January 22
After Brent shot down that beast, Xiangzi saw two people sprinting toward them from that direction.
They could still be saved.
They just needed a little time.
And so, in the brief interval before the monsters could reorganize and come flooding back, Xiangzi made her decision—
She would save them.
"You all stay up here, keep watch on the ground, and maintain the perimeter. I'm going down!" As she spoke, Xiangzi set down her assault rifle and even tossed her helmet aside to Miranda.
Anyone seeing that much would naturally assume she meant to head for the ground.
But she did not take the normal route.
Xiangzi strode to the edge of the second-floor roof, standing on the eaves six or seven meters above the ground—
"What— Ah! Don't—!"
Huaxiu did not even finish shouting before Xiangzi vanished from the terrace.
There was nearly a hundred meters between them and the approaching pair. Xiangzi knew that even if she yelled now, they would not hear her. And if they wanted to get inside, there was only one main gate, which could only be opened from within. Someone had to go down to receive them.
And Xiangzi hated wasting time running stairs.
So she jumped straight from the second-floor terrace, more than six meters high, slamming down into a snowbank hard enough to blast snow into the air and leave a deep crater.
That move terrified Huaxiu. Standing on the terrace, she squeezed her hands so tightly they hurt, her heart hanging by a thread for Xiangzi. The others were the same. They could not help but worry for Xiangzi's knees. Could a human body really endure that?
"I'm fine. Don't worry about me. Watch the surroundings. Don't let any infected creatures get in!"
"Understood! Don't worry, we'll hold!"
Climbing back out of the snowpit, Xiangzi did not look back. She hit the cleared ground beyond the drift and tore off across it in a hundred-meter dash.
That kind of explosive movement put a huge burden on the body.
And Xiangzi was on her period.
People might think Xiangzi could pull off this kind of superhuman stunt as casually as plucking something from thin air.
They would be wrong.
The motion had looked clean and effortless, but in truth it was anything but simple.
She was not some kind of god.
She could only do it because her body was extraordinarily strong, because several of her physical traits boosted her limits, and because the Samurai-3 single-soldier armor helped absorb part of the impact.
Even so, aside from the jolt that traveled straight into her lower abdomen, the rest of her body went half numb.
This is insane.
Even Xiangzi herself wanted to mock herself for it.
But there was nothing to do now except save them.
They had fought all the way here just to live.
Only one step remained.
If they had died somewhere else, Xiangzi would have had nothing to say. But now that they had made it all the way to her doorstep, she could not ignore them.
Their lives clearly were not meant to end here.
As Xiangzi ran, gunfire erupted again behind her from the upper floor.
Bullets poured out in long strings, mixed with the heavy, dull boom of Brent's large-caliber sniper rifle.
Xiangzi did not even need to look back to know what had happened.
Those damn things had come back.
Just as she had expected, the wolves had only withdrawn briefly. Before the defenders had even finished refilling the magazines they had just emptied, the pack had returned.
This was bad. She had to move faster.
If she could get them inside before the wolves swung fully around to this flank, they still had a chance.
"Help—!"
The pink-haired girl cried out, staggering forward beside a sturdy old man. They both ran with all the desperation they had, half-tripping through the deep mountain snow. Running in snow like this was far harder than it looked. It was like stepping on cotton one moment and sinking into mud the next. One bad fall, and it was over.
Still, they kept scrambling on, ugly but effective.
By the time Xiangzi reached the fence, they were less than a few dozen meters away. Her enhanced eyesight let her make out their faces clearly.
What a striking face.
But that voice was strange too. Sweet somehow. Almost too sweet.
No, not the time.
She had no room for nonsense.
Reaching the gate, Xiangzi shouted toward them, "Hurry! Over here! This way!"
The compound's only entrance was a five-meter-wide double gate made of wired fencing.
It was not locked in the conventional sense. To open it, one had to pull out the heavy wooden bars bracing it from the inside, then shove the leaves outward. It had been built for vehicles to pass through.
There had been no time to build a smaller pedestrian gate.
Crude, yes—but they had only arrived here two days ago. For such a short time, what they had built was already superhuman.
As soon as Xiangzi cut the power, she seized the still-warm gate frame and started pulling out the heavy braces one by one.
"Damn, still hot!"
Even through thick gloves she could feel the residual heat.
She yanked free the thick wooden locking bars and the lone iron rod wedged into place, then pushed.
The gate moved slowly. Snow had piled against the far side, so it took considerable force to shove it open even enough for one person to squeeze through.
That would have to do.
