Su Wan gasped, sucking in a cold breath, the sight of her flesh melting on the back of her hand making her scalp tingle.
She abruptly looked up.
A crimson spider was closing in from above the broken stair railing!
"Run!" Xiao Han cursed, pulling Su Wan to him.
The two had just retreated from the basement filled with ammunition, climbing the dark, damp stairs, and before they had fully returned to the surface, they ran head-on into the monster.
At the stairwell, a spider slowly approached them.
This one was a few sizes smaller than the ones they encountered below, entirely crimson, with a strange red pattern on its back that glowed ominously in the dim light.
Its eight beady compound eyes glowed faintly green, locked onto them.
Su Wan's heart tightened abruptly.
This red spider might not have been the largest, but the dangerous aura it emitted far surpassed any they had encountered before.
It was a killing intent so condensed it made the air feel viscous.
"Die!" Xiao Han roared, raising his gun and firing.
Most of the bullets hit the afterimage where the spider had just been, with only a few grazing its crimson carapace, sparking but failing to harm it in the slightest.
The spider's reaction speed was incredibly fast; the moment the gun fired, its seemingly slow body suddenly swayed, leaving an afterimage, and the bullets embedded themselves with a thud into the wall behind, kicking up a shower of debris.
"Damn it! This thing's become a spirit!" Xiao Han's face was grim.
The spider didn't retreat; instead, it was enraged, letting out a sharp hiss, its eight long legs intertwining, its speed suddenly increasing as it transformed into a red blur and pounced!
"Su Wan, get back!" Xiao Han roared, twisting his wrist, and an invisible whirlwind suddenly formed in front of him, howling as it swept towards the red spider.
"Screech!"
The red spider shrieked piercingly as it was cut by the Wind Blade, its attack pausing slightly, but it quickly adjusted its posture, its crimson body swaying in the wind, its eight green eyes glowing with even fiercer malice.
The Wind Ability could only temporarily restrain it!
Su Wan raised her knife, intending to charge, but the spider immediately broke free of Xiao Han's control and flashed to the side.
"Su Wan! What the hell are you doing?! Are you rushing to your death with that knife?!" Xiao Han's veins bulged on his forehead, his voice hoarse as he roared, "This damn thing is too fast, my Wind Ability is for control! Use the gun to blow its head off! Is your knife for filing your nails?!"
His wind was for control, for restraint, not for absolute lethality.
"I don't know how to use it!" Su Wan yelled back.
She had barely touched a toy gun growing up.
Now, she was supposed to use a real one, in such a tense moment, to shoot a monster as fast as a ghost?
She was afraid of missing, afraid of wasting bullets, and even more afraid of accidentally hurting Xiao Han.
"No time! Learn!" Xiao Han roared, his gun firing another rapid burst, trying to force the spider back.
"Safety! Flip it down! Open it!"
"Pull the bolt! Pull it all the way back then let go! Chamber a round!"
"Raise it! Don't shake! Three points in a line! Aim for its head and blast it!"
Xiao Han's words came out like a rapid-fire cannon.
Su Wan took a deep breath and pulled out the heavy submachine gun from her space.
Her fingers were stiff with tension as she fumbled for the cold small lever, pushing it down hard.
Next was pulling the bolt; she mimicked Xiao Han, using all her strength to pull it back, but the first time, due to incorrect force and angle, she only pulled it halfway.
"Harder! Pull it all the way back then let go!" Xiao Han roared.
Su Wan gritted her teeth and pulled again, and with a "click," the bolt reset, and a bullet finally chambered.
The red spider seemed to sense a new threat; its several green eyes turned towards Su Wan, radiating icy killing intent.
It suddenly broke free, tearing a gap in Xiao Han's wind restraint, and its sharp chelicerae lightning-fast stabbed towards Xiao Han's side waist!
"Xiao Han!"
"Don't mind me! Shoot! Hit it!" Xiao Han roared, his body awkwardly leaning back, narrowly avoiding a fatal blow, but his arm was scraped by a spider leg, leaving a deep wound that exposed bone, and blood instantly gushed out.
She abruptly raised her arm, the dark muzzle of the gun pointing at the red monster that was pouncing again. There was no time to aim, no time to think. It was now!
