100: Chapter 100 The Slums of the Thirty-Six Cities

Passing through the city gate, which was adorned with severed heads and now featured the additional corpse of a Fifth-Rank Naga, the noise and bustle instantly rushed toward them.

Shops stood in rows along both sides of the wide street.

Some displayed the skinned carcasses of exotic beasts, others showcased weapons still dripping with blood, and there were even iron cages specifically for selling slaves of various races.

This was the Starry Sky Thirty-Sixth City, the largest supply point and den of vice within a radius of ten thousand miles.

At this moment, a strange sight appeared on the otherwise crowded street.

A ten-person team from Earth was walking swaggeringly down the middle of the road.

Around them, whether it was the alien merchants who had been clamoring just moments ago or the armed patrol guards, everyone now retreated to the sides in terror, as if they had seen a plague god, forcibly clearing a wide path.

No one dared to stop them.

And no one dared to take a second look.

After all, the Fifth-Rank Naga corpse still dripping with blood at the city gate was the best pass.

"Phew..."

Ancient Sword Soul gripped the hilt of his sword tightly, his palms sweating. Walking behind Lin Yuan, he watched the aliens surrounding them, who had retreated but still held venomous gazes. "Captain... I think we've played too big this time."

"That Naga Captain seems to be from the 'Blood Wolf Gang.' I've heard they're the local bullies in this city, and their leader is a ruthless character at the Sixth-Rank Peak."

"We just arrived and already killed their people, even hanging them on the city wall. The City Lord's Mansion will probably come looking for trouble too."

Dragon Battle also nervously licked his lips. "Yeah, Captain, how about we find a place to hide first? Looking at the eyes of these aliens, it's like they want to eat us."

"Hide?"

Lin Yuan walked at the very front, his pace not faltering in the slightest.

Carrying the slaying abyss that had just tasted blood on his back, he swept his calm gaze across the surroundings. His voice was not loud, but it carried an air of dominance that put people at ease.

"On Earth, killing is against the law."

"But on the Starry Sky Ancient Road..." Lin Yuan sneered, "Whoever has the biggest fist makes the rules."

This is the law of the jungle.

The weaker you are, the more others will want to crush you; the more brutal you are, the more others will fear you.

Just as the group passed through a bustling alien commercial street and prepared to find a place to stay.

Suddenly, from a dark corner of an alley, a hand missing three fingers reached out quietly and grabbed the hem of Lin Yuan's garment.

"Who?!"

In a state of high tension, Ancient Sword Soul instantly drew his sword, preparing to strike.

"Don't... don't attack! It's me! One of our own!"

A trembling voice rang out. Although the voice was hoarse, it was actually using... a Chinese dialect from decades ago!

Lin Yuan's eyes narrowed. He reached out to block Ancient Sword Soul's sword and looked down at the figure hiding behind a trash can.

It was an old man in rags, reeking of foul odors.

His left arm was severed at the root, and his face was covered in scars and filth. Only in his cloudy eyes was there a glimmer of excitement and fear at seeing kin.

"Little brothers, are you... are you from Earth?"

The old man clutched Lin Yuan's pant leg tightly, as if grabbing the last straw of hope. Tears carved two furrows down his wrinkled face.

"I'm Old Liu... Old Liu who came in from the Xichuan Military Region thirty years ago!"

Thirty years ago!

The group was shocked.

That was the early stage of Earth's spiritual energy recovery, the first batch of pioneers to explore the Starry Sky Ancient Road!

Most of that group had gone missing, and the Federation assumed they had all been wiped out.

Unexpectedly, they actually encountered a survivor here!

"Old man, you..." Ji Hongyi just wanted to step forward to help him.

"Shh! Don't speak! Don't let those aliens hear you!"

The old man, who called himself Old Liu, looked around in terror, especially staring at the patrol soldiers in blood-colored armor in the distance, his body trembling uncontrollably.

"Quick! Hurry and come with me!"

"You killed a Naga; the people from the 'Blood Wolf Gang' will come to settle accounts immediately! If you don't leave now, it'll be too late!"

"Don't implicate everyone, hurry and follow me to the 'pigsty' to hide!"

Starry Sky Thirty-Sixth City · Lower District. Location: Black Water Alley (Slums)

Following Old Liu, the group left the bustling commercial district and ducked into intricate, dark, and damp alleys.

The further they went inside, the dimmer the light became, and the stench in the air grew stronger.

It was the smell of rotting food, excrement, and festering wounds mixed together.

"We're here... this is it."

Old Liu stopped in front of a sewer entrance filled with sewage and pushed open a rusty iron door.

As the iron door opened, the scene before them made the hearts of all the geniuses from Earth present twitch violently.

This was a huge underground air-raid shelter, with no light, only a few oil lamps about to go out.

On the muddy ground, hundreds of tattered tents were packed densely, and between the tents lay emaciated, barely clothed humans.

Some of them were missing arms or legs, and others were covered in poisonous sores.

Seeing Lin Yuan and the others enter, these people who had been lying on the ground raised their heads one after another.

