It was clear that Shen Ge had realized this far too late. On top of that, without his Red Mist Armor, he had no choice but to walk all the way to the banquet hotel.
Still, his original intention had been to test the feasibility of traveling through the Dream World. Besides, the research institute wasn’t too far from the hotel, so it was a good opportunity to check out the “final outcome” of this Dream Fragment.
Rain was drizzling from the sky, and the closer he got to the city center, the heavier it fell. Thunderclaps occasionally boomed overhead, and lightning split the sky, illuminating the dilapidated buildings on both sides of the road, making them look especially eerie.
After walking for nearly an hour, Shen Ge finally reached the city center—and immediately sensed something was off. Each district seemed to show a completely different scene.
Although everything was in ruins, with collapsed buildings everywhere, the architectural styles and neighborhood layouts were nothing like the Dajing he knew. Even though Shen Ge had already seen several versions of apocalyptic Rong City and Dajing during his previous trips through the Dream World, this was the first time he’d encountered a style that looked straight out of a post-apocalyptic shelter from those doomsday movies.
Shen Ge heard faint, strange noises coming from a bunker. Though the heavy rain made it hard to hear clearly, he still caught the sound. He walked over, amplified his strength, and yanked open the iron door—only to find the bunker crammed full of parasitic hosts, their bodies covered in fleshy petals and scorpion-like heads.
“Were these survivors hiding in the bunker who got infected by parasitic anomalies, or…” Shen Ge couldn’t help recalling the experimental records he’d seen in the underground lab on Sakura Island. The Sakura people had locked survivors in sealed rooms and released parasitic anomalies among them, turning everyone inside into mutated monsters for research material.
And this bunker didn’t have a single “living facility” in sight—it looked more like a prison for holding captives. The idea that it was used to store experimental subjects wasn’t too far-fetched.
Just then, the infected hosts inside noticed Shen Ge—a living, breathing human. The scent of fresh life instantly triggered a violent reaction among them, and they roared as they surged toward the door.
Shen Ge casually pulled the door shut. Although the sight of these infected hosts was quite shocking, he wasn’t the type to investigate every single suspicious detail he came across—especially since he had more important things to do right now.
Thump!
Thump! Thump!
After Shen Ge pulled the iron door closed, the infected hosts crammed against it began slamming into it wildly. The banging echoed through the rain-soaked ruins, carrying an inexplicable chill of dread.
Shen Ge had assumed that as long as he followed the original route, he’d reach the banquet hotel in no time. But now, with the city having changed so drastically, finding the hotel was no easy task.
Most of the buildings in the city center were in shambles, and the bunker walls and iron fences were full of gaps, as if a major battle had taken place.
The number of infected hosts and mutants was also growing. At first, they were mostly low-tier, but gradually, third- and fourth-tier anomalies began roaming around as well.
After crossing an old neighborhood, Shen Ge was completely “lost” in the city center. The surroundings had changed so much that finding the hotel seemed nearly impossible.
Just as Shen Ge activated his “Invisible + Traceless” traits and prepared to warp out through the Anomaly Domain, he noticed a very familiar building among the abandoned structures ahead—
Dajing’s “Spire.”
But this Spire looked different. Only seven or eight stories remained; the upper part had collapsed, even bringing down two adjacent buildings. Shen Ge had previously infiltrated the Spire from the lower levels, which was how he recognized this “landmark.”
The Spire was also surrounded by a thick wall ten meters high. The open area inside was packed with various infected hosts.
And on the back wall, fleshy monsters had grown, extending tentacles that reached out like an all-you-can-eat buffet, grabbing infected hosts and stuffing them into gaping maws on the wall. After “digesting” the hosts, the wall would grow new tumors, and fresh fleshy tentacles would sprout.
The Spire had collapsed to the right, crushing several buildings and creating a mountain of rubble.
Shen Ge had planned to head straight to the Spire, find a hidden spot, and exit this space, while also checking which original building the Spire corresponded to. But just then, he noticed a figure flash past near the “rubble mountain”—so fast that he almost thought he’d imagined it.
He walked toward the rubble mountain and found the entrance blocked by dozens of abandoned car frames, arranged like a defensive barrier made of scrap metal.
Rain poured down, and water flowed along the slopes on both sides, forming a small “lake” below. Shen Ge noticed that beneath the car frames, a water-collection device had been set up, channeling rainwater into a pipe on the side of the rubble mountain.