"Come on! You in front—through here!" Xiangzi shouted.
But when she looked up again, the pair were already nearly there.
And then the pink-haired girl suddenly went down hard in the snow.
Damn it. Why now?
Xiangzi rushed out through the gap.
With Saitō supporting her, Chihaya Ai struggled back to her feet. Neither of them had any attention left for anything except the simple act of moving forward.
Could they make it?
Could they—
Yes.
The entrance ahead was hope itself.
Ai could no longer feel whether her body was still functioning. She only knew there was light ahead, and that she had to reach it.
Then a powerful arm swept her up.
"Th-thank... you..." Ai forced out, her throat dry and raw. That was all she could manage. She had no strength left. Hunger, exhaustion, cold—her body, never robust to begin with, had long since hit its limit.
"Save the thanks. Get moving. Already—they're here."
Xiangzi snatched Ai from the old man's arms and hauled both of them toward the still-safe yard.
"You take her and get to that door. I'll shut the gate."
"Thank you... I..."
"Stop talking and save your strength. Get over there and wait for me."
Watching the old man still trying to speak in polite, formal phrases at a time like this, Xiangzi snapped at him in irritation. They were in the middle of mortal danger and he still had the energy for etiquette?
With a clang, Xiangzi slammed the gate shut.
Gunfire above intensified at once. The side of the yard she was on, which had only just been safe, now had infected creatures rushing in too.
She yanked out her pistol and fired. At the same instant, arrows whistled down from above.
Several wolves were hit. One large gray wolf pitched sideways into the snow. Another was pinned to the ground by a long bolt, howling helplessly—until Xiangzi's 9mm round drilled through its skull and turned its hot brain matter into slurry.
Meanwhile, at the inner door, Imagawa Chihaya Ai and Saitō Koina were met by someone rushing to open it—
Chihaya Kuriyo.
"Kuriyo! I knew you were alive!"
Saitō's exhausted, colorless face finally broke into a smile. The burden on his heart, which had nearly crushed him, at last eased. Kuriyo was safe. That was enough. Everything else could wait.
"Grandpa, hurry inside. I was saved by these people. It's too dangerous outside—come on."
Taking the two of them with her, Kuriyo led them into the warm interior. Xiangzi came in right behind them and slammed the door shut.
Kuriyo had only been released because they were too short-handed. With her there, it was easier to mediate between the newly arrived pair and the others.
If they knew each other, good—communication would go smoothly. If not, they lost nothing.
"The three of you come upstairs with me. Tonight is going to be rough. If we want to rest later, we have to get through this first. Endure it!"
"We'll do our best!" Kuriyo answered for the three of them. The others were too spent even to speak properly.
Xiangzi did not answer. She simply led them upstairs at speed.
On the way, she had already changed her mind about their roles. Kuriyo and the pink-haired girl had practically no combat power. Exhausted, starving ordinary girls were useless on the firing line. It was better to keep them on support.
Outside, as they climbed, the gunfire started thinning.
Had the number of infected animals gone down?
Or were her people running short on ammunition?
That possibility made Xiangzi hurry even faster.
"Xiangzi, we've held them off for the moment."
"That was another probing attack. Not much bigger than the last one. I've got a bad feeling tonight's really going to hit."
"Good work, all of you. For tomorrow's sake—keep it up."
As soon as Xiangzi reached the terrace, they gave her their rapid report.
Brent was chewing coffee beans dry, trying to brace herself for the coming fight. Brass casings carpeted the floor around them. In just those two rounds, they had already burned through several hundred rounds.
And that was with them firing carefully.
Now several ammo crates still sat unopened. Maybe, just maybe, that would be enough to last until dawn.
With Xiangzi back in position, she quickly rearmed herself. The old man loaded his hunting rifle. Downstairs, the pink-haired girl and Kuriyo were now in the kitchen boiling water and preparing food.
On the way up, Xiangzi had decided it made no sense to leave them idle. They had no real fighting ability, so they would be far more useful as support.
Some hot food and coffee in the middle of a freezing night battle could make all the difference.
At that moment the dark, blurred mass on Xiangzi's live map was drawing steadily closer.
That alone was enough to put her completely on edge.
What was it?
She did not know.
She only knew one thing:
They could not hold anything back now.
"They're coming. Everyone get ready... fire!"
Even through the pain and weakness, Xiangzi forced steel into her voice.
And what appeared in their field of view this time was not just wolves.
Standing on the terrace, they saw larger shapes too—infected deer, wild boars... even bears.
