Chapter 14: 14 Turning Back (Combined)

14 Turning Back (Combined)

Anna!!!

At the very instant the thin girl plummeted, Li Ang, who was observing the situation from across the way with a telescope, felt as if he had fallen into an ice cellar!

At that moment, the very concept of death hadn't even crossed his mind; his entire consciousness went blank, his heart felt as if it were being tightly gripped by an invisible hand, seemingly halting the blood flow to his entire body, while his hands and feet went stiff and cold as if they had lost all sensation.

The entire world was incomparably quiet at this moment; everything, absolutely everything, froze on that pale little face, lips tightly pursed, falling helplessly downward. And the only thing Li Ang could do now was watch, eyes wide, as his sister fell from the high altitude, her eyes filled with despair!

"BOOM!!!"

A deafening roar resounded through more than half the street, followed immediately by the sound of large-scale glass shattering and the low, piercing screech of metal deforming under immense force.

More than half the windows in the entire hospital were shattered by this violent impact. The exterior wall of the fourth floor also suffered a massive blow; the metal framework embedded in the wall buckled and protruded, forcing the outer bricks to collapse and fly in all directions, leaving the street directly below in a state of utter chaos.

Yet, to Li Ang's ecstatic relief, Anna, who had been falling rapidly just a moment ago, did not hit the ground; instead, she had stopped abruptly between the first floor and the ground.

Although she had not only fainted from the massive impact but also seemed to have had her thigh slashed by shards of shattered glass, when Li Ang looked through the telescope, he could still see the violent heaving of Anna's chest, proving that at the very least, she was still alive!

Thank you... thank you! I owe you my life!

However, just as Li Ang was staring joyfully at Anna being lowered bit by bit to the ground, offering a thousand thanks in his heart to the reliable Bandage Woman, Hearing Heishanyang narrowed its eyes, knitted its brows, and said:

"Not good, this is trouble!"

Indeed!

Upon hearing Hearing Heishanyang's words, Li Ang was jolted, suddenly reacting: the point of impact was exactly where Anna's ward was! Bandage Woman was still inside!

Although Bandage Woman being able to grab Anna proved she was still alive and her soul state remained stable, could she really be unscathed after suffering an impact of that magnitude?

"I'm not saying Auntie Ai Ma is in danger, rest assured! That Bandage Woman's ability to save her own life ranks among the best in the entire Cleaning Bureau; even if you died, she might not necessarily die."

Sensing the agitation in Li Ang's soul, Hearing Heishanyang shook its head and took the initiative to explain:

"What I mean is, this incident is not quite normal. That out-of-control infected person most likely didn't appear 'naturally'; there is a high probability that he knows of the Cleaning Bureau's existence."

If you put it that way... it really seems so!

Hearing this, Li Ang's expression couldn't help but turn stern, and he also noticed the parts that didn't feel right.

Whether it was the hospital that just happened to have a soul the moment Bandage Woman stepped in, or the impact that occurred in the special care ward just as she was hanging Anna out the window and unable to dodge—everything was too deliberate, as if it were a targeted attack specifically against Bandage Woman.

So... could there be accomplices? Is it not necessarily safe for me to stay outside?

Watching Anna being untied from the curtains by the nurse who had come down first and then carried away, stumbling, Li Ang, who had let out a sigh of relief, tried his best to suppress the fear in his heart that urged him to flee. While continuing to search for the soul belonging to the out-of-control infected person, he gritted his teeth and asked:

"Do you... does our Cleaning Bureau have any enemies?"

"There are far too many of those."

Hearing Heishanyang grinned, let out a 'heh', and said:

"Demon evil gods, infected people, True God moon people, prehistoric people—I can't even count the mortal enemies of your Cleaning Bureau! If they could join forces, your Cleaning Bureau would be wiped out even if it were ten times stronger!

But the good news is, the enemies of your Cleaning Bureau aren't all on the same side either; the hatred between them is even greater.

Whichever side looks like it's about to succeed, the other waves will secretly pull its legs, or even openly sell its weaknesses to the Cleaning Bureau, so you are safe for the time being."

After explaining the situation of the Cleaning Bureau, looking at Li Ang whose face was becoming increasingly ugly, Hearing Heishanyang said with a chuckle:

"Alright, those matters aren't for someone like you to consider right now; just focus on your work!

As for Auntie Ai Ma, she is a veteran employee of the bureau and must have realized that something is wrong with this incident. You just need to keep an eye on the locations of those souls, and when it's time for you to act, just fire a shot to finish it!"

Sure enough, there is a problem with this infected person!

Even earlier than Hearing Heishanyang had guessed, the moment the bolt inexplicably snapped and the metal cabinet came crashing down, Bandage Woman had already thought of this point.

From the lobby up to the fourth floor, there hadn't been any abnormal situation along the way, yet the attack happened precisely at the moment she was rescuing Li Ang's sister and unable to dodge.

