Apocalyptic Era: Starting from picking up a Bishoujo
Chapter 526 - 494 Strange Phenomenon Reappears 2

Chapter 526: 494 Strange Phenomenon Reappears 2

Tap, tap, tap...

The one who first heard those footsteps must have been me.

After I stopped moving, the cartographer first looked at me in confusion, then his expression changed slightly, gazing into the depths of the darkness beyond the reach of the light.

And Tan Xiang, who had already become as skittish as a startled bird, also stopped, looking at the cartographer and me with suspicion, whispering, "What’s going on..."

The cartographer placed his index finger against his lips. Seeing this, Tan Xiang swiftly closed his mouth, shrinking his body like a quail, looking around nervously.

Tap, tap, tap...

Before long, the footsteps came close enough for Tan Xiang to hear, and his face immediately turned rigid.

The cartographer silently raised his lantern high, as if accompanying the movement, the white light became brighter, and the illuminated area grew larger.

About ten meters away, a foot that seemed to have its skin peeled off, drenched in blood, stepped into the circle of light. With another step, the monster exposed its bloody terrifying body.

This was the same bizarre creature that the cartographer had previously pinned to the outer wall of the drop tower in the abandoned amusement park. Just like when we first met, its appearance seemed to have turned inside out, with fat and entrails all exposed and hanging from its body surface, seemingly touching the deepest taboo fears in the human mind. Encountering it in such a bizarre dark area made a chill run down one’s spine.

Tan Xiang took a step back, then, as if lost his balance, fell to the ground, his body trembling uncontrollably.

"Truly a haunting thing that lingers on."

The cartographer said, frowning, then glanced at Tan Xiang, "Good thing this anomaly’s first witness wasn’t him... No, he lacks any combat capability, so even if he was the first witness, its power wouldn’t increase by much.

"If I had become the first witness, things might have turned really bad. Although I’ve seen many anomalies, I still can’t erase my fear of these demons and ghosts."

He sighed gently, then said, "Compared to this, it seems that nailing it to the wall last time didn’t work. Nor does it look like it escaped on its own, and I don’t think it moved here through chaotic space by normal physical means.

"See, it’s completely unscathed, with no traces of being pierced by rebar or steel pipes. I think it might have ’refreshed’ itself here in some form. No wonder past victims couldn’t shake it off; if it were that simple to trap it and escape its pursuit, it wouldn’t have been such a hassle."

"Let me take care of it this time," I said, "After all, it’s the threat I brought, so I should take responsibility."

"What do you plan to do?" the cartographer was curious.

"Like this."

I summoned a fireball and hurled it at the distant creature.

Just like a flame encountering gasoline, the creature was immediately ignited.

This time, the fire I used was different from the one the first time I killed this monstrosity, with my earnest killing intent infused in it. If it only had an ineffectual undying nature, this strike would be enough to prevent it from resurrecting. Even certain Great Success Rank demon hunters, who pride themselves on having an Undying Body, would perish like ordinary creatures when encountering this flame.

The monster was reduced to ashes in the flames.

The cartographer couldn’t perceive the profoundness of this flame, merely commented indifferently, "This level won’t kill the anomaly... Anyway, I never intended to eradicate it completely from the start; after it resurrects, we’ll deal with it again.

"If worse comes to worst, we could try to forget about it. That way, it wouldn’t attack us again.

"It’s just a pity neither I nor my two companions have memory-related abilities, so we might have to wait for the frenzy to wash away your memories about this ordeal."

On the other side, Tan Xiang said in fear, "What on earth are these inexplicable monsters..."

"These are the Doomsday incarnations that destroyed human civilization... These are the things that messed up our world," the cartographer said with a sigh.

"Doomsday incarnations... So, they’re like zombies? Just like how zombies destroy the world in horror movies, our world was destroyed by these monsters?" Tan Xiang said incredulously, "These monsters aren’t all humans transformed, are they..."

The cartographer said wistfully, "Humans certainly do transform into monsters... But they’re not quite like what you’ve seen."

Perhaps limited by their perspective height, both the cartographer and Tan Xiang misunderstood one thing.

The Doomsday wasn’t brought by these anomalous creatures.

This is also the consensus of the Lushan Great Impermanence, including myself.

In the modern world, as the time draws closer to the prophesied Doomsday, the number of strange incidents increases. After reaching a critical point, demon hunting organizations like Luo Mountain can no longer serve as a firewall. The endless bizarre phenomena will overwhelm the mortal world like a breached dam, and human civilization cannot survive under this terrible tide.

