32: Chapter 32 Killing the Divine Apostle, that's it?

The Black Robe lay prone in the pile of rubble, half its body blown to pieces.

Its withered ribs were turned outward, seven or eight of them broken, and beneath the black robe, a grayish-white torso that was clearly not human was exposed.

The parts that had been crushed and shot through were writhing—dark red granulation tissue crawled out from the wounds, growing layer by layer, its repair speed visible to the naked eye.

It was self-healing.

Quickly.

The Black Robe jerked its head up; its hood was gone.

A face so shriveled it clung to the skull was exposed to the moonlight—no nose, no ears, only two deep-set eye sockets where green ghostly fire danced frantically.

"Bug—!"

Its mouth had just split open.

Puff.

Puff.

Puff.

Three 9mm rounds were fired at point-blank range into its two knee joints and left elbow joint, which were currently regenerating.

The attribute that ignored 20% of physical defense worked to its full potential at close range; the bullets penetrated that layer of grayish-white mutated bone, shredding the newly grown granulation tissue and articular cartilage.

The Black Robe's lower body instantly lost its support, and the entire figure slammed onto the rubble.

It went mad.

Its remaining right arm propped itself up against the ground, the ghostly fire in its sockets burning with a white-hot intensity, while its mouth emitted a high-frequency scream that human vocal cords could never replicate.

Dark red energy exploded from its body, radiating outward.

A mental attack.

Chen Chen's mind felt like it had been hammered.

It was as if he had been struck with a heavy, invisible club.

The scene before his eyes blurred for half a second, and his eardrums rang.

Fortunately, his 28 points in the Spirit attribute hadn't been added for nothing.

He gritted his teeth and forced himself to endure it.

His left hand pressed down on the Black Robe's crown.

A palm backed by fifty points of Constitution gripped that shriveled head like it was squeezing a cracked coconut shell.

His right hand held the Armor-Piercing Military Dagger, driving it downward.

The tip of the blade was aimed at the frantically dancing green ghostly fire in the left eye socket.

He stabbed it in.

The high-carbon steel blade passed through the flame, through the orbital bone wall, and through some sort of non-material energy core.

The sensation was bizarre—the first half felt like stabbing into ice, while the second half felt like stirring boiling mud.

Chen Chen twisted his wrist forty-five degrees.

The green fire exploded.

The Black Robe's body began to collapse inward from the chest.

Flesh, bone, robe—every bit of matter that composed it collapsed inward in an extremely violent manner.

A piercing, soul-penetrating scream squeezed out from the center of the collapse.

And then—

Boom.

Grayish-white dust shot out in all directions.

The residual dark red energy was instantly reclaimed by the Power of Rules, leaving behind only a pile of foul-smelling residue.

Not even a complete corpse remained.

Chen Chen flicked off the grayish-black slime clinging to the military spike and withdrew the blade.

System notifications began popping up like crazy.

[Killed a low-tier Apostle of the "Lord of Flesh"! Obtained special kill reward: High-tier Attribute Blind Box *1!]

Immediately after, a blood-red warning pop-up filled his entire field of vision.

[Warning! You have killed a God's Apostle and have been marked by the "Lord of Flesh" faction!]

[When encountering monsters from this faction in the future, your aggro level will be forcibly locked at the maximum level!]

The red warning flashed three times before disappearing.

Chen Chen stood on the altar steps and looked down at the pile of ash by his feet.

He had been permanently blacklisted by an evil god's faction.

To put it another way—from now on, whenever he encountered a monster from the "Lord of Flesh" lineage, no matter where he hid, the monster would ignore everyone else and come specifically for him.

So what?

Even without the mark, he would have killed them anyway.

Stealth mode deactivated. Chen Chen's figure reappeared under the moonlight.

He turned around to face the sacrifice platform at the highest point of the altar, which was built from deep red crystals and white bones.

There was no middleman left.

The path... was clear. "When you're drowning in debt, you stop worrying about the bills."

Chen Chen slid the Armor-Piercing Military Dagger back into its strap and walked down the steps, treading on the ash covering the ground.

The soles of his boots crushed the shattered crimson crystals.

Permanently blacklisted by an evil god?

As if the list of people who hated him wasn't long enough already.

One more deity wouldn't make a difference.

