Chapter 344 - 169: Mutant

Chapter 344: Chapter 169: Mutant

After pulling past them, Xu Mo didn’t keep driving.

He stopped the car, got out quickly, and simultaneously reached back to pull an AK-47 from the backseat. He aimed the rifle at the SUV he had just blocked.

The people in the other vehicle clearly hadn’t processed what was happening. They had seen Xu Mo’s car speed past them, watched the woman get sent flying, and were still in a daze when they saw him get out, raise his rifle, and take aim—

"RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!"

The roar of the AK-47 ripped through the sweltering afternoon air. A muzzle flash erupted as bullets rained down on the other vehicle’s windshield.

"CRASH!"

The piercing sound of shattering glass followed as the windshield exploded, sending countless shards flying in every direction.

"AHHH!!!"

A series of shrill, short-lived screams erupted from the vehicle, but they were quickly silenced by a few more of Xu Mo’s controlled bursts.

The screams from the car stopped abruptly. Xu Mo kept the rifle raised, maintaining his firing stance.

After waiting for about ten seconds and confirming there was no further movement from inside, Xu Mo slowly approached the vehicle.

Peering through the shattered window, Xu Mo saw the scene inside.

The man in the driver’s seat was slumped to one side with a bloody hole in his head. The woman in the passenger seat stared wide-eyed, her chest a mess of red, unable to rest in peace. Two more people were in the backseat, a man and a woman, both of them now silent.

’All of them are dead.’

Xu Mo scanned the car, confirmed there were no survivors, then turned and walked toward the woman he had hit.

She lay motionless in the grass on the roadside. Xu Mo walked over and checked on her, discovering that she was still breathing, merely unconscious.

After confirming she wasn’t dead, Xu Mo took a moment to size her up. She looked to be in her twenties, but her face was so caked in mud and grime that her features were obscured. She wore a filthy camouflage uniform, and strange marks were visible on her exposed skin.

Xu Mo looked closer. Her right arm was significantly thicker than her left, and was covered in several dark, bluish-green scales. They looked like fish scales, or maybe reptilian scales.

’A Mutant, no doubt about it.’

Xu Mo turned her over and patted her on the cheek.

"Wake up."

No response.

Xu Mo slapped her again a few times, harder this time.

The woman’s brow furrowed. Her eyelids fluttered a few times, and then she slowly opened her eyes.

The moment she saw Xu Mo, a flicker of confusion crossed her eyes; she didn’t seem to have processed what had just happened. Then, as memories flooded back, her expression changed from confusion to a look of fierce, venomous hatred.

She opened her mouth to speak, but only managed to spit out a couple mouthfuls of blood.

Bloody foam dribbled from the corners of her mouth—a clear sign of internal injuries. It made sense. Xu Mo hadn’t held back. To survive an impact at that speed was a miracle in itself.

"You... bastard..." she cursed, her voice hoarse and weak, yet overflowing with a palpable hatred.

Xu Mo watched her, his expression impassive.

"Why did you people attack me?"

The woman glared at him, her eyes filled with a hatred that wasn’t faked. It was genuine, bone-deep.

"Why? Hahahaha..." She burst out laughing, a sound laced with madness, despair, and an indescribable glee. The laughter turned into another fit of coughing, and she brought up more blood.

"All of you normal people! You all deserve to die! You should all go to hell!"

Xu Mo’s brow furrowed slightly.

"But I have no quarrel with you."

"No quarrel? Hahahaha..." the woman cackled hoarsely. "By what right do you normal people get to live? Get to be perfectly fine? And what about us? We ended up like this, and you just stand by and treat it like a joke! What right do you have?!"

She struggled to sit up, but her injuries were too severe. All she could do was lie there, gasping for breath. Her chest heaved violently, and with every gasp, more bloody foam bubbled from her lips.

"We helped them..." Her voice grew distant, her gaze unfocused as if lost in a memory. "That group... those normal people... they were surrounded by zombies. We charged in and saved them. We killed the zombies, rescued them, and what was the result?"

Tears streamed from her eyes, but they weren’t tears of sorrow. They were tears of pure hate.

"The result? They called us monsters! They said we weren’t fit to be around people! They drove us out! We saved them, and they drove us away!"

"We helped them fight off zombies, time and time again. And them? They just hid behind their walls, watching us bleed, watching us die. And when we won, they’d come out and call us monsters again, saying we shouldn’t even exist!"

"Why?! Why?!"

The woman practically screamed the words, her voice filled with a despair and fury that came from a hatred carved into her very bones.

Xu Mo remained silent.

"Then we understood," the woman continued, her voice turning cold and her gaze sinister. "In this world, there are no good people or bad people. There are only normal people and monsters. In their eyes, we’re the monsters. So, we’ll just kill all the normal people. Let them become monsters too!"

She looked at Xu Mo, her lips twisting into a grotesque smile. It was a smile full of madness and glee, as if she could already see his fate.

"You’re a normal person, too. You’re fine now, but that won’t last. No harm in killing you early."

’Now he understood. These people weren’t born evil. They were once ordinary people, just other survivors. They ate the flesh of mutated creatures—maybe to stay alive, maybe to gain the power to protect others. They’d succeeded, too. They gained power, but they also paid the price and became Mutants.’