Chapter 19 Gun Kai

Chai Da Xiaojie's mind raced, wondering what kind of background setting could match her style, when a burst of crazed, mournful howls grew louder and closer, rapidly approaching.

Wei Linglan couldn't see clearly in the fog, but Li Ang, with the aid of his Cat's Eye, could see slightly farther.

Giant rats. Dozens of tank-sized giant rats crammed the entire street, making it impossible to pass. Vehicles, landscaping trees, streetlights—everything in the path ahead was knocked down and crushed by the swarm.

The black spikes on each rat's back stood up like bristled fur, rapidly changing from black to red. After a brief delay, they shot backward.

The cannon-like spikes poured into the fog like a rain of arrows, and the sounds of the spikes exploding echoed from behind.

However, the number of explosions was clearly less than the number of spikes being launched.

It was as if something in the fog nonchalantly devoured most of the exploding spike projectiles...

The rat swarm charged headlong, their red eyes filled with violent bloodlust, but even more so with the instinctive fear of living creatures.

They were trying to escape something in the fog.

Whoosh—

The sound of air being torn apart came.

In the thick fog, the air surged. A vague, vertical dark shape descended from the sky, suddenly enveloping the last giant rat in the swarm, hoisting it up and pulling it into the high air.

The swarm shrieked in terror, their charging speed increasing again, but this did not stop the vertical dark shape from descending from the sky, again and again dragging them into the thick fog.

Li Ang could see it clearly, but Wei Linglan only saw a dozen giant rats rushing toward the restaurant.

Her expression changed drastically. She immediately flashed behind a table facing the front door, propped the grenade launcher's support on the table, and aimed the muzzle at the restaurant door as if facing a great enemy.

This Mk19 grenade launcher was a heavy firepower weapon issued by the Special Affairs Bureau to extra members of the Mobile Task Force.

If she operated the Mk19 grenade launcher alone, she could fire an average of 80 high-explosive grenades per minute.

In an open area, she could definitely pin these giant rats to the ground and blast them,

But this enclosed restaurant had no fortifications. The area that needed to be defended was too large, and the distance between them was too close.

Even if she killed or wounded the first few monsters that rushed in, the other giant rats could still squeeze in through the surrounding floor-to-ceiling glass windows and attack the crowd...

The sound of trampling was as dense as a drum beat. A dozen giant rat figures broke through the fog and crashed into the floor-to-ceiling windows on the street side of the restaurant.

The glass windows shattered in response, and the crowd's terrified cries shook the sky.

The vertical dark shape had originally descended from the sky, pointing toward the outermost giant rat, but it suddenly stopped when it was about to approach the restaurant's range. After hesitating for a moment, it silently withdrew.

The rat swarm successfully escaped.

A giant rat with the largest body burst in through the front door, its red eyes reflecting Wei Yueyan's back in the bronze armor, motionless.

The concept of "abnormality indicates danger" did not exist in its mind. The fear of the dark shadow in the thick fog completely filled its mind, causing it to ignore the sharp sense of threat coming from Chai Cuiqiao.

The giant rat waved its strong forelimbs, raising its scythe-like sharp claws high, and slashed down fiercely towards Wei Yueyan.

All of this happened so fast. Wei Linglan had just blasted a giant rat that had broken through the floor-to-ceiling window with a high-explosive grenade. When she turned her head, she saw Wei Yueyan standing at the door about to be disemboweled by the rat monster.

Why... why doesn't she dodge?

"Hmph... noisy."

Wei Yueyan stood with her hands behind her back, not turning her head. She just sighed softly, as if the lightning-fast claw strike behind her was just a gentle breeze.

At the moment when the giant rat's claws were about to hit her, more than a dozen pale, slender arms stretched out from the ground.

Like pythons, they firmly wrapped around the giant rat's body and twisted it fiercely!

Crack, crack, crack—

The giant rat's bones were snapped off, and with a "bang," its full, *hunyuan* belly exploded like a lemon being squeezed!

Red and white splattered everywhere, and the stench spread.

The dozen or so arms did not disappear. The next second, they appeared under the feet of other rat monsters, and like squeezing lemons, they quickly reaped the lives of all the giant rats.

After a few breaths, the messy restaurant was like a carpet of scarlet, and the stench rushed into the nose, causing many people to vomit on the spot.

The crowd looked at Chai Da Xiaojie with eyes full of fear and shock.

