Chapter 92: Third Stage
Chapter 92: Third Stage
In the chaotic mall, Lu Xin had increased his speed to the maximum. His feet lightly stepped over walls, railings, and slowly moving escalators as his figure leaped toward the various chaotic crowds in the mall at that time. With each strike from his rod, it accurately hit the leg joint of a man or woman who was running wildly, easily helping them dislocate.
After the dislocation, they could only crawl; some couldn’t care less about anything else and just hugged their legs, howling in pain.
Since the force was applied with extreme precision, it should have been easy to set them back in place afterward, though they might have ached for a few days.
When encountering people who might originally have been lovers shopping together and were both affected, he separately broke their legs and then searched the surrounding shops. He sent one into a shop, quickly pulled down the grate door, and locked the other outside.
Seeing one crying outside the iron grate and the other shouting inside, Lu Xin felt that his work was very meaningful.
In that chaotic crowd, figuring out who was affected and who was just panicking was also easy. Those who were affected were all frantically rushing toward their loved ones, either chasing them or tightly embracing them. Those unaffected were clearly terrified, either running wildly to find an exit or already hiding.
Crack, bang, snap.
Lu Xin didn’t know how many legs he had broken in those short few minutes.
Nor did he know how many couples he had separated who were passionately embracing each other, so sweet it became foul-smelling.
For some reason, while performing these lifesaving actions, his mood felt inexplicably good.
Probably because he was saving their lives…
… It definitely wasn’t because he hadn’t had a girlfriend since he could remember!
Under his extraordinary speed and precise strikes, this part of the mall quickly quieted down. Though strings of cries of pain and yells resounded everywhere, the figures running wildly around suddenly vanished, greatly reducing the danger.
After finishing this, Lu Xin also hastily rushed out from the mall and scanned the surroundings.
At that time, the entire Satellite City No.2 was enveloped in major Psychic Contamination Incidents, plunged into chaos.
On the streets, he could see people hurrying along with fanatical expressions; nearby, he could spot some chasing or embracing each other.
Without Han Bing reminding him, he charged forward to continue his work.
His work involved breaking all the couples’ legs.
During the process, a few minor errors occurred. Most of those whose legs Lu Xin broke only lay on the ground, shrieking in pain— it seemed the intense agony from their legs temporarily overpowered their fanatical urge to find their loved ones. With no one treating them, even if they wanted to crawl, their speed was slow and the pain constantly kept them awake.
In this situation, very few questioned Lu Xin about what he was doing.
Only when a chubby man and a plump woman were embracing and kissing, Lu Xin went over, broke one leg each, and shoved them into two shops by the roadside. Just as he was about to lock the doors, he heard the chubby man shout while howling, “Why are you hitting me?”
Lu Xin was a bit surprised. “You weren’t contaminated?”
“What contamination?”
The chubby man yelled, “It’s the apocalypse! I’m giving my girlfriend one last kiss— what’s it to you?”
Lu Xin didn’t quite know how to respond, so he said seriously, “Kissing is fine, but why were your hands reaching into her chest?”
Then, he quickly climbed up the facade and left.
“What does it matter if I reach in or not?”
The chubby man cursed for a while before suddenly realizing. “That guy just now could climb walls? Spider-Man?”
“Why would Spider-Man carry a stick?”
“Shaolin Spider-Man?”
The scene was chaotic, so Lu Xin’s speed had to be very fast.
But before he could fully clear this area and ensure no Contaminated were running amok, he noticed something odd.
Since this was a mall and a densely populated residential area, there were many couples and lovers there. After being affected, they had already been frantically embracing each other, kissing with the greatest passion, which presented a scene of extreme fanaticism.
Suddenly, they stopped their frenzied movements.
Because at that moment, many people stopped their fervent actions simultaneously, creating a bizarre sight.
As if that fanaticism slipped off them abruptly, it was replaced by an eerie calmness.
They pulled back slightly from each other, gazed intently into each other’s eyes, and then smiled.
After that, they seemed to see something in the other’s gaze, took hands, turned around, and walked off.
Their movements were gentle and joyful, their faces showing a very resolute and blissful expression.
Some re-entered the mall, others went into the nearby Tower.
It looked just like they were entering the halls of marriage.
“What is going on?”
Lu Xin was still holding the flagpole, but faced with this change, he wasn’t sure how to handle it. Should he keep fighting?
“Lone Soldier, report what you see on-scene.”
Han Bing’s voice came through the channel.
Through the camera, she could observe some scenes.
But with Lu Xin moving so rapidly, the lens shook wildly, making it hard for her to see clearly.
Lu Xin snapped back to attention and hurriedly reported truthfully: “They suddenly seemed… calm. No longer frenzied. An unnerving calm. I saw them heading in different directions. Most entered high-rises, or…”
At that moment, his pupils abruptly constricted as he stared at a building in the northwest corner. “Not good!”
Without waiting for Han Bing’s question, he dashed toward that direction, shouting, “Someone’s standing on the edge of the building over there…”
Han Bing’s voice instantly became unnervingly calm, as if the young woman was forcibly stripping away all panic and shock to facilitate cold analysis: “It has now been thirty-two minutes since the sudden contamination source outbreak at Wanzhong Plaza. Confirm: are these individuals attempting suicide people who previously suffered secondary contamination?”
Lu Xin sprinted desperately in that direction, but after only a few strides, he stopped.
Because he saw them. A young couple, looking barely over twenty, standing on the ledge. The man was handsome with a sunny demeanor, the girl cute. Hands clasped, they silently exchanged a smile… then simultaneously stepped off the edge into the void.
Lu Xin could only watch, helpless, as they plummeted to the ground like kites.
He noticed they were still holding hands even after they fell.
…
“Lone Soldier, confirm: are these individuals attempting suicide people who suffered secondary contamination?”
Han Bing’s urgent voice in the channel snapped Lu Xin back to reality.
He forced himself to look away from the bodies and hastily scanned the surroundings. Nearby, another couple, hand-in-hand, was entering a high-rise. He recalled seeing them just moments before—wildly passionate, kissing while standing on a car roof…
He nodded grimly. “Yes!”
“Reason to suspect the secondary contamination cohort of Special Contamination Incident 096 has begun to mutate…”
Han Bing’s voice trembled slightly as she struggled to steady it. “Insufficient evidence for full inference, but the most probable cause…”
She paused briefly, then murmured in a low voice, “…is Double Love.”
“What does that mean?”
Lu Xin demanded as he burst into the adjacent building.
His flagpole lashed out, swiftly dislocating the ankles of the hand-in-hand couple who had just ascended the stairs.
He kept his voice as level as possible while questioning Han Bing.
“It’s an extreme emotional distortion… driving subconscious self-annihilation,” Han Bing’s voice quivered faintly. “We were right earlier. Because the core contamination source’s Psychic Magnitude was insufficient, and there hasn’t been enough time for the secondary group to deepen their infection and assimilation… Third Stage propagation hasn’t occurred…”
“But a problem still emerged: mass deaths among the secondary group, deliberately causing… Chaos…”
…
Lu Xin listened quietly. Only after a long moment did he finally mutter under his breath, softly, venomously:
“Fuck.”