"Who are you..." The young man’s words were cut off halfway, his face suddenly changed dramatically, "What’s your relationship with that entity?!"
"I don’t want to answer you." The mysterious girl said coldly, then raised her hand and made a squeezing gesture.
With a light "boom", the young man’s body exploded into a mist of blood, and then slowly dissipated.
Cheng Ming felt as if his brain had been struck, the whole world spun around... By the time the intense dizziness faded, the mysterious girl had completely vanished.
"Hey... hey?" Cheng Ming looked around, "Are you... are you still here?"
However, the only response he got was the suddenly trembling ground.
Cheng Ming looked up, only to see above the cavity, the millions of Fungus Puppets that had sealed off the entire sinking area were rapidly decomposing, turning into nothingness...
It was already noon, and beam after beam of sunlight pierced through the gaps among the puppet remnants, casting down onto the pit floor, forming countless blotches of light, leaving the giant creature’s body still intact, preserving a large shadow amidst the increasing patches of light.
"Is this the end?" Cheng Ming looked around somewhat helplessly, but soon noticed among the headshot Hunters, one person was still struggling slowly. He rushed over and squatted down beside him.
This person had been shot twice in the forehead, the upper half of his face was a bloody mess, but the two deformed bullets were lodged in the bone of his forehead, they hadn’t penetrated his head.
"Are you okay?" Cheng Ming touched the man’s arm, "Can you hear me?"
"Ow... pain, pain, pain..." The man groaned from his throat, trembling as he said, "I... I... there’s morphine in my pocket..."
Cheng Ming quickly took out a syringe from his pocket and jabbed it into his arm.
As the drug began to take effect, the man’s breathing gradually eased from rapid to steady, this Hunter slowly climbed up, tentatively stretched out a finger to touch the hanging piece of meat from his own forehead but immediately retracted it gritting his teeth.
"Damn it... Luckily my bones are tough, otherwise I’d be dead for sure..." The Hunter froze for a moment, suddenly realizing a crucial question, "By the way... what happened to that creature? Was it taken out?"
"Yes." Cheng Ming nodded, "Dead."
"You took it out?" The Hunter instinctively widened his eyes, but the movement tugged on his face wound, instantly making him hiss with pain.
"Yes." Cheng Ming thought, rather than painstakingly explaining the mysterious girl’s origin to everyone, he’d just lie to smooth things over — especially because he knew nothing about the mysterious girl’s origin. He only knew that during the train carriage incident, this ghost-like mysterious girl ’attached’ herself to him after saving him.
To Cheng Ming, "her" abilities seemed almost omnipotent... If "she" were a creature, then "her" danger level probably wouldn’t be lower than "Chimera 17" or "Eternal Night" types of creatures.
Cheng Ming didn’t know whether letting such an entity mingle in human society was right or wrong... But judging by the mysterious girl’s current behavior, she hadn’t shown any hostility towards humans... Not to mention during exchanges with her, her thinking was very human-like...
Could it be that this mysterious girl wasn’t a creature but a special type of infected?
Regardless, this mysterious girl clearly wasn’t willing to reveal her identity — Cheng Ming vaguely felt that if he leaked her existence, it might bring about an unimaginable disaster.
Cheng Ming wasn’t afraid to die, but he had people he cared about in this world, and that mysterious girl clearly knew who mattered to him.
Just as Cheng Ming thought about this in hindsight, he seemed to hear a faint laugh, like a response to his speculation from her.
"How... How did you do it?" Upon hearing Cheng Ming’s positive response, the Hunter was dumbfounded, "How did you take out that creature?!"
"It had just completed its metamorphosis, its body was still fragile, so it possessed a human. Its attack power was strong but its defense was virtually negligible." Cheng Ming said, "I fired a few shots, it died, and even the possessed Hunter’s body cracked open."
"Oh right." Cheng Ming stood up, drew his pistol, walked over to the ’cracked’ Hunter’s corpse, "I’ll shoot some more, just in case it comes back to life."
After speaking, he raised the gun, emptied the magazine onto the Hunter’s corpse.
This made it unclear whether the Hunter was shot dead before cracking or cracked open then shot some more.
The Hunter wanted to ask something more, but the sound of helicopter rotors was already coming from overhead, several thick ropes dropped to the pit floor, and over a dozen fully armed mercenaries slid down the ropes at once, landing at the bottom.
These mercenaries were evidently the private military of the three major families, their tactical skills and coordination were impeccable, forming a defensive formation immediately upon landing, surrounding Cheng Ming and the Hunter in the center.
Three minutes later, Chen Jing himself arrived at the pit bottom.
After hearing Cheng Ming’s account, Chen Jing walked near the cracked corpse, after examining it briefly he gestured behind him, four researchers wearing white protective suits promptly stepped forward, carefully packing the corpse into a transparent bag, then they placed the bag into the Eternal Freeze Coffin brought down by the helicopter.
"Clean up the area, don’t leave any traces." Chen Jing instructed his men, "Furthermore, place detection beacons at various parts of the creature’s body, monitor any changes in the body."
"Yes!"
"Understood!"
After arranging a series of cleanup tasks, Chen Jing came up to Cheng Ming and said, "This operation, you contributed the most, ninety percent of the Dubhe Tower reward will go to you, additionally the extra compensation we promised will be proportionally given this amount..."
"I get ninety percent alone?" Cheng Ming paused, "And what about those who died..."
"Compensation will be separately taken care of by the three families, you needn’t worry." Chen Jing patted Cheng Ming’s shoulder, "Moreover, a powerful figure wants to meet you."