Chapter 126: Mutant Assault

Flower Buddha ignored Wu Ji and kept his eyes fixed on Chen Cao. He knew that if even one word went wrong, this temporary alliance, held together solely by mutual interest, could erupt into a firefight. And in the end, regardless of who won or lost, there could be only one consequence: they would all die in this cursed jungle.

So Flower Buddha continued, “All right, Chen. Stop staring at me with that damned look. Believe me or don’t—it’s your choice. Otherwise, we can split up right now. You’re nothing but a band of wounded stragglers, and I’m the only one among you who still has any real fighting strength. Following me is better than stumbling around blindly in the jungle. Understand, Mr. Chen?”

Before Chen Cao could answer, Stanley cried out, “Damn it! It’s that accursed thing again. It’s been following us the whole way!”

Chen Cao stared at Stanley in confusion. “What?”

He asked because, within the range of his vision, he could see no sign of an enemy at all. Even so, his grip tightened around the rifle in his hand.

Flower Buddha’s face turned ashen. He pulled back the bolt and said grimly, “The goblin babies!”

Stanley and Lu Tianming seemed to have already witnessed how formidable the goblin babies were. They immediately leaped away from Chen Cao’s side. Only Lucia continued to giggle foolishly while Lu Tianming dragged her along.

Chen Cao was about to ask another question when he noticed the ground beneath his feet beginning to tremble. Like earth being loosened by an earthworm, the soil bulged slightly, then sank again.

“Don’t stop here! A large group of natives will be here soon. We have to move!”

Before Flower Buddha could finish speaking, a shaggy head suddenly burst from the earth with a sharp squeal and landed directly in front of Chen Cao. Without time to think, Chen Cao raised his gun and fired. The bullet struck the creature squarely in its enormous head.

Flower Buddha shouted, “Chen, don’t get caught up fighting them! There are as many of these things as locusts. Move!”

He turned and ran, clearly terrified of the creatures.

Stanley wailed as he followed Flower Buddha. Chen Cao glanced at the little monster he had just killed. It looked like a monkey, yet its hands and feet were shaped like a child’s. Its entire body was covered in bristling hair, and it had a grotesquely swollen belly. Who knew what kind of mutant it was?

As that thought crossed his mind, several more goblin babies burst from the ground with dull thumps. They whimpered and squealed, each one carrying a tube between its teeth. The moment they saw anything moving, they began to chase it desperately. Once they drew close enough, they blew through the tubes with sharp, whistling breaths.

“Damn it, poison darts!” Chen Cao suddenly understood their purpose and shouted, “Run!”

As he spoke, he fired at the creatures. Every shot found its mark, and several of the goblin babies fell.

Wu Ji clearly knew far more about the creatures than Chen Cao did. He shouted, “Chen, you can’t kill them all! Run! If one of their poisoned needles gets you, you’re finished. The poison causes paralysis!”

With that, he seized Kalisa and began retreating deeper into the jungle.

Chen Cao had no time to think. He saw that Lu Tianming, already weakened by malnutrition and hunger, had fallen with a heavy thud while trying to drag his wife along too quickly. He lay on the ground, groaning and unable to rise.

Chen Cao grabbed him by the arm and roared, “This is no time to act refined! Dig deep and find your strength!”

He hauled the not especially heavy Lu Tianming to his feet, slung Lucia over one shoulder, and hurried after Flower Buddha.

The goblin babies were clearly less agile than ordinary humans. Chen Cao felt that he had shaken them off with surprising ease. After running several hundred meters, he slowed down and faintly spotted Flower Buddha and Stanley ahead.

He set Lucia down and left her in Lu Tianming’s care. Wu Ji and Kalisa seemed unharmed as well. Chen Cao was about to go over and demand an explanation from Flower Buddha when Flower Buddha spoke first, his face grim.

“We can’t escape. We’ve already entered their territory.”

Chen Cao froze, swallowing the words he had been about to say. He looked toward Wu Ji and saw the man’s expression grow despondent. Wu Ji nodded solemnly.

“Damn it, they’re coming again!” Stanley stamped his feet and pointed toward the distance, shouting furiously. “When Lu and I were running away before, these things nearly ate us. They’re completely without humanity. I saw them devouring the bodies of dead natives with my own eyes. They’re worse than the man-eating fish on television—not even the bones remain!”

Chen Cao looked around. The soil all about them had begun to churn. Starting from every direction, the ground was rapidly loosening and swelling toward them.

A phrase suddenly came to him: surrounded on all sides.

At that moment, Flower Buddha laughed.

“Hmph. I’ve been waiting for the day I could have my revenge. Come on, you little devils! Everyone, form a circle!”

He unfolded the entrenching shovel strapped to his gear and began digging furiously, his expression one of intense concentration. He did not look like a man trapped in desperate circumstances.

“Flower Buddha, what are you doing?”

