Chapter 46: Corpse Collector 8 |
"Let's hurry and leave, this place isn't safe to stay either."
"Unit 985 will keep expanding their search range, we should go find Old Xia first."
Luo Yi lit a cigarette and led the way, the glowing ember sparkling in the night like a twinkling star.
Wu Zhong and Yang Chunsha followed: "Lord Luo, do you know where Brother Xia is?"
Luo Yi shrugged: "Huh? I don't know, we just need to find a corpse with a name and tell him."
"This guy has safe houses all over the world... he's probably lying on a sunny beach sunbathing right now."
Wu Zhong and Yang Chunsha froze: "Huh? A corpse with a name?"
Luo Yi tilted his head: "Hmm? You didn't know?"
"Heh, he didn't tell you? His ability could be called Corpse Collector. As long as he says he'll collect someone's corpse, he instantly teleports near that body."
Wu Zhong understood now, so that was how the ability worked.
No wonder they were meeting at the funeral parlor, and he knew the deceased's name without recognizing them - he must have gathered that information in advance.
No wonder he threw a dead person's head down before teleporting away in the tunnel - there were no corpses in the tunnel, so if he teleported away he couldn't return.
Wu Zhong had never heard Xia Heng speak about corpse collection, so whispering or silent recitation must work too.
Actually, he had already guessed some aspects of this ability, but he didn't know it worked on living people, allowing him to promise corpse collection in advance.
The key points were really just knowing the name and ensuring the target's surroundings were relatively safe.
"Lord Luo, is it really okay to just reveal Brother Xia's secret like this?"
Luo Yi rolled his eyes: "What's the big deal? If you spend more time with him, you'll find out eventually anyway. This ability is pretty easy to figure out."
Wu Zhong pursed his lips: "I'm really curious, how did you and Brother Xia meet?"
He felt their relationship was strange - they were very close friends, yet still guarded against each other, especially Xia Heng being wary of Luo Yi.
Wu Zhong needed to figure out exactly how good their relationship really was.
Luo Yi chuckled while walking: "We were originally opponents, fighting against each other in conflicting missions."
"Then when he was retreating, I discovered his teleportation ability because he didn't know I could separate shadows and hide clones in his shadow."
"So when he attached to it, his teleportation took my shadow along too, meaning I always knew his location."
"But we didn't have any deep hatred, our missions just conflicted. I was curious about him, so I kept chasing him, always able to find him."
"It was like hide and seek, you know? At first he wouldn't even talk to me, acting all cool, but later he realized I must have some method of marking him, so he started chatting with me to probe my abilities."
"Haha, as if I'd tell him! Then this guy pretended to invite me for drinks, poisoned me, lied saying it was some logic bomb. Heh, but I drank it all and nothing happened."
"After that, he specifically went to weird, even ridiculous places waiting for me. And me? I could always track him down every time..."
"He's actually not cool at all in private, he's quite the goofball. After every mission he always goes to soak in a bath first, even plays with rubber ducks."
"Anyway, he'd suddenly see me when washing his feet, I'd show up when he was sleeping and charging, I'd unexpectedly appear during his missions..."
"Like this, with one chasing and one fleeing, many stories happened. Over time, feelings developed from the chase. I called him 'cunning rabbit with three burrows,' he called me 'lingering ghost that won't leave.'"
"Sometimes when trouble happened and I happened to be around, we'd face it together. Back and forth we saved each other a few times."
"Finally he compromised after being worn down by me... and we became buddies! Even an iceberg would melt if I kept warming it up! Hehe."
"Let me tell you, before he met me, this guy had no friends at all, trusted no one. I worked hard to melt this ice block."
Wu Zhong listened fascinated - so that was how they became friends.
Luo Yi's ability happened to counter Xia Heng's perfectly - shadows could merge with Xia Heng's shadow, meaning wherever Xia Heng teleported, he brought Luo Yi's clone along.
So his teleportation was basically half-useless, no wonder Luo Yi was like a lingering ghost.
Fortunately Luo Yi meant no harm, just pure curiosity and mischief driving him to chase Xia Heng, and over time feelings developed from the pursuit.
Xia Heng was someone very cool and icy toward strangers, but once you learned his secrets, you'd see his other side. Like last time when Xia Heng got drunk and howled like a wolf at the karaoke bar in front of Wu Zhong...
This feeling was somewhat like 'since you've already discovered so many of my secrets, I can't be bothered pretending to be cool anymore' - like giving up completely.
So this wasn't the first time - he'd been melted by Luo Yi. Are introverts really just toys for extroverts?
No, not completely melted. Wu Zhong knew Xia Heng still kept some guard up against Luo Yi.
Tsk tsk, Wu Zhong wondered what Xia Heng had been through to not completely trust even his only friend? Maybe that was just his survival strategy.
Of course, Wu Zhong believed he must have his reasons for doing this, so naturally he wouldn't expose it.
And since Xia Heng kept some guard up against his best brother, no wonder Wu Zhong also kept some guard up against Xia Heng.
The moonlight was hazy.
The three traveled through the night, relying purely on physical bodies to traverse the mountain forests.
This method of travel was the most concealed - no vehicles used, and every direction offered a path, as if walking on flat ground.
Needless to say, Wu Zhong's speed had surprisingly become the fastest.
He was like lightning, feeling like a sports car speeding on a highway, the mountain forests on both sides flashing past in his vision.
