Apocalypse: I Can Upgrade Everything

Chapter 158: Escape

Just as the Doomsday Pickup was about to smash through the remnants of the school gate, a green willow branch whipped out from the driver’s side window. It lashed down, tightly wrapping around the violently writhing tentacle the Eight-Limbed Human Face had left behind in the snow, and instantly retracted back into the cab.

With its prize secured, the Doomsday Pickup roared out of the courtyard, plunging headlong into the freezing darkness of the apocalyptic city.

In the truck bed, a terrified cultist lost his grip as the vehicle violently swerved to crush a Crawler. He was thrown over the tailgate, tumbling hard onto the frozen asphalt.

“Help! Stop! Please—”

His desperate screams were instantly cut short as the tidal wave of Anomalies chasing the truck swarmed over him.

Because of his grim sacrifice, the density of the horde actively pursuing the Doomsday Pickup thinned out considerably.

However, compared to the brutal escape, the situation back inside the school had devolved into a literal vision of hell.

Wu Jianshan’s sudden execution had left the majority of the cultists in a state of catatonic shock. Many of them were still kneeling in the bloodstained snow, devoutly kowtowing and murmuring the Death God Scripture. Before their brains could even process that their ‘god’ was no longer protecting them, they were violently pinned to the ground and torn apart by Crawlers.

Others, finally waking up to the reality of their doom, desperately rushed the few remaining vehicles. But the survivors who had already secured a seat violently barred the doors, kicking and punching the frantic cultists away.

Those unable to board resorted to sheer malice. They threw themselves onto the hoods of the cars, glaring through the windshields with bloodshot, hate-filled eyes.

If I can’t leave, none of you are leaving! their postures screamed.

Unfortunately for them, the drivers behind the wheel were equally desperate. Their eyes were just as bloodshot, and their feet never once lifted from the gas pedals.

The people outside thought: I don’t believe you actually have the guts to run me over!

The people inside thought: I don’t believe you’re actually stupid enough not to move!

The result was a sickening cacophony of thuds and snapping bones as the vehicles plowed straight through the human barricades.

And then there were those who simply sat down in the snow, their minds completely broken, numbly waiting for the monsters’ teeth to find their throats.

Faced with absolute, unavoidable death, everyone made their final choice.

As the endless horde of Anomalies flooded into the courtyard, the hundred or so survivors left behind became a macabre feast, effectively acting as bait to anchor the bulk of the monsters to the school.

“Wait for me! Damn it, wait!”

By the time He Laosi finally managed to shove his way out of the panicked crowd of cultists, it was too late.

He Laosi possessed a supernatural talent for hot-wiring and stealing vehicles. This skill had made him incredibly popular among the survivors and highly valued by Wu Jianshan’s inner circle. When Chu Che had opened the convoy’s doors to the cult, He Laosi had been one of the first to defect, trading his loyalty for a high-ranking position within the church.

Now, he stood in the snow and watched as Boss Gao drove the massive, armored passenger bus—a vehicle that He Laosi had personally stolen and claimed as his own—roaring out of the gates without him.

He Laosi screamed a string of venomous curses, but the bus didn’t even tap its brakes.

Seeing the sheer wall of Anomalies closing in from all sides, He Laosi turned and sprinted desperately back toward the dark corridors of the teaching building.

As for the Death God…

The apex entity was still trapped in a state of agonizing, corrupted madness. She wandered aimlessly through the slaughter, clutching her head and shrieking. Yet, her residual aura was so overwhelmingly terrifying that the other Anomalies actively parted around her like water flowing around a boulder, not daring to touch her.

Speeding down the dark highway, Chen Ye only had time for a single, fleeting glance in his rearview mirror.

His expression didn’t change. There was no pity, no regret.

He had seen this exact scenario play out too many times. In the apocalypse, you lived for yourself, or you died for someone else. There were no saviors.

Would he ever regret what he did today?

If Wu Jianshan hadn’t died, every single person in that convoy—including Chen Ye himself—would have been butchered on an altar. He didn’t feel a shred of guilt.

He knew that right up until the moment his head separated from his neck, Wu Jianshan believed his actions were totally justified. The cult leader truly believed that sacrificing a few hundred people to gain absolute power was the only way to save humanity.

But Chen Ye subscribed to a much simpler philosophy: If I’m dead, what the hell does saving humanity have to do with me?

Chen Ye wasn’t a psychopath. He didn’t actively hunt down innocent people to grind for Slaughter Points. But he also wasn’t a saint. He absolutely refused to risk his own life to perform miracles that were beyond his capabilities.

Perhaps one day, if he accumulated an astronomical amount of Slaughter Points and possessed enough personal power to guarantee his absolute safety, he might play the hero. He could mass-produce Sequence Serums from the system, arm every surviving human on earth, and lead a crusade to exterminate the Anomalies and rebuild the world.

But today was not that day.

If word ever leaked that he could simply manifest Sequence Serums out of thin air… even the honorable Captain Chu Che would likely turn on him in the name of the ‘greater good.’

