Chapter 69: Under the umbrella of the odor
Translator: Letty / Editor: DarkGem / Jello
Chang looked around in the ruin for a while, and found the half of the millipede that was charred. The power of the missile blew up its hard shell and separated it into two parts. The fire extinguished most of its bodily fluids, making the remaining more viscous.
“It seems like it was killed, but I don’t want to confirm whether it is dead or not.” Chang stared at the corpse that hung onto the tree.
Qing Shui rolled up and wiped off the nosebleed, “Fortunately, there weren’t too many pieces of shrapnel that got blown to where I was, otherwise, I would have died.”
“Good for you...but that man had bad luck.”
One soldier pointed at the wounded soldier who was carried by Qing Shui before the explosion – the shower of shrapnel killed him.
His death reminded Chang of Jing. He immediately turned around, but only saw Pangzi lying on his stomach.
His back was bruised and lacerated from the shockwave of the missile, and half of his hair on the back of his head was burnt. He seemed like he was right under the center of the explosion. What was even worse was that Jing was nowhere to be found.
“Pangzi, Pangzi!...” Chang pushed Pangzi fretfully, as he asked with great concern “Can you hear me? Where is Jing?”
“Ah...” Pangzi was awoken by Chang and was barely able to lift his eyelids. He took a while to digest what had happened in the last few minutes, and he revealed what he had been covering– Jing. “She is fine, but I feel like I am gonna die.”
Pangzi sat up and stretched his hands to touch the back of his head and lightly touched his skin “I probably got a concussion from the shock. My head keeps buzzing. Oh and the tinnitus! Ah! If the missile exploded even one meter closer to us, I am not sure if the monster would get blown up or not, but I am positive that none of us could have endured that explosion.”
“I am sorry... I didn’t know we were so close to the target...” Realizing the missile caused irreversible damage to everyone, the soldier apologized to the troop.
“Don’t worried, be glad that your missile eliminated that millipede, otherwise we would have died in a different way.” Ming Yi comforted that soldier with a light laugh. Apparently, his skin was so solid that only 2 or 3 pieces of shrapnel sliced his body, and there was almost no visible wound.
“I wish I had your body!” Pangzi smacked Ming Yi’s chest, “we should have asked to fight it one on one, so that we don’t need to be in such a tight spot.”
“Come on, I can be easily killed by it.” Ming Yi joked back.
However, the troop strived through the disaster, and without further delay, they set off again to Zhengzhou.
Now there were only 9 people left.
Almost everyone teetered forward, as they didn’t know if they were the ones to die next. The fear and insecurity haunted them, but the hope of getting saved in Zhengzhou kept them alive.
“Don’t worry everyone, it wasn’t a bad thing that we ran into that millipede.” Qing Shui tried to encourage the troop lightheartedly.
“Yeah, sure, it wasn’t a bad thing. Without the wounded, we can even speed up.” Someone in the troop taunted. Apparently, people became more aggressive when they were in deep fear.
“I didn’t mean that.” Qing Shui didn’t take that person’s attitude seriously, instead, he explained “I was talking about that heavy smell from the millipede, don’t you think that odor should have covered the smell of blood?”
“So what?”
“Well, it is beneficial in many ways. First of all, we’d be much safer if the blood smell is not giving out our location. Secondly, that millipede looks like a top predator in this jungle, if we smell like it...” Qing Shui laughed happily “the smell has become our umbrella.”
“That doesn’t sound too bad!” Chang sniffed the millipede’s body fluid on his cuff and said, “Should have rubbed my shirt on it haha!”
“What a joke, Chang! You know I can’t laugh too hard, it hurts my back.” Pangzi was relieved by Chang’s jest, he lightly scratched his back, hoping that it could reduce the pain on his back.
Under the protection of millipede’s smell, the nine joked and teased at each other along the way.
As the sun moved toward the horizon, they were finally close to the end of the journey – Zhengzhou.
“We are almost there! Come on!” Qing Shui calculated the remaining distance while speeding up.
The destination was right in front of them, and the troop resisted the fatigue to trot faster. The sky got darker and darker in another half an hour, the visibility dropped sharply, and while everyone paced up again, Chang heard the footsteps of Satan.
That familiar rustle sound.
It was exactly what they heard a few hours ago, Chang never forgot what it brought.
“Millipedes! There are more than 1 this time!”
“What the hell? Do they think we are one of them?” As Chang spoke, some soldiers dropped their weapons immediately and ran as fast as they could towards the end of the Zheng Kai Avenue. They could have died there if they didn’t have that rocket launcher, but now, there were a few coming altogether. The destination was so close that added onto the fear of the millipede, it made everyone choose to flee instead of fight. Every single person, including Chang, Qing Shui and Ming Yi, bolted out. Jing was held by Chang with both his arms as they bumped along the Avenue.
The gap between EMs was clearly shown.
Ming Yi, as expected, was faster than anyone in the troop. He jumped up and down like a monkey, and soon disappeared in the jungle ahead.
Chang tightly followed Ming Yi, the stronger physique and better vision allowed him to avoid obstructions in the forest in advance. Although he carried Jing with him, he wasn’t much slower than Ming Yi.
And the third in the troop turned out to be Qing Shui. He was visibly weaker than those elite soldiers, but he was far ahead of those people. As if every step he took had undergone sophisticated calculation, he precisely avoided those slippery mosses and stout vines. He always stepped on wherever was easy and safe to take the next step. Although his vision was as normal as the others, he seemed like he had a sensor installed to tell him what and how to avoid. To be more accurate, the way he ran seemed like he had taken this route countless times, it was all natural for him.
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