Eventually, Chu Yunsheng still left the place. He picked up his walking stick and the Qian Bi sword, took the stuffed toy, and carried on limping on the highway towards Jin Ling City.
Even if Jin Ling City had fallen, he still wanted to see the debris, and if humans had really fallen, there was no point for him to live anymore.
Moreover, his aunt was still in Jin Ling City, even if she was really dead, he still wanted to personally see her body.
With the help of the walking stick, Chu Yunsheng limped alone on the highway covered with bodies. He has already stopped reciting the incantations and simply walked on the highway like a robot with his mind completely blank.
Previously, he didn’t understand why people would easily give up their lives to commit suicide, but now he knew.
His watch was already broken so he didn’t know how long he had walked, but there were still hazy shimmers in the sky, which meant that the day was not yet over.
The number of bodies gradually started to reduce, so the space on the road became wider.
However, while he was walking down the highway, he, who didn’t pay attention to the road condition, slipped over a puddle of blood and tumbled down the road. His head directly hit a dead tree and started to bleed instantly, but he didn’t pass out this time, because at that moment, he heard the insects’ screeches. The panic and fear woke him up.
He immediately stood up and gazed afar. Finally, he saw a live human!
The person seemed to be attacked by three red-shelled insects.
‘Uh? No…’ Chu Yunsheng wiped off the blood in his eyes, and looked one more time. It was two! And the other one was a tiger!
Strangely, the tiger was helping the man fight the red-shelled insects!
Since the Dark Age began, apart from some small domestic pets, Chu Yunsheng had never seen a large animal. This was the first time he saw the “king of animals”(1) fighting in the wild in person.
The tiger was surrounded by a golden light and was constantly roaring at a red-shelled insect. Every time it roared, it seemed to fire a projectile breath attack from its mouth.
The man, who was fighting together with it, was a fire elemental warrior and was using his bare hands to fight the red-shelled insects.
Three other red-shelled insects had already died next to them.
When Chu Yunsheng noticed them, he was still very far from them. Only when he took out his bow and arrows did he notice that the man and the tiger were both heavily injured, they were bleeding a lot.
He hated insects. It was them who destroyed his world, his hopes, and everything else that existed in this world. The intense desire of killing those monsters instantly surged up within him.
“Kill! KIll! Kill!”
Chu Yunsheng did not have much yuan qi left, but he still started to infuse yuan qi and aimed the arrow at one red-shelled insect.
“Die!” He shouted loudly.
The frost arrow instantly shot out and froze a red-shelled insect before his voice faded out.
Then the fire elemental warrior threw a punch to smash the frozen insect into pieces.
Meanwhile, the other insect instantly went mad. It ignored the tiger’s projectile breath attack, and although its claw was broken by the tiger’s breath attack, it still charged towards the fire elemental warrior and used its sharp leg to stab the back of the fire elemental warrior’s head.
The fire elemental warrior’s defence was very weak, if he was hit, he would definitely die.
The insect’s speed was very fast, even if Chu Yunsheng tried to remind the man, it was still too late. When Chu Yunsheng thought that he was dead for sure, what he saw next, he probably would never be able to forget in his life.
The tiger roared and jumped towards the man, it used its body to block the deadly attack.
The tiger’s neck was pierced through by the red-shelled insect’s sharp leg. The golden light that surrounded it instantly became brighter. Although the blood constantly burst out from its neck, it bit off the insect’s sharp leg and then started to tear the insect’s head.
The fire elemental warrior was shocked. He instantly threw his fire punch and constantly smashed the red-shelled insect’s body until the insect’s shell was broken and its sticky blood came out.
The insect died.
The tiger also died.
The fire elemental warrior was a forty-years-old man, but at the moment he was tightly hugging the tiger and weeping aloud like a child.
Chu Yunsheng stood aside silently and watched him cry.
After a while, the fire elemental warrior slowly stopped crying. He tried to stand, but he immediately collapsed on the ground. Only now did Chu Yunsheng notice that there was a hole in his right chest.
He helped the man to sit up.
The man gave him a wry smile and said, “Brother, I don’t know who you are, but thank you.”
Chu Yunsheng shook his head, he wanted to kill the insects because he hated the insects.
