Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation
Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Stepping on the soft grass, Lin Chao approached the forest surreptitiously.
Two zebras had their heads lowered in the bushes in search of food when one of them suddenly picked up its head in alert as if hearing some movement. A human arm dangled from its mouth, sharp teeth mutated from the virus biting into it tightly.
Surprised, Lin Chao halted his steps immediately.
He was approximately twenty meters away from the mutated zebras. Although the light could create an illusion to hide his visibility, his scent and noise were not able to be concealed. He had to be extremely careful to be able to get close!
Lin Chao adjusted his breathing and sealed his pores to prevent sweating lest he exposed himself.
Gently stepping on the grass, he took one step after another, like an agile cat, praying his targets.
The mutated zebras were still feeding; a human corpse that wore the zoo uniform laid under them. The clothes were tattered now and most of the flesh was eaten, leaving behind the skeleton; while the munched up head with nose and cheeks hardly attached rolled in the bush.
Lin Chao held his steel bar in a death grip. He chose not to use his pistol, it was too loud and it would alert the nearby monsters.
Ten meters, eight meters… Lin Chao was slowly approaching.
All of a sudden, the attentive mutated zebra lifted its head once again. Its gaze was locked towards the direction of Lin Chao, emerald green eyes glowing viciously.
Lin Chao was bemoaned. He must have stepped a tad too heavier and attracted its attention. He controlled his heartbeat, trying as much as he could to achieve a frequency of just one beat every sixty seconds.
Stay calm! Stay calm!
Clutching his steel bar, Lin Chao was determined to bash the zebra to death in one abrupt movement if it came close.
To Lin Chao’s disappointment, the zebra had only kept its eyes trained on his location without any sign of approaching. After a few minutes, it resumed masticating the remains on the ground.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Lin Chao carefully took another step.
Both mutated zebras looked up abruptly in unison, glaring at where Lin Chao was. A moment later, both of them turned to gallop away and vanished in sight speedily.
Lin Chao was vexed. His mission of stealth had failed.
Although he had watched battle videos of light manipulators in his past life and understood the basic battle styles, it was a whole new world to execute it himself.
He was fine with controlling light and hiding by manipulating the vision’s blind spot but his experience in ambushing was too little. Lin Chao reflected upon the factors of his failure and concluded that his footsteps were too loud during his stealth; he had landed as light as he could but the physical attributes of these mutated beasts were alarming, even creatures that did not usually depend on their hearing would be able to capture any tiny movement as their senses doubled or tripled in sensitivity after mutation.
How could he not make any sound?
Lin Chao was engrossed in his own thoughts.
Ten minutes passed without any idea. Lin Chao was rather miffed. He could only retrace the mutated zebras, hoping to gain experiences from practice.
Following the footprints, he saw the zebras again now roaming on the grassland.
Lin Chao subdued his vital signs instantly and approached the creatures from the back with caution. He once again came within the ten-meter warning zone and grew more cautious.
You can’t see me, you can’t see me… Lin Chao chanted in his heart and lifted his leg to take another step.
One of the mutated zebras lifted its head again and stared at Lin Chao’s position alertly.
Groaning in his mind, he expected that when both zebras hissed lowly they would sprint away, disappearing from his sight in a blink of eyes.
Lin Chao was so frustrated that he would gladly just pull the trigger and kill them.
Hoo!
A tense cry suddenly rang in the sky as a black formation shielded the sun. Flying towards the faraway land, it was a massive black bird with wings around nine feet long.
The few inky feathers that fell from the sky were tinged with a rotting stench.
Lin Chao caught one of them and sniffing its scent, relieved when he realized that he would pay a hefty price if he could stay alive should they battle face to face, based on the immense pressure he felt from the bird.
Hold on!
The wind?
Realization dawned on Lin Chao as he was struck with enlightenment. ‘So this is it – the real stealth isn’t soundless but blending the sound in the breeze so one cannot differentiate if it’s footsteps or the wind!’
After all, who would be on guard against the wind?
Lin Chao suddenly became lively just thinking about it. He went after the zebras again and found them in a few minutes.
This time, Lin Chao approached them much faster. When he came to the ten-meter distance, he was still speedy but he made no noise; the minuscule noises were not obvious as they sounded exactly like wind brushing past the plants.
Both mutated zebras did not feel a thing as they remained wandering around the plain.
Five meters, three meters!
Lin Chao scurried abruptly using his speed enhancement!
He looked like a shadow when the steel bar in his grip crudely smashed one of the zebras’ head and his knee stabbing the other neck.
With a crack, the bones in the neck were fractured.
The steel bar shattered the zebra’s skull without surprise, the thwack almost depleting all of Lin Chao’s strength but there was no time to pant as he swung the bar up and brought it down violently at the other zebra with the broken neck.
Bam!
The skull was cracked open. The zebra convulsed twice before it fell in a stagger. Blood poured from its dented head, like red spring water that seeped into the field.
Everything had happened within one and a half-second. Lin Chao had been visualizing the battle repeatedly as he approached the creatures, thus his movements were fluid and organized.
Lin Chao heaved slightly. The one and a half-second explosive stunt had expended about one-third of his stamina.
He did not slack but squatted down and pulled out the flying knife tied to his leg to slash the zebras’ stomach open. He dissected them speedily and spotted a ball of white at their chest area. They looked like jellies that wiggled in the flesh with a thin membrane on the surface.
Picking them up, Lin Chao stuffed them to his mouth without hesitation.
The genetic zests did not taste strong, akin to thick sticky rice, but they were slippery, quickly sliding down the throat into the stomach.
Lin Chao left the vicinity promptly to prevent the zebras’ blood from drawing in other monsters.
A few minutes later, Lin Chao felt a little lighter and his physique strengthen slightly when his stomach had completely digested the genetic zests.
He went into the forest once more to hunt.
Hidden in the light, Lin Chao identified the footmarks on the ground, estimating the number of his target and the species by inspects of its traces, and chose the monsters that his current ability could kill before giving chase.
Half an hour later, Lin Chao had already killed six mutated zebras and two mutated ostriches.
Further grasping the stealth’s creed, Lin Chao could now approach the mutated beasts and kill them easily. In spite of it, there were still creatures with sensitive senses of smell and hearing that he could not come close to.
He hopped onto a tree and rested hiding on the branch. The continuous hunting took a huge toll on his stamina; there was not much of his cell energy left and controlling the light became strenuous.
Leaning against the withering tree, he fully relaxed to replenish his stamina and cell energy in the shortest time.
Hiss, hiss!
All of a sudden, a hissing came from the top of his head.
Alarmed, Lin Chao looked up to see the head of a green snake, about a finger’s width, slithering down from a branch above him and was now less than half a meter away from him.