Chapter 288

Suo La's words were like a gust of icy wind, sweeping away the warm, lively atmosphere of host and guest reveling in the hall.

Facing Ke Li Si Ting's gaze from above, Suo La's somewhat gaunt figure stayed straight-backed, his every movement carrying a touch of wanton recklessness, and his words were laced with biting mockery.

How so? Little Ke Li Si Ting, you were so confident when you spoke just now—why can't you say anything now?

""

The mask concealed Ke Li Si Ting's expression, but could not hide the nearly tangible anger; her hands, encased in chainmail, slowly clenched, like a volcano on the verge of eruption.

She had no idea where this greedy, lecherous old man got his confidence; back when she herself was still depressed and living under others, he never dared to raise his voice at her, yet now with her blade almost at his throat, he instead grew defiant.

Could it be that he cannot accept his inevitable defeat and has gone mad?

Similar doubts arose in the hearts of nearly everyone present; as they touched their slightly flushed faces, they snapped out of their earlier calculations on how to ingratiate themselves with the new lord of Sunshine City, realizing they were now on mercenary turf, and hastily composed themselves, reverting to their former wariness.

Of course, the clear-eyed observer aside—Ji Ming, who harbored no illusions—had already begun to infer in silence; to know a person's aim, one must first analyze their actions, and tonight Suo La had done two things.

First, he had his prearranged person suddenly cause trouble, and while Ke Li Si Ting hadn't yet decided how to respond, he stepped in to help her gloss over the matter, effectively forcing a favor upon her.

Second, just now, when everything had ended, everyone relaxed, expecting the night to end peacefully, he suddenly leapt out, pointing his spear straight at Ke Li Si Ting.

And given the current situation, it's no longer a question of whether to cause trouble—he is literally slapping Ke Li Si Ting's face in public!

Everyone present was astonished by Suo La's near‑mad behavior; those who thought a little deeper found it strange that he was acting so provocatively and fickle.

After all, whether it's a battle of wits or of technique, it must be built on a foundation of real strength; merely flapping one's gums is like a scholar meeting soldiers…

……Damn!

Ji Ming finally figured out Suo La's purpose and was about to get up and flee.

But at that moment, the two engaged in verbal sparring tore all pretenses apart.

Suo La lifted his head high and shouted loudly, as if issuing a command.

"Ke Li Si Ting, do you think you've won? I tell you, even if you kill me now, it wouldn't change that you betrayed Fein and committed murder…"

This is a rather classic and useful stratagem; an ordinary person, upon hearing such words, would already be fuming with a flushed face, but to avoid giving others ammunition, they could only be forced to strike the option of 'settling it with violence on the spot' from consideration.

But what kind of person is Ke Li Si Ting?

Good grief, I've endured humiliation and borne burdens for so many years, and now that it's about to end you tell me I still have to put up with it?

The furious war‑mare maiden didn't think at all! The furious war‑mare maiden seized her own lance!

"You're looking for death, huh? I'll oblige you!"

Suo La was now completely dumbfounded; the old man's wide‑eyed, speechless expression was rather amusing, and in the next second he was engulfed in the dust kicked up when the lance struck the ground.

Fortunately, Ke Li Si Ting had not lost her reason; she did not use the explosive‑type throwing variant, but drew a normal‑sized lance, minimizing the chance of friendly fire—aside from a few stray stones hitting unlucky bystanders, she had effectively killed only Suo La alone.

Enough—what the hell!

Indeed, as Ji Ming smashed through the glass and fled outside without a word, the settling dust revealed that Suo La was completely unharmed, and he was even hefting the lance of Ke Li Si Ting that had been bent and warped by the tremendous impact.

"This…"

Suo La was still smiling, but his breath had turned dangerous and terrifying; he slowly widened the corners of his mouth.

"Ke Li Si Ting, you think I rely only on my mouth? To dare be the head of a profiteering gang, how could I do it without some real skill?"

……No, strictly speaking that foul, putrid stench is like……

As his grin turned increasingly hideous, his aging body suddenly swelled, his withered cheeks instantly filling out; he was like a balloon being inflated, and in the blink of an eye he became a flesh‑and‑blood giant over three meters tall.

He merely flicked the weapon in his hand, and it shot toward Ke Li Si Ting's head; startled, she quickly swept her lance to deflect the deadly projectile, which embedded itself in the lovely mural.

