"Haa... haa..." Claw staggered through the crimson forest while clutching his broken arm, a rain of blood and sweat cascading down his body. He desperately tried to suppress the loud echo of his ragged breathing to no avail.
Whenever he recalled what had just transpired, an unprecedented horror and panic surged from the depths of his heart, causing him to tremble uncontrollably.
It had been so long since he suffered such severe injuries.
He and his three other companions had often tead up and bulldozed through nurous Cycles without needing to expend much effort. Not to exaggerate, but when they joined hands, very few could overpower them and sotis they could even take down players whose rank was higher than them. Which was why, witnessing Mr. Baldy and Breath of Poison being pumled and crushed beyond recognition sent a violent impact that shook him down to the core.
How...?
Their enemy was just one person, for fuck’s sake— so how could he do that? How could he defeat them with such effortless ease?!
Claw knew his companions’ skills and fighting prowess very well, which made the current situation all the more baffling and horrifying for him. Just who the fuck was that player?!
Once again, those savage and hostile heterochromatic eyes flashed through his mind, sending a rush of violent shivers down his spine. That man is not normal! He scread inside the confines of his mind. Claw had no idea whether it was his imagination or not, but when he looked into those eyes, he found his mind blanking out and his body paralyzed in intense fear. It was like he was peering into the bottomless abyss where his most morbid and cruel nightmare lay. And he was certain that it was not only him who felt that way.
This suffocating despair and foreboding... the helplessness that ca from the realization that he was no different than a weak ant... it brought him back to the ti when he was still a newbie and unwittingly caught a glimpse of the Nightmare.
Only the Nightmare could evoke such deep-seated fear and terror within him.
Yet now he had gotten similar feelings from a fellow player, whom he had never heard of before.
Driven by desperation, Claw trudged deeper into the forest, leaving a faint trail of blood behind him. Once in a while, the scarlet trees would attack him but Claw managed to fend them off just fine even in his current state. The level of these creatures were not enough to leave a single scratch on him.
See? This was how things were supposed to go. He refused to believe he had used up his precious life-saving prop just to escape in such a sorry manner!
Soon after, Claw found a suitable hiding place behind a small hill and decided to take a brief respite there. He kept a vigilant eye over the surroundings as he retrieved a roll of bandage and hemostatic spray from his prop storage. But just as he was about to deal with his wounds, an eerie chuckle suddenly sounded behind his ear, giving him such a terrible fright that he dropped everything in his hands,
"Still wanna run?"
Claw’s pupils constricted sharply. With a speed faster than the eye could perceive, he sprang forward and whipped around, opening a considerable distance between them. "How..." he gasped, his complexion blanching in horror and disbelief. "How did you get here?!"
He had not sensed the other person’s presence, let alone heard his breathing or footsteps! It was as if the man had sohow teleported right behind him!
Shrouded by thick crimson foliage, Jin Jiuchi’s figure lood tall, his sharp features partially concealed in the shadows. Yet those eyes – those terrifying eyes which were akin to the personification of the Nightmare itself – shone all the more brilliantly. Like a pair of cold eyes belonging to a bloodthirsty predator, intently watching over its prey with hostile aggression.
"How, you asked..." Jin Jiuchi took a deliberate step forward, forcing Claw to reel backward, a cruel smirk hanging on the corners of his lips. "I’ve rembered your scent. From now on, you won’t be able to escape from ... not even if you hide in the corner of the world. How is it? Are you happy? Are you touched?" he sing-songed with a faux cheerful tone.
Raw fear perated every inch of Claw’s body, chilling him down to the bone marrow. "Y–You fucking lunatic!" he sputtered in sheer horror.
At this mont, he had yet to realize that he was now standing in the sa position as his previous innocent victims, who had pleaded for their lives only to be rcilessly slaughtered. Driven by the will to live, he desperately scoured through his list of props, searching for the ones who could buy him so ti to escape, yet he could not find anything suitable... nothing.
Claw’s mind blanked out, tremors wrecking his entire body. Impossible, h-how could there be nothing?!
"Lunatic?" Jin Jiuchi barked out a laugh as if he had heard sothing funny. Humorless mirth tinged the sharp edge of his voice as he bit out, "You’re not the first to call that, nor will you be the last."
"Now, which hand did you use to injure my Nian’er?"
The last words had barely left his mouth when he lunged forward, his expression twisted into a deranged grin. Claw’s dilated pupils reflected his figure which was approaching in an almost inhuman speed, and in that split second, everything seed to unfold in an excruciatingly slow motion, dragging out each fra into eternity.
A burst of unwillingness, resentnt and hysteria erupted within Claw, almost driving him to the point of insanity.
No... NO! This couldn’t be happening! He was among the top ten players in the whole country, a proud mber of the number one organization, Imhotep. How could he possibly perish in this lousy Cycle, in the hands of an unknown player whose na he did not even know? How could he allow himself to succumb here, in such a humiliating way? He refused...
He refused to accept such an outrageous outco—!
With an enraged roar, he threw all caution to the wind and confronted Jin Jiuchi head-on.
When Shen Nianzu, Gu Luoxin and Noir finally caught up to the scene, the battle was already over before it could even start.
Calling it a ’battle’ would be a little too far-fetched. In the first place, the players stood no chance against Jin Jiuchi, for they were fundantally built different. Stripping off their skill cards and props, they were, in essence, humans. Whereas Jin Jiuchi was a nightmare creature. Plus, the Cycle was considered his ho field, which granted him an extra advantage.
The three simultaneously halted when they were still ters away.
Up ahead, the sickening sounds of bones breaking and flesh tearing echoed, interspersed with the weak grunts and pleas of rcy. Yet Jin Jiuchi did not seem to hear it at all as he relished in tearing the player apart limb by limb, all the while ensuring the man remained conscious throughout to enjoy this endless suffering.
"How is it? Do you feel good now? Keep talking ah, why do you stop?"
Jin Jiuchi was drenched in blood from head to toe, his eyes glowing in a manic light. His expression was chillingly cold, nearly devoid of emotions, as if the mutilated figure before him was not a person but nothing more than a slab of at. The current him looked far too different than usual, so much so that Gu Luoxin instinctively took a step back, colors draining from his face.
Shen Nianzu, however, proceeded as if he had not noticed the grueso scene before him. His gaze remained locked on Jin Jiuchi’s back as he stepped forward, his foot sinking into the wet, bloodstained soil.
"Da Shen," he called out, his voice unprecedentedly soft and gentle, as though he was facing a sensitive, fragile animal and was afraid he would scare it away if he wasn’t careful.
When Jin Jiuchi showed no inclination that he had heard him, Shen Nianzu bit his bottom lip and attempted once more, a little louder this ti, "Jin Jiuchi."
A particularly cruel twist of Jin Jiuchi’s hand drew out a feeble, agonizing cry from Claw, tinged with a hint of despairing sob. And all of a sudden, Shen Nianzu couldn’t bear it anymore.
"Jin-Ge!" he snapped.
Jin Jiuchi’s movent abruptly froze, blood dripping from the damp tousled hair which fell over his forehead, his breath light and shallow.
.
.
A/N: three more Chapters until the end of this Cycle! ^^
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