The chill in the air seemed to carry a weight as it froze in the room.
There was no air current nor any sound. Lin Sanjiu could only feel the increasingly cold air wrapping around her skin. She couldn't help but hold her breath.
Another puff of white air blew past her ear. This time, it was even closer.
Behind her, there was only dead silence.
It was only when Lin Sanjiu suddenly made a sound that the suffocating silence was broken. Suppressing her trembling voice, she stared straight at the cosmos outside the glass door and muttered to herself, "That's weird. Where is he?"
As she spoke, she took a step forward and approached the glass door. If it weren't for her tensed muscles, she felt that her legs, which had never undergone evolution, would have buckled.
Lin Sanjiu's reflection on the glass door could vaguely make out a pale silhouette. She stared fixedly at the silhouette and placed one of her hands on the glass door.
The silhouette moved a little.
"He found his reflection!"
The moment this thought flashed across her mind, Lin Sanjiu supported herself with one hand on the glass door to maintain her balance. She immediately kicked backward. Her kick should have landed on the man's knee, but the man reacted quickly and dodged her kick. Instead, he grabbed her ankle. Lin Sanjiu's heart tightened. She twisted her body and swung the bottle in her hand in a semicircle before smashing it on the man's deformed face with a loud clang. The wine splattered in the air and drenched her.
When the man roared and covered his face, Lin Sanjiu pulled her leg back. Her fingers flew across the glass door, trying to unlock the door. The corridor behind her was completely blocked by the man. There were only a few seconds left for her to escape to the door.
However, just as her fingers touched the door lock, she felt a sharp pain at the back of her head. A hand gripped her hair so tightly that it felt as if it wanted to pull out her scalp. Lin Sanjiu tilted her head back involuntarily. She heard the man whisper into her ear, "When I feel pain, I get very angry."
An irresistible force tugged at her hair and pulled her backward. Lin Sanjiu couldn't help but let out a whimper. She continued to push her fingers forward and finally hooked the lock. Almost at the same time the lock made a clicking sound, the man pulled her to the ground.
"Is this your first time in the Astral Plane?" Lin Sanjiu fell heavily on the ground, and the broken pieces of the wine bottle filled her body. Even so, she could still feel his warm breath on her face. "What a pity, this is your last time."
Her hair was finally released. Lin Sanjiu quickly pushed herself off the floor and tried to get up. However, after losing her Evolved Ability, the difference in physical strength between a Russian mafia member and a female office worker was too great. The man stepped on her hair. Lin Sanjiu gasped as if her windpipe had been snapped. Then, the man threw a heavy punch at Lin Sanjiu's throat.
Pain was an understatement. When Lin Sanjiu regained her vision, she felt as if her throat had been squeezed into her brain and was about to break into two. Seeing that the fist was about to land on her again, Lin Sanjiu endured the excruciating pain in her scalp and flipped her body over. The glass shard that she had been holding in her palm for a long time finally sank deep into the man's calf. Lin Sanjiu felt as if she was going to explode into pieces.
As the man groaned in pain, Lin Sanjiu sprang to her feet and dashed toward the glass door. She pulled it open and rushed into the wooden corridor. Immediately, she heard heavy footsteps behind her. Then, she rushed out of the corridor.
Lin Sanjiu ran along the wooden corridor with all her might. Her lungs were burning with pain, but she didn't have the time to care about it. She was about to reach the end of the wooden corridor, and beyond it was a vast galaxy.
Once out of the confines of the house, she would only fall more quickly into the hands of the man.
When she stopped, she could already see half of the man's head poking out from the corner behind her. Lin Sanjiu looked to her left and right, and her heart skipped a beat. She had locked the door and used the sofa to block the door. She couldn't get in, and the broken window was about five to six steps behind her. In other words, she had to run toward the man to get into the window.
If she hesitated any longer, she would be dead!
Gritting her teeth, Lin Sanjiu turned around and ran back. The man's face, which had been corroded by syphilis, was getting closer and closer. It quickly twisted into a crooked smile. The distance between the two of them shortened rapidly. Just as the man was about to grab her, Lin Sanjiu twisted her body and dashed out of the wooden corridor.