The fire elemental warrior coughed a few times, and sat next to the dead tiger. He slowly stroked the tiger’s fur and sighed, “My wife and daughter are dead, now Hu Zai (tiger’s name) is also dead, there is nothing left for me in this world.”
He then took out two boxes and passed it to Chu Yunsheng, “Brother, cough… cough… I know that I am not going to make it, and I am sorry to ask you for a favor. I used to be a zookeeper in Gu Su Zoo, cough… cough…” he used his hands to draw a small circle in the air and said, “I raised Hu Zai when it was this big, it has been ten years now… cough… cough…”
Then he pointed to one big box and said, “This is its kid, it was pregnant with it since before the Dark Age began, but I don’t know why… cough… cough, it’s been half a year now, it just gave birth… a few days ago… cough… cough… three of them… only one is alive now…”
He then raised his head and begged Chu Yunsheng, “Please, bring it to Jin Ling City and give it to the government… if you want, you can keep it as well… cough… cough… but… please, no matter how hungry you are… please do not eat it… okay? It is not an ordinary baby… It has a special ability just like its mom… It will be very strong and useful… cough… cough…”
Chu Yunsheng took out the box and told him not to worry. He nodded his head, “You need to stay calm, I won’t eat it, I promise!”
He looked into Chu Yunsheng’s eyes and said, “Thank you. I believe you because you helped us, I believe you… take care of…” the man died before Chu Yunsheng even got a chance to say anything!
Chu Yunsheng opened the box, the little tiger baby was still asleep as if what happened earlier had nothing to do with it.
As he picked it up from the box, the little tiger baby was startled and yawned. Its little paws moved in the air a few times, but it still went back to sleep again.
It was a new life, a life from Earth, a life that represented that no matter what happens to Earth, life itself would continue to survive and prosper in this Dark Blood Age.
Looking at its tiny body, Chu Yunsheng suddenly felt something, his dying heart started to beat again as if a new plant’s bud started to grow on his dying heart.
“Life will never stop, life will go on!”
As long as new lives continued to be born on Earth, one day, the human race would expel the insects from their home and rebuild human civilization.
There was still hope, and only by staying alive would he keep that hope going!
He then put the little tiger baby back into the box and picked up the smaller box. On the cover of the box, it wrote, “beloved wife and daughter”.
Chu Yunsheng sighed, “I’ll bury you together with the tiger as well, I hope you all will be reunited in heaven!”
……..
After burying the man’s whole family, Chu Yunsheng took the box that had the little tiger baby in it and started his journey again.
Feeding the little one was a problem for him for a while because he did not know how to raise a tiger. Fortunately, the man kept a notebook in the box. It was more like an observation notebook.
Chu Yunsheng suspected that because of the strange ability the mother tiger had, the man wanted to note down as many details about the little tiger as possible.
The little tiger was growing very fast, it was definitely not normal compared to the tiger during the age of light.
According to the note, the mother tiger could eat red-shelled insect’s meat, so the man suspected that after one month, the baby tiger would be able to eat the red-shelled insect’s meat as well.
This just happened to solve the thing Chu Yunsheng was worried about the most, which was, would there be enough food for the little one?
Since its food was the red-shelled insect’s meat, and Chu Yunsheng also happened to have piles of them inside the storage talisman, it could eat as many as it liked.
The little one made him feel that the world wasn’t lifeless anymore.
Soon after he came back on the road, he encountered groups of red-shelled insects several times. From this, he suspected that he might be near the area that was full of red-shelled insects.
He was afraid that if he continued moving in the same direction, he might encounter more red-shelled insects, so he found a hidden place for him to restore his yuan qi for three days.
During those three days, his injured leg also recovered. At least, he didn’t need to use the walking stick anymore.
Before he was back on the road again, he made an energy shield for the little tiger and cast it onto its head. The little one’s growth speed was much faster than what the zookeeper had expected, it has already opened its eyes. After it could jump around, its favorite activity was to play with Chu Yunsheng’s hands.
What surprised Chu YunSheng even more, was that not only did it have the metal elemental energy, which was the strongest defensive elemental energy, but it also had a strange wind elemental energy, which allowed it to control the wind. This was the first time Chu YunSheng saw such elemental energy exist.
