A sharp buzzing filled their minds.
At that moment, both Gu Yao and Chu Muge experienced an almost identical sensation.
An excruciating pain in their heads.
Gu Yao watched in bewilderment as white threads emerged from the massive lump of flesh and rapidly pierced into her body.
The pain struck with such sudden ferocity that it eclipsed anything she'd ever felt before.
She needed to endure it.
To control it, make it submit, force it to obey.
—
Boom!
Dust swirled in the air.
This was a chase.
Something whizzed past her side.
Chu Muge dodged a chunk of debris the size of a basketball, gritting her teeth as she fought off the intense pain in her head.
The creature was clever, using its surroundings against her, making her situation far worse.
And her situation was already far from ideal.
Her physical injuries were one thing, but it was the surge of volatile emotions that threatened to overwhelm her.
She needed the medication.
Her vision began to darken around the edges as she continued to run, coughing under the strain.
She couldn't afford to lose control in the middle of a fight with this monster, it would be fatal.
The creature roared, like a predator closing in on its prey. Its compound eyes, oozing green liquid, were locked onto Chu Muge’s back with a murderous glare, eager to rip her apart.
It was fast, but...
Chu Muge was just as fast.
Fast enough to keep up with the beast, like a cat keeping pace with a charging leopard, not allowing it to close the distance.
As they raced through the first floor, the creature opened its mouth, revealing mutated organs aimed directly at Chu Muge.
Zzz...
A thick, clear liquid shot towards her, but she deftly dodged it. The liquid splattered onto a nearby counter, where it quickly solidified into a white substance, still steaming from the heat.
And the distance between them was shrinking.
Chu Muge glanced back, frowning.
It seemed the creature had mutated with insect-like features; the "spider web" from earlier was likely its doing.
But Chu Muge had no sharp weapon in hand now, and if she got hit, it would be over.
Slightly agitated, she touched the pair of fluffy cat ears on top of her head.
The creature was closing in.
In truth, there were some similarities between mutants and espers. Some individuals or creatures gained traits from animals, along with their unique abilities.
The creature might have mutated from a spider.
As for her...
The cat ears on top of her head twitched slightly at her touch, sending a warm, tingling sensation across her face.
Chu Muge's expression remained stoic, despite the blood staining her lips and the delicate blush that tinged her features—a stark, almost surreal contrast to the perilous situation surrounding her.
Her crimson eyes darted back, the slit-like pupils narrowing into alert lines.
She was ready.
The creature's roar echoed behind her.
Chu Muge thought, thankfully, she hadn’t fully unleashed her abilities; otherwise, a tail might’ve appeared.
That would have been troublesome.
With a graceful leap and a perfect backflip, she landed on the creature's back, delivering a powerful kick to its bony skull before it had time to react.
She should have done this earlier.
The force of the impact drove the creature's head into the ground, dragging it forward as its tail thrashed wildly.
Chu Muge seized the moment to nimbly jump off, exhaling a breath of relief.
The pair of black cat ears on top of her head twitched gently as her slit pupils shifted towards the nearby door of the safe passage.
She thought:
Almost there.
—
As the pain gradually subsided, Gu Yao finally saw it.
Through the writhing mass of flesh, she glimpsed the life that was being nurtured within.
White threads, glowing faintly, connected her to it before fading away, signaling the end of her ability’s activation.
It was as if she now had two perspectives. One was her own, and the other was from the mass of flesh, though the latter was still veiled in darkness.
It was hatching.
A primary brood nest was a costly investment, not just in terms of the flesh needed to create a specific mutant to the queen’s specifications, but also because it was a one-time use.
Yes, a one-time use.
Once the creature within hatched, the primary brood nest would lose its ability to spawn more monsters, its only remaining function being to control the flesh carpet and defend against intruders.
In short, a primary brood nest was wasteful, a transitional tool in the early days of the apocalypse, far inferior to the nests that would come later.
Looking at the wriggling, sparsely-haired flesh, there was an undeniable sense of cheapness about it. It was clear this wasn’t anything high-end.
But to Gu Yao, at this moment, it was priceless.
Gu Yao: ???`?
A freebie!!!
She had just scored herself a new pet!
The queenly instinct within her sparked a strange joy; if the lump of flesh weren’t so disgusting, she might have thrown herself at it for a hug.
As for the flesh that fed the nest...
Gu Yao was about to control the flesh carpet through the brood nest for the first time, feeling a bit nervous as she closed her eyes.
Lu Xun once said: "Feel it with your heart." (Lu Xun: ?)
Gu Yao felt her consciousness sinking deeper, eventually settling into the soft, blood-red carpet beneath her feet. The next second, a section of the flesh carpet beside her quivered, and a tentacle squirmed out, curiously pointing in her direction.
Nice.
The success bolstered Gu Yao’s confidence as she commanded the tentacle to retract back into the flesh carpet.
Meanwhile, in the underground parking lot on the second basement level, flesh carpets were also present, though not as densely as on the first basement level. The cars parked there had all transformed into pulsing, red tumors, writhing as if alive.
From the blood-red ceiling, a tentacle slowly extended.
Its tip swayed like an eye, surveying the grisly scene below.
On the patches of ground not yet covered by the flesh carpet, countless decaying corpses were piled high, filling the entire underground parking lot.
These dead zombies were stacked like mountains, with giant, worm-like tentacles moving between them, their hollow, round mouths occasionally plunging into the corpse mounds, consuming the bodies, and miraculously liquefying them into a pink sludge, which then flowed along the slender tentacles with a gurgling sound.
These dissolved corpses would be absorbed, nourishing the flesh carpet, which in turn spread stealthily between the first and second basement levels, following the commands of its previous master.
...But what happened to the previous master?
With her eyes tightly shut, Gu Yao’s consciousness drifted through the murky gray memories of the infected site, where she vaguely saw a blurred silhouette of a person.
A small figure with a large-eared mouse perched on their shoulder, standing out prominently.
In the next moment, Gu Yao received the final clue from the infected site:
There were originally two core flesh masses here.
It made sense, given the towering piles of corpses in the underground parking lot. Even a yet-to-hatch primary brood nest wouldn’t require so much flesh.
So the answer was simple.
—A matured special mutant had been taken away.
...But why had they gone to such great lengths to hatch a specific mutant?