As soon as Lin Sanjiu left the wooden corridor, she would revert to her Higher Consciousness form. The man reacted quickly. The moment Lin Sanjiu moved, he also leaped out of the corridor. In an instant, he was the first one to leap out of the corridor. However, just as Lin Sanjiu was about to land on the wooden floor, she grabbed the edge of the wooden floor tightly.
Without wasting a second, she turned around and leaped into the window.
"You —"
The man spat out two words in midair. Then, he transformed into a streak of white light and dashed back into the house. Once he reached the edge of the wooden corridor, he transformed back into his human form and dashed toward the window.
Half of Lin Sanjiu's body was already in the house, leaving only her feet outside. When she felt the man grabbing her ankle again, she kicked him with all her might. She only realized that she had been screaming unconsciously when she kicked the man in the chest and she fell to the floor when the man staggered a few steps back. Lin Sanjiu fell to the floor and realized that she had been screaming uncontrollably all this while.
"Hah, aren't we back to the starting point?" The man panted as he stood up from the wooden corridor. "... I've changed my mind. Before I take away your Potential Growth Value, I will use a needle and urine to tattoo your brain … Oh, don't think I can't do it."
As he spoke, he slowly walked to the other side. Lin Sanjiu could no longer see him from the wooden corridor.
The wall that blocked the intruder also blocked Lin Sanjiu's line of sight, so she couldn't pinpoint the exact location of the man. Previously, he had used the same method to lure her to the back of the room, but he had entered through the glass window next to the front door. However, when Lin Sanjiu thought about it carefully, she realized that she had no choice but to let him lead her. There were too many doors and windows in the house. She had no choice but to run from one door to another.
"What kind of house is this?"
Lin Sanjiu couldn't help cursing again. She dashed to the back of the house without stopping. She didn't see the man from the study or the back door, so she immediately turned back into the living room. Almost as soon as her eyes fell on the cold wind blowing into the window, she heard the sound of glass shattering from the direction of the bathroom behind her.
Her body trembled. She rushed into the kitchen and grabbed another bottle of red wine. Then, she carefully moved toward the corridor without making any noise.
In the dimly lit corridor, the door of the washroom was half open. It opened and closed in the wind, knocking against the lock with a "Ka Ka" sound. Even though there was no light in the house, Lin Sanjiu remembered that the door was closed when she passed by it a few minutes ago. Now, she could feel the cold wind blowing through the door even though she wasn't near it.
However, the only sound coming from the door made the washroom even more eerily silent.
Even Lin Sanjiu couldn't explain why. She slowly crouched down and stopped. She squatted in the corridor and pricked up her ears to listen for a while.
At first, Lin Sanjiu could only hear her pain, trembling, and the sweat on her palms. However, after she tried her best to calm herself down, Lin Sanjiu caught a faint noise that was so faint that it almost sounded like a hallucination.
"Creak" — a sound that sounded a little like this made her frown. It sounded very familiar.
When she realized what that sound was, she felt a chill run down her spine.
It was the sound of someone landing quietly on the floor and stepping on the broken glass.
From the window of the living room, she could see the entire corridor, which was where she was squatting, by taking a few steps.
Lin Sanjiu didn't think that she could survive more than a few fights.
She held her breath and slowly turned her head around.
A black figure straightened his back in her line of sight. It seemed that he had just come in from the window.
Lin Sanjiu quivered and immediately crouched down. She put down the bottle of red wine and crawled quietly to the kitchen. There was a cooking counter that was about half a person's height in the kitchen, which blocked the man's view. Just when she reached the bottom of the cooking counter and retracted her leg, the man was already in the corridor.
He walked forward step by step. Apparently, he didn't realize that there was a person hiding beside his feet.
Lin Sanjiu wished that she could press down on her heart so that it would not make a sound. She moved backward silently and crawled past the fridge. Then, she crawled under the stove and around the cooking table. She would be able to escape from the man's back.
However, the man's footsteps suddenly stopped.
"Oh no!"
Lin Sanjiu shuddered. She quickly got up. She had forgotten that she had left the bottle of red wine in the corridor!