The latter stood in a pool of blood, without a trace of scarlet contamination on her body.

She just slightly raised her chin nonchalantly, frowned, and said in a deep voice: "Kick the thick earth, reveal the clarity of the sky. Traverse the *cengxiao*, pierce the deep darkness. Agitate three thousand to rise up, and march swiftly towards ninety thousand.

I am Wei Yueyan of the Xuánwǔ Seven Constellations of the Cengxiao Hall. The Wei constellation is mostly ominous, in charge of the duty of executing!"

"Cengxiao Hall..."

Wei Linglan's expression was solemn, chewing on the word.

*Cengxiao* means clouds and sky.

Su Shi of the Song Dynasty had a poem, *West River Moon: I was in Huangzhou*: "Shallow waves fill the field, faintly visible layers of clouds in the sky."

"Kick the thick earth, reveal the clarity of the sky. Traverse the *cengxiao*, pierce the deep darkness" also comes from Li Bai's *Ode to the Peng*

Wei Yueyan is one of the twenty-eight constellations, the fifth constellation of the Northern Seven Constellations, located at the tail of *Xuánwǔ*, in charge of the autumn execution.

As an extra member of the Special Affairs Bureau's Mobile Task Force, Wei Linglan had not yet reached the level of clearance to access various confidential information.

Naturally, she could not discern whether the "Cengxiao Hall" that Chai Cuiqiao casually mentioned was real or fake.

Moreover, the other party was wearing bronze heavy armor but moved freely, with a profound and awe-inspiring aura. She gave a long self-introduction as soon as she opened her mouth, and combined with the blood on the ground, it didn't seem like she made it up.

From an ancient secret organization? Or a secret society that was recently established?

Chai Da Xiaojie glanced at Wei Linglan, who was still thinking, "Your identity."

The latter reacted and hurriedly showed her player ID.

Chai Cuiqiao, who was not a player, couldn't see the other party's ID at all, but this did not prevent her from nodding lightly with a calm expression, pretending to be aware of it.

In fact, Chai Da Xiaojie didn't see clearly the scene of the rat swarm being chased in the thick fog just now, but Li Ang did.

With the help of the Cat's Eye's illusion creation function, he projected a line of small words on the inside of Chai Da Xiaojie's mask, acting as a prompter to control the situation from behind.

Although he didn't know what the vertical dark shape that descended from the sky was, or why it stopped within the restaurant's range,

It was an established fact that Yong Yi Ge restaurant was no longer safe—if it was safe, the system would not have assigned two players to specifically carry out the escort mission.

Under the command of Li Ang's prompter, Chai Da Xiaojie, or rather Wei Yueyan of the Xuánwǔ Seven Constellations of the Cengxiao Hall, indifferently glanced at everyone in the restaurant,

and said in a deep voice: "It's not safe here, get ready, we have to leave immediately."

"Okay, okay."

Wei Linglan, who was faintly shocked by Chai Da Xiaojie's aura, did not dare to say much. She quickly collected a giant rat corpse from the ground into her backpack and turned to look at the crowd, directing them to move various tools from the kitchen,

including, but not limited to, steel plates, various steel pots, long ropes connected together, and lighting equipment.

After taking out the tools, Wei Linglan had the crowd stand in a 11x12 square formation.

The middle-aged men stood on the outside of the square formation holding steel plates and various steel pots, while the old, weak, women, and children stood on the inside of the square formation.

People held lighting equipment in the front, back, left, and right of the square formation, illuminating the four directions.

Everyone also held a rope that surrounded the square formation, to prevent anyone from accidentally leaving the team, entering the fog, and never returning.

It wasn't that no one wanted to continue staying in the restaurant, but in front of Wei Yueyan's cold gaze and Wei Linglan's rifle,

no one dared to stand up and express dissatisfaction.

After quickly arranging the formation,

Wei Yueyan led the way in front of the square formation, Wei Linglan guarded the rear, and a group of people walked out of the restaurant in a mighty manner and came to the fog-filled street.

As an adult male, Li Ang naturally stood on the outside of the team—Wei Linglan had arranged Wei's parents, Li Ang, and Wang Congshan at the rear of the team, closer to her protection range.

He glanced left and right with his Cat's Eye, and after confirming that the vertical dark shape in the high air was not nearby, he directed Wei Yueyan to lead the team along the road.