"Boom!"
The crimson fireball shot out violently and drilled into the mutated rat's gaping mouth.
"Squeak—"
The giant rat immediately let out a pitiful cry, rolling and struggling on the ground until its belly exploded. Cooked innards splattered out along with rising white steam.
Before the other rats could feel fear and retreat, several condensed, compressed fireballs had already caught up with them one after another, igniting them into writhing torches.
They screamed miserably, rolling in the damp, muddy ground, but the flames were difficult to extinguish and kept burning until they turned into charred corpses and stopped struggling.
The air was probably now filled with the acrid smell of burning meat, but since both men had blocked their sense of smell, they couldn't detect anything.
"All right, go collect your herbs."
Silas turned and said to Darkwill.
"Okay, okay."
Darkwill immediately nodded and hurried to his wooden racks to harvest the herbs that hadn't been ruined yet.
As he collected the herbs, he replayed the battle scene in his mind.
Such impressive fire control ability!
Darkwill marveled.
He happened to know that one particular sequence of Beyonders possessed this ability: the Hunter pathway, Sequence 7 "Pyromaniac."
I never imagined I'd actually hire a mid-sequence powerhouse!
Thinking that his payment was only a few potions and a mere 10 pounds, Darkwill couldn't help but feel guilty, and his herb-gathering speed increased considerably.
If he knew that Silas wasn't actually Sequence 7 but Sequence 5, who knows what he would think.
Silas wasn't thinking about any of that, because his main goal wasn't to make money but to find a way to connect with the local Beyonder circle.
He lowered his head to examine the charred corpses of those giant rats.
He'd eliminated them too quickly earlier without careful observation.
Now taking a closer look, he immediately sensed a familiar aura from the corpses.
The subtle, corrupted evil essence of the True Creator.
He frowned slightly.
Besides the True Creator's aura, there was another, more dominant presence in the giant rats' flesh and blood.
That presence was exactly the same as what he'd encountered with the crazed streetwalker at the mental hospital.
Are these rats Lanevus's doing?
Silas thought to himself, looking up at Darkwill, wanting to ask him what was located above this section of the sewers.
Just as he raised his head, his previously blocked nose suddenly caught a whiff of warm, sweet fragrance.
Ma'am M was standing beside the wooden rack, smiling at him.
The busy Darkwill hadn't noticed the extra person beside him at all and was bent over, working hard to collect his herbs.
Rustling whispers gradually rose in his ears, surging into his mind layer upon layer. In the distant darkness, it seemed like countless hostile eyes wanted to burst out at any moment and ambush him.
"What are you doing out here?"
Silas said coldly.
He felt his mood rapidly deteriorating, the mad ravings slowly growing louder, filling his ears.
He seemed to have overestimated himself. Madness had caught up with him earlier than expected.
"Huh?"
Darkwill turned around in confusion and found Silas staring at empty space with a ferocious expression.
Ma'am M didn't speak, only smiled.
Silas let out a cold laugh, dug a chunk of flesh from the rat corpse on the ground, and threw it in Ma'am M's direction.
"Hiss—"
The flesh instantly dispersed, transforming into a large cloud of blood mist that enveloped where Ma'am M stood. The bricks and stones were immediately corroded and dissolved. Ma'am M didn't escape either; her flesh rapidly rotted away, her body burning through to reveal her skeleton.
Unable to support herself, she fell, still raising her right hand with the red ring, pointing behind him.
She seemed to be warning Silas of something.
"Splash—"
As if confirming her gesture, violent water sounds immediately erupted from the dark river behind Silas.
"Ah!"
Darkwill, already startled by Silas's sudden madness, suddenly screamed because something was climbing up from the river channel!
Their bodies were dripping wet, and under the firelight, they revealed an unusual pale pink color, the kind of pinkish white of skinned flesh soaked in water for too long.
Traces of clothing still remained on their bodies, but their appearance had strayed too far from the concept of human.
"It's them!"
Darkwill retreated in terror until he bumped into the wooden rack and fell. He recognized these people.
They were Horn's underlings, the guys who'd entered the sewers before them!
How did they become like this?
Have they come to claim my life?
Darkwill was so frightened his legs kicked wildly until muddy water soaked his clothes, and a chill brought him back to clarity.
"Hey! Anderson, hurry up and kill them!"
He shouted at the standing "Pyromaniac."
Then Darkwill watched in despair as the mid-sequence powerhouse seemed trapped in some strange nightmare, standing frozen in place with a dazed expression, muttering something under his breath.
"Anderson! Anderson!"
No matter how much he shouted, there was no response.
The twisted blood-men had already climbed up.
Under the burning firelight, the craving for fresh flesh and blood gleamed in their bloodshot, redundant eyes.
"Why did he have to go crazy right now!"
Darkwill cursed and pulled a revolver from his coat.
"Bang!"
The bullet hit the monster, and the gunshot echoed violently through the sewers, but the monster only swayed slightly, leaving a bloody hole on its surface.
"Damn it!"
After discovering the revolver was clearly ineffective, Darkwill pulled out a small dark green bottle.
He looked at it with heartache, gripped it in his hand, and threw it at the monsters.
"Crash!"
The bottle shattered on the blood-men, and the liquid inside transformed into a rising cloud of toxic gas that spread out.
Dark blue-black discoloration soon spread across the nearby blood-men's bodies.
The one most affected by the toxic fog took a few more steps before collapsing, its entire body turned blue-black.
But the other monsters were only partially affected. Darkwill's action instead enraged them, making them speed up their movements, crawling rapidly toward the living people.
How is this possible? That entire bottle contained enough toxin to bring down ten elephants!
Darkwill was shocked and horrified.
"Anderson! Wake up, quick!"
Darkwill was terrified. Watching as Silas was surrounded by the monsters, once he was devoured, he would be next...
Then he saw these monsters suddenly show expressions of terror as their bodies split open.
Anderson, who had been immersed in madness, suddenly snapped awake because the monsters had touched him.
"Huh?"
He looked at the twisted humanoid forms gathered around him with an irritated expression.
"Pop!"
It was as if a rain of blood had begun falling in the low space. The monsters were grabbed one by one and thrown upward.
So those hideous, terrifying limbs that could withstand bullets and toxins collided with the ceiling and exploded, transforming into clusters of filthy fireworks.
Darkwill stared wide-eyed, watching as the "Sequence 7" powerhouse bathed in this rain of blood, occasionally muttering twisted, blasphemous words.
"For the Lord of shit..." [I offer a feast of flesh and blood...]
He looked deranged and terrifying.