After All Species Mutated, I Activated Cheats [Apocalyptic] - Chapter 11
At this moment, Lu Mian had no time to worry about the residents calling for him. His entire mind was focused on that single runaway trolley.
In a fraction of a second, he judged the distance between himself and the cart, and a look of urgency immediately surfaced on his face.
Damn it! Based on his current trajectory, he was still ten centimeters short! He couldn’t reach the trolley at all!
His brain began to work at high speed, and his intense focus caused a golden light to ignite deep within his pupils.
Right then, something miraculous happened.
In Lu Mian’s eyes, everything began to slow down. The terrified expressions of the crowd froze on their faces, their leaping bodies hung suspended in mid-air, and even a plastic bag caught in the wind hung weightless in the sky.
This was the second time he had entered this wonderful sensory world since his encounter with the Butterfly Queen.
He examined everything around him with absolute clarity, desperately searching through the air-borne clutter for anything useful.
Hard work paid off. To his back right, he spotted a clothesline. Someone must have left it on the roof without taking it back, and it ended up saving Lu Mian’s life.
Lu Mian reached out, grabbed the clothesline, and whipped it toward the trolley. He successfully hooked it, and as the pause on time lifted, he and the cart were sucked together into the Leech King’s oral cavity.
The Leech King was massive. He fell a significant distance before finally landing on a wet, slippery, and slimy wall of flesh. Looking at the situation, it seemed he couldn’t even return the way he came, the walls of the Leech King’s intestinal cavity secreted a slick mucus, making it impossible to climb up.
The light source was completely cut off, leaving him in total darkness. Since compound eyes do not have night vision, Lu Mian could only fumble to his feet. The pitch-black environment and unknown dangers sent his heart into his throat.
Just then, he noticed the rhythmic pulsing of the flesh walls had increased. Something was crawling up his leg. Lu Mian reached out to grab it, feeling something ice-cold, they were tentacle-like appendages.
The tips of these tentacles had suckers. Lu Mian tugged at them but couldn’t shake them off. Then, a sharp pain shot from the back of his neck. He let out a muffled groan as the strength drained from his legs, and he collapsed against the wall of flesh.
A swallowing sound came from the base of the tentacles. Lu Mian felt his blood being continuously drained away.
The Leech King was feeding on him!
The blood loss caused the oxygen levels in his body to drop, leaving him unable to support normal movement. He realized he was about to go into shock, and the tightness in his chest made him see stars.
Just as his consciousness began to fade, the tentacles that had been biting into his neck suddenly recoiled, as if frightened by something.
Seeing stars in the darkness, he laboriously reached for the back of his neck. His hand was instantly covered in a thick, sticky wetness.
A moment later, this section of the Leech King’s inner wall acted as if it had swallowed poison, churning violently. Lu Mian was tossed back and forth, up and down, hovering on the edge of fainting and nearly vomiting.
He struggled to crawl away from that section of the wall. His eyes were tightly shut, and he was drenched in cold sweat, yet his body temperature was rising rapidly. Within seconds, his temperature hit the extreme limit of human endurance.
Lu Mian felt around and touched a familiar hard object to his front right. It was the trolley he had successfully dragged in during the chaos. He followed the handle down to the platform, but it was empty, the loose bags of salt had long since flown into some unknown corner.
Lu Mian held his breath and didn’t give up, continuing to grope around the area.
His luck held out. Those dozens of bags of salt were scattered nearby. Without hesitation, he raised the short blade he had been clutching and slashed open a bag of salt. However, his physical strength was failing. After opening three or four bags, he lay powerless on the soft, slippery wall of flesh.
His body temperature continued to climb, his consciousness was blurred by the heat, and his limbs felt unbearably sore and numb.
Especially the palm of his right hand.
When he had used the clothesline to drag the trolley into the leech’s entrance, the rope had sliced several gashes into his palm. The Leech King’s intestinal fluid was corrosive, and when the wounds touched it, it felt like being soaked in chili water, a searing, burning pain. But now, he lacked the strength even to move his hand.
The Leech King seemed to still be inhaling, so there was still sufficient oxygen in the abdominal cavity. Lu Mian’s mind drifted further and further away. A split second before he blacked out, two “thump” sounds landed beside him.
“Xiao Lu! Xiao Lu! Wake up! You can’t sleep!”
“Wake up, kid!”
“Xiao Lu!”
Three familiar voices rang in his ears, a noisy commotion, and his face was gently slapped.
Lu Mian opened his eyes, the sudden light stinging them.
The people who had come in were Old Wang, Lin Feng, and Brother Chen. Lin Feng was holding a flashlight.
He coughed violently for a moment. “You guys… how did you get in?”
Seeing Lu Mian wake up, they all breathed a sigh of relief.
Lin Feng said, “How could you take such a risk alone!”
Old Wang held the flashlight, sweeping it over the surroundings, but he gagged several times at the sight of the pink, writhing intestinal walls. He then squatted obediently back beside the group. “Leaving your Brother Wang behind, do you look down on me or something?”
Hearing this, Lu Mian weakly twitched the corner of his mouth. “What was I supposed to say? ‘Hey guys, come jump into the tiger’s mouth with me’?”
Brother Chen chuckled. “Why not!”
