As the SUV turned onto a side street, the road began to narrow. The two-lane surface was littered with abandoned vehicles, and Red-Armored Beetles scuttled out from under the cars and from the storefronts on either side.
They had reached the outskirts of the main city, and the giant insects were becoming a more common sight.
Lin Feng's brow furrowed. The sun was just beginning to rise, and the light was blinding. His Hawkeye was especially sensitive to the glare, so he reached up and pulled down the sun visor.
Noticing Lin Feng's discomfort, Zhang Yurou took a pair of sunglasses from the glove compartment.
He put them on. 'Much better.'
After driving another few hundred meters, they entered the central area of University City. By now, over a dozen Red-Armored Beetles were trailing the SUV, biding their time.
Ahead of them, at the heart of the area, was Hai City University. In the plaza before the school's main gate, a vast Swarm had gathered.
Tens of thousands of Red-Armored Beetles lay in wait.
Through his Hawkeye, Lin Feng could see the distant dormitories. Many surviving students were there, locked in a desperate battle against an endless stream of Red-Armored Beetles!
The entire University City was surrounded by the Swarm!
"Turn left! We'll circle around to the side gate!"
Just as the group stared, stunned by the sight, Chen Yanyan's voice came from the back, jolting Zhang Yurou back to reality.
Zhang Yurou quickly spun the wheel, crushing a few Red-Armored Beetles in their path as she headed in the direction Chen Yanyan pointed.
"If the helicopter is here for the professors, they'll be at the Research Institute. It's on the side of the campus, near the attached high school."
"The west gate is usually quiet, so there shouldn't be as many of them there! Hurry! Go faster! More and more giant insects are on our tail!"
Chen Yanyan glanced back. The insects behind the SUV were gathering in packs, swarming like students in a cafeteria at lunchtime.
Luckily, as a graduate of Hai City University, she knew the campus like the back of her hand, which was a huge help.
In the middle of this life-or-death chase, a loud CRUNCH echoed from the roof. The sunroof caved in, and the SUV began to swerve uncontrollably.
Then, a Giant Red Beetle slowly crawled into view over the top of the windshield...
It raised the massive pincers by its mouth, ready to strike!
Lin Feng's pupils constricted. This Giant Red Beetle was terrifyingly large—over three meters long!
「Red-Armored Beetle, LV 7/9」
「Life Value 70, Physique 20, Spirit 5」
In the nick of time...
Lin Feng quickly leaned out the window, gripped his Legendary Pistol, took aim, and fired!
From a distance of only two meters, he fired three shots in quick succession. They struck the side of the Giant Red Beetle's lower abdomen, severing one of its thick legs and blasting bloody holes in its abdominal armor. Yellowish-green ichor sprayed out.
The three hits dealt a total of forty-five Damage. The impact of the close-range shots made the giant beetle reel in pain and tumble off the roof.
It rolled behind the SUV, crushing several of the pursuing Red-Armored Beetles and slowing the advance of the others.
But before the three could even sigh in relief, a bigger problem appeared. Zhang Yurou hit the washer fluid button, and the wipers cleared the beetle's ichor from the windshield...
...revealing dozens of Giant Red Beetles perched on the roofs of abandoned cars, all eyeing the SUV menacingly.
Lin Feng had just gotten back into the passenger seat, his heart still pounding in his chest. Without a moment to recover, he roared:
"Floor it!"
He immediately leaned back out the window, aimed ahead, and fired a series of quick, aimed shots at the lunging insects.
The situation was too desperate to kill them all. Lin Feng could only afford to put one bullet into each of the LV 6+ Giant Red Beetles to stop them from pouncing on the vehicle, conserving as much ammo as possible.
At this rate, even his seven hundred spare rounds might not be enough.
Spurred by Lin Feng's shout, the SUV shot forward, accelerating sharply and plowing through the Giant Red Beetles blocking its path.
Though they were over three meters long and half a meter tall, they were no match for the three-ton SUV.
With Zhang Yurou driving and Lin Feng shooting, the two worked in perfect sync. They quickly broke the SUV out of the encirclement of Giant Red Beetles.
Following Chen Yanyan's directions, they took a detour and successfully reached the west gate of Hai City University. A sign on one of the buildings inside read "Graduate School".
Chen Yanyan pointed to the building next to it and said:
"That's it. The faculty dorms are right next to the Graduate School. When the eclipse happened, any professors who were on campus should have been resting in there."
"Next door is Hai University's attached high school. We're on the edge of University City now. The graduate school doesn't have many people, so there shouldn't be too many beetles drawn here."
Zhang Yurou nodded, made a sharp left, and charged off the main road through the campus gate. She smashed right through the automatic barrier arm. In the shattered guard booth to the side, only a blood-spattered wall remained.
After entering Hai City University, they drove another two hundred meters and finally reached the faculty dorms Chen Yanyan had indicated.
Lin Feng fired several quick shots, killing three Red-Armored Beetles that were gathered at the entrance, feeding on a corpse.
After that tense, thrilling battle, the three of them had finally arrived at their destination, shaken but safe. At the same time, his own Upgrade was completed:
「Lin Feng, LV 5/9」
「Life Value 30, Physique 25, Spirit 26」
His Attributes hadn't changed much. After Level four, each Upgrade granted five points.
