Chapter 293 - 153: Invitation

Chapter 293: Chapter 153: Invitation

’He who hesitates is lost. This is no time to waste.’

Wielding his Triangular Spike, Xu Mo concealed his aura and sprinted toward the outskirts of Luochuan City.

The rain poured down in sheets. Xu Mo’s figure was like an unsheathed blade, silently slicing through the dark curtain of rain.

Rain struck Xu Mo’s face and streamed down the contours of his combat suit. His breathing was steady and deep, his vitality circulating within him, sustaining a continuous sprint at a speed far beyond that of a normal person.

Xu Mo didn’t know his own top speed, but on this rainy night, he finally got a general idea.

Over ten meters per second.

And not in a burst, but as a sustained running speed.

Just as he’d expected, things went much more smoothly after abandoning the vehicle.

The hordes of corpses that had relentlessly pursued him that afternoon, the zombies that had swarmed from all directions to block his every escape route, now seemed to have lost their target. As Xu Mo, with his aura concealed, skirted past them, the wandering gray figures didn’t even turn their heads or roar. They just continued to move aimlessly through the rain.

Xu Mo sprinted nonstop, not daring to let up for even a moment.

One hour.

Two hours.

By the time the third hour passed, Xu Mo had lost track of how far he’d run. All he knew was that behind him, in the curtain of rain, there were no longer hordes of zombies in pursuit. But this came at a steep price.

The SUV was gone, and so was his private warehouse.

Inside was a massive amount of supplies he had scavenged—ammunition, food, medicine, tools... It was enough to sustain him for a much longer journey. But now, all of it had been left on the roof of that abandoned vehicle, awaiting an unknown fate.

’If I can’t go back, those things will be lost there forever.’

But Xu Mo knew he couldn’t turn back now.

After another hour of sprinting at full speed, Xu Mo felt the surging vitality within him begin to stagnate slightly.

It wasn’t fatigue, but the natural reaction after a long period of maximum output. His body could keep running, but his efficiency would drop and his reflexes would slow. In a wilderness where unknown threats could appear at any moment, maintaining peak condition was more important than covering a few extra kilometers.

Noticing the change, Xu Mo slowed his pace, regulating his breathing as he continued forward.

He still held the Triangular Spike, its tip pointed toward the ground, rainwater trickling down the blade. His gaze swept warily across the surrounding darkness, his ears straining for any unusual sounds.

Another thirty minutes passed.

The rain had lessened at some point, slightly improving visibility. Xu Mo saw a relatively open clearing ahead. He was originally planning to skirt around its edge and keep going.

But after a single glance, Xu Mo stopped in his tracks. In the center of the clearing was a parked SUV.

The SUV’s headlights were on, two beams of white light piercing the rain and casting two bright, fan-shaped patches on the ground. The strands of rain were exceptionally clear in the light—dense and unending.

Two people stood in front of the vehicle. One was a young woman, likely in her early twenties, holding a black umbrella. She wore a dark, heavy coat that enveloped her completely, its hem falling to her knees and its collar fastened so tightly that the clothes underneath were barely visible. Her long hair was damp with rain, hanging by her shoulders.

In her right hand, the woman held the hand of a little girl, who was only about 1.1 meters tall. The girl wore a white dress, its hem fluttering slightly in the wind and already quite soaked by the rain. She had jet-black hair and a round face, looking very cute—if it weren’t for her eyes.

Those eyes held no light. It wasn’t the emptiness of blindness, but an indescribable soullessness. She stood there, hand in hand with the woman, her gaze fixed on nothing in particular. She wasn’t looking at Xu Mo, her surroundings, or anything at all. She just stood there, like a doll without a soul.

The moment she saw Xu Mo appear, the young woman raised a hand and gave him a small wave.

The gesture was light and natural, as if she had been waiting for him for a long time.

Xu Mo’s pupils contracted sharply.

’This combination.’

’This rain.’

’This dead of night.’

’This patch of wilderness, dozens of kilometers from Luochuan City.’

’A conservatively dressed young woman, leading a little girl in a white dress with soulless eyes, waiting for him here.’

’Considering what I’ve been through and my own suspicions, their identity is practically screaming at me.’

But to Xu Mo’s surprise, they didn’t seem to be zombies either.

