Chapter 68: Death of the Utmost Consular Officer
Translator: Pluto Editor: Tehrn
The entire sky was now hidden from view. They could hear the cacophony of their own heavy breaths and their footsteps as they ran as fast as they could between the building with Lin Sanjiu leading the way. Their goal was to reach the vehicles. Once they get their vehicles, they could pick up Fang Dan and Hai Tianqing and escape from Oasis!
From the ground to the sky, the current scenario could be split into three layers.
The top layer was made of many duoluozhongs. They were flying above Lin Sanjiu’s group and following them, but they were unable to swoop down and attack the people below as there was a gigantic silver net between them and the humans below.
If they slowed down to look at that net carefully, they would realize that it was made of random paraphernalia: a broken brick, a torn insulation blanket, a ladle from the canteen, a metal grille… They were all junk items, but they all had a silver sheen like the well-polished edge of a katana.
The brown rabbit held on to Lin Sanjiu’s combat pants with two paws. His furball-like body bounced in tandem with Lin Sanjiu’s pace. He looked up at the gigantic net above them and yelled out, “It’s almost ready!”
Without even looking up, Lin Sanjiu snapped her fingers. The items which made up the silver net immediately dispersed, they shot upward toward the duoluozhongs, each leaving a silver trail like those of a meteor streak. The duoluozhongs did not even bat an eye. Their excited screeches became even sharper — they were not afraid of that rubbish! Without the net, it was even easier for all of them!
That common thinking was disproved in half a second. A piece of rag with the hardness of a diamond, rotating at a very high speed, sliced off one of the wings which belonged to a duoluozhong. In shock, it let out a screech before it crashed downward as it lost control. It fell toward a pile of “rubbish”. Its body was instantaneously shredded into bits and explosion of blood and ground flesh erupted in mid-air.
“Fantastic! Do it again!”
While the brown rabbit cheered excitedly, the roof of several of the dormitories broke into pieces, almost a thousand parts, consisting of bricks, tiles, and wood showed a familiar silver sheen and rapidly replaced the gaps in the net.
Marcie was inspired by Chen Jinfeng’s ability when she described this ability to Lin Sanjiu. After Lin Sanjiu’s Pygmalion Choker was activated, she could feel a slight warmth from under the bandages on her neck. Compared to Chen Jinfeng who could only control a limited number of items simultaneously, Lin Sanjiu’s extremely high Potential Growth Value meant that she could control nearly one thousand weaponized items at the same time. That also meant that the lethality of the ability in her hands was far beyond that of Chen Jinfeng.
“I didn’t know you were that powerful…” Xu Xiaoyang was just behind Lin Sanjiu. The girl petite face was now pale, perhaps from all that running or even because she was scared by Lin Sanjiu. Griselda was running beside Xu Xiaoyang, carrying Professor Bai on her back. Professor Bai was dumbfounded as she looked up at the sky.
Lin Sanjiu sighed dejectedly. The disparity between feeling like a superhero for 5 minutes and a weak sh*t for the remaining 1435 minutes within a 24-hour period was really too great, she couldn’t help feeling that it was bad for her heart. As she thought about time, she suddenly asked, “Hu Changzai, how many more minutes do I have?”
Marcie was carrying Hu Changzai on her back as his running speed was really behind everyone. His face was red and flustered as he replied, “You have exactly 4 minutes. We are reaching soon, we can make it in time!”
They could indeed see the empty lot where the vehicles were right ahead. Without 12’s key, they could retrieve two vehicles. Thankfully, Marcie’s bus was large, so they probably had enough space for everyone.
“Huh?”
Once Lin Sanjiu reached her truck, she scanned her surroundings and saw something which stunned her for a moment. The few people running behind her also noticed what she saw. The back of her truck was opened, the door was slightly ajar. There were a few mineral water bottles on the ground and a packet of crushed instant noodle with a footprint on it.
The packet of instant noodle was right in the middle of a puddle of fluid. “Pitter-patter. Pitter-patter.” Drops of blood trickling down from the small gap between the opened doors hit the plastic packaging of the instant noodle.
Lin Sanjiu eyes were glued on the gruesome state of Voley’s corpse for a few seconds before she suddenly covered her mouth. Marcie quickly rushed beside her, and when she saw that sight, her expression changed immediately, “It’s 12!”
From the methods used, it was clear that the murderer was none other than 12. Multiple organs in the body have all been slit open. Lin Sanjiu knew that she didn’t have time to waste so she bore with the wave of nausea and pulled the body off the truck and indicated for Marcie to throw Hu Changzai’s protest. After that, she heaved a sigh. “The visa was issued to Voley, so the Consular Officer must be someone else!”
Even though she came to that conclusion, she knew that this was not the time to think about the matter regarding the Consular Officer. She only had 3 minutes and 20 seconds before her Pygmalion Choker went into cooldown mode again. Seeing that everyone in both vehicles already settled down, Lin Sanjiu closed the door of her truck, pulled out her key and started the engine. She stepped on the accelerator and sped toward where Fang Dan was. She did not need to swerve to avoid the obstacles as everything in front of them were weaponized and added to the net, opening a clear path for the two vehicles.
