Everyone has awakened, but I am the only mortal!

Only Lao Zhou is different.

He instinctively hid behind Su Bai, still trying to save face: "I'm not scared, I just feel like it wants to talk to you."

Su Bai said, "It's looking for you."

Old Zhou immediately shut his mouth.

Su Bai's gaze swept over the two superpowered men who remained motionless, his eyes narrowing slightly.

Their fists were clenched tightly, and their lips were taut.

That expression wasn't one of fear.

Yes—excitement.

Just then, the strand of black hair that was about to reach out to the crowd suddenly stopped.

Then, little by little, it shrank back.

It's as if...they're afraid of something.

The hair slowly retracted back to the ground.

The black pupa, woven by humans, shrank and shrunk at a visible speed, eventually disappearing completely.

All that remained was a clump of jet-black hair and the man who had just recovered from his monster form.

As for the man who had just broken down and gone mad, it was as if he had never existed, leaving not a trace.

No one felt they had escaped unscathed.

Based on the previous pattern, it should be one person dying every day.

However, in the short time since the monster was exposed, four people have already died.

The team size has been reduced from twenty to fifteen.

No one dared to sit down again.

Everyone stared blankly at the strange tuft of hair and the huddled man not far away, their hearts sinking lower and lower.

No one could understand why the hair suddenly stopped moving and why it suddenly receded.

Finally, it was the shorter of the two ability users who spoke first, his voice flat and almost indifferent: "It's getting late, let's rest."

After he finished speaking, no one dared to move.

It wasn't until the two superhumans sat down on the ground that Ma Jun pursed his lips and followed them down. Under his influence, the others gradually slumped back onto the ground.

Su Bai and Lao Zhou also sat down.

The sky remained at dusk, not darkening for even a second longer.

Time seemed to have been abruptly cut off here by an invisible hand.

There was dead silence all around.

Su Bai felt empty and lost.

Where is the future? Where is the way out? Will I be the next one to die?

He knows nothing.

"Take a nap," Old Zhou's muffled voice rang in my ears.

Su Bai gave a soft "hmm," closed his eyes, but his mind was racing.

The fact that one person dies every day indicates that there is a strict limit to the number of people the monster can kill.

It remained hidden among the crowd and never attacked proactively, indicating that there must have been some kind of triggering condition.

The two superhumans initially tried to stop Bucktooth from exposing the old man's identity, but later they decisively took action.

They knew perfectly well who the monster was and had the ability to eliminate it, yet they chose to keep it alive.

His attitude was strangely contradictory.

And that clump of hair from earlier...

Those two people knew something bad was going to happen, yet they didn't stop it from beginning to end.

What exactly are they trying to do?

Su Bai opened his eyes and looked at the eerily quiet clump of hair.

People will definitely die tomorrow.

Just like Lao Zhou said—it's very well-organized.

Will he be able to survive by sheer luck, just like he has before?

Time passes little by little.

That night, Su Bai actually fell into a deep sleep in the latter half of the night.

When I woke up the next day, I was surprised to find that no one had died the night before.

The man curled up on the ground and the clump of hair were still there.

Having survived the eerie night, the group's emotions calmed down slightly, and they continued their journey numbly.

The sky, which hadn't darkened since last night, remained eerily bright.

The sun was nowhere to be seen, only a pale white sky, dry, hot, and stifling, making it hard to breathe.

After several days without a drop of water, most people had completely run out of the little water they had left.

"Brother Ma, if we don't get to our destination soon, we'll either starve or die of thirst," the buck-toothed man said in a panicked voice.

Ma Jun said in a deep voice, "Hold on a little longer."

The buck-toothed man wanted to say something, but when he saw Ma Jun's gaze fall on the two superhumans in front of him, he swallowed his words.

Just then, a disgusted muttered from behind: "Why do you stink so much?"

Xiao Li, who had been criticized, lowered her head and quickly walked to Ma Jun's side without saying a word.

Ma Jun turned around abruptly and glared at the people behind him: "If you don't like the smell, then leave. Nobody's stopping you."

The person speaking immediately fell silent.

Su Bai's lips were cracked and bleeding, and every breath was painful.

They had been walking all morning.

As far as the eye can see, there is still only endless yellow sand and ruins.

But as he glanced around, his heart sank.

Not right.

We walked for another half hour.

That familiar tuft of black hair, and that man curled up on the ground, reappeared before everyone's eyes.

Su Bai was 100% certain that they had been going around in circles.

"That……"

A chilling scene unfolded before their eyes, and some people's voices trembled, unable to even finish their sentences.

"How...did we end up back here again?"

Ma Jun, who was leading the way, looked down at the compass in his hand, his face growing increasingly grim. He scanned the needle back and forth between the clump of hair and the compass needle: "The needle is pointing south the whole time. We haven't gone the wrong way."

Someone said in a trembling voice, "If the road is right... then they are the ones moving."

"They" naturally refers to the clump of hair on the ground and the strange man.

Panic erupted instantly.

Su Bai noticed that the two superhumans quickly exchanged a glance.

The tall man's hand was already reaching for his waist.

The next second, his arm suddenly swung up, and the long whip was unsheathed with a "whoosh".

He spoke, uttering a sentence that left everyone bewildered: "It seems this is the place."

Old Zhou moved closer to Su Bai, his voice tense: "What are they going to do?"

Su Bai's gaze was deep: "You'll find out soon enough."

He also wanted to know what the purpose of these two people hiding all the way was.

The tall superhuman moved swiftly, heading straight for the man curled up on the ground, his long whip whistling through the air as it lashed down.

The whip fell beside the man, but the man on the ground did not react.

What shocked everyone was that the seemingly calm clump of hair suddenly began to writhe wildly, surging like a black tide, and coiling wildly upwards along the whip, closing in on the whip-wielder's wrist.

The short, superhuman who had been silent all along finally made a move.

He strode forward, gripping the black hair that spread across the whip tightly with both hands, and a blinding burst of fire suddenly erupted from his palms.

"Sizzle—"

The acrid smell of burning hair instantly filled the air.

The man who had been curled up on the ground, unresponsive to the whip, suddenly rolled over, clutching his head and letting out a piercing scream, as if his soul were being torn apart.

As the last strand of black hair burned out, the man's body began to twist and swell violently.

It was as if something was about to burst out of his body.

The skin cracked open little by little, and a blinding white light burst forth wildly from the cracks.

Su Bai's last consciousness was in a blinding pure white.

---

When he woke up again, he found himself in an abandoned, empty house.

Four walls, one window, and one door.

Before he could even react, a bottle of mineral water and a bag of biscuits were stuffed into his arms.

Old Zhou lowered his voice: "You were unconscious just now, so I grabbed this for you. Eat it quickly."