Chapter 72: Mutant Rat
Just then, the expressions on Logan Sawyer and his group changed drastically. Their faces filled with terror, and their bodies began to tremble slightly. It was clear they had sensed something utterly terrifying approaching.
Kevin Keane noticed their expressions, then glanced at Luna Dawson, whose eyes held a flicker of confusion.
He immediately demanded, his tone urgent and brookng no argument, "What’s coming?"
Logan Sawyer’s brow was tightly furrowed, his expression indecisive.
On one hand was vengeance for his brother; on the other, an impending catastrophe. For a moment, he didn’t know what to choose.
The others beside him were already scared out of their wits.
Bull couldn’t wait for Logan Sawyer to hesitate. He looked at Kevin Keane and yelled urgently, his voice trembling, "Boss! We have to run, now! Any later and it’ll be too late!"
The moment he finished speaking, he and the others tightened the straps on their backpacks, all poised to bolt. Their faces were filled with panic, desperate to flee the area immediately.
Luna Dawson snapped sharply, "Did I say you could run?!"
’Something’s not right with these people. They seem to know something.’
Kevin Keane understood. His face darkened, and his voice turned icy. "Explain. If you don’t, you’ll all die."
As he spoke, he raised his gun and chambered a round. The sharp CLICK instantly ramped up the tension, the killing intent in his eyes unconcealed.
Logan Sawyer’s expression shifted several times, but in the end, the will to survive overpowered his anger and grief.
He looked down at Quentin Sawyer’s body on the ground one last time, gritted his teeth, and quickly knelt. He brutally dug a red Crystal Core out of Quentin Sawyer’s skull and clutched it in his hand.
Then, he looked up at Luna Dawson and began explaining, the words firing out of his mouth like a machine gun.
"It’s a swarm of mutated rats from nearby! Their numbers are growing. The last time we stumbled upon them, there were already over a thousand!"
The anger in his eyes had been replaced by terror. He hastily added, "There’s a cat in the building next to ours. As long as we stay within a three-hundred-meter radius of that cat, the mutated rats won’t come near us. Let’s go! If we’re a second too late, the rats will eat us all!"
Seeing that his boss had finally faced reality, Bull quickly chimed in, his tone pleading, terrified that Luna Dawson wouldn’t let them leave.
"Boss, Ma’am, everything we’ve said is true, not a single lie! We really will be too late, those mutated rats are terrifying!"
Luna Dawson’s expression changed. In the apocalypse, mutated rats were like a game-breaking bug. She knew better than anyone just how dangerous they were.
Without a second thought, Luna Dawson waved her hand, and a modified Wuling Hongguang van instantly appeared before them.
At the same time, a heavy RPG appeared in her hands. Though her hands had started to tremble slightly, she gripped the rocket launcher tightly and forced herself to calmly give the order.
"All of you, get in this van! Take us to your hideout. Don’t try any tricks, or I’ll blow you all to hell with one shot!"
The moment she spoke, Logan Sawyer’s group didn’t dare hesitate for a second. As if they had teleported, they all scrambled into the van in an instant, their movements shockingly fast.
They were terrified of angering this woman who, despite appearing ruthless, was actually petrified of rats.
One car following the other, engines roaring, the two vehicles sped away in the opposite direction of the sound, wishing they could sprout wings and fly.
Just moments after they got in, a dense skittering sound rose up from behind them.
Everyone turned to look and saw that the incredibly fast mutated rats had already come into view.
A vanguard of several dozen black shapes was rushing madly toward the two vehicles.
Each one had an eerie red dot gleaming in its eyes, a sight that made one’s skin crawl.
Gradually, more and more mutated rats swarmed in. A dense mass of black shadows surged through the street like a tide, instantly blanketing the entire road.
The area where they had just been standing was now completely covered by mutated rats, without a single gap to be seen.
"Fuck! It’s really mutated rats! So many of them?!"
Aaron Palmer was so shocked he pressed himself against the window, staring back with a face full of disbelief.
As for Luna Dawson, she was so scared the hair on her arms was standing on end.
She knew better than anyone how terrifying mutated rats were.
They were incredibly fast, omnivorous creatures that ate basically anything. While their individual attack power wasn’t high, they never appeared alone. When they showed up, it was always in a massive, dark swarm.
They were, without a doubt, the most disgusting creatures in the apocalypse. Any living thing they surrounded would be worn down and killed, eventually gnawed away until not even bone fragments remained.
Even more terrifying, they even ate zombie brains, making them one of the species with the highest survival rate in the apocalypse. They were the undisputed kings of apocalyptic viruses, carrying thousands of germs on their bodies.
In a city defense battle in her past life, a mutated rat had torn a large chunk of flesh from her calf.
Luckily, she was a Superpower User and had managed to pull through.
Among the known mutated creatures from her past life, only mutated rats and a type of red, mutated wolf spider could transmit the zombie virus!
If an ordinary person were to be bitten or scratched by one, they would almost certainly be infected with the zombie virus and turn within minutes!
Extreme fear and disgust washed over Luna Dawson. She couldn’t hold it in any longer. "Ah! So disgusting!"
Muttering to herself, she opened the sunroof all the way, stepped onto a seat inside, and stood up, emerging from the top of the van.
Her legs were trembling slightly, but the RPG in her hands remained aimed squarely at the swarm of rats behind them.
’Of all the cute animals to be reincarnated as, they had to be rats. These bastards must have been terrible people in their past lives!’
BOOM!
With a massive explosion, Luna Dawson squeezed the trigger on instinct, her eyes shut tight. A rocket shot out, blossoming into a fireball in the middle of the distant rat swarm.
Dozens of mutated rats, each the size of a small dog, were instantly sent flying by the rocket blast. Their bodies scattered across the ground, and black blood splattered everywhere.
She fired again and again, the vanguard of the swarm continuously torn apart by the explosions.
But even so, a never-ending stream of mutated rats surged forward. There were even a few massive rat kings—clumps of rats with their tails tangled together—rolling over and over in pursuit.
Luna Dawson was utterly disgusted. She viciously squeezed the trigger. BOOM! BOOM! Explosions continuously rocked the street in the distance.
Each rocket landed precisely in the densest part of the swarm, blasting a patch of mutated rats into the air.
The deeper the fear in Luna Dawson’s eyes, the faster she pulled the trigger.
"You want to bite me?! I’ll blow you all to hell! Mom! Their tails are tangled together!"
Luna Dawson’s curses, mixed with the explosive roar of the rockets, echoed through the streets.
She was scared to death, yet unbelievably ferocious at the same time.
Everyone: "..."
A vein throbbed on Kevin Keane’s forehead. He watched Luna outside the van with a complicated look. ’Is she really scared... or just faking it...’
Miles Dawson couldn’t even watch. He whispered, trying to persuade her, "Sis, if you’re scared, let me do it! Get back down!"
But his voice was instantly drowned out by the deafening explosions of the rockets. Luna Dawson couldn’t hear a single word.
Evan Olson silently lowered his window and, along with Blake Blue, began firing their guns at the swarm behind them.
Mrs. Dawson sat in the van, watching her daughter outside, who was simultaneously crying and blasting rats. She glanced at the mutated rats being blown to bits in the distance and shook her head helplessly.
Rhonda Dawson, however, breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank god, thank god Luna has a launcher. Otherwise, we really would’ve bought the farm today..."
The others in the van, however, looked like they were watching a show. They all crowded by the windows, suppressing their laughter as they fired at the swarm.