As for Ding Dong, Chen Ye harbored zero hatred toward her. From her perspective, she was protecting her surrogate uncle. From his perspective, he was removing an obstacle to his survival. There was no objective right or wrong; their interests had simply violently collided.

Further up the highway, Mad Lion was currently acting as a living battering ram for the convoy.

Sprinting ahead of the school bus, the giant sent any Anomaly foolish enough to block the road flying into the darkness with devastating punches. His vital energy surged around him like a boiling ocean.

Between strikes, Mad Lion threw a quick glance back toward the shrinking silhouette of the school.

At least a hundred people had been left behind to die. Some had given up, some were simply too slow, and some had been trampled by their own friends. They were currently being ripped apart.

A profound sadness flashed through Mad Lion’s eyes. The hero within him desperately wanted to turn back and save them.

But he knew he couldn’t. Charging back into that meat grinder would achieve absolutely nothing except adding his own corpse to the pile.

On the roof of the SUV, the fire dragon roared, incinerating a pack of pursuing Crawlers into falling ash. Sun Qianqian’s pink hair was plastered to her skull with sweat. Despite the freezing winter air, she was boiling.

She slumped against the roof rack, utterly, physically exhausted.

For the next ten minutes, a ragged convoy of battered vehicles tore through the pitch-black streets of Rong City.

Captain Chu Che leaned out the window of his SUV. With a flick of his thumb, he sparked his lighter. He took a deep breath and blew gently across the tiny orange flame. Instantly, a massive, superheated fireball over thirty feet in diameter erupted from his lips, rocketing down the highway.

While Chu Che’s fire lacked the raw, destructive pressure of Sun Qianqian’s dragon, the sheer ambient heat was enough to instantly flash-melt the snow on the asphalt and set the pursuing Crawlers ablaze.

Everyone was burning their final reserves.

At the rear of the pack, the Doomsday Pickup roared along, acting as the anchor. Thick, gray smoke poured from the grill, forming a dense, wedge-shaped ‘snowplow’ that effortlessly parted the frozen drifts on the highway.

Having ascended to a Sequence 2 Mist Master, Chen Ye’s control over his smoke was exponentially greater than before.

The breakout hadn’t been entirely clean. Chen Ye hadn’t actively thrown any of the cultists out of his truck bed to act as bait, but he also hadn’t done a single thing to protect them. Every few minutes, a sickening scream would echo from the back as a leaping Anomaly claimed a victim in the dark.

When larger Anomalies tried to block the road, Chen Ye didn’t even bother swerving. He just floored the accelerator and let the reinforced bull-bar do the talking. If the Doomsday Pickup could send the Abyssal Blood Eye flying, turning these low-tier grunts into roadkill was a trivial matter.

Fortunately, the overwhelming majority of Rong City’s nightmare ecosystem was currently busy gorging themselves at the primary school. The further they drove, the thinner the monster presence became.

Finally, the relentless pressure began to ease. Chen Ye let out a long, heavy exhale, the tension bleeding out of his shoulders.

He reached into the canvas bag sitting on the passenger seat and pulled out a small, smooth stone. Hovering above it were the ethereal, glowing letters: [Chen Ye].

It was the Marking Chu Che had given him.

Every mile or so, Chen Ye tossed one of the marked stones out the window. The glowing letters acted as a perfect, supernatural breadcrumb trail in the pitch-black wasteland. As long as Chu Che or any of the other convoy members saw them, they would be able to follow his path.

Glancing in the rearview mirror, Chen Ye noticed that there was only a single, violently shivering survivor left in the truck bed.

He couldn’t make out the person’s face in the dark, and frankly, he had zero interest in inviting them into the warm, smoke-filled cabin.

Chen Ye eased off the gas, letting the Doomsday Pickup cruise at a slow, leisurely pace down the desolate highway.

He had no phone. He had no map. And he had lost visual contact with Chu Che’s SUV miles ago. He had absolutely no idea where this road was taking him.

Tossing another stone out the window, Chen Ye frowned.

Driving blind like this is a terrible idea, he reasoned. I’m only a Sequence 2. There are still countless things out here in the dark that could effortlessly rip my head off. Instead of wandering deeper into unknown territory, it made much more sense to hole up and wait. Chu Che would definitely track his Markings.

Spotting an abandoned, walled-off industrial complex just off the highway, Chen Ye cranked the wheel and pulled the truck into the secluded shadows. He killed the engine, leaning back in his seat with a sigh.

He pulled a fresh Huazi Cigarette from his pack, sparked it, and took a long, deep drag.

As he exhaled, a thick, unnatural fog poured from his lips.

Previously, a single breath of his smoke could cover an area maybe fifty feet across. Now, as a Sequence 2, a single exhale effortlessly blanketed a radius of over three hundred feet. The dense gray fog rapidly swallowed the Doomsday Pickup, the surrounding concrete walls, and the immediate highway.

More importantly, this wasn’t just a visual smokescreen anymore.

It was Absolute Aura Shielding. Every trace of his scent, heat signature, and spiritual presence was violently erased from the world.

In the deadly, unpredictable darkness of the apocalypse, this ability was the ultimate trump card for survival.