“Huh?”
Could there be survivors here?
Water and food were the two most scarce resources in the apocalypse, and rainwater-collection setups like this weren’t uncommon. So Shen Ge’s first thought was that there might be something hidden beneath this “rubble mountain”—perhaps survivors living there.
Earlier, while trying to rescue Wang Han from the Dream World, Shen Ge had used the power of the Dream Fragments to scan and had detected numerous life forms across countless fragments.
Of course, not all of those life forms were necessarily “human.” And since anomalous energy was a negative force meant to destroy humanity, the most common “outcome” was a world where humanity had already gone extinct.
Just as Shen Ge was about to use Collapse to probe whether there was something beneath the rubble mountain, he heard a loud crash from a nearby building.
BOOM!
With dust billowing into the sky, an abandoned building collapsed. A massive figure strode toward Shen Ge’s position. It stood at least seven or eight meters tall, its skin a dark gray, covered in spikes several meters long. It had a humanoid shape, but its hunched, knuckle-walking posture looked just like a giant gorilla.
The mutant’s blood-red eyes locked onto Shen Ge’s location, and it headed straight for him, crushing buildings underfoot along the way. It was a sight straight out of a tokusatsu monster movie.
The mutant charged in, swinging its massive arm in a wide arc, its giant hand reaching for Shen Ge. Fortunately, Shen Ge had been prepared. Although he didn’t have the mobility of the Red Mist Armor, his Immovable Anomaly Domain’s “bullet time” effect made dodging easy enough.
“System, scan!”
Shen Ge had long grown used to the system malfunctioning in the Dream World. Especially this time—the monster was right in front of him, and the system hadn’t given a single alert.
Though the system was “broken,” at least the paid features still worked. After deducting his system points, a screen projected the data for the monster before him.
“Whoa, a Tier-5 mutant!” Shen Ge knew that any mutant appearing in the Dream World wouldn’t be a pushover—the baseline was Tier-5.
Without the Red Mist Armor, Shen Ge’s biggest problem was losing his “Health Bar Backpack,” which held all his valuables—including his butcher knife, “Indestructible.” In other words, aside from his traits and stat boosts, he didn’t have many ways to deal with a mutant.
But Shen Ge didn’t feel like burning through anomalous energy for a full stat boost just to have a brawl with a Tier-5 mutant right now.
For one thing, mutants weren’t as appealing to him as anomalies. Even if he let the system scavenge them, mutants gave lower rewards than anomalies.
Besides, for Shen Ge, only “trait-type” anomalies were truly valuable.
Unfortunately, trait-type anomalies were rare and hard to come by. Any single one of them could become a world-ending threat in a given “outcome.”
Aside from energy-draining stat boosts, there were only two ways to quickly deal with the mutant in front of him: one was to rely on “Misfortune” and try his luck—maybe he’d get a meteor strike to take out the mutant like some legendary hero. The other was to redirect the threat—lure a high-tier anomaly nearby and let the two fight it out while he watched from the sidelines.
After a brief thought, Shen Ge chose the second option. He summoned the system for a scan of the surroundings while using Invisible Barriers as stepping stones to launch himself toward the mutant. Even if there were high-tier anomalies nearby, he’d need to keep the mutant’s aggro locked on him to successfully lead it over.
Thump, thump, thump!
Shen Ge leaped into the air using invisible platforms, and with “bullet time” helping him, he quickly landed on the mutant’s shoulder. As soon as he deactivated his Immovable Anomaly Domain, the mutant lost track of him for just a second—but soon locked onto his life signature and realized he was standing on its shoulder.
The mutant slapped its shoulder hard—smack!—but missed. Shen Ge moved like a gymnast, sliding down along the spikes on its chest toward its torso—
Heart Strike!
Shen Ge used his Anomaly Domain to penetrate the mutant’s thick hide and attack its insides, but the expanded domain was soon blocked by the mutant’s own anomalous energy.
Forcing through wasn’t impossible, but Tier-5 against Tier-5 would cost him at least half his energy. In the end, he might as well have just boosted his stats and fought hand-to-hand.
By then, the system had finished its scan. Shen Ge glanced at the 【Map】 and saw quite a few hidden high-tier anomalies nearby—but most of them, like the mutant earlier, were lying low to avoid detection by rivals or higher-tier beings.
