Suzy’s grip on the gun was surprisingly steady. Pulling the trigger had never been easier, too.
With a heavy, resounding BANG, a bullet tore through the air and drilled straight through the man’s head.
Dark blood splattered outward. The man’s body stiffened for a brief second before collapsing limp onto the pavement with a sickening thud.
The deafening gunshot reverberated through the air, freezing everyone dead in their tracks, paralyzed with shock and fear.
The crowd looked back and forth between the gun in Suzy’s hand and the man lying lifeless on the asphalt, their faces draining of color in an instant.
A gun... she fired a freaking gun!
That woman actually has a gun!
At that moment, every glance cast toward Suzy carried a newfound surge of terror. None of them had anticipated she would be armed with firearms. Had they known, who among them would have dared to block her path?
"Can I leave now?" Suzy asked, her voice cold and even.
Her tone wasn’t overly loud, but in the deathly quiet around them, every word rang out with crystal clarity.
The leader offered no reply. Face pale as a sheet, he could only stare blankly at Suzy.
Suzy shifted her gaze toward him, adjusting the barrel of her gun accordingly.
She recalled that this man was their leader. In that case, making an example of him next posed no issue at all.
"Why so quiet?"
With the pitch-black barrel leveled directly at him, the man met Suzy’s icy eyes. A chill ran down his spine, and he instinctively took a step back.
In a split second, the tables had completely turned.
"Y-Yes... of course... Please..."
The man stammered out his response, but the moment the words left his mouth, another gunshot shattered the air.
The heavy BANG struck everyone’s hearts like thunder.
The leader felt a sharp burst of pain across his cheek, accompanied by the acrid stench of gunpowder drifting around him. As the realization struck him, his knees buckled, and he collapsed onto the ground, his legs shaking uncontrollably.
Suzy didn’t lower her gun right away. Instead, she swept her eyes across the crowd with unhurried indifference.
The mob that had been so aggressive just moments ago was now cowering like harmless rabbits. Right now, not a single soul dared to meet her eyes; a few even quietly turned their bodies away the moment they felt her gaze drifting toward them.
Without another word, Suzy glanced into the distance.
A few quick-witted scavengers took the hint, scrambling forward to drag the obstacles out of the way to clear a path for her.
Suzy didn’t bother wasting any more time with them. She tucked her weapon away, started the engine, and drove out of the area.
Only after her RV vanished down the road did the surrounding mob let out a collective sigh of relief.
Finally... they had sent that bloodthirsty killer on her way...
Before long, a few people snapped back to reality and looked over at the middle-aged man slumped limply on the ground. His eyes were blank, his cheek streaked with blood, and his clothes soaked in cold sweat as his legs continued to tremble uncontrollably.
"She had a gun and you still dared to stop her? Have you lost your damn mind?!" a woman’s voice rang out, heavy with condemnation.
Hearing her words, the man finally snapped out of his daze. He glared angrily at her and argued, "How the hell was I supposed to know she had a gun?!"
Even if he had racked his brain, he never would have imagined that a seemingly defenceless young girl would be packing heat.
"You absolute fool! If she dares to drive around out in the open like that, how could she not have a way to protect herself?" the woman snapped back in frustration.
Flustered and embarrassed, the middle-aged man was left completely speechless, his cheeks flushing red.
Their bickering didn’t last long, as others had already begun clearing away the corpse.
As they moved the body, complex emotions filled their hearts. This was a classic case of trying to steal a feather and losing a chicken—they had set out to hijack someone else’s vehicle, only to end up empty-handed and down a man.
Still, they silently thanked their lucky stars that the person lying dead wasn’t them.
Within minutes, Suzy had put a considerable distance between herself and the town.
After driving for another half hour, the effects of the Earthbind Talisman finally wore off. Without its magical stabilizing force, her travel speed slowed down drastically, making the journey across the ruined terrain exceptionally grueling.
