Taking a deep breath, Li Yao threw the fire hose that was connected to the ejector at the top of the rope. After a few bangs, it was refracted and bounced on the walls of the narrow elevator shaft before it finally tied up a section of the rope above.

In the meantime, almost ten iron nails darted out like lightning and hit the bottom of the rope precisely. Sparks were spluttering, and half of the rope was cut off.

The four people hanging below the rope immediately started shaking violently. Zhang Daniu even screamed like a pig being butchered.

Taking the opportunity, Li Yao tied the remaining fire hose to his waist and jumped down, landing on the head of the first muscular man like a ferocious vulture.

The muscular man was also an elite expert among the awakened. He did not panic at all when he was ambushed. Instead, he bellowed and punched upward. While his fist was still on the way, he suddenly opened his hands and clenched his fists into claws. His arms and palms seemed to have gone through abnormal mutations. His arms were covered in green scales, and his sleeves were bulging because of the expansion of his muscles. His fingers were like five sharp claws that tore apart his gloves and snatched at Li Yao.

Five iron claws swept out five streaks of silver brightness in the darkness. The sound of rushing wind filled the entire elevator shaft.

Li Yao’s pupils constricted violently. He had analyzed the subsequent routes and changes of the iron claw clearly. He crouched and dodged the slash of the iron claw by a hair’s breadth. When the two of them passed by each other, Li Yao spat out an iron nail from his mouth, which pierced into the eyeball of the Cultivator and blew it up.

The iron-clawed muscular man screamed miserably. Li Yao took the opportunity to grab his neck and pull him down into the depths of the elevator shaft with a dull ‘boom’. There was no telling whether he was dead or alive.

In the meantime, Li Yao pulled out a pistol from his bulging waist.

Weirdly enough, Li Yao had never touched a real gun before. At most, he had played with toy models. But now that the cold metal was in his hands, he seemed to have become a living creature with temperature and intelligence. He grasped the center of gravity and the axis of the pistol in the blink of an eye, and he knew every component of the gun like the back of his hand. Opening the safety, Li Yao shot all nine bullets into the darkness below without aiming at all.

His movements seemed to be random, if not random. He was not aiming at the two awakened Cultivators below him at all, but at the walls of the elevator shaft.

However, when the flying bullets bounced and bounced back from the wall, they formed a fatal trap for the bottommost awakened one and turned into venomous fangs that could barely be blocked or dodged from nine weird angles.

The man must’ve been an expert in guns. The moment Li Yao showed up, he had tied up the rope with his legs and held a pistol in each of his hands, ready for the incoming threats.

His helmet and vest could resist most of the threats from above and from the front, too.

However, he didn’t expect that Li Yao wouldn’t play by the rules at all. After a series of messy bouncing, the bullets actually came from his side and below. Even if he dodged left and right, continuously dodging and blocking the first six bullets, three bullets still hit his feet, thighs, and waist respectively, making him unable to clamp the steel rope. He similarly fell down the elevator shaft, disappearing in the ear-splitting explosions.

Then, there was only the last Awakener, who seemed to be the most awesome one.

In the darkness, the blue eyes of the awakened Cultivator were glittering. While he was mumbling to himself, the sound of wind suddenly echoed inside the narrow shaft of the elevator. The wind suddenly turned sharp, as if it had been compressed into invisible wind blades by a mysterious force.

The mumbling of the Awakened turned into fatal whistles.

Li Yao immediately sensed that invisible wind blades were coming at him from various angles like transparent vipers.

Shua!

In the blink of an eye, his cheek was cut by the wind blade, and hot blood flowed out.

In such a narrow and dark combat environment, invisible wind blades were indeed the best weapons. No wonder the ‘hunter’ had asked the Awakened to escort Zhang Daniu.

Unfortunately, their opponent was Li Yao.

Li Yao grinned. Dark red flames were flowing on the edge of his palm. He suddenly slashed back and did something unexpected.

He cut off the steel rope hanging in midair.

This steel rope supported the entire weight of Li Yao, Zhang Daniu, and the other Awakener. Now that the steel rope had been cut off, the three were naturally controlled by gravity and fell down at the same time.

However, the awakener was caught off guard and had to suppress Zhang Daniu, who was screaming and struggling like a pig being butchered. There was no way that he could control his body precisely. For a moment, both the whistle and the wind blade were half a beat slower.

Li Yao, on the other hand, had been prepared for this. The moment before the rope broke, he had already moved away and stomped on the wall of the elevator shaft. He turned into a roaring cannonball and dashed below the awakened one and Zhang Daniu, narrowly dodging the most brutal wind blades.