Shen Ge locked onto the location of the nearest high-tier anomaly, then leaped downward. The mutant reached for him, but Shen Ge blocked the grab with a condensed Invisible Barrier.
After landing, he rolled to break his fall and sprinted toward an old building. The mutant gave chase, but Shen Ge darted straight inside.
“Grrrr!”
“ROOOAR—”
The mutant let out an enraged roar, then kicked over a building in frustration—only to have several terrifying anomalies scramble out from the wreckage. And as the mutant approached, the rubble pile it had just toppled began to rise with a rumble, revealing a gigantic pitch-black rat!
The rat looked just like the “Rat-zilla” from Li Xiang’s failed experiment. Although it was only Tier-4, it stood a head taller than the mutant.
The mutant and the anomaly, upon seeing each other, both wanted to convert the other into anomalous energy. Within moments, they were locked in combat. The mutant’s spikes could fire off like a “porcupine man,” each one hitting with the force of a heavy ballista, while the “Rat-zilla’s” hide could tank cannon shells—let alone mere ballista bolts.
That was the key difference between mutants and anomalies. A mutant’s abilities came from anomalous cells inside its body—how could that compare to the real, raw power of an anomaly? That was exactly why mutants always ranked a tier lower than their anomalous counterparts.
The battle between the mutant and the anomaly grew fiercer. With both of them at that level, it would take a while to determine a winner. Everywhere they went, city blocks were instantly flattened.
And this massive commotion not only “drew out” numerous hidden anomalies and mutants—it even “drew out” a group of people.
Shen Ge noticed a group of heavily armed “people” emerging from a ruined building near the rubble mountain. They seemed to be taking advantage of the chaos to scavenge for resources.
Most of them wore the uniform of Dajing’s Anti-Anomaly Forces, but the clothes were worn and tattered, patched up countless times—as if they’d been fighting here for decades.
“There really are ‘living people’ here.” Finding living people in the Dream World was the biggest surprise and delight for Shen Ge.
It seemed that in many “outcomes,” humanity hadn’t been entirely wiped out. Shen Ge was curious—how exactly had Earth defined “destruction” and “restart” before?
Shen Ge quietly followed them and noticed they had very clear division of labor. Some kept watch on the battle between the mutant and the anomaly, and if it even showed signs of shifting in a certain direction, they’d immediately signal the teams in that area to evacuate.
“These people seem to have been in this area for a long time—why are they still searching for supplies nearby?” Shen Ge found it odd, because he could tell they were genuinely looking for something.
After tailing a few more teams, Shen Ge suddenly heard a “familiar” voice among the crowd. It was a bit hoarse and weathered, but he recognized it as Fang Mingyue’s.
“Fang Mingyue” was also wearing the Anti-Anomaly soldier’s gear and a mask. After issuing orders for her team to split up and search, she headed alone toward the basement of an old building.
Shen Ge used Collapse to descend into the basement ahead of her, then hid in a concealed corner. When “Fang Mingyue” came close, he suddenly struck out, trying to subdue her.
He didn’t use any trait abilities. His average physical stats were now close to four times that of a normal person, and even though Fang Mingyue had professional training, she was no match for him.
But Shen Ge had clearly underestimated her. He completely overpowered her in strength and agility, but Fang Mingyue reacted extremely quickly. Even after he grabbed her arm, she tried a counter-grip to break free. If he hadn’t had the raw strength advantage, she might have actually gotten away.
“Don’t move!” Shen Ge said coldly.
Fang Mingyue shot back: “Who are you? I’m Fang Mingyue, leader of the 101 Search Team. Our life-sign detectors picked up a survivor nearby—I came to rescue them.”
“How do you prove your identity?” Shen Ge asked deliberately.
Fang Mingyue snorted. “We broadcast survivor-seeking messages across the city every month. If you came here after receiving our signal, you should know that.”
“Who’s to say you’re not luring survivors here just to kill them and take their supplies?” Shen Ge sneered.
Fang Mingyue snapped back angrily: “Our 101 Shelter used to be the Dajing Anomaly Response Support Division of the Great Celestial Dynasty. We’re regular military—how could we stoop to such disgraceful acts?”
“Anomaly Response Support Division? Never heard of it. I only know about the Great Celestial Dynasty’s ‘Special Event Management and Security Response Department,'” Shen Ge said.
