The air was contaminated with the smell of rotting plants and the fishy stench of various mutated creatures. It flowed through the respiratory tracts and into the lungs of all the humans and posthumans in the city.
Under such circumstances, no one uttered a word even when they saw those wanted criminals, the female posthumans, running past them. Hundreds or even thousands of humans sprawled on the streets like dead bodies. Their almost-dead, listless eyes trailed the graceful footsteps of the posthumans until they finally revealed a tinge of envy.
Blood gushed out from their respiratory tract, making it impossible to breathe, yet they no longer had the strength to even cough. Occasionally, a few people would appear with milder radiation sickness. They would stumble through the streets covered with the bodies of the duoluozhongs and shout, "Save me!" before collapsing to the ground like toy blocks.
There were victims everywhere.
The soldiers who were fighting the women just moments before had already abandoned their mission and dispersed, trying to find a way to survive. Their anti-radiation suits were quite effective, giving them more time to live. Xueqin and the others were wounded and soaked in blood, but they couldn't care less. They ran through the streets and alleys and called for other possible surviving posthumans.
Facing death, all the residents finally went mad. Now and then, a man would appear holding a knife and an ax, brawling and screaming while he chopped up any living thing he saw. The people who hid in their anti-radiation shelters had already lost their sanity, crying loudly non-stop. A group of soldiers who were previously fighting against the female posthumans headed for the laboratories. They raided the place for medicines, burning some of the labs in the process. Some researchers, still wearing white coats, hung limply from the walls of the laboratories like pieces of beefy jerky.
Amidst the shrieks, the crying, the call for help, and the fires, far above the city, the glass window at the top floor of the black tower was blasted apart. Glass fragments fell from the sky, but nobody noticed.
The surrounding sound of devastation drowned out the posthumans' calls for their companions, leaving only murmurs. Lin Sanjiu composed herself as she looked down from the top of the black tower. The walls of the tower seemed to stretch downward with no end. She felt dizzy even with a single glance.
She forced herself to stand firm and watched the city below her again. Then, she noticed a few dots, like black ants, moving quickly through the city. After a while, the dots converged and headed toward the black tower. Judging from their speed, those were posthumans. Lin Sanjiu assumed that the others probably already guessed that she had accomplished her mission when they saw the glass globe disappearing before their eyes, so they quickly reassembled and flocked toward the black tower.
Lin Sanjiu's heart tensed up for a moment, and she quickly estimated the time she had. She sighed. She had no choice. Behind her, a segment of the floor had slid away, and a control desk had risen. That was the control desk which caused the disassembling of the radiation shield. The metallic support that held the console disappeared deep into the floor, and a rope was tied to it.
Lin Sanjiu looked behind her. She saw St. Peter staring at her with unblinking eyes. Nervous, she let out a laugh. "You went easy on me just now," she did not care whether St. Peter comprehended her words. She looked down at the three other Neuhumes who lay unconscious on the ground. She nodded at St. Peter and said, "Bring them away. I am also leaving."
St. Peter slowly stood up and carried his companions as if he understood what she had said. The wounds on his arms were torn open during their fight, so two of his arms were covered in blood. Blood dripped from his wounds, creating a small puddle on the floor.
Lin Sanjiu turned back and took one step closer to the edge again. Suddenly, she couldn't hear the sounds from the city below her. All she could hear was her pounding heart. She tightened the knot on her wrist and took a deep breath. She stuck the tip of her leg out—
The next second, Lin Sanjiu's body was in the air. She had leaped out from the window and was screaming involuntarily. Under the cyan skies at dawn, her body swooped downward like a small hawk. As she free-fell, the few seconds of weightlessness made her feel like her heart was about to leap out; the gushing air current caused by the air resistance hit her face and body. Her skin hurt, but she was suddenly overwhelmed by a refreshing feeling from her head to the tip of her toes that she had never felt before. She made a whooping sound and then started laughing uncontrollably.
The rope of a few hundred meters quickly reached its full length, stopping her fall abruptly. Lin Sanjiu was still a few stories away from the ground. Lin Sanjiu thought quickly and converted the rope into a card while she flexed her legs and leaped toward a nearby tree using her momentum.
There were a few cries of alarm from the ground as Lin Sanjiu grabbed a tree branch tightly. She swung off the excess of downward momentum before jumping to the ground with a thud.
"It's Xiao Jiu!"
"Miss Lin jumped down from the top!"
The women who were still some distance away were shocked by her antics, and there was a large commotion as they quickly ran over to Lin Sanjiu. Bai Xiaoke led the group as her escort ran behind, carrying Xueqin.
Lin Sanjiu caught her breath before she flashed a large grin at the people running toward her. Everyone was in quite a sorry state. All of them grinned widely, showing their white teeth despite their dirty and bloodied faces, making it hard to distinguish them. The women cheered and laughed. Considering the noise, Lin Sanjiu found it difficult to make out what the others were saying.
Gong Daoyi stood behind the group of ecstatic women and watched them quietly with his hands in his pockets.
"Alright, let's talk later," Lin Sanjiu gestured for the group to keep quiet. "We don't have much time now. There are only 20 minutes before this entire place is destroyed."
Indeed, after the radiation shield had been disabled, the next progression of the chain reaction was turning the city into ashes. Since Nüwa no longer wanted to continue this experiment, the humans living in the Garden of Eden were naturally useless to her.