Chen Cao knew that Flower Buddha was not a man who ever joked. Nervously, he ordered everyone to close ranks. Holding his pistol ready, he kept watch over the shifting soil around them. At any moment, those things might leap out and fire a poisoned dart. Once paralyzed, a victim could only lie there helplessly while the creatures tore him apart.

The soil was extremely loose. Thanks to Flower Buddha’s practiced movements, it did not take long for him to dig a pit roughly half a meter square.

At Chen Cao’s question, Flower Buddha pulled a grenade from his ammunition belt. A smile even more sinister than Lucia’s spread across his face.

“I’m going to give these half-human, half-demonic creatures a feast of flesh. Let them lose themselves in a glorious orgy of blood and meat!”

He pulled the pin and dropped the grenade into the pit, then quickly covered it with soil.

“A poison-gas grenade?” Chen Cao asked.

Flower Buddha gave a cold laugh and nodded.

Chen Cao suddenly understood what the white man intended to do. The goblin babies had come through tunnels they had dug beneath the ground. For creatures to survive in such tunnels, there had to be adequate ventilation and airflow. Now the humans were standing at the center, serving as bait and drawing a great number of goblin babies toward them. This place was therefore the meeting point of the tunnels.

By burying a poison-gas grenade at their intersection, Flower Buddha had effectively planted an atomic bomb among the creatures. The moment they dug through to this spot, the grenade would explode and the poison gas would spread. Since the earth had already been packed over it, the goblin army would suffer massive casualties without harming the humans.

“They really are beasts,” Chen Cao thought inwardly.

He turned his gaze toward Flower Buddha and saw a bloodthirsty light burning in the man’s eyes as he waited for the gas grenade to detonate.

The trembling soil drew nearer and nearer. Everyone waited in silence.

Chen Cao’s mind raced with possibilities. What if the grenade was a dud? If that happened, there would be no way for them to escape. At the same time, he could not help admiring Flower Buddha’s cunning. The man had silently used them as bait for the sole purpose of wiping out the entire swarm.

At last, there was a muffled boom. Soil sprayed in every direction.

Flower Buddha held his gun in one hand and pinched his nose with the other. “Cover your noses! Follow me out of here!”

No one dared hesitate. They all covered their noses and held their breath as they retreated behind Flower Buddha. Looking back toward the place where they had been standing, they saw countless shaggy heads suddenly burst from the earth. The sight made their scalps prickle.

Some of the hairy goblin babies crawled out squealing. Barely half a meter tall, they waddled on swollen bellies, staggering drunkenly from side to side before collapsing heavily onto the ground like diseased rats.

Others sprang out of the earth, only to crash back down almost immediately, unconscious and senseless. Still more goblin babies realized the danger ahead and leaped out anyway, only to be attacked and savagely bitten by the poisoned creatures already driven mad by the gas.

The enraged victims fought back with all their strength. The goblin babies’ bloodthirsty nature erupted in full force. For a time, the ground ran red. Hairy limbs and torn organs flew through the air, while the stench of blood filled the jungle and turned the stomach.

By then, the group had already retreated a considerable distance, but the sight of the goblin babies tearing one another apart remained vivid in their minds.

Flower Buddha was clearly delighted by the result. He patted Chen Cao on the shoulder and laughed.

“Let’s go, Chen. The danger has been dealt with for now, but the natives will catch up with us soon!”

He entered the jungle first, his voice filled with the satisfaction of revenge.

Chen Cao had watched the poison gas spread through the goblin babies, driving them mad until they slaughtered one another. His stomach churned violently. Kalisa had vomited until she was too weak to stand, and Wu Ji was barely able to support her.

Lu Tianming stood there in a daze, unable to speak. He could not believe that the creatures that had chased him and Stanley into such a wretched state, creatures that had nearly made them their meal, had been dealt with so easily by Flower Buddha.

Only Stanley’s eyes shone with excitement. He muttered under his breath, “Serves you right! That’s what you get for biting me! That’s what you get!”

Looking at everyone’s expressions, Chen Cao said darkly, “All right. Let’s go.”

He followed Flower Buddha into the jungle. The others hurried after them. No one dared take the chance that a few surviving goblin babies might come rushing out and sink their teeth into them.

The group did not dare linger in the jungle. Flower Buddha was now their only guide. He moved ahead with his submachine gun, clearing a path. Clearly familiar with the route, he encountered no obstacles along the way.

Chen Cao brought up the rear. Stanley, the only other able-bodied worker besides Chen Cao and Flower Buddha, moved back and forth through the group, helping the others along. Their pace was not slow.

Even so, Chen Cao felt increasingly uneasy about how smoothly everything was going. The more effortless the journey became, the less careless one could afford to be. That was something Horizon Duan had taught him during his special training.

He glanced behind them and, seeing nothing unusual, moved forward until he was walking alongside Flower Buddha.

“I want to know why you’re so familiar with this route.”