Zhou Kai finished inspecting the second floor without incident.
The windows in the remaining two bedrooms were all sealed well. There was nothing unusual.
In the basement, that Moonlight Orchid had already grown to the length of a finger, suffused with a faint,幽 blue glow. Even without an oil lamp, one could barely make things out in the entire basement.
“If it can be transplanted reliably, I can consider planting Moonlight Orchids in other parts of the house later. That would save on oil lamps.”
Zhou Kai carefully pulled a tender Moonlight Orchid sprout from the nursery bed and hid it inside his clothes.
This thing had the effect of dispelling ill omens and keeping one clear-headed. It would allow him to last longer outside.
After extinguishing the oil lamp, he took off his coat and wrapped the brand-new longsword in layer after layer, concealing that overly conspicuous cold gleam.
Once all these preparations were complete, he took a deep breath and gently pulled open the shelter’s front door.
An overwhelming stench of blood immediately came at him with the drizzle, splashing across his face.
The rain outside seemed to have lightened somewhat. For him, this counted as a decent opportunity.
Zhou Kai’s heartbeat suddenly quickened. This was the first time he had truly, of his own accord, stepped into this nightmare town called Soraka.
He had long since devised a relatively safe exploration plan.
Soraka Town was crawling with monsters. On the streets, inside houses—there was nowhere they did not exist.
Compared to fighting on the open streets, resolving battles inside enclosed buildings could effectively avoid attracting more enemies.
Tonight, Zhou Kai’s goal was to explore one or two nearby buildings as much as possible, search for usable supplies, and hunt down any lone monsters along the way.
The darkness and the curtain of rain were both his cover and the monsters’ cover.
In an environment like this, cautious stealth was far less wise than moving at high speed without caring about noise.
Like a cheetah, Zhou Kai crouched in the shadow of the shelter, his eyes wide open as he adjusted to the darkness.
He had long since memorized the positions of the surrounding buildings. At the five o’clock direction, seventy meters away, there was an independent two-story house.
The only thing he needed to determine was whether there were any ill-intentioned “roadblocks” along that seventy-meter path.
“Wait for a bolt of lightning.”
Zhou Kai rubbed the oil lamp at his waist, calmed his mind, and listened to everything within the rain.
A bolt of lightning tore across the sky. In that extremely brief instant, the entire town was as bright as day.
Zhou Kai’s pupils constricted sharply, taking in everything along the route.
When the world returned to darkness, he abruptly rose. His body was like a fully drawn bow, instantly erupting with all its strength as he sprinted madly toward the house seventy meters away!
A collapsed flowerbed, a broad stretch of muddy ground, a few scattered odds and ends—between him and that house, there was nothing.
Charge!
Zhou Kai pushed his speed to the limit. His legs flew over the muddy ground, and in only eight seconds, he crossed more than seventy meters.
Crack!
The instant he neared the doorway, Zhou Kai reached out in advance and seized the door handle. With strength from his waist and abdomen, he actually tore the entire door bolt straight out of the rotten wooden door!
He casually tossed the bolt aside, pushed the door open, and rolled with the momentum, charging into the interior of the house.
Another bolt of lightning happened to flash past, allowing Zhou Kai to make out the two faintly glowing windows in the living room, as well as the rough layout of the room.
His mind spun rapidly, and the next series of movements instantly took shape in his head.
Without stopping, he rushed to the wooden cabinet at the side. Exerting force with both arms, he pushed the heavy cabinet behind the door, wedging it firmly in place.
Then he quickly propped up the wooden boards under the windows, blocking those two glass panes.
Only after finishing all this did Zhou Kai let out a long breath. He took the lighter from his pocket, clicked it, lit the oil lamp, and began carefully exploring his surroundings.
The materials used in this house were inferior to No. 777. The sound of the rain outside could be heard clearly; there was no soundproofing effect at all.
He needed to devote more attention to distinguishing whether there were any abnormal sounds inside the house.
When he entered, he had glanced at the doorplate by the lightning. This place was “No. 653.”
Were the house numbers not arranged according to any pattern…
As Zhou Kai frowned in thought, he controlled the light of the oil lamp. Its brightness was just enough for him to barely see, but not so bright that it shone too far.
Holding his sword, he walked toward the rooms connected to the living room.
When he explored the kitchen, he discovered that the floor here had actually been broken open from below by something. Rotten wooden strips were scattered all over the ground. The floor of the entire room had sunk more than ten centimeters lower than the living room. Using the tip of his sword to push aside the wooden strips, he could clearly see the damp soil beneath.
“Soil…”
Zhou Kai suddenly remembered that when he had run over just now, the feeling underfoot had been somewhat peculiar.
Driven by a subconscious impulse, he turned over the soil for a while longer, but found nothing. For some reason, a strange feeling rose in his heart.
The kitchen furnishings were dilapidated beyond recognition. The tableware was covered in rust, and all sorts of miscellaneous items were piled up like a garbage dump.
There was nothing worth noting.
Zhou Kai frowned, turned around, and walked toward the next place.
“Could it be… my first exploration is going to end with nothing?”
Just as he stepped out of the kitchen, an eerie rustling sound came from behind him.
Zhou Kai instinctively turned around, and his eyes suddenly widened!
The soft soil that had been deathly still just now was now actually churning, bubbling and gurgling like boiling water.
Zhou Kai retreated several steps in succession, staring fixedly at the soil.
A few seconds later, one black beetle after another, each the length of a finger, crawled out of the earth, layer upon layer, packed densely together!
The soil was full of bugs!
Could it be that when he had run over just now, those hard, block-like things under his feet had been these damned bugs?
A powerful wave of nausea surged up his throat!
Zhou Kai’s trypophobia was about to flare up. He cursed a few times, hurriedly turned and left the kitchen, then strode swiftly up the stairs.
When it rains, it pours.
The instant Zhou Kai rushed to the second floor, a black shadow suddenly shot out from the darkness around the corner and lunged straight at his face, nearly pressing face to face with him.
He instinctively raised his blade and forcefully held off the monster’s biting and clawing.
Under the violently swaying light of the oil lamp, Zhou Kai saw what the thing looked like.
Its body was that of a normal human, but it was badly swollen, displaying the characteristics of a bloated corpse. Its head, however, was a lumpy squid head, frantically waving tentacle-like feelers…
A Diablo Parasite Corpse!
“Get lost!”
Zhou Kai was no longer what he had once been.
This monster’s strength was greater than the previous “Lanze,” but his efforts over the past few days had not been for nothing!
He let out a muffled grunt. The muscles in both arms bulged as he steadied himself, then shoved forward with ferocious force. The parasite corpse was actually sent flying by him!
The parasite corpse’s sharp claws still tried to grab Zhou Kai’s two-handed sword, but they only shredded the clothing wrapped around it, revealing the cold, chilling gleam of the blade beneath.
“Die for me!”
Sword light flashed. Zhou Kai strode forward and slashed down vertically with his sword, hacking fiercely at the parasite corpse’s head!
Crack!
Accompanied by a series of terrifying sounds of sinews splitting and bones dislocating, that incomparably sharp greatsword cleaved all the way down to the parasite corpse’s waist and abdomen.
Its head, shoulders, and chest were actually split cleanly in two by this single strike!
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