Chapter 147: Striking My Teammate Hard
Wu Xie ran in a panic while answering Lao Yang: “Running for our lives! What else? Didn’t you hear the sounds behind us?”
Lao Yang really hadn’t heard much, or rather, he’d only heard a bit before Wu Xie dragged him running. Now all he could hear was their footsteps and heavy panting; he truly couldn’t hear anything else.
“What exactly did you hear? I didn’t… didn’t hear anything!”
Wu Xie didn’t dare stop now either. Although he couldn’t hear that rustling sound anymore, he didn’t dare take the risk. What if it was still following behind them?
But he couldn’t hold back in the end. Just before reaching a corner, he stole a glance back—
His self-mutter was so soft even he could barely hear it: “We’re done for. No escaping now.”
Wu Xie suddenly stopped. Lao Yang and Master Liang nearly crashed into him. After the two rolled into a heap and barely steadied themselves, Lao Yang glared at Wu Xie angrily: “What the hell is wrong with you? You said to run, and now you’re the one stopping! You—”
Wu Xie looked at him with a strange expression, raising a finger to his lips in a silencing gesture. Lao Yang was about to say more when he saw Wu Xie shining the flashlight back the way they’d come, pointing with his other hand at the spot illuminated by the light.
Lao Yang followed his finger, and in an instant, his hair stood on end: “Holy shit! What, what the hell is that thing?” Master Liang was so scared he nearly sat down hard on the ground, barely steadying himself by grabbing onto Lao Yang.
The spot lit by the flashlight had nothing on it, but just outside the beam, countless green dots were glowing, and those green dots were even multiplying steadily.
Anyone with a bit of common sense knew this was the reflection of animals’ eyes in the darkness.
Closer to the flashlight beam, they could barely make out what these animals looked like. They were things very much like rats, but the gleaming large fangs protruding from their heads showed these weren’t to be trifled with. Normal rats were usually just a couple of palm-sizes, but these rats’ body sizes here.
These were bigger than house cats! And with their numbers… Lao Yang looked at the sea of rats still gathering and his face turned ashen.
“Wh-what do we do?”
The rats at the edge of the flashlight beam were starting to stir restlessly, as if testing whether the light would harm them. After several probes, Lao Yang and Wu Xie watched in horror as the rats seemed to receive some signal. The rats on the nearby coffins and cliff began jumping down one after another, slowly closing in on them.
“How the hell should I know what to do?!”
Wu Xie was extremely tense. Though he didn’t know what to do either, where could they run now? No need to look—he knew the rustling sounds were coming from all around. The rats throughout the entire cave were gathering toward them; there was nowhere to run!
And he clearly couldn’t pin his hopes on these rats not eating human flesh! It was obvious what food the rats living here ate—likely the corpses in the surrounding coffins had been gnawed clean by them! How were they supposed to play this? Where could they hide?
Finally, the rats seemed unable to hold back any longer and charged toward them at full speed!
“Wu Xie, what the hell are you standing around for!”
Lao Yang yelled, and in a flash of inspiration, he leaped onto a nearby coffin board, dragging Wu Xie along. The two rolled into a heap and tumbled inside. A wave of putrid stench hit them instantly, nearly knocking Wu Xie out.
“…Lao Yang, give a heads-up next time before you do this, or I’ll die of the stink before the bites!”
Once Wu Xie adjusted, he covered his mouth and nose with his sleeve. Afraid of alerting the rats, he complained in a low voice while listening to the countless claws scrabbling past them. He felt his limbs go ice-cold and his whole body shivering. If there was a choice, who would want to be gnawed alive by rats?
“Wait… something feels off, doesn’t it?”
“What’s wrong?”
Lao Yang seemed to have noticed something and whispered in Wu Xie’s ear: “This rat pack doesn’t seem… like it was startled by us. Look at them—doesn’t it look like… like they’re running for their lives?”
“…Running for their lives?”
Wu Xie thought about it. The rats had seemed very agitated during their probing, and their gathering speed was unnatural: “Could something inside have come out, so the rats are fleeing in such a hurry—and they just happened to run into us?”