And after breaking out of the encirclement, the LV 5 Legendary Pistol in Lin Feng's hand had accumulated twenty-six Upgrade Points.
He had certainly fired more bullets than that, but many had missed or gone wide, failing to deal the required fifteen Damage.
Firing from a moving, bouncing vehicle meant his accuracy was actually very low. Even with the enhancement from his Hawkeye Skill, he was lucky if one out of three shots managed to hit a giant beetle's soft underbelly.
Thankfully, once they arrived and he was out of the car, Lin Feng could plant his feet. He immediately went to work clearing the area, driving back the army of Red-Armored Beetles that had been chasing them.
Lin Feng aimed only for their legs. A single shot could cripple a Red-Armored Beetle, buying time for Zhang Yurou and Chen Yanyan to get their gear from the SUV.
Firing as he retreated, he slammed the dormitory's main doors shut, temporarily holding the Red-Armored Beetle Swarm at bay.
But Lin Feng knew the iron doors wouldn't hold for long. As more giant beetles arrived, their pincer strikes were already denting the metal, producing a series of dull, heavy THUDS.
Fortunately, the Giant Red Beetles didn't seem to be good climbers; their massive size restricted their mobility.
No time to think. Lin Feng immediately led the two still-shaken women deeper into the dormitory.
The building was still teeming with giant insects. Lin Feng took the lead, while Chen Yanyan and Zhang Yurou followed with their shields raised, picking off lone Red-Armored Beetles along the way.
Seeing them preoccupied with gnawing on corpses, Lin Feng shot them without hesitation. This wasn't the time to let the two women get combat practice; they needed to get upstairs as fast as possible.
The city-wide blackout meant the elevators in the faculty dorms were out. Chen Yanyan wasn't familiar with the layout, so they had to follow the emergency exit signs. After searching for some time, they finally found an emergency staircase leading upstairs at the far end of a hallway.
But the door to the stairwell was locked from the inside. No amount of kicking would budge it.
Lin Feng had no choice. He told the two women to stand back with their shields, then turned sideways and aimed his pistol. He fired five or six shots into the lock mechanism, finally blowing it apart.
He pushed the door open and led the women up the stairs.
The faculty dormitory was ten stories high. Unlike the student dorms, which had dozens of rooms per floor, this building had only ten single-occupancy apartments on each level.
The helicopter obviously couldn't land down below. At best, it would hover over the rooftop and use ropes to hoist up key personnel.
That meant Lin Feng and the others had to climb all the way to the top floor and get to the roof.
It would also make them more visible to any rescuers.
Fortunately, the stairwell was relatively clear of Red-Armored Beetles. They made it to the fifth floor in one go, only encountering two or three of them gnawing on a corpse near a hallway entrance.
Lin Feng dispatched them easily and took the opportunity to lock the stairwell door on each floor they passed.
'Normally, emergency stairwells can't be locked; some places even remove the locks entirely. But the door on the first floor had been firmly locked from the inside,' Lin Feng suspected. 'Someone must have already escaped into this building and locked the door behind them.'
'To stop more Red-Armored Beetles from getting to the upper floors.'
They took a short break on the sixth floor. The two women were exhausted, weighed down by their packs and worn out from climbing so many stairs at once.
Lin Feng took a deep breath. 'The pistol's Upgrade is still in progress. I hope it finishes soon.'
'As the Red-Armored Beetles get higher in Level, their Life Value and Defense Power are increasing too. The Legendary Pistol isn't cutting it anymore.'
Before they came, he had expected the Swarm to be larger here in University City, being so close to the city center, but he had never imagined there would be this many.
Especially at the main gate of Hai City University, a writhing, red sea of Red-Armored Beetles was packed together. Forget his LV 5 Legendary Pistol; even an LV 9 super pistol with double the power couldn't stand against such a surging, flood-like tide of insects.
'I have to Upgrade it as soon as possible!'
After a short rest, they continued on, only to stop at the tenth-floor landing.
The final flight of stairs was blocked by a heap of Red-Armored Beetle corpses—at least a dozen of them were scattered about.
Their bodies were covered in deep gashes. The heads of many of the beetles had been split in two, and their Back Armor had been stripped away.
Lin Feng led the two women carefully over the corpses. He found the door to the ninth-floor hallway chained shut but slightly ajar, leaving a gap about thirty centimeters wide.
It was just wide enough for them to crouch and squeeze through sideways.
To be safe, Lin Feng, protected by his Armor Shield, decided to go in first.
'Better not to break the chain,' he thought. 'If we can't lock the door again, the Swarm could flood the ninth floor.'
So Lin Feng stuck his head through the gap and began to slip inside.
But as he ducked his head and squeezed his shoulders through, a cold glint of light flashed before his eyes. The tip of a blade stopped just inches from his forehead.
At the same time, a female voice demanded from above:
"Who are you! What… what are you?!"
Lin Feng turned his head.
Standing by the door was a young woman in a white blouse and a short, black pleated skirt.
'That uniform looks familiar,' he thought. 'It looks like it's from the high school attached to Hai City University.'
'Why is a high school girl here?'
Lin Feng's brow furrowed.
The girl wore black-rimmed glasses and had straight hair in a hime cut. She gripped a Long Saber tightly in her hands...
...her expression tense as she stared at him.