Chapter 281: Can I Grow a Pair? [Part 1]

Thanks to his lithe figure and nimbleness, Cillin was able to dodge the white mouse’s attacks repeatedly. Unfortunately for the immobile trees around him, they were cut down into pieces as easily as tofu.

Meanwhile, the red dots caused by gunshots on the white mouse’s body shrank visibly until the wounds themselves were completely gone. No one had expected this to happen considering that the toxin plugged inside the bullet was capable of killing a bio-soldier almost instantly.

“What do we do?” Erty looked at Gu Xin while searching for an opportunity to open fire at their enemy.

Gu Xin wasn’t sure how to deal with an artificial beast like this either. It had tough muscles that could block physical force from outside when tensed. A bullet would get stuck in its muscles before it managed to penetrate much. Even if they used an explosive bullet and blew a hole in its body, it regenerated at such speed that the wound slowly but visibly shrank before their eyes. For now, Gu Xin thought that the right way to take it out was still eluding them.

The commotion drew the attention of some nearby animals that were hunting for food, so Cillin’s group had to deal with the white mouse and the wild beasts who were coming their way.

Bang!

Erty blew off the head of an animal charging towards him, but he didn’t look gladdened by his success at all. On the contrary, he was very, very worried about their situation. The same explosive bullet could easily take a wild beast out of commission, but not a white mouse. The shot just wasn’t as effective on the white mouse even without accounting for its unnatural agility.

Cillin ran circles around the area and kicked at the white mouse from time to time, slowing it down so that his companions could shoot at it while it was staggered. It was the only real opening they got because the white mouse was so fast that their shots missed most of the time.

One of the white mouse’s ears was blew off by an explosive shot, but it didn’t affect its speed at all. It was obvious that the white mouse was growing more and more irritated, however. Their attacks had angered it, and its hair was standing like needles and growing at a visible rate.

Gu Xin and Hua Li managed to hit it in the paw, but the white mouse only slowed for a bit before chasing after Cillin again like it had never been hit.

Cillin had no idea why the white mouse was so fixated on him. The chase had been going on for a long time and it still hadn’t given up. However, he did notice one thing: the white mouse’s ears were completely folded while it was running. It hadn’t lifted its ears once since they started shooting at it.

Bang!

Someone managed to shoot its paws again, slowing the white mouse’s movements for just a bit. This time, Cillin seized the opportunity to open fire three times in a row at his enemy, the bullets arcing past a tree branch to hit it squarely in the ear. The white mouse’s left ear was blown off as a result, its strange, reddish brown blood stain covering almost the entire left half of its body.

“Chi—”

A sharp screech hit everyone’s ear drums like an ultrasound as the white mouse’s killing intent grew even stronger. By now, its needle-like hair had grown twice as long as before, and thick, scaly armor grew across its limbs and armoring it all the way down to its toes. If this situation continues, even shooting at its paws would soon be ineffective.

Cillin fired another three shots just as the white mouse started screaming and changing. All three bullets flew straight towards the open, not yet protected wounds left behind by the explosive shots.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

reddish brown blood scattered everywhere, the shots destroying its head so thoroughly that only a barely visible skull and some flesh was left.

The group didn’t care if the white mouse looked dead, however. Everyone started shooting at the same spot with everything they had. They all used explosive bullets instead of the toxin bullets they were given.

When the gunshots finally settled, the white mouse’s entire head was gone. Although its huge body was still standing on its feet, it was completely still and seemingly dead.

Is it dead?

The group slowly inched towards the white mouse, but Cillin suddenly shouted, “Watch out!!”

Most of their attention were on the dead white mouse because its screech from earlier had scared away all of the wild beasts surrounding them. Although Cillin’s shout successfully pulled their attention back to their surroundings, Hua Li’s reflex wasn’t nearly as fast as Cillin’s. Luckily for her, her first reflex was to lower her rifle and hold it in front of herself. She turned around just in time to see a white blur sweeping towards her, but because the rifle was in the way she was merely sent flying across the air instead of being taken out of the fight completely. Her rifle was also bent where it was struck.

Hua Li’s rifle could be used to break stones with ease, but the attack still caused a dent in its body. The white blur had been the tail of a white mouse, a different mouse that had been drawn over from nearby by the commotion.

She could no longer lift her rifle because her hands were completely numb. Moreover, the hook-shaped spike at the end of its tail had left a scratch mark on her back. Still, Hua Li should be grateful that she was still alive, and that she hadn’t been decapitated outright like that bio-soldier from before.

Erty fared worse than Hua Li, however. Although his reflex was better than Hua Li’s, he suddenly stumbled while he was trying to dodge the attack. Unable to move out of the way in time, all he could do was watch the claw swiping down towards his direction.

“Chi—” Another screech cut through the air again.

Erty collapsed on the ground as the swipe left a bloody gash from his chest to his stomach. If the attack had gone any deeper, it would result in disembowelment already.

When they looked at the new enemy, they suddenly discovered that a large chunk of flesh had been torn right off its back. This was why the white mouse had let out a furious screech of pain just now. Not far away from the white mouse, Wheeze was licking its bloodstained mouth. It was a shame that its meat was tougher than it expected, or that surprise attack from earlier should’ve torn off even more flesh.

