Book 1Chapter 16: Grand Lobby of Peril!
The threeheaded from the door to the elevator in single file.
Inside, BaiLong couldn"t help but stare at the three backpacks in his grasp. With a facefull of dissatisfaction, he shifted his gaze between the two. It seems Ye Chenand his sister have both unanimously liberated themselves of their backpacksand have designated him as their new carrier. Bai Long wondered if he hadinadvertently joined a metaphorical "pirate ship" where he played the role ofslave labourer in the troupe….
With littlechoice in the matter, he laughed bitterly at his current predicament. Bai Longwas convinced that he was coerced by some malignant jinx into agreeing to leavethe safety of the hotel with these two maniacs. To hurl himself willingly intosuch peril was akin to a long-lived fool who ingested a.r.s.enic to hasten his owndemise, was he tired of his own longevity or something?
Xiao Yi!
Bai Longcried her name out in his thoughts before breathing out a sigh. The pain andlonging that clouded his eyes for an instant, disappeared deep into his heart.Acting as though nothing happened, he casually called out to Ye Chen who stoodin front, saying: "What"s the hurry? Wouldn"t it be better to leave when we"vebuilt up our strength further?"
Ye Chenshot back his reply, saying: "I have my own plans."
Bai Longpursed his lips in silence.
15thfloor!
12thfloor!
7thfloor!
As theelevator descended, the three did not engage with any idle chatter. They eachheld their weapons closely and focused their senses. They were well aware thatthe bottom floor contained the highest amount of zombies!
It was alsoquite possible for a formidable mutant beast to appear!
2ndfloor!
1stfloor!
*Ding!
As theelevator stabilized, a soft "ding" resounded before the doors gradually opened.
Like aparting set of heavy curtains, the scene behind was slowly revealed to Ye Chenand the others. In front of them was a grand and s.p.a.cious lobby crowned with anexquisitely crafted chandelier and walls decorated with elegant motifs giving amajestic sense of luxury and cla.s.s.
However,within this grand lobby stood numerous zombies, anch.o.r.ed stiffly upon the well-polishedfloor. Their grotesque forms stood in stark contrast with the lavishsurroundings, giving rise to a bizarre sense of horror!
"2,4,6,8,10,……"Ye Chen swept the lobby with a glance and counted 82 zombies altogether! Theclothes upon each zombie revealed a little of what each of them were likebefore they turned. There were security guards, business men, perhaps sometourists judging by their casual clothes and many others. Some of the zombiesstill had their gla.s.ses on, no doubt individual who suffered from impairedvision during their lives.
"Rrrargh!"
The slightnoise made from the elevator alerted every zombie to their arrival. The nearestwas a woman zombie, dressed like a hotel staff. Her chest had been torn intoand was covered in dried blood. With eyes fiendish from hunger, the womanzombie bared her maw and lunged towards Ye Chen.
"Grrargh!""Rrrargh!"
The entirehorde of zombies filled the lobby with their piercing snarls before scramblingtowards the three like a furious tide.
Ye Chen"seyes were cold. Behind him, Ye Zhu began to pale while Bai Long"s facialmuscles stiffen as though he were suffocating.
"Scram!"
With onestep out of the elevator, Ye Chen spun his body around performing a spin kick.As his foot plunged into the woman zombie"s stomach, it dispersed an explosiveamount of kinetic energy which sent her entire body hurtling backwards andcrashing into one of the incoming zombies.
Although YeChen had clearly obliterated all of her organs by caving in the woman zombie"sabdomen, she continued to prop up her upper body in a furious crawl back in hisdirection.
Withoutlooking back, Ye Chen swiped Bai Long"s watermelon knife and began wielding aweapon in each hand. With an axe in his right hand and a knife in his left, hetook on the likeness of a deity of war. Stepping forth, his black hair swayedas he directed his frigid glare towards his incoming prey.
"Bloodwindarts fourth stance!"
"Twin-edgeslaughter!"
Ye Chenbegan flourishing the watermelon knife and fireman"s axe in elegant arcs,seemingly like a b.u.t.terfly in dance. Brandishing the two weapons allowed him tomaintain a watertight defense. Any zombie that got within three feet would beinstantly wounded with dozens of lacerations!
Bloowindsarts had a total of nine stances. Each stance should only be used in a specificinstance!
Firststance: blindside a.s.sault, used when behind a mutant freak!