What kind of eyes were those?

There was no joy at seeing fellow countrymen, nor was there any light of hope.

Only numbness.

Only fear.

And even... a trace of deep jealousy and resentment.

They looked at the shiny, bright combat armor on Lin Yuan and his group, and at Ji Hongyi's fair, rosy skin, like a group of rats living in a gutter seeing a swan flying in the sky.

"This is... the human stronghold?"

Dragon Battle looked at this scene, which was like a refugee camp, his voice trembling: "Is this what the Federation archives called... the Starry Sky Outpost?"

"Outpost?"

Old Liu gave a bitter smile, a self-mockery that was desperate to the extreme:

"That's what your superiors say."

"Here, the aliens call this a two-legged sheep pen, or a 'pigsty'."

Afterward, Old Liu led the group to a slightly cleaner corner and poured a few bowls of turbid water using chipped, broken bowls.

"Drink. This is filtered, it's not poisonous."

Looking at the impurities floating in the bowl, even Dragon Battle, who was usually the least fussy, couldn't swallow it.

"Old man, what on earth... is going on here?" Lin Yuan didn't drink the water and looked at the numb faces all around. "Since you were able to enter the Starry Sky Ancient Road, you must have been geniuses on Earth back then, right? Why did it end up like this?"

Those who had the qualifications to step onto the Starry Sky Ancient Road were definitely elites of the Fourth-Rank or higher on Earth!

"Geniuses?"

Old Liu leaned against the damp wall, looking at his severed arm, his eyes hollow:

"Thirty years ago, I was also a genius from Xichuan. I had high spirits back then, thinking the starry sky was nothing much."

"But only after arriving here did I realize... we were just frogs at the bottom of a well."

"Here, Fourth-Ranks walk all over the place, and Fifth-Ranks are worse than dogs. Those aliens... are too strong. Their physical fitness is several times ours, and their technology crushes us by hundreds of years."

"Half of our batch of over a hundred people died on the very first day we arrived."

"The rest were captured to be miners, cannon fodder, gladiators... Those who resisted were all skinned and hung at the city gate."

"Later, we were afraid. Our backbones... were broken."

Old Liu pointed outside: "As long as you behave obediently, as long as you pay the 'head tax' on time every month, as long as you occasionally send a few women out... at least you can still live."

"This is reality."

Speaking of this, Old Liu suddenly seemed to remember something, grabbed Lin Yuan's hand violently, his eyes full of terror:

"Right! Little brother! Did you kill the Naga Captain of the Blood Wolf Gang at the city gate earlier?"

Lin Yuan nodded: "I killed him, so what?"

"It's over... it's all over..."

Old Liu collapsed onto the ground, his face deathly pale, his whole body trembling:

"You've caused a huge disaster! The Blood Wolf Gang is the master of this district! That Naga Captain is the brother-in-law of the gang leader!"

"You killed him... the Blood Wolf Gang will definitely retaliate! They dare not directly cause trouble for the City Lord's Mansion, but they will vent their anger on us!"

"You must leave! Hurry and leave!!"

Old Liu suddenly pushed Lin Yuan frantically: "Don't stay here! You will get everyone killed! The Blood Wolf Gang will slaughter this Black Water Alley!!"

Not only Old Liu, but the surrounding crowd, who had been numb, instantly erupted with extreme terror upon hearing the words "Blood Wolf Gang."

"Get out!!"

"You bunch of jinxes! Why did you come to harm us?!"

"Drive them out! Hand them over to the Blood Wolf Gang to apologize!!"

Some people began to pick up stones and trash from the ground and throw them at Lin Yuan and his group.

In those pairs of eyes, there was a longing for survival, as well as hatred for the "people who implicated them."

"You..."

Ancient Sword Soul was trembling with anger. He had risked his life for these people at the city gate earlier, and now he was being driven away by them as a jinx?

"Shut up."

Lin Yuan blocked Ancient Sword Soul, letting a lump of mud hit his combat boots.

He looked at Old Liu's face, which was distorted by fear, and at the surrounding compatriots who had become hideous in order to survive.

He was not angry, but felt a deep sorrow.

"Slaughter them all?"

Lin Yuan reached out and gently brushed the mud off his pant leg.

He slowly raised his head, and in his deep blue eyes, a black fire burned that was enough to incinerate all the filth in this world.

"I'd like to see that."

Lin Yuan's voice was very soft, but in this dead-silent underground air-raid shelter, it exploded like a thunderclap:

"In this place."

"Before my blade."

"Who dares to touch a single hair on your heads."

Boom!

Before the words had even finished falling.

Above their heads, that originally tightly closed iron door to the underground entrance was suddenly kicked away by someone!

Bang!!!

A loud noise.

Immediately after, a voice full of killing intent and brutality came down from above:

"All you two-legged sheep inside, listen to me!!"

"Hand over the murderer!!"

"Otherwise, today I will blood-bathe this pigsty!!"

The Blood Wolf Gang had arrived...