Compressed Ant Biscuits

Before that seething mass of aberrants could react, they had already slammed the door to the sixth carriage shut.

At the same time, Xie Xu's group pulled back to the eighth carriage and closed that door as well.

Working in tandem, they trapped the majority of the aberrants between the seventh and sixth carriages. The creatures couldn't comprehend how their prey had slipped away; enraged, they hurled themselves against the glass, their viscous blood smearing across the transparent panels in a gruesome, horrifying display.

Of course, not all the aberrants from the fourth, fifth, and sixth carriages had been sealed inside. A few hadn't been fast enough to squeeze into the sixth carriage and now milled about aimlessly in the fifth.

The sudden appearance of fresh meat sent them into a frenzy, and they lunged at their prey.

The five of them repeated the same maneuver.

Lure. Retreat. Seal.

Three steps executed in one fluid motion.

By the fourth carriage, only a handful of aberrants remained.

And the door between the fourth and third carriages was shut.

Through the transparent glass, Tu Ran could see what was happening in the third carriage.

Her scalp went numb.

The aberrants inside were packed so densely that nearly every one of them was pressed against the next, like a billion ants compressed into a cubic biscuit.

They all faced the second carriage. Because the second carriage was crammed with survivors, and to the aberrants, they were nothing less than a sumptuous feast.

One by one, they began noticing the group approaching from behind.

They wheeled around and charged.

But they all slammed into the transparent glass door.

The pounding, thumping vibrations made Tu Ran worry the door wouldn't hold.

As for the situation in the second carriage, Tu Ran and the others couldn't see it.

If they opened the door and killed them one by one, who knew how long that would take.

They didn't have much time left.

The people in the second carriage could break at any moment.

And the dense gunfire that had been pouring out of the second carriage was thinning to sporadic pops.

They were probably almost out of ammunition.

Throughout the fighting, the group Tu Ran was with had also depleted most of their ammo.

The main forces now were the burly man and the woman with the curved blade.

The two men with machine guns fired off their last rounds, then gripped the barrels and used the stocks as crude weapons, smashing them into the aberrants' heads with raw, simple brutality.

Blunt force couldn't kill them outright. It often took several blows just to pulp their flesh and slow them down, but their limbs still worked, and their teeth remained sharp enough to bite.

The burly man chopped off another aberrant's head, and it rolled to Tu Ran's feet.

She looked down. Its eyes were still open, and its mouth could still move—it was about to bite her foot.

Tu Ran kicked it away, sending it flying into another aberrant's head.

The creature that got hit immediately fixed its target on Tu Ran, claws extended as it charged at her.

Tu Ran cracked her knuckles and tightened her grip on the dagger Xie Xu had given her.

But just as the aberrant was about to reach her, the burly man sliced it in half at the waist.

Blood sprayed all over her.

He roared at her, "Stay back! You're in the way!"

Tu Ran: "...I'm a Pioneer."

"I don't care what you are. Stay back!"

Tu Ran: So what exactly was the point of her joining this squad?

The burly man grumpily split the last aberrant in the carriage from top to bottom, cleaving its body into two halves.

The carriage was clear.

Everyone let out a long breath, wiped the sweat from their brows, and stretched their stiff limbs.

They could rest for a bit—for now.