Therefore, this out-of-control infected person must know of the Cleaning Bureau's existence and understand that ordinary attacks would be ineffective against people like her, which is why he specifically chose this moment to strike.

However, even knowing the opponent's plan, Bandage Woman did not let go, nor did she dodge; instead, she stood silently in place and took the impact head-on.

Under this impact, not only did her thigh bone bend backward under the immense force, but even her entire lumbar spine was deformed, and she collapsed powerlessly onto the slanted windowsill.

Is she dead?

I don't know when it started, but the young nurse who had been stuck on the exterior wall, who had just been begging bitterly for rescue, had already calmed down and was examining Bandage Woman's condition with a very indifferent gaze.

Multiple fractures throughout the body, eyes without focus, chest caved in from the impact with the stone windowsill, bandages wrapped around her body scattered all over the ground—she was most likely dead.

Like a strange gecko, she 'crawled' up the exterior wall twice, and after emerging from the inner wall next to the windowsill, the young nurse walked over to Bandage Woman, took off her mask with her blood-stained right hand, and tested her breath.

Indeed dead.

After discarding the blood-stained crow mask with some disgust, the young nurse was just about to turn and leave when she noticed with some surprise that even though Bandage Woman was already dead, her palms were still tightly gripping the curtains, gripping them so hard the knuckles had turned white without loosening.

Heh... with this woman's physical fitness, she shouldn't have died even if she had jumped out directly; to think she didn't even dodge... boring persistence.

Sticking her head out to glance downward, seeing the older nurse who was busy untying the curtains, the young nurse curled her lips, reached out to pick up a huge glass shard from the windowsill, and then threw it downward with force!

"So it was you!"

Just as the glass shard was about to leave her hand, a calm voice came from behind the young nurse.

In her horrified gaze, the large amount of bandages scattered on the ground suddenly shot up, like pythons that had found their target, tightly wrapping around the young nurse's arms and twisting them with force in the opposite direction of the joints!

"Creak!"

"AH!!!"

Looking at the young nurse whose four limb joints had been pulled out of socket and who had been wrapped almost into a ball, Bandage Woman couldn't help but shake her head and say:

"You certainly had some ideas to set up such a trap to ambush me, but the methods were still a bit crude."

Reaching out to push against the cabinet with force to throw aside this murder weapon weighing over three hundred pounds, Bandage Woman stood up unhurriedly and began to reset her dislocated bones one by one.

Even her chest, which had been caved in from the impact with the windowsill, slowly heaved with her powerful breathing; if not for the large amount of bloodstains remaining on the bandages, she looked as if she hadn't been injured at all.

"Hey, the reason they chose to go down from the window must have been induced by you, right? Although this plan is passable, there are really too many flaws."

Walking over to the nurse-ball and squatting down, after pulling away the bandage that had been wrapped around her mouth, Bandage Woman asked with a peaceful gaze:

"To be able to expose yourself so easily, you don't look like someone with the brains to set up such a killing trap; this whole thing must have been taught to you by someone else.

Be obedient, you brainless fool; if you don't want to suffer, then honestly tell me, who is behind you?"

"Heh... hehe!"

After gasping for breath a few times, the captured young nurse stared fixedly at Bandage Woman while speaking with a ferocious face:

"You are the truly stupid one! You don't think you've already caught me, do you? This woman is just a puppet I controlled; you are already finished!"

Seemingly to prove what she said, after finishing these words, the young nurse's expression changed abruptly; first, she was confused as to why she was tied up, then she seemed to notice the excruciating pain coming from her limbs, and after letting out only half a syllable of a scream, she fainted from the sheer pain.

Caught the wrong person?

Bandage Woman raised an eyebrow upon hearing this, and just as she was about to test further to see if the young nurse was faking a faint to trick her, a heavy sound of footsteps suddenly came from outside the special care ward.

"Do you believe it now?"

Passing through the patients all over the floor and standing still outside the special care ward, the fat director who had arranged for Anna to be in the special care ward sneered:

"The people in this hospital are all my tools! As long as I want, I can control them at will! You don't even know who I am, so it's impossible for you to catch me!

Also, stupid woman, look down at your feet!"

Pointing at Bandage Woman's feet, which had already sunk below the floor, the 'Fat Director' raised his layered double chin and said with an arrogant face:

"Besides controlling this hospital, my true ability is to directly swallow sick people! Within the scope of this hospital, as long as one is infected, there is no way to resist the hospital's swallowing.

Understand? I didn't attack you before, not because I didn't want to, but because you were always wearing a protective mask, but your mask was just taken off by me! You are finished!"

"..."

Have I been too cautious for six years, only to be careless in the end?

Looking at the fat director laughing in front of her, Bandage Woman, whose lower body had already been swallowed, felt her feet, which could no longer move, and couldn't help but sigh with annoyance.

Although she could tear this guy into pieces in just one second, as the other party said, these people were not his true body, so doing so would have no meaning; this time she had truly fallen into a trap.

