Chapter 290: No Apology
The road ahead became increasingly dark, with the candlelight illuminating only a few steps ahead. The darkness in front was like a heavy but movable wall. He didn’t know when the wall would stop and smash him, causing his head to bleed and his face to be covered in blood.
The uneasy heartbeat was like music playing from in-ear headphones, with rapid vibrations that made even his brain tremble along.
This was Xia Chen’s feeling. Compared to Fang Mu’s superhuman hearing and vision, he who did not have enhanced senses found everything around him unknown, full of death traps. He felt fear for this, even though his heart constantly reminded himself to stay calm and not lose to Fang Mu.
But as soon as he thought of what Fang Mu had said before, that ahead might lead to the abode of the Abnormal God—not to mention the abode of the Abnormal God, the Flesh and Blood Giant Toad born from human flesh and blood was enough to scare him out of his wits.
Fang Mu was constantly paying attention to his surroundings. He didn’t hear the calls of those Strange Toads, nor the terrifying footsteps made by the frog people when they moved. There should be no anomaly hiding nearby. There was only the sound from that Flesh and Blood Toad that seemed to be eating, and its “food” full of hard bones.
Suddenly, Fang Mu stopped his advancing footsteps. Xia Chen, who had unknowingly changed from walking side by side to following closely behind, also hurriedly stopped. He looked at Fang Mu in confusion, wanting to speak, but saw Fang Mu widening his eyes and making a hush gesture. The candlelight illuminated his pathologically pale face, making it even more eerie and terrifying.
Xia Chen’s nostrils flared, unconsciously holding his breath following Fang Mu. Following the direction of Fang Mu’s gaze, at his fingertips’ paper box, he stared intently, gazing hard, vaguely seeing some outline moving in the darkness ahead.
Huge, strange, and twisted, two scarlet lights swayed in the darkness, and a low, gloomy strange cry roared from ahead.
Bang bang bang…
The heartbeat was like marbles falling under gravity, bouncing frantically on the ground, the frequency accelerating yet slowly returning to deathly silence.
The next second, Xia Chen felt his wrist being pulled, uncontrollably following Fang Mu to run. His whole body was pulled by Fang Mu, turning back to rush fiercely.
He didn’t know if they were really walking straight back. Xia Chen couldn’t see the light at the entrance from when they came. It was pitch black before his eyes, as if he and Fang Mu hadn’t escaped to the right place. Only the heavy jumping sounds coming from behind made him feel that he was fleeing in a direction away from danger.
But not long after, Xia Chen felt pain in his wrist again. His body was pulled once more. Fang Mu suddenly turned a right angle, rushing toward another unknown direction.
Xia Chen only felt that Fang Mu had gone mad. Why suddenly change direction? Was he trying to take him to death together?
But soon, Xia Chen heard a series of rapid and light hopping sounds. The hopping steps were chaotic and disorderly, now in front, now behind. Under the swaying firelight of the candle, one after another deformed humanoid figures with toad frog heads stared at them expressionlessly from the front. Their huge frog eyes were filled with absolute ruthlessness and emptiness. They seemed to have no emotions, merely moving by instinct.
“Protect your head!” Meeting those eyes, Xia Chen had already lost his ability to think, even failing to hear Fang Mu’s reminder to him. He was just dazed until he rolled down the high slope twice, then the pain woke him up. In the high-speed rolling, he realized he was heading toward death, hurriedly protected his head, and rolled helplessly in the darkness.
Thud!
Until his entire back slammed into the stone wall, hearing the sound of bones cracking, he then arched his waist in pain and let out a miserable cry.
“Are you okay?” The illuminating candle had been lost when rolling down the high slope. In the darkness, Xia Chen could only hear Fang Mu beside him, checking his injuries with concern and trying to help him up.
“My back… my back…” Xia Chen kept repeating about his back, unable to describe the bursts of pain coming from his back.
Fang Mu’s hand gently scanned over his back. Only hearing Fang Mu suck in a cold breath, then calmly say: “Bear with it, don’t move.”
Xia Chen didn’t speak, but had already grabbed one of Fang Mu’s ankles, his teeth biting into his own clothes.
The pain of skin tearing was like a nail piercing the soul. Xia Chen’s eyes rolled back, feeling his consciousness slowly fading.
Fang Mu was tearing his skin—or more precisely, pulling out the unidentified object stuck to the skin on his back. Something like a leech but without merciful anesthesia was clinging tightly to his skin. The method to separate it was destined to be shaving off a piece of skin and flesh together.
Slash!
As the skin on his back, even the tendons, snapped with a pop, the unidentified object attached to his back was also flung to the ground. After losing the nutrition it was sucking, the unidentified object cried out irritably, making a sound similar to a frenzied rabbit.
Seeing Xia Chen pass out from pain, after dealing with the foreign object on his body, Fang Mu didn’t dare to stay, hoisted the person on his back, and immediately started running again, his eyes vigilantly watching the sacs sticking to the walls.
Those sacs of varying sizes—some as big as yoga balls, some as small as jujubes—rolled inside with tadpoles bearing huge eyeballs. Those were eggs laid by the Strange Toad, arranged in the surrounding corners and on the walls.
Humans couldn’t touch those eggs easily, nor could those frog people, or even the Strange Toads themselves. Those eggs had extremely strong adhesiveness as well as devouring and digestion abilities.
Xia Chen not seeing those things was both a misfortune and a blessing. Because he couldn’t see, he failed to protect himself well, letting those terrifying things stick to him, making him so miserably injured. But he was also lucky not to see the terrifying scene in this passage: the images of creatures that had unfortunately touched the eggs being devoured alive by the egg cluster, everywhere blood and flesh blurred.
While running, Fang Mu felt the hot blood flowing from the wound on Xia Chen’s back slide across his hand, then heard the sound of it dripping to the ground.
The Xia Chen on his back was twitching from time to time, his breathing disordered, sometimes weak, sometimes strong, his body slowly losing temperature.
“You’re going to die.” Fang Mu stated to Xia Chen on his back.
He didn’t care whether the person on his back was conscious at the moment, just saying to himself: “I originally didn’t want to drag you all into this, but I didn’t expect it.
You will die here. Those teammates of yours, who got involved with me and delved into my trouble, will also die soon.
I won’t apologize, because it’s not my fault. I can only bless you not to die too miserably.”
Feeling the fabric on his shoulder being tightly clutched, Fang Mu softly said: “Before you die, I’ll keep carrying you. Once you’re dead, I’ll put you down. The necklace around your neck is important, right? I’ll hold it for you. If I can meet your teammates, I’ll give it to her.”
“Thank you…” Fang Mu felt the tense clothes loosen.
