Before Nightfall

Lin Ye sensed the subtle connection between the Sheep-Headed Monster's Mutation Organ and its limbs, moving ahead of time to dodge its charge.

Seeing that its charges were ineffective, the Sheep-Headed Monster kept increasing its speed while swinging its forelimbs, trying to tear Lin Ye apart.

Lin Ye focused entirely on the Sheep-Headed Monster. Although his physical abilities had improved somewhat, he still could not compare to a monster that had no need to worry about the consequences. One slip, and he would die here.

He certainly did not want to waste a precious reality simulation attempt in a place like this.

Lin Ye was forced into a corner. The room was only so big, and he had nowhere left to retreat.

The Sheep-Headed Monster paused, bared its teeth, and prepared for one final charge.

Bang, bang, bang!

Lin Ye fired three shots in succession at the Sheep-Headed Monster's head. All three bullets struck its eye sockets.

But this did not make the Sheep-Headed Monster pause in the slightest, as though its goat head were merely an accessory and it had no need for a brain to think.

Although he had already considered this possibility, Lin Ye still felt a little frustrated. Monsters that defied all reason like this were a real nuisance.

Now he could only put his life on the line... just like in every simulation.

There were three rounds left in the CL0 Pistol. Lin Ye held the gun in his left hand and drew the Red Blade with his right.

Bang, bang, bang!

The three bullets struck both elbow joints and its left knee, respectively. By then, the Sheep-Headed Monster had already charged right up to Lin Ye. The shots did little damage, but they disrupted its charge just enough.

Even if it could move without a brain, getting shot in the joints would still make it fall.

Perhaps it would be able to avoid falling in the future, but not this time.

Lin Ye directed the meager energy inside his body toward his right hand. He had been absorbing energy all along, and after sensing the Sheep-Headed Monster for so long, he had learned a few simple ways to control it.

He was not very proficient yet, but if all he needed to do was concentrate it...

His right hand suddenly accelerated. The Red Blade plunged into the Sheep-Headed Monster's body through the gap between its forelimbs. Both the Red Blade and his arm passed through its chest, and Lin Ye grasped its Mutation Organ.

The Sheep-Headed Monster slammed into the wall to Lin Ye's right, leaving several cracks in it.

Lin Ye pulled out his right hand, flung aside the Sheep-Headed Monster as its strength failed, and tucked the Mutation Organ into his backpack.

Thud, thud, thud, thud!

A jumble of footsteps sounded nearby, and something battered the gun shop's entrance.

The Sheep-Headed Monster had made quite a commotion earlier, and large numbers of mutated creatures were converging on the gun shop.

Lin Ye hurried into the storeroom. The moment he entered, he stopped rushing and instead stood where he was, taking a deep breath.

Ah, the fragrance of gunpowder.

This was a storeroom filled with firearms.

Pistols, submachine guns, shotguns, rifles, light machine guns, sniper rifles-guns of every model sat on the racks, while crates of ammunition of various types were piled in the corners.

Lin Ye had to admit that he was getting a little excited.

Lin Ye began loading the weapons.

He had long since had enough of having only ten bullets.

If possible, he wanted to take all these weapons back.

As for the monsters outside, they could talk to the bullets.

Lin Ye: I got my hands on a batch of weapons. I'll haul them away on a cart in a bit. Have you found a safe house?

Lin Ye sorted through the guns in the storeroom. By now, the gun shop was piled full of Mutated Creatures' corpses, and their Mutation Organs filled a large woven sack.

Lin Ye had already removed the crystals inside them and put them in his backpack.

While dealing with the corpses, Lin Ye gradually developed the mindset of someone gutting fish at RT-Mart. With the help of his perception, all it took was a gentle flick of his dagger to extract the crystals inside.

Xu Min: I found a reasonably intact supermarket. It's out of the way, and there are still some basic supplies inside. We can meet here.

Li Ji: I got hold of some unusual things. I'll bring them back for you in a bit.

Zhao Yong: There are a lot of mutated creatures in the center of the ruins. I took care of a few.

Lin Ye found a flatbed cart, piled his spoils onto it, and pulled it to the supermarket Xu Min had found.

The supermarket was in the northwestern corner of the ruins. It had two floors and covered around five hundred square meters. It was very out of the way, with almost no blood corpses nearby.

Lin Ye was the last to arrive. Finding a flatbed cart had cost him some time.

"Fantastic! I've wanted to try a machine gun for ages."

Zhao Yong picked up a light machine gun and stroked its surface, unable to put it down.

"I thought you'd prefer melee weapons."

Looking at the old man's powerful muscles, Lin Ye could not help saying it.

"I did like practicing with swords and spears when I was young, but no amount of training makes them as useful as a gun. To put it the way you youngsters do, beyond seven paces, a gun is faster. Within seven paces, a gun is both fast and accurate."

Zhao Yong skillfully loaded an ammunition belt into the light machine gun, then aimed at a distant blood corpse.

Ratatatatatat!

The blood corpse's entire upper body was shot away.

This was the violence of firearms, the culmination of human technology. Moral or not, it had its own unique beauty.

Xu Min also selected a few pistols to carry. Although she had never used a gun before, she could learn.

As soon as Lin Ye entered the supermarket, he saw Li Ji crouching in a corner, staring blankly at several blood-red, ellipsoidal, egg-like objects.

Those things were only a little shorter than Li Ji as she crouched.

"...Could these be? Are these...?"

Lin Ye involuntarily took a step back. He loved classic films, especially classic horror films. He could even recite the dialogue from some of them.

"They're not xenomorph eggs... although they really do look like them. I cut one open just now. There's some kind of juvenile creature inside, but it's not a bug. It has plant characteristics as well as animal characteristics. I don't know what it is either."

Xu Min pointed at the desk beside her. A red egg that had been cut open lay on it, its internal physiological structure extraordinarily chaotic.

"If you ask me, we should shoot them all to pieces and throw them out. People who study this sort of thing in movies never come to a good end. Young Lin happened to bring back plenty of weapons, so we can use them for target practice."

Grandpa Zhao fiddled with the machine gun and moved away from the corner of the room, his face full of wariness. He disliked those eggs. He kept feeling that some demon or monster might jump out of them.

"We have to figure out what we're going to face. Know yourself and your enemy, right?"

Lin Ye took a fresh red egg, set it on the freezer beside him, and began dissecting it.

Just as Xu Min had said, the red egg's internal structure was extremely chaotic and complex. Some plant structures were mixed with animal organs, yet they fitted together remarkably well, as though that was how they were meant to be.

Lin Ye compared it with the red egg Xu Min had dissected and discovered that the two eggs differed greatly in structure, as though they were two different kinds of creatures.

"Are we just going to wait here until tomorrow morning?"

Zhao Yong fiddled idly with the machine gun. Outside the window, the sky was growing dim, and night was about to fall.

"I don't think we'll be able to stay here safely until tomorrow."

Xu Min sat by the window, observing the changes outside the entire time.

"Agreed. Don't you think our team is too strong? Your innate abilities should all be pretty powerful, right?"

Lin Ye was fully armed and had placed a large number of weapons within easy reach.