With that, he reached out and hacked off a fleshy tentacle reaching toward them. “You took such a big risk to get in here, surely it wasn’t just to lie here and wait for death. Tell us, what was your original plan?”
Lu Mian coughed a few times. “That salt… it’s not enough to kill a creature as huge as the Leech King if we just throw it on the outside. But if we scatter it directly from the inside, we can ensure the Leech King absorbs every single grain. It will be much more efficient. Then, I’ll slice through the intestinal cavity from the inside.”
Old Wang hissed. “That plan is a bit risky. What if you were sucked dry the moment you got in? If we hadn’t come in to find you, you’d be leech feed by now!”
Lu Mian replied, “You’re right, Brother Wang…”
He hadn’t really thought that far ahead. The situation was dire. If he could successfully scatter the salt in the Leech King’s intestines, the creature would at least be weakened, and the people on the roof could escape. If he did nothing, everyone would end up in the Leech King’s stomach together.
As they spoke, Brother Chen had gathered the scattered salt. “Is this… enough?”
Lu Mian shook his head. “If it were scattered on the skin, I wouldn’t be sure, but if we stuff it into the intestines, the chance is better… worst case, I’ll use the knife to carve a hole through the wall and climb out, provided I haven’t been digested…”
Old Wang said, “The carving a hole idea sounds more reliable…”
Even as Old Wang said this, his hands were busy tearing open the salt bags and scattering the salt like flower petals. The others also buried their heads in opening the salt bags. No one noticed the strange expression on Lu Mian’s face as he leaned against the intestinal wall.
Just now, the wound on his right palm felt… different.
The gashes were no longer burning with pain. Instead, they were replaced by an abnormal sensation of air flowing through them.
Strands of ice-cold liquid were drilling into his body through the wounds in his palm. With every bit that entered, his strength recovered slightly.
But his hand was clearly pressed against the intestinal wall!
What exactly was being sucked into his body!
Lu Mian’s face turned as dark as a pot’s bottom. He tried hard to pull his right hand away, only to find that it was firmly suctioned to the soft wall of the intestine. He couldn’t budge it at all!
The suction speed was rapid. Within half a minute, his near-collapsed strength had fully recovered, as if the large amount of blood that had been drained earlier was flowing back into him.
But his right hand didn’t stop! The endless flow of icy liquid ignored the fact that his body’s energy was reaching a saturation point, instead, it accelerated the delivery into his body.
The surrounding walls began to struggle. The intestinal cavity, which had some space, began to compress toward the center. Thick, stinking intestinal fluid began to gush from all directions like a faucet had been turned on.
Old Wang yelled, “Holy crap! What a massive reaction!”
Brother Chen shouted, “There’s a reaction, it’s working!”
Lin Feng urged, “Stop talking! Are we done? Once this fluid rises, if we aren’t dissolved, we’ll be drowned! Find an exit, fast!”
Old Wang complained, “How do these guts even work! It’s so slippery, the knife won’t even cut it! Looks like we either go back the way we came or… exit through the back door…”
Lu Mian frowned and sat up. His right hand was still stuck firmly to the wall of flesh. No matter what he did, he couldn’t pull it back. He shouted loudly, “Go toward the tail!”
Old Wang replied, “Got it! Xiao Lu chose the back door.”
Lin Feng: “…”
Brother Chen snapped, “Keeping your mouth shut for one second won’t kill you!”
With that, the group struggled toward the tail. Meanwhile, Lu Mian raised his knife and dragged the blade along the wall of flesh to his right, attempting to cut away the entire section of the wall his hand was stuck to.
However, the three men had come down specifically to save Lu Mian. After a few steps, they realized he wasn’t following.
So, the group shuffled back as if they were walking on a trampoline.
Old Wang shouted, “Xiao Lu! Where are you!”
Brother Chen called, “Xiao Lu! Hang on, we’re coming back to carry you!”
They thought he was failing to keep up because of his injuries.
Lu Mian’s face was grim, his anxiety beyond words. “You guys get out first!”
Lin Feng called, “Xiao Lu! Are you still in the same spot? Wait, we’re coming!”
Through the gaps in the shifting pink walls of flesh, Lu Mian saw the beam of the flashlight getting closer and closer. His movements became faster and faster, yet he still couldn’t cut through the flesh. He looked down and glared at his right hand. “Damn it! Let go!”
The skin on his right palm was deformed from the extreme pulling, but Lu Mian didn’t care anymore and increased the force of his retraction.
Just as Lin Feng pushed aside a fold of flesh, a “pop” sounded from his right palm. Lu Mian managed to pull his hand away from the Leech King’s intestinal wall at the very last second.
Lin Feng asked, “What’s wrong?”
Lu Mian swallowed, his heart pounding wildly from the intense stress. He looked at Lin Feng. “No… nothing. Let’s go, fast.”
With that, he stumbled to his feet, hiding his right hand behind his back.
Relying on his strong physique, Lin Feng bent down to support Lu Mian. “I’ve got you, let’s go!”
Distracted, Lu Mian followed the three men toward the tail. The further they went, the narrower the space became. They went from walking side-by-side to a single file line, from struggling to walk to crawling on the walls of flesh. Finally, their path was blocked by a large area of wrinkled, folded flesh.