Therefore, from the perspective of Doomsday survivors like the cartographer, human civilization is destroyed by the whims, and the Doomsday is inevitably brought by them.

But that’s not how it is. It is not that the more bizarre creatures there are, the more the Doomsday progresses; rather, the more the Doomsday progresses, the more bizarre creatures there are.

If the Doomsday is compared to a natural disaster, these endless strange creatures are like the insects and animals that sense the coming of earthquakes and tsunamis and frantically scurry out from the cracks in the tree shades. Just like us humans, the anomalies are also "victims" swept up by the Doomsday calamity.

To put it extremely, if just relying on massive amounts of strange creatures could lift the curtain of the Doomsday, then I would only need to spend a little effort to spread my flames across the planet’s surface, setting a rule that "all strange creatures must die." Besides that, nothing else would be harmed, and the Doomsday curtain would never be lifted from the beginning.

Even if I don’t take action, other Impermanence have their own methods, and the era of rampant strange creatures arriving can only be said to be a fool’s dream.

Therefore, in Liu Shuying’s Doomsday prophecy, when the Doomsday process reaches its final stage, not only humans will be destroyed under the great calamity, but all creatures, all monsters must be completely annihilated, and eventually, even all material things must turn to nothing.

This Doomsday is not the end of humans, but the end of the world.

Although this era is called the Doomsday Era, and the cartographer believes themselves to be in the Doomsday, the true Doomsday is still on its way.

After that bizarre creature was dealt with, the cartographer pulled Tan Xiang up from the ground, and then we continued moving in the dark.

Along the way, there were occasionally some strange creatures that rushed to attack us. They all looked bizarre and were terrifying and strange in their own ways.

In place of the cartographer who was not good at ranged attacks, I manipulated the flames to eliminate them all. Although I wanted to learn about the wonders of Doomsday monsters, it wouldn’t be good if the cartographer responsible for guiding us got into trouble. Therefore, I always acted immediately to prevent these strange creatures from using their eerie abilities.

Despite this, there were still a few unexpected incidents along the way, which I won’t elaborate on here.

"How strange, why is there so much danger along the way, it’s like we’re unlucky... It wasn’t like this before?" the cartographer muttered.

But after seeing all the monsters on the road eliminated, Tan Xiang relaxed a bit, looking at me with great envy.

I changed the subject, "Instead of this... Aren’t we there yet?"

"We should be close." The cartographer sighed, "By the way... Zhuang Cheng, you look like a Flame Ability User? Besides manipulating flames, do you have other powers?"

Perhaps because he felt closer to his base and companions, he became more eager to understand my capabilities as a stranger strong in power. I replied without hesitation, "I only have the ability to manipulate flames."

Although I also have powers like refining furnace residue and Power of Word Spirit, refining furnace residue is a soul-refining skill, which doesn’t sound good if spoken out; and the Power of Word Spirit can’t be used temporarily, so there’s no need to mention it.

And I’m not really lying, no matter how much power I acquire later, the core of my power is always "flame."

"They say one unique skill can take you far, your destructiveness is amazing, enough to handle many enemies, just like now," the cartographer said, "but you must be careful, the Flame Ability, though powerful, is not good at defense. Many strange creatures excel at surprise attacks, and just witnessing their figure or even hearing about them can cause fatal harm to humans.

"And certain sinister survivors wouldn’t distance themselves before attacking you, engaging in a fair duel, but instead, they would sneak up on you and unexpectedly take your life.

"Those who truly live long are always survivalists, not just those good at attacking. Never drop your guard just because of your strong power."

Perhaps because he thought I lost many memories, he took on the attitude of a senior trying to teach a newbie.

It had been a long time since anyone told me how a Flame Ability User should do things, the last time was when I chatted with Agent Kong. The cartographer couldn’t be said to be nitpicking, after all, he was advising me with good intentions.

After walking for quite some time, we arrived at a dark pedestrian street.

"The safe house is on this street; for the last small stretch, let’s stay vigilant," the cartographer said like a jungle guide.

Tan Xiang breathed a sigh of relief, his pace becoming much lighter. The cartographer slowed his pace, cautiously watching the surroundings, seemingly a bit puzzled.

Noticing this, Tan Xiang’s expression changed immediately, nervously asking, "Is there anything wrong nearby?"

"No, just feels a bit strange..." the cartographer said suspiciously, "So much time has passed, why hasn’t the strange creature from earlier resurrected to attack us?"

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.