Clearly, she could have used the bandages to block, but to lure him out, she chose to rely on her undead body to take the hit, only to end up catching a fake and losing the mask that could block the opponent's ability; it was truly stupid.

Hmm... also, besides fishing, the reason she chose to take the hit was to deliberately play the victim, so that the newcomer would owe her a favor, making it convenient to ask him for help in the future.

As a result, this whole thing backfired, and in the end, she would probably have to ask him to help her call for reinforcements; when the Director finds out three days later, who knows how much she will be mocked...

Shaking her head helplessly, Bandage Woman, not in a very pleasant mood, was too lazy to say more and simply closed her eyes, choosing to refuse communication. However, the other party seemed not to be satisfied enough; besides the Fat Director, he brought over several other doctors and nurses, who stood outside the ward with sneers, mocking her one by one:

"You think you're very smart? You are simply stupid to the core!"

"There are over five hundred people here; once they are completely absorbed, my power will be even stronger!"

"Heh, don't you want to know who is going to deal with your Cleaning Bureau?"

"I'm not afraid to tell you! The one preparing to strike at you is a great True God!"

Hmm?

Hearing this, Bandage Woman, who had been preparing to stay silent for three days waiting for her teammates to rescue her, twitched her eyelids, her heart filled with great joy.

This guy is truly... even more of an idiot than she had anticipated!

It would be one thing to casually talk about the trigger range of his ability, but to be able to casually blurt out who is behind him? Honestly, if the True God who chose him knew this guy was so stupid, he would probably wish he could descend directly and slaughter him, right?

Not knowing that his IQ had already fallen to the bottom in Bandage Woman's heart, the 'Fat Director' looked down from above at his opponent, whose lower body had already sunk into the floor tiles, and with an excited face, raised his arms high, making a pose of embracing the sun, and then announced with a fanatical face:

"Listen well! Stupid woman! My God was born in the chaos..."

Just as Bandage Woman was concentrating and pricking up her ears, preparing to eavesdrop on this incomparably important intelligence, for some reason, the expressions on the faces of the dozen doctors and nurses in front of her stiffened simultaneously, and then, as if they had received some order, they all fell to the ground at the same time, and her lower body, which had been bound in the floorboards, was also eerily 'spat' out directly.

And by the time she raised her head, filled with confusion, a sound of airflow explosion, incomparably piercing, came from the roof of the shopping mall diagonally across from the hospital...

"Bang!"

"Kid, that was a pretty accurate shot!"

Watching the dim soul on the sixth floor of the hospital extinguish instantly, Hearing Heishanyang smacked its lips with some envy, and then praised him happily:

"That was nearly three hundred meters, and you were still able to solve it with one shot; you might actually have a talent for guns!"

Talent... that definitely doesn't exist. The reason this shot could hit was half because Bandage Woman had already helped adjust the position, greatly reducing the difficulty of aiming, and the other half was the bonus from the cheat.

Silently shaking its head to indicate it was just good luck, Li Ang raised his eyes to look at his badge slots; the two badges flickering with gray-black light had just dimmed.

The work efficiency bonus of 【Probationary Employee】 combined with the accuracy boost of 【Shooting Rookie】 seemed to have an effect where one plus one is greater than two.

At the very instant before he fired, these two badges were activated simultaneously, and his hand, as if by divine inspiration, pressed down slightly, raising the muzzle by about two millimeters.

And it was that slight lift that caused the special nail, which might have only wounded the target, to lift just enough to hit the mark, killing with a single strike!

As for how he could confirm who the target was...

"The infected person this time probably doesn't have a very good brain."

Regretfully glancing at the spot where that sinful soul had dissipated, Hearing Heishanyang said with amusement:

"This fool probably doesn't know that when he is controlling others, the soul fluctuations of the controlled people will become exactly the same as his.

If he had only controlled once, it would be one thing; even if he only focused on those dark souls, it wouldn't be an easy task to filter him out from these six or seven hundred people."

"But he controlled again and again, and even controlled those people to surround Auntie Ai Ma... senior, creating a bunch of souls with identical fluctuations, which was just too conspicuous."

Taking over the conversation from Hearing Heishanyang, recalling that inexplicably funny scene just now, Li Ang, with a stern expression, couldn't help but purse his lips and add:

"After finding those souls with identical fluctuations, the only one who didn't go to the fourth floor was naturally the real infected person... By the way, I remember you saying that the Cleaning Bureau also has performance metrics?"

"Yes! And there are extra benefits."

Hearing this, Hearing Heishanyang nodded repeatedly; looking at its excited appearance, if it weren't just a head left, it would probably happily give Li Ang another thumbs up.

"You've only been on the job for three hours, and under our guidance, you successfully discovered and killed the infected person, and even rescued the trapped veteran employee; the reward will definitely be huge!"

"Also, hahaha! We were so cooperative with you this time, and the job was done cleanly and neatly; that red-haired woman, no matter how much of a piece of work she is, will have to treat us a little better, right?" ===== CHAPTER 15 =====