But after the shock came, it turned into grinding‑teeth fury.

"Suo La, it turns out you're the insider, the one who made a deal with the uncanny!"

Regardless of collateral damage, the enraged Ke Li Si Ting snatched up a lance, charged down from the platform, and clashed with that uncanny monstrosity.

Seeing Suo La's trump card turn out to be an uncanny monstrosity, Ji Ming, while signaling the start of action against the white wolf Fei Er Luo, also decided to hurry to the Sheng Guang Jiao Tang—tonight he needed professionals to clean up this filth.

However, when he pushed open the door of the adjacent building, what met his eyes was a scene of extreme bloody chaos; the corridor, already somewhat ominous, now lay littered with several corpses strewn haphazardly, each with intestines spilled and stomachs torn, their deaths gruesome beyond compare.

As for the killer who slew them, he wore the same attire as they did, but these mercenaries had gray eyes, vicious claws, and mouths full of sharp teeth mixed with countless bone fragments and flesh—clearly they were a band that had been transformed into animated corpses, uncanny undead.

"Oh well, I should have guessed that earlier."

Ji Ming let out a faint sigh, produced a pitch‑black long‑handled shovel, and applied tried‑and‑true physical means to treat these patients stricken with the famine‑ghost sickness.

And while he was chopping off the skulls of the undead here and there, he also spotted on the ground a somewhat familiar diner—the mercenary who had earlier dragged the merchant away from the scene.

The last time I saw him he was still arrogant, but now only a lopsided head lay on the ground, its teeth constantly opening and closing, making a click‑clack sound, stained with blood.

"Honey, you're hungry, right? Come, load a. 22‑caliber rifle magazine."

Thus, the final piece of the puzzle Ji Ming had been piecing together in his mind fell into place, giving him a rough idea of Suo La's plan for tonight.

First, that merchant—his appearance had two meanings.

One was to help Suo La draw away the attention fixed on him, making everyone think he had no intention of clashing with Ke Li Si Ting tonight, but rather was acknowledging her success and choosing to yield, thereby letting the mercenaries lower their guard.

The other was to use his sudden provocation to lure out the mercenary alliance's concealed sentries placed inside and outside the city beforehand, facilitating later operations.

So, when the merchant was dragged out by the mercenaries to be beaten, threatened, or even killed to vent anger, he might have been a spy planted by Suo La in advance, or even the merchant himself, and the infection agent hidden on them would suddenly explode, turning the carrier into a walking corpse while sparking a frenzied spread.

As for why the people inside the hall failed to notice this chaos, it could be that Suo La used the same bewitching drug as before, or that he set up some sound‑blocking formation outside the hall, though the likeliest scenario is that both were in play.

Therefore…

As the guests excitedly praised Ke Li Si Ting, insisting she could lead the mercenary alliance to a better future, outside the human battle against the walking dead was already about to dye the carpet red.

Moreover, these are monsters transformed from mercenaries; perhaps not very bright, but every move is a life‑risking suicide strike, their individual quality is terrifyingly high—anyone could play an elite big monster in a zombie flick.

Relying solely on cold weapons made it hard to break out of the encirclement; to hold back the endless corpse tide, Ji Ming had no choice but to toss out peace‑bringing talismans and warding talismans, relying on the power of the inscriptions to force a path open.

Using Dao arts to fight the undead was extremely strange, yet upon seeing that the undead's arms would burst into flame upon touching the golden light barrier, Ji Ming's sole thought was to increase the intensity!

At that moment, the sorry lot who had fled the hall also noticed the abnormality outside, and in their panic they all screamed, wanting to cling to a chance at survival.

But inside there were two monsters locked in combat, where even a slight touch would reduce one to pulp, while outside ravenous, gnashing undead hungered to pounce and feast; the situation was truly a case of 'wolf ahead, tiger behind'.

Apart from those who still counted as professionals, the vast majority in the chaos could only end up lying in pools of blood; regardless of their former fame or profit, in death they were nothing more than background filler under others' feet, or low‑grade minions among the corpse horde.

This is the cruelty of the extraordinary world: a clever mind might give you wings like a tiger's, but if you lack even basic strength, those wings are nothing more than fried chicken in others' mouths—and they'll even scorn you for not being New Orleans‑style.

And Ji Ming had no intention of saving this group of adventurers who liked to take risks, nor did he have time to save them, because the most urgent task now was to rush to the outside of the arena, seal off all entrances and exits, and prevent the further spread of this living‑dead calamity.