The expression on the young woman’s face was too vivid, her eyes too clear, her posture too calm. Zombies didn’t have such eyes, nor such composure.

Xu Mo didn’t move. He stood his ground, his Triangular Spike angled toward the earth, his body poised to either launch a sudden attack or beat a hasty retreat. Rainwater slid down the blade, splashing into fine droplets on the ground.

The young woman spoke.

"Powerful one from afar," her voice was soft, yet it cut clearly through the rain to reach Xu Mo’s ears. "We mean you no harm. We simply wish to invite you to our settlement as a guest."

Her tone was calm and natural, as if she were speaking to an old friend.

Xu Mo didn’t answer, his mind racing to analyze the information in her words.

’’Powerful one from afar’—she knows I’m not a local survivor, which means she, or they, have been watching me.’

’’We mean you no harm’—if the zombie hordes that cornered me during the day were their doing, then that’s the biggest joke in the world. What kind of invitation involves a zombie chase? Forcing someone to abandon their car, run for hours on end, and then stopping them halfway to say, ’We mean you no harm’?’

As for the line, "We simply wish to invite you to our settlement as a guest," it made Xu Mo’s eyes narrow.

’A settlement! They have their own settlement, and they don’t want to kill me—they want to ’invite’ me over.’

’Why?’

Xu Mo didn’t know.

But no matter what their objective was, Xu Mo didn’t think agreeing to their request would be a good choice.

"Thank you for the kind offer," Xu Mo said, his voice just as clear and calm. "But I have urgent business to attend to and can’t stay for a visit. Perhaps next time, I’ll be sure to stop by."

The young woman didn’t reply immediately. She just stood there quietly, holding her umbrella and the little girl’s hand, her gaze meeting Xu Mo’s through the curtain of rain.

Three seconds.

Five seconds.

Just as Xu Mo was about to say something else and turn to leave—

A chill shot up from the base of his spine and straight to the crown of his head without any warning!

It wasn’t the chill of the rainy night. It was the instinctive alarm his body sounded when faced with extreme danger!

Xu Mo’s pupils shrank as every muscle in his body tensed. The vitality of the Iron Bone Realm surged frantically within him! His gaze shot past the young woman, into the darkness behind her—

A sound came from the distance.

A deep, dense rumble.

It was the sound of footsteps. The sound of countless footsteps trampling the ground in unison.

Then came a roar. Not the roar of a single zombie, but the combined roar of hundreds, and it wasn’t the kind made by ordinary ones!

The layered roars echoed through the rainy night, deep and oppressive, like an invisible tidal wave surging out of the darkness!

Xu Mo only had to listen for less than a second to feel the crushing pressure wash over him.

It was not something he could handle. It was a torrent powerful enough to tear him to shreds.

"But on second thought, traveling through the night in such heavy rain isn’t very sensible. And since you’ve both so graciously invited me, stopping by for a visit sounds like a wonderful idea."

Xu Mo paused, as if he weren’t the one who had just refused.

"Is it not a delight to have friends come from afar? And I, for one, love making new friends."

The young woman smiled. When she did, her eyes curved into crescents, and she looked much softer than before.

"Then get in the car," she said.

The instant her words fell, the distant roars and footsteps vanished.

Xu Mo: "..."

Taking a deep breath, Xu Mo sheathed the Triangular Spike at his waist and walked toward the lit SUV.

The rain was still falling. Xu Mo’s steps were steady, as if he were truly just a guest who had accepted an invitation.

The young woman turned sideways and pulled open the rear passenger door.

Xu Mo ducked his head and slid inside.

The interior of the car was warm, with a faint, unidentifiable fragrance.

The young woman closed her umbrella and opened the front passenger door to get in. The little girl in the white dress got in from the other side and sat next to Xu Mo.

Even though she was just a little girl, alarm bells were screaming in Xu Mo’s mind. However, she simply sat obediently beside him without making a move, so Xu Mo merely remained in a state of readiness to erupt at any moment.

SLAM!

With the slam of the car door, the SUV’s engine started. It turned around and began driving slowly back in the direction of Luochuan City.

Xu Mo leaned back against the rear seat, his gaze fixed on the rain-swept night rushing past the window.

He didn’t speak, but he knew that he was now heading back toward Luochuan City—the very city he had just risked everything to escape.