Lin Sanjiu didn't have time to explain further. They needed to search and get as many resources from this place as possible before the self-destruction sequence started. After she briefed them quickly, the group was split into two teams and went about completing their tasks. One team was tasked with searching for food and daily necessities, while the other had to gather weapons and Special Items.
Xueqin was in the group now rushing to the Garden of Eden Laboratories. Bai Xiaoke's escort carried her behind while he ran beside Lin Sanjiu. After hesitating for a few seconds, Xueqin finally whispered, "What happened in the black tower? Where is Li Tao?"
Lin Sanjiu grimaced inward. Lin Sanjiu found it incredible that she managed to disable the radiation shield despite the perils.
At that time, when her Pygmalion Choker was activated, she was so dejected that she could pull out a clump of her hair.
'What shitty ability is this?! Can sneezing kill anyone? Is it powerful? Besides, St. Peter and the others do not have noses. They only have two nostrils!'
Even though she knew the ability was probably useless against them, Lin Sanjiu couldn't help trying her luck and testing it on them. She tried to use the ability on all four of them simultaneously, but they did not react. They didn't even cringe.
"Damn it!" she gnashed her teeth madly. "I can't believe I, Lin Sanjiu, will just die here—"
Before she completed her thought, she suddenly felt an irritation in her nose. An explosion of violent sneezes from herself interrupted her track of thought. In that split second, with her eyes closed, Lin Sanjiu was nearly hit by a sweeping punch. When she opened her eyes again, she cursed Hu Changzai repeatedly in her mind.
"So, I just have to think of a target, and the person will sneeze, no matter who it is? So, when I say my name, Lin Sanjiu—Achoo!"
She accidentally thought of herself again and started sneezing. She even started tearing up.
"How am I supposed to fight like this?" Lin Sanjiu grumbled to herself. At that moment, in that state, she immediately thought of an idea. She remembered that though Nüwa could verbally give orders to St. Peter, she sometimes only had to give him a look for him to understand.
For example, Nüwa did not say anything when she wanted the neuhumes to attack Lin Sanjiu, yet they certainly received her order. Lin Sanjiu was sure it was not like in novels where people had that sort of tacit understanding due to the strong rapport between them. 'Could it be that Nüwa was using some sort of psychic communication?'
Lin Sanjiu jumped, dodging Aristotle's attack. The excitement of this discovery made her palms feel a little numb. If her deduction was right, she just had to stop Nüwa's psychic connection.
When she thought of this, she realized that the attacks paused momentarily.
The combined attacks from the four sages were not as well-coordinated and timed as closely as before. Her opponents had missed four opportunities to attack her, even though it was an easy strike. Somehow, they stopped at a critical point, allowing Lin Sanjiu to evade their attacks with her preoccupied mind.
"Four times..." she repeated to herself, "I think I thought of Nüwa four times?"
Just when she finished mumbling, she saw Montesquieu in the air as if he was about to strike her. But he did nothing and just landed back on the ground.
Lin Sanjiu felt an electrifying feeling throughout her body. Without really thinking it through, she started laughing loudly. "Hu Changzai, good job! Nüwa, Nüwa, Nüwa!"
No matter how much Nüwa despised humans, she was one herself; Lin Sanjiu just needed to think about her, and no matter where she was, she would sneeze!
When humans sneezed, there was no way they could process any cognitive thought! She could not communicate and send her order telepathically with her thoughts interrupted. The neuhumes would only resume attacking when Nüwa recovered and reconnected with them psychically.
A sneeze might be short, but Lin Sanjiu could make Nüwa sneeze non-stop. When these short few seconds of sneezes were chained up to make five minutes, it didn't matter how physiologically superior or how good the neuhumes were at combat. They certainly posed no threat to her if they were not attacking.
It took a short time for Lin Sanjiu to defeat three neuhumes, except St. Peter. Then, she stopped her sneezing attack. St. Peter looked around him and finally instinctively inserted a key into a keyhole on the floor. The tile on the floor shifted, and a control desk rose.
There was a screen on the control desk, and when Lin Sanjiu switched on the console, the screen lit up with a 'snap.' Nüwa appeared on the screen. Her nose was red, and her eyes were teary. "That's too primitive..." After a few minutes of extreme sneezing, Nüwa's deep, calculating, and enigmatic image disappeared. She spoke nasally, "What sort of method is this?!"
"It's none of your business. It worked, right?" Lin Sanjiu replied rascally.
"Alright... Don't blame me for not saying this." Nüwa squeezed her nose and continued with a buzzing voice, "After 25 minutes, the self-destruction sequence of this place will be initiated. If you want to escape, you better hurry."
Lin Sanjiu was a little surprised. She narrowed her eyes and asked suspiciously, "Why would you be so kind to tell me this? I'm also a human that you hate."
Nüwa placed her hand down and smiled faintly. The screen went black without warning. Nüwa left without even a single explanation.
In any case, Lin Sanjiu decided to be on the safe side and trust her words. It would probably take her about 20 minutes if she had to take the stairs. After some consideration, she took out a climbing rope she had collected at some point in her journey and decided to bungee jump. Unbeknownst to her, the screen suddenly lit up again when she was in midair.
"Say," Nüwa shouted over the screen with her nasal voice—St. Peter and the others walked over, as they did not know who she was speaking to, "Did you manage to get any of your cell plasma into her wound?"
The room was silent.
After a few seconds, Nüwa laughed with satisfaction.