Armed Train in the Apocalypse

Su Huan stood blankly on the front of the vehicle, his Domain shifting more and more frequently—now a torrential downpour, now thunder roaring overhead.

Only after more than ten minutes did he finally manage to collect himself.

Even though he’d agreed back then without hesitation, now that he’d discovered he was really going to be a father, Su Huan was still somewhat dumbfounded.

But it was still a long way from that actual moment. He simply tossed these things to the back of his mind; as for Yu Jing, he’d talk about it when he found the time.

According to Director Xu’s conclusions, only Rule can fight Rule, so he’d tried to use his own Domain to suppress the Plant Zone, since this Domain contained his own use of the [Energy] Rule.

Looking at the result, that statement wasn’t wrong.

However, this was just a stopgap measure. If they wanted to truly establish a safe passage, they still had to start with the Traveler’s Tree, or else find some other Rule that could let outsiders blend into the Plant Zone.

For now, the only lead was still the Traveler’s Tree; he’d just marked quite a few of them.

He’d go check them out tomorrow. Today, he really wasn’t in the mood.

...

Deep within the Plant Zone, the sparse moonlight was filtered by layer upon layer of mutated leaves until all that remained was a pitch-black space where you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. The air was heavy, thick with the earthy stench of humus.

In a mountain hollow, two large pits, three rock walls closing in, four ruined corpses embedded into the stone.

A gigantic mutated locust tree stood there, like a mobile heaven-supporting pillar; each time it swung its branches, it could stir up an earth-shaking roar.

And its opponent was a human whose figure looked small and insignificant.

”Thousand Slashes!”

With a furious shout, a burst of gleaming blade light exploded in the pitch-black night. The vines and mutated plants converging from all around were instantly shredded to pieces by that blade light, plant sap splashing like water and clearing out a radius of over ten meters.

But that unparalleled blade light landed on the locust tree’s branches and could only produce a dull, futile thud; the tree swallowed his full-power strike without a single sound.

The Chongying man sprang back several steps, landing on a bulging boulder he’d already scouted out beforehand.

At the same time, he raised his awareness to the absolute limit, scanning his surroundings. The Plant Zone was full of traps; at other times that was whatever, but at a moment this critical, if a vine tripped his foot, even with his Tier Two physique he’d be turned into a mural by the Tier Three locust tree in front of him.

”Boom!”

The locust tree’s branch struck empty air, releasing a deafening crash. Within a hundred meters, the mutated plants were directly swatted flying by that single slap, the ground itself torn open in chunks.

A layer of invisible ripples spread out from the locust tree’s body, sweeping evenly over the surroundings.

The man’s eyelids twitched nonstop; it felt like in every direction shadowy shapes were about to lunge out and drag him away, or that in the next second one of those monument-cracking branches would burst up from underground and skewer him into a meat kebab.

”Smack!”

The man swung his hand and slapped himself in the face, then viciously dragged his katana across his own arm. Blood spurted out instantly; the sharp pain tore him out of that panicked Fear-state in an instant, just as the reeking wind of killing intent closed in at arm’s length.

”Scrape!”

He instinctively swung his blade in a slash, as if chopping into Metal; the shower of sparks lit up the incoming creature—an Evolution Beast shaped like a leopard, except its body wasn’t covered in soft fur, but in iron-gray rock rough as tree bark, studded with lumps of varying sizes like cooled lava.

Having dodged death by a hair, the man felt no joy at all; it was like someone had gripped his heart in their fist, crushing it with an incessant, overwhelming dread.

This was the Ability of that Tier Three locust tree: releasing a Domain that instilled Fear. If he didn’t have a skill like ”Strengthened Will”, he’d have already been scared into a quivering quail and then mashed into meat paste.

But his current state was hardly optimistic either. The locust tree might not have much combat power, but it completely ignored his damage, and on top of that there were all these bizarre Evolution Beasts being driven by the tree around them. If he kept fighting, he’d definitely die here.

When he landed again, what his feet felt wasn’t solid stone, but soft humus.

His heart instantly lurched.

The retreat behind him had already been blocked by two Evolution Beasts.

And above his head was a locust branch lashing down straight at him.

They’d actually formed a pincer.

The Chongying man’s expression twisted. He ran his hand along the blade’s edge, madness bordering on hysteria in his eyes.

More branches swept in from the left and right, like a frenzy of dancing brooms—except these ”brooms” were far, far too big, crashing down to cover the sky and earth, leaving no gap at all.

He didn’t swing his blade; instead, he pulled out a small vial of reagent.

Even in this pitch darkness, the reagent still gave off a gorgeous radiance, the blue liquid in the tube shimmering like a river of stars, graceful and eternal.

He still wasn’t sure whether that Donghuang woman had given him a real potion, but he no longer had the luxury to judge.

If he died here, everything would be over.

He tore open his shirt front, pressed the needle of the reagent directly to his heart, and then drove it in hard.

Potent medicinal effect and Energy surged into his heart in an instant, then were carried by his blood to every part of his body. He forced every last bit of focus into dealing with the attacks coming from all directions.

He lowered his stance, sidestepped, swung his blade to block the two Evolution Beasts behind him, the sequence of motions flowing together seamlessly, still swift and ferocious.

But the follow-up strike from the branches immediately sent blood spraying from his mouth and nose, turning him into a walking blood gourd in the blink of an eye.

His vision started to sway, a buzzing filled his ears, and the cold touch of death seemed to have already pressed against his skin.

Fragments of scenes from the man’s memory flashed by: an exquisite courtyard twisting and collapsing in flames, a familiar cherry tree turning to charcoal in an instant, silhouettes running along the stone path, their figures turned into cutouts by the blast of scorching air and then vanishing...