Hiu! Hiu!

Li Yao opened his mouth and spat out two iron nails from his tongue, which pierced into the eyes of the awakener.

The awakened one had seen how his first companion was hit. Naturally, he attached great importance to Li Yao’s iron nails and his own eyes. He reacted immediately and tilted his head back. Two iron nails brushed past his eyelids.

But as it turned out, Li Yao was merely feinting. His target had been his throat since the very beginning. He raised his head and exposed his throat, which was exactly what Li Yao had been hoping for. He then slashed the throat of the awakened Cultivator, almost cutting his throat into pieces.

Hiss! Hiss! Hiss! Hiss! Hiss!

The Awakened clutched his throat and hissed like a leaking ball. How could he blow the whistle?

Li Yao guessed that he had to whistle in order to control the wind blades. Since his throat was damaged, he could not make any sound. Therefore, the threat of the wind blades was reduced by 90%. Li Yao followed up with a kick to the chest of the awakened one, sealing his only sound in the depths of his throat and accelerating his fall while he shot out another fire hose and tied up Zhang Daniu’s feet.

BAM!

At this moment, the fire hose on Li Yao’s waist was extended to the end of its length.

There was no knot between the rope and the water belt. The friction of the rope alone was not enough to support the weight of Li Yao and Zhang Daniu. It merely slowed their fall.

But for a monster such as Li Yao, such a cushion was enough for him to control his body and drag Zhang Daniu, who was still screaming and twisting, down. By jumping continuously, he was able to reduce the falling force of the two of them. Just like that, he fell down almost seventy meters and slowly landed below the elevator shaft.

BAM!

Arriving at the first floor, Li Yao kicked open the elevator door from inside and dragged out Zhang Daniu, who had shouted until his throat was hoarse and was struggling to the point of exhaustion.

Huchi! Huchi! Huchi! Huchi!

Zhang Daniu’s face was pale, his body was shivering, and his legs were as soft as springs. He couldn’t stand up no matter how hard he tried. It was obvious that the fierce battle in the elevator shaft had given him quite a scare. He stared at Li Yao for half a minute before his face gradually turned red, and hope was shining in his eyes.

“Li—Li Yao!”

Judging from his face, he was about to hug Li Yao and burst into tears. Zhang Daniu said in a trembling voice, “Thank the heavens, you’re finally here! You don’t even know how those bad guys from the ‘Apocalyptic Organization’ dealt with me—they threatened to cut me into pieces and dissect me. They are not human beings. They are simply a bunch of devils!

“However, I am an iron-willed man. I will not yield just like that! ‘One cannot be corrupted by riches and honor. One cannot be defeated by might.’ This is my motto in life. It is my principle. My principle! You don’t need to worry. No matter how much they tortured me, tortured me, threatened me, and even sent two beautiful female agents to tempt me, I never told them your secret! Because I firmly believe that my good brother Li Yao will definitely risk his life to save me! You have indeed come. Good brother, you are truly loyal!”

“Master Niu…”

Li Yao was silent for a moment. He wiped the blood off his face and said, “Don’t forget that we have a listening device. I heard your conversation with the ‘hunter’.”

“Is that so?”

Zhang Daniu blinked his eyes quickly. With a natural expression, he said frankly, “Then you must’ve discovered how I pretended to play nice with him with my superb acting skills and bought you more time. I even managed to elicit important information from him, didn’t I?”

“Stop it, Teacher Niu. Stop it.”

Li Yao took a long, long breath. “Before I change my mind, please leave me alone and let’s get out of here.”

Li Yao was not sure whether or not there were still traps in the lobby of the first floor. Instead, he led Zhang Daniu to crawl out of the ventilation window of the toilet and arrived at the shabby alley behind the building of wealth.

The terrain here was relatively high. There were still a few cars parked on the side of the road that weren’t submerged in water. Li Yao smashed the window of a large-scale, multipurpose off-road vehicle with a single punch. He forcefully opened the door and stuffed Zhang Daniu inside.

Looking at the rear-view mirror, one would notice that thick, black smoke was popping up from many windows of the building, making it look like a ferocious devil. The building had turned into a demon building.

Countless streams of black smoke snatched at Li Yao and Zhang Daniu as if they were alive.

“We’ve been discovered so quickly?”

Li Yao sniffed. He tore open the panel below the control panel and grabbed a handful of wires.

“I only have one chance. I must—”

He followed his natural instincts and allowed the bioelectricity surging inside his nerves to react naturally with the circuits of the car. Sparks flooded into the control circuits and the engine from the depths of his cells.

After a series of pleasing engine roars, accompanied by violent vibrations, the car started!