Wheeze’s attack staggered the white mouse temporarily, so both Cillin and Gu Xin had a clear shot. They shot it at its eyes and its slight opened ears.

A couple of explosions later, the white mouse’s head was blown off its torso just like the one earlier. However, they were left with two wounded this time.

“The claws are poisonous. They need treatment immediately!” Gu Xin said after inspecting Erty and Hua Li’s wounds.

After looking at their surrounding once, the group quickly evacuated the area and rushed towards Neo’s base. Gu Xin carried Erty and Cillin carried Hua Li.

The sky was still raining snow. Cillin kept his eyes on the front while running. Some time later, his attention was drawn by the snowflakes. Most of the snow flakes were clumped up together, but there were also single snowflakes. As the snow fell at one thousandth the normal speed in his head, he thought that its perfect, hexagonal shape looked incredibly familiar…

Neo had seen some parts of the battle through the security cameras, so he had prepared some medicine ahead of time.

Cillin and Gu Xin put the two wounded inside the medicine room after returning to Neo’s base. Erty was still conscious even though his wounds were burning like fire, but Hua Li was starting to lose consciousness already.

Although Erty’s wound was much bigger than Hua Li’s, he had better constitution and resistance than her. This was obvious just looking at the state of their wounds. Erty’s wound was reddish brown in color, and inflammation was starting to spread from the wound. But Hua Li’s wound was already starting to rot even though it was tiny, and a reddish brown patch had covered nearly one half of her back.

Considering their gender differences, the group purposely called Ah Shou in to treat Hua Li’s wounds. Surprisingly, Ah Shou had handled the task incredibly well. Most of them thought that she would cry or hiccup at least a couple of times throughout the treatment process, but she was able to complete the treatment firmly and proficiently with no more than a pair of red eyes.

Cillin privately inquired about Ah Shou’s skill some time later, and Neo replied matter-of-factly, “Obviously, some basic survival skills are necessary for all those who come here, and wound treatment is literally the most basic of basics. If you come here without even that skill you may as well kill yourself and save everyone some time.”

Although it sounded like common sense, this was Ah Shou they were talking about. Still, Cillin’s surprise had only lasted for a while. He had more urgent things to deal with.

The reason Wheeze hadn’t acted sooner and taken down the white mouse was because Cillin had told it to focus on collecting information. This information was useful in deepening his understanding of this artificial beast.

Cillin let out a sigh of relief after studying the information he was given. Although the white mouse was incredibly tough, its vital spots weren’t random like the bio-soldiers. This meant that the white mouse could be killed as long its head was destroyed, and its headless body didn’t have separate autonomy either.

After calculating the white mouse’s defense briefly, Cillin came to the conclusion that his remaining bullets weren’t enough to penetrate its body completely. Even without accounting for accuracy, it would still take three explosive shots to destroy its head completely. In this case, the toxin bullets were completely ineffective. Their troubles could be solved if their explosive bullets were faster and stronger, but they only had so many materials, and they didn’t have infinite bullets. The number of white mice out there was also an unknown number.

Of course, Cillin wasn’t stupid enough to fight these things barehanded. He could kill them with his blade, sure, but that was only limited to one-on-one fights. Again, Cillin wasn’t stupid enough to take on multiple white mice at once in melee. This meant that he needed to find a way to get more bullets and modify their guns further than they already were.

Cillin called Neo over and told him his thoughts, causing the latter to scrunch up his face into a bun once more. “It’s possible to increase the explosive power of our shots with the materials we have, but the bullets must grow in size too. This means that it might not be fast enough to hit the white mouse, and judging from the data you supplied they had an evasion rate of 67.73%. You might as well just use the old bullets in that case.”

Cillin thought for a moment before asking, “Do we really not have the materials to create stronger explosive bullets without increasing its size?”

“You won’t find them here at least. After all, my research doesn’t doesn’t require this type of materials. However, I think there’s a place and a person who might have the materials you need.” Neo walked into his lab and entered a passcode, causing a cabinet-shaped lab instrument to open up. Neo then tapped a series of keys before pressing a metallic piece on his bracelet, which looked to be almost the same kind as Ah Shou’s. There was a flash, and the characters on the instrument started changing at a rapid pace.

Five minutes later, Neo frowned and said, “How outrageous!”

“What’s wrong?”

“That fellow actually submitted to the invaders!” Neo said in a scornful tone.

It would appear that the place Neo mentioned had been taken over by another group just like theirs. The difference was that that takeover had sounded a little more hostile.

“So we can’t get any materials from there?”

“No. That fellow is being watched.”

“How far is this place you mentioned?” Cillin took out a map and asked Neo to point out its location.

Neo gave it a look at pointed at a corner of the map. “It’s over here.”

A brief calculation told Cillin that it would take at least half a day to make it from the base to his destination.

It was at this moment Gu Xin walked in and called out to Cillin, “Cillin, come over for a bit. There’s something that needs to be discussed.”

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