Chapter 19

Chapter 19: The Suffocating Nest
The phenomenon of the dead coming back to life was something Xiao Xiao could not accept from the bottom of his heart, nor could he understand it.
It was not scientific at all.
But upon seeing the nerves and flesh tissue connecting to the corpse, one suddenly recalled that this city itself was a massive, writhing monster.
Then that would be acceptable.
It was merely some kind of monster and will similar to the city, manipulating these suffocated corpses.
Click click click click……
As he pondered the rationality of this phenomenon, a bone-chilling sound of joints dislocating echoed around him. More corpses twisted and writhed, contorting their bodies into grotesque shapes as they struggled to crawl up from the ground.
They convulsed in agony, their chests heaving violently as if subjected to immense pressure.
Their spasming fingers clawed desperately at their own necks, as if trying to tear open a hole so fresh air could rush in.
Beneath their feet and across their backs, without exception, grew a bizarre, madness-tinged mass of flesh and blood, twisting and writhing like a spider’s web that sprawled from within the warehouse and spread across the ground beneath them. The entire warehouse now resembled a colossal web—dim, oppressive, and suffocating with despair. Combined with the flailing arms of the dead waving around them, the warehouse had transformed into a grim hell of corpses dancing in chaos.
“This is a Suffocation Nest!”
Soft, who had been following from a distance behind, had her small face tense, and she clearly looked somewhat nervous: “The Suffocation Puppet has already upgraded the environment around it, transforming this warehouse into a Suffocation Nest.”
“So that means… a C-rank mission?”
Xiao Xiao instantly reacted, cursing in his heart—who did this intelligence work? How could they make such a mistake?
Getting the level wrong too? Do they have brains or not?
But even as he cursed inwardly, Ruan Ruan had already rushed forward with a wrench in hand, her delicate little face turning toward Xiao Xiao with a somewhat serious expression as she said:
“You can withdraw from the mission now. I’ll take over.”
“The upgrade of the Suffocation Nest was our mistake. We only detected it just two hours ago…”
“Sigh, we’re very weak now, and our monitoring capabilities over this city have also declined…”
“……”
“It’s not just that…”
Listening to Soft’s explanation, Xiao Xiao, standing in the middle of numerous twisted corpses surrounding him, had already thought of many problems:
“We still don’t know how the Outsider organization monitors and discovers the mutated creatures that are everywhere in this city, nor what methods they use to gather intelligence……”
“However, judging from this city’s attitude toward the old district, you can tell that the city’s own operational logic has already developed serious flaws.”
“The Security Bureau doesn’t even dare to patrol here casually on normal days, so when a warehouse that devours people appeared here and has already ‘drowned’ so many people, it’s gone unnoticed by everyone else……”
“Since even the city’s own operational logic has malfunctioned, it seems quite normal that the Outsiders would make some mistakes in their monitoring.”
“Just like this, we’re giving up on the mission?”
“……”
Looking at Ruanruan’s reaction, even if I give up, I won’t lose face…
But the points will still fly away…
Right now, my points are severely lacking, and they’re about to hit zero..
In an extremely short amount of time, Xiao Xiao had already realized: this task still had to be completed by himself.
Moreover, there were writhing corpses everywhere in the surroundings, which looked extremely dangerous, but in reality, wasn’t this precisely the key clue that gave him the solution to this problem?
If the warehouse had become a massive web of blood and flesh, then the suffocating puppet was the source of that web.
Following those writhing strands of blood and flesh, one could surely find it!
He immediately shook his head and said to Ruanruan: “There’s no need to give up yet. You keep watch for me. If I really can’t hold on, then lend me a hand…”
“Huh?”
Ruanruan stared at Xiao Xiao’s serious expression, her eyes somewhat vacant: “Xiao Ge’s side profile is so handsome…”
“…Wait, doesn’t he overestimate his own strength? The crisis level has already been confirmed to be escalating, yet he still wants to handle it himself?”
“Are all the newcomers these days starting to act like domineering CEOs?”
“……”
The two didn’t have much time to communicate further, as the writhing corpses were already swarming toward them.
They were in excruciating pain, their chests like pressurized pumps with no outlet, squeezing relentlessly, their bodies convulsing uncontrollably as they staggered toward them from all directions.
And as they drew closer, what came was not merely a visual shock, but a suffocating sensation that swept over them, growing increasingly intense.
Because of the lack of air, everything around was shrouded in a hazy, distorted quality, and the stumbling figures approached like tormented souls from an oil painting, lurching forward.
“We must find the suffocation puppet as quickly as possible…”
Xiao Xiao made a quick decision and rushed toward the depths of the warehouse, calculating the most critical factors in his mind.
Breathing……
Now, without even finding that suffocation doll, his own life had already begun a countdown.
A normal person who holds their breath can typically last about one to two minutes, and if trained, can even reach ten or twenty minutes.