Logically, with how thin this coffin was, the rats could’ve bitten through it in two chomps. If they wanted to eat them, they would’ve done it already instead of ignoring them and passing by. That said, it really did seem like they were fleeing!
What could force these things to flee? Wu Xie didn’t know much about the rats here, but he knew they weren’t simple. Things that had eaten rotten corpses for years—what could they be but dangerous? Just their size showed they were tough to deal with. Wu Xie felt intimidated looking at that big rat’s build. Sharp fangs, agile—they could take a chunk of flesh in one bite. He might not even handle one alone.
In just a few minutes, the sounds of the massive rat pack began to fade. Wu Xie knew the rats were almost gone. That’s when he suddenly remembered.
“Where’s Master Liang? Did you see where he went?”
Lao Yang slapped his thigh: “I-I forgot! When I dragged you in, I didn’t… didn’t think about the other guy!”
Hearing that, had Master Liang been left alone in the rat swarm? Had he been eaten on the spot? But there hadn’t been any screams, so he was probably fine?
Left in the rat swarm with all the rats running over or past him—Wu Xie felt bad for him just thinking about it. But with some rats still around, he insincerely promised himself in his mind that he’d go save him once they were gone. As for whether he’d still be okay by then, who knew.
Finally, when there was no more movement around, Wu Xie cautiously poked his head out, shining the flashlight through a crack in the coffin: “…No things left. Come out.”
Though it was quiet around them, the two still instinctively kept their voices low and crept out carefully. Once out, Lao Yang’s first glance was at Master Liang lying on a nearby coffin.
He burst out laughing.
It wasn’t his fault—Master Liang looked truly wretched right now, even more disheveled than when he’d climbed out of the water pool after the waterfall. He was sprawled beside the coffin, with several bloody scratches on his face—obviously from rats’ claws as they scurried over him. His clothes were torn in several places, and his hands and feet were even worse.
Most importantly… Lao Yang sympathetically glanced at Master Liang’s crotch, wondering if it was injured, if that thing still worked…
When Wu Xie saw Master Liang in this state, he nearly laughed too, but remembering it was because they forgot to pull him in, he felt a bit embarrassed. He coughed lightly twice to signal Lao Yang to wake Master Liang. Whatever had driven the rats to flee en masse was still behind them. Unless something unexpected happened, they needed to keep running.
Just then, Wu Xie heard another strange sound—like a ball bouncing on the ground?
The sound was getting closer and closer. Wu Xie could hear it more clearly now—it really sounded like a ball bouncing on the ground! This dull thud came at nearly two beats per second, approaching them. Wu Xie hurriedly dragged Lao Yang behind a random coffin to hide and turned off the flashlight.
Lao Yang heard it too this time. He finally remembered to pull Master Liang behind the coffin to hide: “What is that thing? Doesn’t sound like a zombie. Zombies don’t walk with that sound, right?”
Wu Xie gave him a “shh” gesture, signaling silence: “I don’t know either, but why does it feel like a rubber ball bouncing?”
In an instant, his mind flashed to urban supernatural stories like “midnight hallway ball sounds.” In this ancient tomb… Could it be a sacrificial little ghost looking for someone to play ball with? No way—did ghosts really exist in this world? His materialist worldview was shattering!
Zombies were one thing, but ghosts? Weren’t they not real? Grandpa’s notebook didn’t mention this stuff either. How were they supposed to hide?
If it was the kind of ghost from ghost stories, how could they hide? They’d die anyway! This coffin board was like nothing in front of it!
But the good news was, as it approached them, the sound didn’t stop—maybe… it was chasing the rats?
It was getting closer… Wu Xie felt his mouth go dry, his ears filled with that thing’s thuds and his own heartbeat… He involuntarily held his breath.
But as luck would have it, just as it neared them, the sound stopped.
Lao Yang poked his arm, silently asking: What now?
Wu Xie was uncertain now too. He didn’t know if the thing had spotted them. If not, moving now would be walking right into the trap. If it had, early death or late death made no difference?
