48: Chapter 48 Do Dead Men Have the Right to Negotiate with Me?

Limb fragments and severed arms littered the ground.

The thick, pungent smell of blood was nauseating.

The other survivors from various factions who had been hiding in the shadows, hoping to profit from the chaos, were now utterly terrified, their souls nearly frightened out of them.

"They're insane! These three are monsters!"

"Run! Run now, or we'll all die here!"

The crowd erupted into chaos, screams of terror rising and falling in waves.

Hobos and freelance mercenaries pushed, shoved, and trampled over each other, crying and wailing as they fled deeper into the black market, terrified that if they were too slow, they'd be caught in the terrifying crossfire of ice and flame magic.

In the apocalypse, spectating came at the cost of one's life.

In less than three minutes...

...the dozens of Iron Blood Society elites who had been so menacing moments ago were now reduced to less than five, all backed into a dead-end corner of a platform.

Scorpion Man was among them.

The submachine gun in his hand had long since run out of ammo and was discarded on the ground like a useless stick.

Looking at the corpses strewn everywhere and the three figures—Lin Feng and the others—advancing step by step like gods of slaughter descended to earth, Scorpion Man's mental defenses completely crumbled.

*Thud!*

His knees gave way, and he fell heavily to the blood-soaked floor, his head knocking against it with dull thuds.

"Sir! Master! Please, spare me!"

Scorpion Man wept bitterly, a foul, acrid stench seeping from his crotch—he had been so terrified he'd wet himself.

"I'm with the Iron Blood Society... No! I'll be your dog from now on!

You want the blueprint, right? I know where the boss's vault is! I'll take you there! Please, don't kill me!"

Lin Feng stopped and looked down coldly at this whimpering, pathetic cur.

The flames in his left eye gradually extinguished, and the icy blue in his right eye faded back into its depths.

"Do you think the dead have the right to bargain with me?" Lin Feng's voice held not a trace of warmth.

He raised his right hand, and a sharp ice spike took shape in his palm.

Just as Lin Feng was about to casually dispose of this waste...

*BOOM—THUD!*

From the deepest passage of the black market came a series of heavy, oppressive footsteps, filled with immense pressure.

Accompanying the footsteps was an aura of terror that made one's soul tremble.

It was as if a ferocious beast slumbering deep underground had suddenly opened its eyes.

The fleeing survivors around them, sensing this aura, froze in place, their eyes showing a fear even more desperate than when they had seen Lin Feng.

"This magical energy fluctuation..."

Su Ya's face abruptly changed color, and she involuntarily took half a step back.

The First-Order Succubus's perception was screaming warnings. It was an absolute hierarchical suppression—a higher-order being exerting dominance over a lower one!

An existence beyond the first order!

"Worthless trash. You've completely disgraced the Iron Blood Society."

A voice as coarse and grating as sandpaper on metal, rough and hoarse, emerged from the dark passageway.

Immediately after...

...a giant of a man, over two meters tall and built like an iron tower, slowly stepped into the dim yellow circle of a searchlight, surrounded by a group of heavily armed elite mercenaries.

The giant was bare-chested, his muscles knotted like rock.

His body was covered in scars, large and small, crisscrossing in every direction. Most striking was his right arm—it was more than twice as thick as his left, its skin an eerie dark red, with veins bulging like earthworms.

[System Warning! High-level threat detected!]

[Target Identity: Iron Blood Society Leader—'Bloody Hand'!]

[Combat Assessment: Second-Order Initial Stage! Talent: D-Grade Berserk!]

A second-order powerhouse!

This was the first truly high-level survivor Lin Feng had encountered in this world who had broken through human limits, aside from that mindless Corrupted Giant Bear.

"B-Boss..."

Hearing this voice, Scorpion Man, still kneeling on the ground, felt no joy of rescue. Instead, his entire body trembled like a leaf in a sieve. He turned his head in despair, looking at the giant approaching like a demon god.

"Boss, save me... The mark is too tough..."

Bloody Hand walked up to Scorpion Man and stopped.

His bloodshot eyes stared coldly at the waste on the ground.

"The Iron Blood Society has no use for living trash."

Before the words had fully left his mouth...

...Bloody Hand's thick, dark red right arm suddenly swung up.

In his hand, a steel sledgehammer weighing over a hundred jin had somehow appeared.

*Whoosh!*

The sledgehammer tore through the air with a terrifying shriek, smashing down viciously toward Scorpion Man's head.

*Crunch!*

It was like smashing a ripe watermelon.

Scorpion Man didn't even have time to scream before his entire upper body was pulverized into a bloody paste by this unreasonable, monstrous force.

Blood and shattered bone fragments sprayed over ten meters away, splattering onto the surrounding train tracks.

Brutal, savage, and utterly unreasonable.

This was the code of conduct for the overlord of the black market.

Bloody Hand casually flicked the flesh fragments off his sledgehammer and kicked aside Scorpion Man's remains.

His beast-like eyes finally traversed the corpses littering the ground and settled on Lin Feng.

When he saw Su Ya and Xia Wanqiu standing beside Lin Feng, a flash of undisguised lust flickered in his eyes.

The First-Order Succubus's exquisite figure and beauty were a priceless treasure even in the eyes of a second-order powerhouse.

But soon, his gaze was drawn to the pile of black ash by Lin Feng's feet—the remains of the mutated potatoes.

"Frost. Flame."

Bloody Hand's voice echoed through the underground chasm.

"Dual-element abilities. Kid, you certainly have the capital to be arrogant. No wonder you could wipe out my scavenging team."

Although he said this, the shock in Bloody Hand's eyes was fleeting.

Dual-element abilities defied common sense, but the apocalypse was full of unbelievable mutations.

In comparison, he cared more about something else.

"But you should never, ever have tempted me with food."

Bloody Hand tightened his grip on the steel sledgehammer. The muscles in his dark red right arm emitted a grating, teeth-clenching sound.

"Two hundred jin of fresh vegetables and potatoes. Plus these two exquisite women."

Bloody Hand's breathing began to grow heavy.

In this wasteland, even a second-order powerhouse suffered the torment of resource scarcity.

Two hundred jin of fresh food was enough for him to expand the Iron Blood Society's influence by another fold!

Food was power!

"Kill him."

Bloody Hand wasted no more words, directly issuing the order for certain death.

The confidence of a second-order powerhouse made him utterly disdainful of a one-on-one duel with what seemed like a mere first-order upstart.

The elite mercenaries behind him instantly fanned out.

*Clack-clack!*

Two heavy, six-barreled Gatling machine guns were set up on elevated positions on either side of the platform. Their dark, gaping barrels began to slowly rotate.

"Turn that man into mincemeat! Keep the women alive!"

Bloody Hand roared wildly. The magical energy within him began to boil, and the precursor to his [D-Grade Berserk] talent turned his eyes completely blood-red.

A true, overwhelming heavy firepower suppression was now fully formed.

Su Ya and Xia Wanqiu's faces instantly turned deathly pale. A sense of despair, as tangible as a physical force, descended upon them.

This time, it wasn't ordinary submachine guns, but two six-barreled heavy machine guns capable of shredding armored trains!

In the face of absolute firepower coverage, any first-order elemental shield would be as fragile as paper.

Lin Feng watched the slowly rotating gun barrels, and his gaze finally turned completely icy.