With ten times the normal sensory and reaction speed, he could easily avoid obstacles in the forest.
Currently he was the fastest, while Yang Chunsha was the slowest.
But that was fine - Wu Zhong simply lifted her with one arm. Weighing just over a hundred pounds, she felt light as nothing, barely slowing his speed.
"You don't need to wait for me, just run at full speed." Luo Yi noticed he was intentionally slowing down and curled his lip.
Wu Zhong blinked, not standing on ceremony, and whoosh - his speed instantly surged again!
The wind howled fiercely, trees rushing past rapidly on both sides.
He glanced back and saw Luo Yi could still keep up, not slowing down at all.
"Eh?"
Wu Zhong noticed that on Luo Yi's legs, his trouser legs had rolled up to reveal pitch-black calves.
They seemed wrapped in a glossy black film that dramatically boosted his strength.
"This is..."
Luo Yi caught up with him: "Nothing special, just Armament Haki."
"..." Wu Zhong stared blankly.
He even saw the cigarette in Luo Yi's mouth standing firm against the high-speed wind... wrapped in haki, appearing as a black cigarette.
"Holy crap..."
"Lord Luo, I'm impressed, truly impressed."
Luo Yi chuckled lightly: "You've improved really fast too. This morning you still had ordinary physical fitness, and by evening you're this strong."
"All thanks to you helping me become first-generation Mad Blood Clan." Wu Zhong said.
Luo Yi waved his hand: "That's how it is with different disaster artifacts combined. Some seemingly useless characteristics paired together might unexpectedly soar to greatness. As long as the combination fits well, getting stronger happens rapidly."
"Mainly your mental shield is really solid... I'm first-generation too, but it's pretty useless for me. Random mental illness? Can't afford to gamble."
"By the way, you're at twenty times now, right?"
Wu Zhong said: "Nineteen times enhancement, plus my original physical fitness, makes twenty times total."
Luo Yi nodded: "Yes, that's how it works. According to the current international standard system, there are only nineteen categories of mental illness."
"The so-called random cost of the Embrace is randomly selecting one 'subtype' illness from each of these nineteen major categories, meaning the random pool has at most nineteen types."
"Of course, there are many other mental illnesses in the world, but you'd have to specifically collect and absorb those yourself - they won't appear in the Embrace random pool."
Wu Zhong understood: "So that's how it is. I was wondering why there were only nineteen types when there are so many mental illnesses."
Luo Yi smiled: "This is actually better. It means first-generation Mad Blood Clan members, once they've absorbed all nineteen types, any future random selections will necessarily be duplicates."
"Therefore, it's equivalent to being able to recover health by absorbing from anyone."
Wu Zhong nodded: "Right, that's better."
After the previous battle, he knew the 'duplicates only restore health' setting was actually more useful.
Improving physical fitness was generally done during safe periods, scouting various mental hospitals for suitable illnesses.
While restoring health would definitely happen in dangerous situations when life was hanging by a thread.
What's more valuable - adding flowers to brocade, or delivering charcoal in snowy weather?
If Wu Zhong had had a stable method of absorbing illnesses to replenish vitality during the previous battle, he would have beaten Ya Bai down long ago, instead of nearly dying several times.
Luo Yi smacked his lips and said: "What people envy most about the Mad Blood Clan isn't the physical enhancement."
"How many times can that even increase? You think everyone has mental resistance effects?"
"The most important thing is survivability. Vitality is the most fundamental thing - whether for longevity or healing, you need it. This is the Mad Blood Clan's core competitive advantage."
"And the first generation best exemplifies the power of the Mad Blood Clan effect."
Yang Chunsha couldn't help interjecting: "Can ordinary Mad Blood Clan members advance to first generation?"
Luo Yi rolled his eyes: "Wishful thinking, impossible. Once you've become ordinary Mad Blood Clan, that's fixed."
"Even if a first generation strips your effect and re-embraces you, you still won't qualify as first generation."
"Only true 'first' embraces can become first generation. You only get one lottery chance, and only if there's a vacancy in the first-generation seats of the thirteen clans."
Wu Zhong licked his lips: "Are there any other effects within the same clan?"
Luo Yi said mysteriously: "Yes... if a first generation dies, all the ordinary Mad Blood Clan members descended from him will die too."
This statement shocked Wu Zhong, and Yang Chunsha shuddered even more violently.
"Ah?" Yang Chunsha's effect came from Wu Zhong, and Wu Zhong was first generation.
"So if he dies, I die with him?"
Luo Yi nodded: "Unless he produces another first generation who establishes their own branch, otherwise all ordinary Mad Blood Clan members he spreads belong to his clan."
"Living and dying together with the clan leader."
Wu Zhong and Yang Chunsha exchanged looks - he was barely keeping it together.
Yang Chunsha said with a tearful face: "If my effect gets stripped, can I avoid dying with him?"
"You can." Luo Yi confirmed.
Wu Zhong looked at her: "Do you want me to strip it? If you want, I can absorb it for you right now."
"Uh..." Yang Chunsha fell silent.
Wu Zhong smiled and didn't say more, Yang Chunsha also stopped speaking.
She was already tied to Wu Zhong on the same rope, now just tied more tightly. She knew too much - Xia Heng would never allow her to leave the team.
Given that, would abandoning the Mad Blood Clan effect really prevent death?
Better to firmly grasp this power and develop it to its fullest.