"Die, monster!!" She shrieked, pulling the trigger hard!
"Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!" Continuous gunshots echoed wildly in the stairwell, spent casings clattered to the ground, and the smell of gunpowder instantly permeated the air. She fired most of the bullets in the magazine in one go, the muzzle shaking wildly, most of the bullets hitting the walls and floor, sending debris flying.
"Where the hell are you shooting?!" Xiao Han clutched his arm, leaning against the wall, breathing heavily, his face pale. Ignoring his wound, he roared, "Steady! Aim at it! Don't you dare waste bullets!!"
The red spider was enraged by the dense gunfire, or perhaps it sensed the threat; its attack, which had been aimed at Xiao Han, paused, and its eight green eyes, filled with bloodthirsty malice, abruptly changed direction and rushed straight towards Su Wan! Its sharp chelicerae gleamed coldly in the dim light, bringing a fishy-smelling wind, aiming directly for Su Wan's throat!
The threat of death was imminent, Su Wan's mind went blank, but her body moved faster than her thoughts. She instinctively raised the muzzle, her arm trembling violently from extreme tension, unable to achieve the "three points in a line." She simply aimed at the blurry red shadow and pulled the trigger again!
"Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!!"
One of the bullets, grazing the spider's carapace, unexpectedly hit one of its eight compound eyes, bursting out a small blob of dark green fluid!
"Screech—!!"
The red spider let out a shriek more piercing than ever before, its body trembled violently, and its attack abruptly stopped. Although not fatal, the intense pain in its eye temporarily threw it into confusion.
"Good job! Now!" Xiao Han's eyes lit up. Enduring the severe pain, he abruptly raised his hand, and a Wind Blade, condensed to the extreme, suddenly formed and shot out like a sharp arrow, fiercely striking the head of the red spider, which had just been slowed by its eye injury!
"Pfft!"
The Wind Blade precisely sliced open the spider's head, and a mixture of dark green and red fluids, along with brain matter, instantly splattered out, staining half the wall. The ferocious red spider was now twitching on the ground.
On its not-so-large head, a huge, bone-deep gash was clearly visible. Its eight legs thrashed wildly a few times, then finally stopped moving completely.
She dropped the hot gun and rushed over to support Xiao Han. Xiao Han looked at Su Wan, then at the spider on the ground, and grinned, wanting to laugh but his wound twitched: "You just shot wildly, and you actually managed to hit the mark... cough cough... still somewhat useful. Next time, don't you dare shoot randomly again."
Su Wan dropped the hot gun and rushed over to support him: "How are you?"
His arm was a bloody mess, and the corroded area on the back of Su Wan's hand also began to blacken, with waves of numbness spreading through it.
"Damn it, this ghost's blood is also problematic." Xiao Han looked at the spider's corpse on the ground, then at Su Wan's hand, "We need to get out of here quickly."
Su Wan dug out a fist-sized crystal core from the monster's head, more than twice the size of an ordinary spider's crystal core. The two found Lu Shiyan and A Mo, and Lu Shiyan had already fainted.
The SUV's engine roared lowly as A Mo drove, bumping along the dark, abandoned street.
Xiao Han leaned back in the seat, blood still seeping from his arm wound, staining the makeshift bandage.
Su Wan took out the first-aid kit from her space and began to treat Xiao Han first.
The sting of the disinfectant made Xiao Han groan, his arm muscles tensing.
Su Wan lowered her head, carefully cleaning his torn flesh, her movements a little clumsy.
His wrist bone protruded, and veins were faintly visible beneath his skin.
After treating Xiao Han, Su Wan finally looked at her blackened hand, the corrosive pain coming in waves.
She silently cleaned, applied medicine, and bandaged it.
In every dangerous situation today, she had felt so passive and powerless. Lu Shiyan was distracted and injured because of her, still unconscious; Xiao Han and A Mo were also covered in wounds from covering her.
This wasn't a matter of "causing trouble"; this was the cruel law of survival in the apocalypse.
The weak were burdens, liabilities.
Her space had upgraded, her power had grown stronger, but what did it matter? She didn't even know the most basic combat techniques, used a gun terribly, and even in that urgent moment just now, couldn't even manage the simplest aim, practically hitting the target by sheer luck to escape.
No. She absolutely could not continue like this.