More vicious beasts had joined the battle, charging the human position in loose but deliberate formation.
Hooves and paws pounded the snow, stamping countless tracks across the white ground.
From the shelter of the forest to the line Xiangzi had set up, there stretched some forty meters of open ground.
There was little cover in that space. Only a few low bushes broke up the blank expanse.
Beneath the spotlights around the house, any movement there was impossible to miss.
And the more clearly they saw it, the heavier the pressure became.
The packed mass of shapes had already spilled out of the woods.
No one could afford precision anymore.
Suppression fire was all that mattered.
Even Ye Ling, who still had a few explosive bolts left, set them aside for the time being. Those would be saved for when the fight became truly desperate.
A torrent of rounds poured from the muzzles. With the rifles set to full auto, ammunition vanished at an alarming pace. In the blink of an eye, empty magazines were being flung to the ground, their metallic clatter strangely sharp and musical.
Gunfire and the screams of wounded animals shook Xiangzi's eardrums. But she did not care. She was completely focused on firing.
"Xiangzi! The ones over there aren't wolves—my armor-piercing bolts can't one-shot them!"
"Brent, take the head off that one! Fast! I'll cover this side!"
"Understood! Miranda, watch the right! A whole pack's coming in from there—suppress them!"
Intersecting streams of fire raked the slope below. In the glow of the lights, the infected beasts dropped one after another—and others died screaming in the fence, electrocuted the instant they hit the live wires.
But this was still only the appetizer.
Even as they wiped out wave after wave of intruders, a deeper roar rolled up from within the forest—so violent it made their skulls ring.
Then the fireline faltered.
A gap.
And Xiangzi knew at once—
This was bad.
Join here to read ahead.
In Star Rail, Ultra-Beast Armored — Have I Caught "Equilibrium"? l (Chapter 80)
Uma Musume, But I Only Have Five Years Left to Live (Chapter 178)
Zenless Zone Zero: I'm a Doctor, Not a Bangboo (Chapter 147)
Ben Tennyson Wants to Join the Justice League ( 126 )
TYPE-MOON: Redemption Beginning with the Holy Grail War (Chapter110)
Yu-Gi-Oh! — Transmigrated into the White Dragon Girl (Chapter185)
"Is this chat group even serious?" (Chapter105)
I, Lord Ravager, Utterly Loyal! (Chapter215)
Can Playing Games Save the World? 65
Crossover Anime Multiverse: The Demon Hunter of an Unnatural World 77
From Junkman to Wasteland 66
Weekly Refresh of Overpowered 31
I'm Grinding Proficiency Like 46
From Kiana, Lord Ravager, Onwa 185
Honkai: Is This Still the Prev 42
Elf: My Starter Pokémon Is Inc 65
Warhammer: My Primarch Is Remi 170
From Demon Slayer to Grand Ass Volume2/1
The Way the Umamusume Look at 68
Uma Musume, but My Cheat Power 206
Naruto: Weaving the Future, Be 65
Zenless Zone Zero, but Kamen R 76
Multiverse Crossover: The Perf 66
My Cyberpsycho Girlfriend 65
Uma Musume: The Dark Trainer 190
Uma Musume: A Calamity Born fr 154
I, a Reincarnation-Loop Player Volume4/23
The Violent Girl Group Is Beat 106
Uma Musume: The Horse Girl Who 67
Uma Musume: From Beginner 125
Becoming a Horse Girl, I Will 85
Uma Musume: I Want All 105
I Can Copy Unique Skills 90
Summoning an Evil God, but the 70
Supernatural Multiverse 90
My Harem Is Indescribable 80
Jujutsu Kaisen: Heroic Spirit 86
"I'm just a Valkyrie passing through." 68
Uma Musume: Today Is Another Romantic Battlefield 81
Still playing traditional Honk 65
The Most Filial Son Under Heav 65
What Should I Do After Switchi - Volume2/3
Reincarnated as a Demon, Skill 57
Hell-Difficulty Dungeon? 45
Transmigrated as Sukuna 59
Checking In in Demon Slayer 59
The Reincarnating Trainer of Tracen Academy 73
I Refuse to Become a Heroic 45
My Best Friend Into a Slime? 36
A Saiyan Stands Above Marvel 40
What Do You Mean by Using a Lab Mod to Be the Hero? 60
Tanya Starts from Re:Zero 30
Why did they assign me to Uma 35
MYGO Beauties 43
DanMachi: Emiya the Giant Hero 30
The Gacha Merchant Who Started 31
My patreon : patreon.com/queen_sin