Returning to the RV, Chen Chen turned the key to start the engine and shifted into reverse.

The eleven-ton steel fortress slowly turned around, the wreckage of the Tyrant being dragged behind the rear plowing new furrows into the gravel ground.

He turned the steering wheel all the way and tapped the accelerator.

The RV rolled over the scrap metal and shattered glass on the ground, coming to a steady stop directly above the sacrificial runes carved with dark red patterns in the center of the altar.

With a thought from Chen Chen...

The runes on the Spatial Traction Chain simultaneously went dark, and the shackles automatically popped open.

The untethered wreckage of the Tyrant—that seven or eight-ton mountain of mutated flesh that had been pierced and torn through the middle by the RV—slammed directly into the heart of the altar's runic array.

The entire altar shook.

Then, the runes lit up.

Dark red liquid-like lines surged outward from the center of the runes, climbing all the way up the white bone steps to the altar's spire.

The energy within the crimson crystals was detonated by the Tyrant's corpse, and an absurdly thick pillar of dark red light shot up from the top of the altar, piercing straight through the layer of gray clouds overhead.

The light pillar's diameter exceeded ten meters.

The accompanying energy storm sent all the remaining scrap metal within a hundred-meter radius flying!

The burning wreckage left behind by the Juehu Convoy flipped several times in the air current, crashing onto the distant wilderness like toys.

The Tyrant's remains rapidly decomposed within the light pillar.

Bone armor, mutated muscle, dark purple blood—all matter was dismantled into the most basic energy particles by the altar's Power of Rules and swallowed whole.

Server-wide announcement.

Dark gold text was forcibly projected into the center of every survivor's retina in District 069, impossible to close.

[Server-wide Announcement: Congratulations to player "Chen Chen" for becoming the first player in District 069 to complete a sacrifice at an "Altar of Flesh"!]

[Sacrifice Rating: SSS-rank!]

[Generous rewards are being distributed...]

The soaring dark red light pillar trembled violently, splitting into four spheres of light.

The largest one, glowing with golden light, passed directly through the roof of the armored vehicle into the cockpit, coming to a steady rest above Chen Chen's open palm.

The remaining three, trailing purple and golden light, floated into the back of the vehicle, each landing in the hands of the three women.

Chen Chen looked down at the golden blind box in his palm, which was about two sizes larger than a fist.

Extremely complex patterns flowed across the surface of the box, emitting an aura that was on a completely different dimension from all previous Bronze or Black Iron-tier items.

He flicked open the latch with one hand.

The moment the lid popped open, a palm-sized ancient book floated up.

The pages glowed with a deep gold, their corners heavily worn; the writing on the cover didn't belong to any known language, but its meaning was poured directly into his mind.

[Unique Gold Skill Book: "Absolute Control: Gravity Field"]

[Effect: Upon learning, the host can control the laws of gravity within a ten-meter radius. Can apply up to ten times gravity to suppress targets, or reduce the host's own weight to achieve brief levitation. Spirit consumption is positively correlated with the suppression ratio.]

Chen Chen gripped the ancient book; the pages turned automatically, and the content transformed into a golden stream of information that surged into his cerebral cortex.

Three seconds.

Learning complete.

He pushed open the car door, stepped out, and stood at the edge of the altar.

Ten meters away.

The Dead-End pickup truck, which had been riddled with holes by the heavy machine gun, still had its hood resting on half a chassis—a sheet of iron weighing at least thirty kilograms.

Chen Chen raised his hand.

He casually pointed his index finger.

An invisible force field radiated from his fingertip.

The gravity coefficient within the target area was instantly rewritten—tenfold.

The hood didn't even have a chance to bounce.

Under tenfold gravity, the iron plate bore an equivalent downward pressure of nearly half a ton; with a dull thud, it was slammed directly into the ground.

By the time Chen Chen withdrew his hand, a two-centimeter-thick iron disc had appeared on the ground.

A perfect two-dimensional form, with radial creases pressed into the edges.

Useful.

This skill, combined with fifty points of Constitution for close-quarters combat—within ten meters, whether it's an Elite or a Mutation—they'll first be pinned down by tenfold gravity, then take a blade.

An assembly line operation.

It's just that mastering this skill... requires Spirit and Perception; in the future, attribute points can be distributed evenly.