Chapter 734: Responsible with Your Own Life

The survivors stopped in the middle of the service yard.

They had followed General Kael because he knew a way out of the city. None of them understood why he had brought them between the damaged warehouses instead of continuing toward the outer road.

One of the injured men looked back at the street they had used. The distant sounds of the infected still echoed between the buildings.

"General, why are we stopping here?"

Andrew did not answer.

He looked at the people around him one more time. Some could still fight, but most of them had already used almost all their qi while escaping the buried city. Blood covered their clothes, and several people needed help just to remain standing.

This group was enough for what he needed.

A woman moved closer to him. She kept looking toward the entrance of the service yard.

"We should keep going. What if those infected find us here?"

Andrew raised one hand.

Red light flowed from his fingers and spread across the ground.

The survivors stepped back as the light passed beneath their feet. It reached the damaged warehouses, climbed over the broken walls, and curved upward until it formed a barrier around the entire service yard.

The red wall closed above them.

The survivors immediately became alert.

"What are you doing?"

"Open it!"

Two cultivators rushed toward the barrier.

The first man gathered the little qi he had left around his fist and struck the red wall.

BANG!

The barrier shook, but the force threw him backward. His boots scraped across the ground before another survivor caught him.

The second cultivator formed a blade of wind and sent it toward the same spot.

The blade struck the barrier and broke apart.

"Attack together!" someone shouted. "Hit one point!"

Five survivors moved forward.

A woman raised both hands and formed a ball of fire between her palms. Beside her, a wounded swordsman forced qi into his weapon until the cracked blade began to glow.

Two others gathered wind and lightning.

They attacked at the same time.

BOOM!

Fire spread across the barrier. The sword struck the center of the blast while wind and lightning crashed into the same point.

A web of thin cracks appeared across the red wall.

For a moment, hope entered their faces.

Then the cracks closed.

The barrier pushed the remaining energy back toward them.

The swordsman was thrown off his feet. The woman’s flames scattered around her, burning the sleeve of another survivor. The lightning cultivator coughed blood as his unstable qi turned against him.

"Again!" the injured man shouted. "It almost broke!"

They attacked the same point a second time.

The fire burned brighter. The swordsman used both hands and poured everything he had left into his weapon.

The barrier shook harder than before.

Several stones rose from the ground, and the windows of the nearby warehouses shattered.

However, the red wall remained intact.

The swordsman’s glowing blade broke in half.

The remaining force entered his arms. Blood burst from his palms, and he fell to one knee.

Before this, none of them would have forced their qi so recklessly. Doing so while injured could damage their meridians or cause qi deviation.

Their lives were now at risk.

They no longer cared about the consequences.

More survivors joined the attack. Fire, wind, sword light, and raw qi struck the barrier again and again.

Each attack made the ground tremble, but none of them had enough strength left to break through.

The others turned toward Kael.

His appearance began to change in front of them.

The face they knew as General Kael became younger. His military uniform changed into royal robes, and the presence around his body no longer felt like that of the general who had led them through the city.

Several survivors recognized him.

"Prince Andrew?"

"Why were you pretending to be General Kael?"

Andrew looked at their frightened faces without answering the second question.

"You should be honored," he said. "Your deaths will be useful."

The people near the barrier attacked it again.

One man formed a blade from qi and struck the same point several times. Another woman sent a stream of fire across the red wall.

The barrier shook under their attacks, but none of them had enough strength left to break it.

The injured people moved toward the center because the attacks made the ground tremble. They looked at Andrew, hoping he was only trying to frighten them, but his expression did not change.

Andrew opened his storage ring.

A piece of red flesh appeared above his palm.

It was larger than a human heart and covered in thick veins. The flesh continued to move even though it was no longer connected to a body.

Every movement released a disgusting smell that quickly spread across the service yard.

Some of the survivors covered their mouths.

"What is that?"

Andrew raised the organ and watched its veins move.

"It came from a daughter of Arachne, the Spider Progenitor."

The people around him became silent for a moment.

They did not know what a Progenitor was, but they knew nothing good could come from something with that name.

It was clearly a secret known only by those in high positions.

Andrew telling them about it meant only one thing.

He had no intention of letting any of them survive.

Not even their souls would be allowed to escape.

The man with the qi blade turned away from the barrier and rushed toward Andrew.

Andrew did not move.

The man only crossed a few steps before red lines appeared beneath his feet. They wrapped around his legs and pulled him to the ground.

He tried to cut through them, but more lines rose from the stone and wrapped around his arms.

The other survivors attacked Andrew at the same time.

Fire, wind, and several weapons flew toward him.

Andrew threw the organ into the air.

The red flesh stopped above the center of the service yard.

The barrier around them brightened.

Every attack sent toward Andrew suddenly changed direction.

The fire, wind, and weapons turned in the air and struck the floating organ instead.

The organ absorbed all of them.

Its veins expanded.

The survivors felt their blood move inside their bodies.

The sensation made them stop attacking.

Several people grabbed their chests. Others fell to their knees as their qi moved out of control again.

"What did you do to us?" the woman shouted.

Andrew stepped outside the center of the formation.

"I gave the organ what it needed."

The red lines beneath the service yard spread toward every survivor.

The first man screamed when blood began leaking through his skin. His body shook as the blood flowed toward the organ.

The same thing happened to the others.

They tried to resist with qi, but their unstable energy only made the formation pull harder.

The people who had used the most strength while escaping collapsed first.

The woman reached toward Andrew.

"We trusted you."

"Then you should have taken responsibility for your own life," Andrew said. "Your mistake was trusting someone else with it. Remember this in your next life. Never trust anyone with your life."

Her eyes widened with anger.

"What next life?"

Her body burst into a cloud of blood.

Her life had already ended.

Even her soul was pulled into the formation before it could escape.