He hesitated, then shook his head at Lao Yang, signaling him to stay silent.
In the dead silence—which might’ve been dozens of seconds or a few minutes—when Wu Xie desperately thought they couldn’t escape doom, the sound moved ahead again!
Great! He and Lao Yang both breathed a sigh of relief. But no one expected that at that moment, Master Liang woke up!
He sat up with a gasp, clutching his head: “I… I’m not dead?”
In the silence, his clear, resonant voice carried far. Wu Xie could even hear the cave’s echo in despair.
“You really know how to fuck things up!”
Lao Yang practically leaped up the instant the sound stopped, grabbing Wu Xie, turning on the flashlight, and running—once again leaving Master Liang behind. Master Liang woke to see Lao Yang dragging Wu Xie flash past him and vanish. Looking after, he only saw the wildly shaking flashlight beam.
“Wh-what are you guys doing?”
Master Liang had no idea what was happening or why they were running so fast, but his gradually clearing mind told him he needed to follow them and run!
“Wait for me!”
He didn’t know what was behind them, but following and running was the right call!
He struggled to his feet, barely able to stand steadily, wanting to follow. Then a voice came from behind him: “It’s us! Why are you running?”
This voice was… Master Liang turned his head in surprise—it was Uncle Tai!
Lin Yan walked over from beside Uncle Tai, picked up the little white zombie on the ground, and gave it a gentle head bonk: “Little guy, you run so fast. We almost couldn’t keep up!”
After saying that, he looked at Master Liang: “Where are Wu Xie and Lao Yang? Weren’t they with you?”
Master Liang’s head was still a bit dizzy, but seeing Uncle Tai and Lin Yan, he knew he was safe. He simply sat down: “I don’t know. Those two just ran this way.”
Lin Yan looked at Master Liang’s disheveled state and couldn’t help being curious: “What… happened to you guys? Why so beat up?”
Hearing his question, Master Liang shuddered, his face showing fear: “Rats! Rats bigger than cats—a huge swarm!”
Uncle Tai looked at Master Liang, frowning. He clearly knew the rats in the tomb weren’t easy to deal with, let alone that Master Liang had only minor injuries: “How’d you dodge them?”
“Dodge? I didn’t dodge!” Speaking of this made Master Liang furious: “Those two don’t know where they burrowed off to—I lost sight of them in a second! Leaving me alone against that huge swarm! Good thing the rats didn’t want to eat me and just ran over me. Otherwise, you wouldn’t see me now!”
Lin Yan gave a peculiar look and exchanged a glance with Uncle Tai, a vague guess forming: “Which direction did that rat swarm go?”
Master Liang rubbed his head, looked around, checked his position, and hesitantly pointed a direction: “Seemed like… from here… to here?”
Lin Yan and Uncle Tai looked at the direction he pointed, then simultaneously glanced at the little white zombie quietly nestled in Lin Yan’s arms—the rat swarm that had left them so battered might’ve been driven by the little white zombie?
This wave, this wave was hitting my teammates hard.
Seeing Master Liang’s wretched state, Uncle Tai and Lin Yan tacitly decided not to tell him, lest his mentality collapse.
“So where are those two? Weren’t they just with you?”
Master Liang sneered: “They ran! I just woke up, had no idea what was happening, and those two ditched me again to run!”
But hadn’t only the little white zombie been here earlier? Lin Yan frowned. Could they not have seen the little white zombie without the flashlight and fled from the movement it caused? If so, that’d be too embarrassing!
Plus, the terrain here was labyrinthine. All these coffins looked identical; a few steps and the path behind vanished. Who knew where those two had gone?
But if they could find them once, they could find them again! Lin Yan looked once more at the little white zombie in his arms and tentatively asked: “Xiao Bai Bai, do you know where Wu Xie and the others went?”
“Ying ying ying?” The little white zombie made a puzzled sound. Lin Yan thought and asked again: “Can you find Wu Xie and them?”
“Ying ying ying!”
The little white zombie jumped down from his arms and once again walked—no, hopped—ahead.