Almost at the same time when she stood up, the festering pale face suddenly turned back into the kitchen. When its eyes fell on her, the face let out a laugh, "You are quite good at hiding!" As it spoke, it rushed forward with large strides.
In that moment, Lin Sanjiu didn't care about anything else. She threw herself to the side, grabbed the edge of the refrigerator, and pushed it forward with all her might. However, a large refrigerator with double doors was too heavy for her. Even if she used all her strength, she couldn't push the refrigerator as she wished. However, with the refrigerator as a shield, she managed to stop the man for a few seconds.
Right now, the only way out was to run around the cooking counter. However, that was also the direction that the man was coming from. Lin Sanjiu's survival depended on whether she could outrun the man. However, just as she was about to run out of the kitchen, she glanced around and stopped abruptly.
There was a bottle of kitchen cleaning spray on the cooking counter.
"What's wrong? You can't escape?"
The pale face looked even more ferocious in the dark. The man took a few steps forward and blocked the other side of the cooking counter, completely blocking Lin Sanjiu in the kitchen.
Lin Sanjiu took two steps back and bumped into the stove.
"It's good to have a body here," the man panted as he walked into the kitchen. "It's been a long time since I've tasted the feeling of killing a woman … I'll let you experience the feeling of having your Potential Growth Value taken away by me, okay?"
Without turning her head, Lin Sanjiu put her hand behind her back and fumbled for the gas stove with trembling hands. She pressed her finger on the switch and prayed inwardly, "Please, please, please, please, this is a good house."
With a snap, she lit up all four burners on the gas stove.
An orange-yellow flame with a tinge of blue leaped out of the darkness. It even burned her for a moment. Lin Sanjiu hurried toward the cooking counter. Just as the man charged toward her, she jumped onto the cooking counter and leaped out of the kitchen. However, just as she touched the counter, a hand grabbed her neck from behind.
"Where are you going?" the hoarse voice asked with a smile.
All of a sudden, Lin Sanjiu's field of vision spun. She was pulled over and pressed against the cooking counter. The man's half-melted face, which was covered by a mask, appeared in front of her eyes.
"This isn't your body. It's the form of your Higher Consciousness," the man said in a low voice. He held Lin Sanjiu's throat with one hand and pinched the edge of her eyeball with the other, "So, no matter what kind of injury you suffer, you won't faint from the pain."
Lin Sanjiu's face turned blood red as her air supply was cut off. However, she felt that her mind had never been so clear before. She let out a soundless scream. She used one hand to block the hand on her eyes while the other reached for the kitchen cleaning spray beside her.
The man did not turn his head. He laughed as he panted, "This kind of thing can't kill me. Not even a steel pipe can kill me."
Lin Sanjiu couldn't say a word. She struggled to raise her hand, and the bottle of detergent flew out. From the corner of her eye, she seemed to see the bottle fall on the stove. However, when the man exerted his strength, her vision was instantly plunged into the darkness brought about by the pain.
"Hold on a little longer, hold on a little longer …"
Every second felt like a year's worth of time.
When the spray on the stove finally exploded behind the man, bright flames licked the ceiling, floor, and the man's back. The blast wave swept across the kitchen, blowing the stove, the wine bottle, and other miscellaneous items into smithereens. It engulfed the two people who were struggling beside the kitchen counter.
Lin Sanjiu's eardrums went numb from the pain. However, she couldn't tell whether the man or herself was screaming. The man was standing between her and the stove, so he took the brunt of the blast wave. When Lin Sanjiu felt the grip on her neck loosen, she kicked the body beside her with all her might and fell off the kitchen counter.
She didn't know how she managed to crawl to the door in the aftermath of the explosion with her crippled body. When the explosion gradually turned into a raging fire, Lin Sanjiu pushed the sofa away, gasping for air. She stretched her arm to turn the doorknob. Her eyes, nose, and mouth were smeared with blood. Fortunately, she survived.
The door opened with a bang. Lin Sanjiu rolled into the wooden corridor.
You've already exceeded your reading limit for today. If you want to read more, please log in.
Login
Select text and click 'Report' to let us know about any bad translation.