With the gigantic net she had set up, Fang Dan and Hai Tianqing should be safe for now. Before even half a minute passed, the brown rabbit which was on her shoulder suddenly bounced up, “That’s Hai Tianqing! I see Hai Tianqing!”
She could also see Hai Tianqing, with his hill-like physique, sitting up. Beside him, there was a woman lying on her side. Lin Sanjiu braked sharply, and the truck came to a screeching halt. The brown rabbit stumbled and crashed into the windscreen. That nearly made his nose crooked, he crawled up and cursed noisily. But when he turned to look at Lin Sanjiu, he noticed her sheet-white face.
“What wrong, seen a ghost?“ the brown rabbit whispered as he turned back to the front to look.
That woman — the person who had been later identified as a traitor by the announcer — Fang Dan, was leaning against Hai Tianqing’s arm. She laid motionless, with her eyes wide opened. A large patch of blood spread out from her stomach, and there was a black knife handle sticking out of the wound. As the knife was too deep in her body, Lin Sanjiu took a few seconds to recognize what the murder weapon was. Her hands and legs shivered as she opened the door and got off her truck. Subsequently, Marcie, Hu Changzai, and Xu Xiaoyang also stepped out.
They could hear the vague sounds of screaming humans on the verge of death coming from far corners of Oasis; they could also smell the stench in the air as the duoluozhongs flapped their wings; they could feel the sand in the wind. Then, almost as if emerging from a deadly silence, Lin Sanjiu walked toward Fang Dan’s body in a daze.
“Don’t come any nearer!” Hai Tianqing suddenly yelled out angrily, he looked as if he was about to stand up but he didn’t move.
Lin Sanjiu felt some sand stuck to her face as a gust of wind blew past. When she reached to dust her face, she realized that she had been crying. She wiped her face and eyed Hai Tianqing coldly, “Did you kill her?”
Hu Changzai’s voice was also trembling when he said, “Executive Hai… Why did you… I thought we had already discussed…”
“I didn’t kill her!” Hai Tianqing pounded the ground with his fist, at the same time a nearby wall vibrated due to the tremor. “Brother Hu, quick! Come over here! You don’t know, but the murderer is that woman!”
Hai Tianqing pointed at Lin Sanjiu with his thick index finger.
“At that time, I was only half-conscious, so I didn’t wake up. Fang Dan appeared to have seen someone she knew. After that, I heard her calling that person ‘Xiao Jiu’. She continued with a question, asking, ‘Why isn’t Marcie and Hu Changzai with you?’ Then, I opened my eyes.” Hai Tianqing inhaled sharply. He shot a look of fury at Lin Sanjiu, “I saw her! She was the person I saw. She stabbed Fang Dan even before I could say a word but I fainted at that critical point...”
As if she was drenched by a bucket of icy water, Lin Sanjiu could not say a word as she gripped the sides of her combat pants tightly, her shoulder trembled violently. Knowing the truth, Marcie also had a very grim expression on her face. They knew that the person that killed Fang Dan was 12.
“Why did 12 kill her... they had nothing against each other…” Lin Sanjiu’s voice was muffled. For the second time, she felt a heat radiating from her pocket. It was so hot that her skin started feeling painful, so she reached for the visa numbly.
Another line of red words appeared at the bottom of the visa: “The Consular Officer of Hyperthermal Hell has died, all visa issued by the aforesaid person are now invalid.”
Lin Sanjiu and Marcie looked toward Hai Tianqing’s direction. At the same time, Hu Changzai was standing beside Hai Tianqing explaining that Lin Sanjiu had been with them all this time and assured that there was no way that Lin Sanjiu could duplicate herself and kill Fang Dan. He even got the brown rabbit and Xu Xiaoyang to be her witness. Hai Tianqing was still doubtful, but when he saw the item in Lin Sanjiu’s hand he shouted out again, “No, it’s really her!”
“That woman looked for Fang Dan and asked for that visa or something. Fang Dan laughed and said, ‘You actually found out that I have this useless ability.’ Next, Fang Dan gave that woman that same paper! Once the woman received the paper, she killed Fang Dan!” Hai Tianqing continued, “When she died, that woman suddenly cursed vulgarly and said, ‘So it’ll become invalid if she dies’, then she headed—”
Hai Tianqing finally realized the oddity of the entire situation. “Huh? That woman was heading for the main entrance of Oasis. Yet, all of you came from there…” He frowned, “the opposite direction.”
After she composed herself, Lin Sanjiu said, “I have an enemy. He knows how to shapeshift.”
When she spoke, her words seemed agonizing to her. “Hu Changzai, can you carry Fang Dan and place her in the truck? We can’t leave her here, she will be consumed by those duoluozhongs. We don’t have much time now. Let’s go!”
Before this, she had never placed such emphasis on those last two words.
She still had 1 minute, 56 seconds before the cooldown period of her Pygmalion Choker. Marcie did not move. Instead, she stopped Hu Changzai and passed him the bus key.
“Marcie, what are you doing?” Lin Sanjiu turned to her side and asked, feeling very uneasy.
After she said that, they heard a “Zzzt!” Marcie’s body suddenly began to fade like the image on an old television when the signal was bad.
“I need to leave first… Don’t worry, I’ll definitely make 12 pay for what he did,” Marcie said gently while smiling.