Secondstance: rising-dragon strike, used when underneath a mutant freak!
Thirdstance: mirage blade, used when facing a mutant freak directly!
Fourthstance: twin-edge slaughter, a crowd control stance used when surrounded bygroups!
The fifth,sixth stance onwards had their own individual uses as well.
Althoughthere were only nine stances in all, they covered all possible contingencies.Take mirage blade of the third stance for example, mirage blade had four levelsof usage: mirage ten blades, mirage hundred blades, mirage thousand blades andmirage ten thousand blades!
With YeChen current strength, he could only perform mirage ten blades at most.Forcefully performing mirage hundred blades would result in crippling his ownhands!
The fourthstance, twin-edge slaughter was not performed during earlier encountersprecisely because it places immense physical strain on the hands in order toperform such high speed movements.
At themoment, every zombie in the lobby was converging towards him. With everyhandful of zombies he mowed down, more would take their ranks. In the blink ofan eye, the ground was littered with a mountain of corpses. The stackingcorpses began to encroach upon Ye Chen"s surroundings, slowly increasing thestrain in his movements as they obstructed his range of motion.
"Die!" Withouta hint of panic, Ye Chen"s glare hardened as he sped up his movements. With hislegs taking a wide stance, he spun his body around vigorously. The weapons inhis hands swept out, kicking up a furious storm of howling wind.
"Dragon"stempest!"
This wasthe second level of twin-edge slaughter, similar to mirage hundred blades. Thekey difference is, a single target stance is more physically demanding while acrowd control stance required an exponentially higher amount of finesse andprecision. Dragon"s tempest required a higher swing speed than twin-edgeslaughter as well as incorporating basic footwork in coordination for increasedmomentum in order to pull it off.
Althoughcrowd control stances covered a wide area, they don"t measure up to singletarget stances in terms of stopping power. Making the jump from mirage tenblades to mirage hundred blades required an exponential increase in musclepower in order to compensate for the increased swings per interval!
The essenceof crowd control stances were finesse as it core and strength as a supplement.
Ye Zhu andBai Long gawked in utter astonishment as they stood within the elevator. As thebillowing winds blew against their faces, their hair flew backwards as thesound of furious howling entered their ears.
Outside theelevator, aside from the snarling zombies was an indistinct figure shrouded in aflurry of gleaming blades. Any zombie that neared was torn to shreds under the shimmeringof dancing metal.
Even thepiles of corpses that encroached upon Ye Chen were swept into scattering chunksby the relentless tornado of sharpened steel. His surroundings were instantlycleared of obstacles, allowing him to perform any blade arts he desired.
Soon afterperforming dragon"s tempest, Ye Chen could feel a gradually intensifyingpain transmitted from his arms. His brows began to crease as he lamented how ithas only been ten or so seconds since he kicked himself into high gear. Hisarms would not last for much longer; it appears that his current body was stilllacking the capacity for such a demanding blade art. If he persisted further,it could end up paralyzing his arms. Therefore, he switched back to using twinedge slaughter.
During thebattle, Ye Chen snuck a peek at the streets outside. It seems like the streetswere swarming with zombies, listlessly shuffling about. This h.e.l.lish scenewould chill the hearts of anyone who beheld it.
The onlything worth being thankful for was the fact that there were no mutant beastsamidst the horde of zombies in the lobby. Otherwise Ye Chen would be forced tochoose between his own safety and protecting Ye Zhu and Bai Long.
However,this could hardly be surprising as mutant beasts were creatures that evolvedinto a new lifeform. Their flesh and blood were bright red unlike thefestering, rot infested zombies which carried blackish blood.
If youconsidered zombies to be undead creatures, then mutant beasts were properliving creatures.
That"s whyzombies would not hesitate to swarm mutant beasts en ma.s.se as they too carriedfresh blood which made zombies ravenous. This was the only similarity betweenunturned humans and mutant beasts, they were both prey in the eyes of zombies!
Translator"sNotes:
Bai Long whodescribed himself as a slave labourer, more specifically refers to a coolie.Coolies were unskilled/ uneducated labourers more common in the 19thcentury that were primarily tasked with physical labour such as carryingluggage.
Once again,Bai Long inwardly mentions the mystery girl Yi"er in his heart, firstintroduced in chapter 12.
A moreliteral translation of dragon"s tempest is tornado dragon cleave.