Eventually, Suzy brought the vehicle to a slow stop and looked into the distance up ahead.
Straight ahead lay the entrance to a tunnel.
The pitch-black tunnel stretched into the darkness with no end in sight, its exact depth impossible to gauge.
Suzy brought the truck to a slow stop and checked her navigation screen.
Fortunately, the offline map still retained information about this stretch: West Tunnel, total length: two kilometers.
A two-kilometer tunnel... there was no telling what condition the interior was in right now. It wasn’t at all out of the question that the middle section had already collapsed. If that were the case, driving in would only mean having to back right out again.
With that thought in mind, Suzy didn’t rush to start the vehicle. Instead, she switched on the external surveillance feeds surrounding the RV.
Upon inspecting the cameras, she found no sign of anyone in the vicinity. This brought her a slight sense of relief.
No people around was for the best—it made things far simpler. If she ran into an impassable roadblock inside, she could simply pull the entire vehicle straight into her spatial domain without worry.
After double-checking that the surroundings were completely clear, Suzy drove slowly into the tunnel.
All the tunnel lights had been destroyed, and hairline cracks laced the walls on both sides, making the structure look as though it could collapse at any second. Yet Suzy had no choice but to push through here; taking a detour would add dozens of kilometers to her journey—not to mention the unknown dangers that might await on an alternate path.
And so, she resolved to proceed through the tunnel.
With her high beams cutting through the gloom, she covered a good stretch of distance smoothly. Along the way, she spotted several abandoned vehicles parked inside; their original owners lay dead inside the cabins, reduced to dried, shriveled corpses.
Roadblocks were scattered everywhere throughout the tunnel—mostly wrecked cars and fallen concrete rubble. However, this small rock debris posed no real threat to Suzy’s heavy rig.
Gradually, a faint light peeked through from the far distance, somewhat piercing against the dark—the tunnel exit was finally in sight.
Am I finally going to make it out?
Before Suzy could even sigh in relief at how smoothly this leg of the journey had gone, she suddenly felt a subtle tremble shuddering up through the ground beneath her.
Suzy’s expression shifted instantly.
She slammed her foot onto the gas pedal, accelerating at full speed.
Another earthquake hit!
Suzy couldn’t even tell whether she was cursed or lucky right now. To be caught inside a tunnel during an earthquake...
Still, it counted as luck of sorts—the quake had struck just as she approached the exit. Had it hit while she was trapped halfway through, escaping would have been a near-impossible feat.
Suzy’s RV rocketed toward the exit while the earthquake chased relentlessly right behind her, collapsing everything in her wake. A deafening, rumbling roar echoed through the cavernous space.
Suzy didn’t even dare to glance back. She gripped the steering wheel tightly, her eyes locked intently on the bright light ahead.
Finally, blinding light engulfed her windshield as the vehicle burst out of the tunnel mouth.
An earth-shattering explosion sounded behind her—the entire tunnel had caved in completely!
She had successfully escaped moments before being swallowed alive.
Yet the danger was far from over. The earthquake didn’t just affect the tunnel—the moment she cleared the exit, a violent landslide erupted on the adjacent cliffside. Countless boulders and shattered rocks cascaded down the mountain, hurtling straight toward her vehicle.
Suzy jerked the steering wheel wildly to dodge the falling debris, but the rocks seemed almost to have eyes, raining down furiously in her direction with a relentless clatter.
She couldn’t help but curse out loud: "You goddamn sky-bastard, trying to kill me again?!"
Swearing under her breath, she spun the wheel so fast the steering column practically smoked, barely escaping the lethal zone.
Once she finally broke free of that treacherous area, the view ahead opened up dramatically. The road in front was level and perfectly intact; clearly, the earthquake’s reach hadn’t extended this far.
In the distance, a massive black perimeter wall rose up into Suzy’s view.
Standing beside the road ahead was a wooden signpost, bearing huge letters painted in crude red dye: Black Mist Base.