention again.

It let out a roar, then suddenly lunged forward, its two enormous mouthparts biting hard into the shore.

It swallowed a large chunk of earth and rock, along with all the survivors running on top of it, then gave a cruel, belching burp.

In the bushes, Qin Mao panted heavily, still shaken.

He raised his hand and looked. A little liquid remained in the Three-Minute-Heat Lighter, but its body had melted into a puddle of plastic and metal.

It was clearly ruined.

By then, the fleet had already escaped with the supplies they had collected.

Only the greedy Eight-Eyed Ice Weird Spider remained. It stamped its eight jade-like feet furiously on the shore, staring at the three large ships disappearing into the distance, but it didn't dare take a single step into the sea.

"I can't hide on the island!"

Many weird creatures could sense the locations of nearby living beings within a small area, and besides, this island was tiny.

If he stayed hidden, he was bound to be found.

Qin Mao ran seven or eight hundred meters away and fixed his gaze on a short, thick, rotten tree that had fallen into the sea and was soaking in the water.

You're the one!

Qin Mao quickly used his bent dagger to cut through the point where the trunk joined the roots, then called out to the system.

[Ding-Rotten wood detected. Repair/upgrade?]

He pictured a boat in his mind.

"Upgrade!"

[Ding-The host has a balance of 180 Kill Points. Spend 180 Kill Points to upgrade the rotten wood?]

"Yes!"

He had no idea whether these Kill Points could upgrade it into a boat.

[Upgrading...]

A formless wind rose out of nowhere, blowing over the thick trunk.

Then countless invisible hands quickly chopped, cut, shaved, and hollowed out the trunk...

Perhaps the commotion was a little too loud.

The Eight-Eyed Ice Weird Spider in the distance sensed something and abruptly turned its head.

Its ugly, filthy head had features jumbled all over it. Eight enormous green eyes stared straight at Qin Mao, brimming with astonishing greed.

Boom-

Its enormous body clumsily charged toward Qin Mao.

It was like a building sprinting toward him.

Although it was fat and moved awkwardly, with a body that enormous, it was undeniably fast.

Even from far away, Qin Mao could feel the tremors in the ground growing stronger and more rapid.

"System, hurry up!"

Luckily, the upgrade was quick. As the final gust of wind swept past, the strong wind brushed the wood shavings piled on the dead tree away.

A Rotten Dugout Canoe, three meters long and less than one meter wide, with oars of its own, appeared before Qin Mao.

[Description]: Shabby and crude, but just barely usable.

The tremors grew stronger. The ice spider was less than two hundred meters away.

Qin Mao desperately pushed the little boat toward the sea.

Taking advantage of the offshore wind, he jumped aboard and frantically rowed for his life.

"Roar-"

Having lost its food twice in one day, the Eight-Eyed Ice Weird Spider let out an angry roar and leaped high into the air from a hundred meters away.

Its mouthparts turned into a giant pair of ice pincers and snapped down hard at the dugout canoe!

Crack!

The ice spider scraped past the dugout canoe, swallowing a huge mouthful of sand and seawater, then retreated to the shore and roared furiously.

"Go! Hurry!"

Qin Mao's adrenaline surged. Ignoring the continuous roars behind him, he just rowed furiously to escape.

He kept going until the roars gradually faded away and he couldn't hear them anymore...

Who knew how long had passed?

The sky overhead was a clear blue, and salty sea wind blew across his cheeks. Qin Mao wept with joy.

It felt as though he'd passed into another life.

"Hahaha! I actually survived!?"

"Su Miaomiao, you'd better pray... that I never run into you!"

He gritted his teeth.

The Qin Mao of the past was dead.

From now on, he would live only for himself!

This time, he would take revenge, do everything he could to awaken the supernatural... and live better and longer in the apocalypse!