Chapter 3: Defending the Carriage to the Death and an Unexpected Ally

The howls of wolves were like horns of death, echoing across the dead wasteland and hammering hard against Lin Mo's taut nerves. The figures of seven or eight mutated radiation wolves gradually sharpened through the dust, fanning out in a crescent. Their ghostly green eyes locked dead onto the battered subway car, low growls rolling from deep in their throats, drool hissing as it hit the scorched earth. The pack leader at the front was as burly as a young bull, its fur a sickly grey-blue, covered in vicious scars and protruding bone spurs, radiating a ferocity far beyond that of the younger wolves.

Retreat was cut off! Lin Mo's heart sank to the bottom. The car's only entrance and the few larger broken windows had all become fatal gaps!

"Stay calm! Lin Mo! Think of something!" He pinched his thigh hard, using pain to drive out fear. He scanned the cramped interior of the car, his gaze sweeping rapidly over the toppled metal seats and scattered debris. The handbook had said that in tight spaces, obstacles could be used to limit the movement of large beasts!

The will to survive overwhelmed despair. He exploded with startling strength, ignoring the tearing pain of his wounds, and hauled the heavy metal seats with all his might, wedging them firmly against the largest broken window! He also stuffed broken steel pipes and rusted metal plates into the other smaller gaps as best he could. The entire interior of the car was a mess, but the main entrances were all sealed tight with whatever heavy objects he could find, leaving only a few narrow slits for observation.

Just as he finished, "Boom!" A tremendous crash shook the entire car violently! It was that burly pack leader, slamming its full brute force into the very window Lin Mo had just barricaded! The metal seat jammed there groaned under the strain, caving inward by a large chunk!

"Awoo!" The pack leader yelped in pain and let out an angry snarl. The other wolves also threw themselves forward, raking the car's outer walls with their claws, producing ear-piercing screeches, or butting their heads against the other sealed gaps. The entire car was like a skiff in a storm, tottering on the brink under the wolves' frenzied assault.

"Hold! Hold at all costs!" Lin Mo braced his back against the heavy objects blocking the door, both hands gripping the buckled seat, feet planted on the floor, pouring every ounce of strength into resisting the tremendous impact from outside. Every crash made his blood surge, the wound on his arm tearing open again, fresh blood staining the bandage. Sweat mingled with blood streamed down his forehead, blurring his vision.

The pack outside seemed enraged by the leader's injury, attacking even more frantically. One wolf thrust a paw through a narrow gap, clawing wildly! Lin Mo's eyes were quick; he snatched up a broken metal pipe with a sharp jagged end from the ground and drove it hard into that wolf's paw!

"Pfft!"

"Aaargh—!" A shrill howl accompanied the paw's retraction. But soon, more claws came poking through other gaps!

Lin Mo was like a cornered beast, darting and weaving within the cramped car, using the terrain and everything at hand—broken steel pipes, rusted metal shards, even sand scooped from the floor—to put up a desperate resistance. He stabbed with the pipe, slashed with the metal shards, flung sand into the eyes of wolves trying to peer through the gaps. Every counterattack came with ragged gasps and the searing pain of his wounds.

The car's outer wall began buckling under the wolves' biting and ramming, and the barricade at the door loosened with each impact. Lin Mo's stamina was draining fast, his movements growing sluggish, and despair, like a cold tide, began to submerge him once more. Was he to be devoured by wolves the moment he'd just crossed over? He refused to accept it!

Just as he was nearly spent, and a wolf had already shoved half its hideous snout through a gap it had pried open, its stinking fangs only inches from him—

"Whoosh—!"

A sharp sound of tearing air ripped through the wolves' snarls!

An arrow glinting with cold metallic light, precise as a venomous snake, drilled straight into the eye socket of the wolf trying to squeeze in, the arrowhead punching out through the back of its skull in a spray of filthy blood! The wolf didn't even have time to scream before it dropped dead on the spot!

This sudden turn made the wolves' frenzied assault falter sharply! Even that ferocious pack leader warily stopped its ramming, its ghostly green eyes turning toward the direction the arrow had come from.

Lin Mo was stunned too, the blankness of a survivor and the sheer shock leaving him unable to react for a moment.

Immediately after, two more sharp sounds: "Whoosh! Whoosh!"

Two arrows, as if they had eyes of their own—one pierced the throat of another wolf that was tearing at the car's outer wall, the other grazed the pack leader's neck and buried itself deep in the scorched earth beneath its feet. Precise, lethal, carrying a cold efficiency.

The pack leader let out a reluctant low growl, its ghostly green eyes fixed on some direction through the swirling dust, brimming with wariness. It seemed to weigh the odds, then finally gave a short howl. The remaining radiation wolves immediately abandoned their attack on the car, tails tucked, swiftly following the leader, and as silently as they had come, retreated into the yellowish dust, vanishing in the blink of an eye.

Inside and outside the car, dead silence instantly returned, leaving only Lin Mo's Heavy Breathing and the whimpering of wind through the broken metal.

Rescued? By whom?

Lin Mo's heart was still pounding wildly. He struggled over to a gap that hadn't been sealed, and carefully peered out.

The dust gradually settled a little. About thirty meters from the car, atop the ruins of a half-collapsed concrete structure, a figure stood silently.

The figure was not tall, even somewhat thin, wrapped entirely in a dirty, tattered grey-brown cloak, a cloth mask covering the face as well, leaving only a pair of eyes exposed. Those eyes… sharp as a hawk's, cold, wary, betraying no emotion whatsoever, fixed unblinkingly on the car where Lin Mo was hiding. In her hand she held a strange-looking metal crossbow, a faint ghostly-blue glow flickering along its limbs—clearly no ordinary weapon. The life-saving arrows had come from that very crossbow!

The cloaked figure did not approach, nor speak, simply watching in silence, like a sculpture devoid of life, only the hand gripping the crossbow terrifyingly steady.

Alarm bells screamed in Lin Mo's heart! On the wasteland, there is no aid without a reason! Was this person more dangerous than the wolves? What was her purpose in saving him?

He licked his cracked, blood-seeping lips, summoned his courage, and shouted through the gap: "Hey! Thank you! I… my name is Lin Mo! Who… who are you?"

The figure atop the ruins gave no response. Those cold eyes remained fixed on the car, as if examining an object, or perhaps assessing the value of prey.

Silence, like a tangible pressure, hung between the two of them. More suffocating than the wolves' snarls.