However, it was already too late. As the uncrowned king of Sunlight City, Suo La might not be strong, but he absolutely understood this city named Sunlight better than anyone; since he could silently trigger the plague, he had enough power to make it unstoppable.

Now the mercenaries had withdrawn to their stations, the handlers stood by in place, and the adventurers scattered in all directions—this was precisely when the Inner City's armed forces were at their weakest.

If he then used his own means to transfer the troops guarding the key area, chaos and slaughter could erupt in several of the Inner City's most traffic‑complex districts and begin to spread at an unimaginable speed.

This time, however, the Outer City became a safe haven; a tightly sealed inner‑outer wall served as their shield, so no matter how bloody the Inner City got, it could not affect them…

Boom—

Since the Supreme God had issued an order, Fei Er Luo's arrangements were also in place; when Ji Ming announced the start of the operation, the Pioneers who were out catching thieves and fighting bandits, upholding justice, happened to have several strong units stationed near the city gate carrying out their missions.

"Ah? How come you suddenly told us about the hidden main quest? Let me see what it says… ah?"

"I'm not mistaken, are we supposed to seize the Outer City's eight gates and protect everyone as they head to the vicinity of the Inner City gate?"

If it were an ordinary person, they'd surely suspect their commander had gone mad—actually demanding they go seize someone else's walls; a foot‑soldier's life isn't a life, is it just cannon fodder?

However, they were players—not afraid of a perilous mission, only afraid the game wouldn't be fun enough; after cheering a couple of lines toward the livestream, they excitedly launched a full‑scale assault to seize the gates.

At this point, the Outer City guards had already noticed the chaos in the Inner City; they were anxiously awaiting orders from the City Lord's residence, wondering whether to keep waiting or make a quick escape, when they suddenly realized that several burly men had appeared beside them out of nowhere.

"Dad, if I kneel down now, can I spare my life?"

Perhaps the Outer City still had a semblance of "defenses" before; the nearby mountain bandits and outlaws, faced with such towering walls, were completely helpless and could only be shot down by the archers on the walls before fleeing in disgrace.

But after being hit by a violent biological event and then the turmoil of the Inner City storm, this bunch of originally scruffy soldiers and bandits became even more useless.

Many squads encountered virtually no resistance the whole way—just a flash of blade or cutting down the fiercest‑looking thug in the crowd, then the death of this chicken terrified a whole bunch of monkeys, causing them to defect and abandon their armor en masse.

Others simply handed over a bit of cash, whereupon the guards gladly took them in as "friends coming to visit"; seeing the players raise their revolvers, they didn't even grasp what was happening—until the barrel of a Winchester struck their grinning heads did they realize they needed to surrender at once.

Even a few opportunists, thinking surrender wasn't enough, upon seeing what should have been an Eastern‑region bigwig, thrust out their faces to curry favor.

"Sir, we've actually wanted to follow you all along—please give us a chance, let the brothers eat and drink well under you!"

"Sir, I know a fairly wealthy local merchant; our connection is decent, and his basement is full of money—I've been drooling over it for ages……

"And me too! Sir, I know where my neighbors hide their money; just give me a tenth, please—I only ask for one‑tenth!"

As it turned out, ill‑fated, this was the team led by the Brocade‑Clad Night Walkers; such shameless remarks earned them nothing more than a faint smile from Cang Lang.

He slowly slipped on a steel knuckleduster, flexing his wrist enough to unleash a charged blast punch.

"Sun Zei, you like showing the way, huh? Well, I'll point you toward the road to King Yama's place."

……

But having said it was just a matter of pointing the way, after symbolically throwing forty‑odd punches, he tossed them all into the family garrison's big jail.

The Outer City guards, forced by the players to coordinate an inside‑outside joint assault, could hardly hold out; they were quickly defeated, and the players seized six of the eight city gates in succession.

As for the remaining two, it wasn't that they put up a last‑ditch defense; rather, when the players attacked they couldn't find where the garrison commander was, so they sent men to comb the city and dragged out from the tavern the sole survivor of the smashed entertainment venue—a man who could only be found here, drunk as a skunk.

Furious, the spearman who had come to arrest him personally dumped a bucket of cold water over him, letting him experience the winter's first cold shower.

"Trash is trash—if you stick a rod in his back, he'll shamelessly stand and sleep!"