But now, under the influence of the Suffocation Nest, it was not merely a matter of being unable to breathe.
This suffocating sensation seemed to intensify endlessly, making the body feel heavier and heavier, as if crushed beneath a great mountain.
Only breathing could alleviate this feeling, but they had not only lost the ability to breathe, but even the meager air remaining in their bodies was being forcibly extracted, forcing them into asphyxiation.
How long can I survive in this situation?
Forty seconds, or thirty seconds?
“Bang!”
Ruanruan was clearly not as meticulous as Xiao Xiao had thought, but she understood the danger of this moment.
She swung the wrench casually, flinging away a suffocating corpse that had drawn near to her. The enormous force shattered the corpse’s head and even half of its chest cavity, with chunks of rotten flesh falling to the ground.
She watched anxiously as Xiao Xiao rushed deeper into the warehouse, wanting to advise him but unsure how to do so.
Although the task was originally assigned to Xiao Xiao partly to observe his potential, it was clearly inappropriate now.
The task difficulty had exceeded what a newcomer could bear. Xiao Xiao should escape from here before losing consciousness from suffocation, otherwise there would be nothing she could do to help him.
You can’t give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, can you?
But he didn’t expect Xiao Xiao to move so fast, completely ignoring his explanation, and had already rushed forward.
Is this really forcing him to perform CPR on him?
……
……
“Time is running out, I can only assume I have forty seconds of activity left……”
“This is only because my body has been enhanced, otherwise I might not even last twenty seconds……”
“……”
In extreme tension, Xiao Xiao’s thoughts raced through his mind like a pack of unleashed huskies running wild, bringing him all sorts of judgments and ideas, mixed with some uncontrollable stray thoughts.
As his thoughts progressed, the twisted corpses surrounding him surged toward him one after another.
Someone suddenly raised their head to look at Xiao Xiao, their neck bulging like a frog’s, and in their dim eyes, as if affected by the internal air pressure, fresh blood kept flooding into the retina, turning everything blood-red.
Someone painfully raised their convulsing arms, as if the agony of suffocation was so unbearable that they needed to vent their suffering onto other living creatures nearby.
The escape route was blocked, and Xiao Xiao was about to be engulfed.
In this moment, Xiao Xiao became aware of his predicament, feeling only a dull oppression as tension and a relatively small amount of panic surged uncontrollably from the depths of his heart, about to fill his entire body.
He confirmed that the suffocating puppet was inside, but these corpses were difficult to deal with.
The ability of thought explosion allowed Xiao Xiao to accomplish many things in a short time that others could not, such as analysis, planning, and finding opportunities.
But there are also some things that cannot be done.
For example, math problems.
If you don’t know it, you don’t know it. Even if your thinking explodes a hundredfold, you still can’t solve it.
The situation before my eyes is the same.
The corpses surging ahead had nearly blocked off all escape routes. Though his body had been enhanced, facing the grasping hands coming from all directions, he still felt somewhat overwhelmed.
Of course, deep down, Xiao Xiao was actually unwilling to engage in close combat with these corpses.
It was far too disrespectful to the deceased…
But was there really no other way out?
Besides turning around and shouting for help from Ruanruan, what else could he do to solve the problem?
As anxiety gripped his heart, Xiao Xiao’s explosive thinking ability was stretched to its limit, and everything around him seemed to have come to a standstill, including the countless desperate hands that were reaching toward him.
He exerted all his effort, observing every detail, trying to find a solution.
The air in his chest was rapidly depleting, and he probably only had a few dozen seconds of action time left to support himself.
In such a short amount of time, is there a chance to solve the problem?
There definitely is.
All the information elements around him reflected into Xiao Xiao’s mind at this moment, constantly planning, attempting, deliberating, trial and error, and finally……
……A bold idea suddenly appeared in his mind.
“Summon——House-Wrecking Evil Dog!”
With the plan confirmed in his heart, Xiao Xiao unhesitatingly chanted these words silently in his mind.
“Woof woof woof…”
Watching as Xiao Xiao, who was rushing forward, was blocked by the black shadow, Ruan Ruan behind him had already clenched her fists, but because Xiao Xiao himself chose to continue, she could only furrow her brows tightly, watching him charge headlong forward.
Although strengthened, the clearly inexperienced movements still appeared somewhat clumsy.
It was just that no one expected that as the corpses blocked Xiao Xiao’s path and reached out with convulsing hands to pull at him, a fierce whimpering sound suddenly rang out.
Xiao Xiao, rushing forward, was illuminated from behind by the flashlight held limply in a mouth, casting several scattered shadows.
And among these shadows, three of them were becoming increasingly dark and profound, as if taking on substance, spreading like cloaks across both sides of the body.
A fierce and low whimpering sound echoed from his shadow, and then suddenly three strong and swift vicious dogs leaped out from the shadow, running forward alongside Xiao Xiao.