Chaos Erupts Before the Museum, Titan Emerges Among Spasm Fiends

Unnoticed by the group, countless staggering figures emerged from the surrounding mist—every single one of them Spasm Fiends. Even a rough headcount put their number at well over three hundred. Liu Xiaoying swept her camera left and right, her face growing paler with each glance: "This is bad! We're surrounded! There are thousands of monsters nearby, and more keep showing up!"

"No, these things aren't here just for us." Rachel Luo kept her cool, pointing ahead: "Look, they're fighting each other now."

Sure enough, once enough Spasm Fiends had gathered, they started attacking each other first. The Dragon Slayer and Frostbrand—those high-level mutated monsters—also began slaughtering the lesser creatures around them. When those two got to work, they were anything but sluggish; a single swipe of their tails or blades whipped up a storm of sword energy. It was like a terrifying silent movie—except for the occasional roar from the elite monsters, the whole brutal melee was eerily quiet.

Flesh splattered, bone fragments flew—the monsters were brawling with wild abandon, and for a moment, none of them paid any attention to the seven people over here. Black mist churned all around, and as the big monsters dropped in droves, the group noticed something: every dead monster released a huge cloud of black mist, which was then absorbed by nearby creatures. The ones that soaked up the mist got stronger—way stronger.

Bi—big honkers—massive melons!

Boom! A powerful explosion echoed from deep within the mist, followed by a string of muffled blasts and sizzling, corrosive sounds. The others couldn't see what was happening, but scout Liu Xiaoying was so shocked her jaw dropped: "No way! There’s a—a mutated monster with really massive melons blowing up a bunch of its own kind!"

Big honkers? Oddball Bro's eyes lit up, about to ask for details, but Chainsaw Girl cut him off: "Feels like more and more monsters are gathering nearby. What’s really going on here?"

The black mist churned, sometimes thick, sometimes thin—meaning the miasma here was being released and absorbed in waves. When it thickened, you could barely see twenty meters ahead, just hear faint noises and catch blurry shadows. When it thinned out, you could see a hundred meters, and within that range, it was pure carnage.

And all these dead monsters lying around—they were ordinary citizens not long ago.

Oddball Bro scratched his head, baffled: "Why aren't these guys coming after us now? Weren't they all fired up just a moment ago?"

"No, maybe they never planned to mess with us in the first place." Professor He spoke gravely: "This time it's more dramatic, sure, but we've seen these monsters fighting each other a bunch of times on the way here. Looks like they're battling to soak up more miasma. Wherever the miasma is thickest, that's where the monsters flock."

"So what's so special about this place?"

"Either it's the jade pendants and trinkets hanging on the Jade Corpse that attract them, or..." Professor He pointed at a building up ahead. "It's that jade fragment that fell from the Jade Corpse's forehead. After eighteen hundred years, even the toughest barrier material can't keep the miasma out forever. The miasma soaked into that jade fragment is probably the purest, highest grade stuff around. These monsters are probably here to fight over it."

Chainsaw Girl wasn't buying it: "Wait, it's been three hours since the city got fogged up—why are they only showing up now?"

"No clue. Maybe something changed during those three hours—don't you think these monsters have gotten a lot tougher since they first popped up?"

"Let's not get hung up on that." Rachel Luo raised her sword, eyeing the destination warily. "What we need to figure out now is whether we should still head that way. While the monsters aren't totally OP yet, maybe we should..."

"Wait!" Liu Xiaoying kept her eyes glued to her camera's viewfinder and quickly grabbed Rachel Luo's arm. "Something even nastier just showed up!"

No sooner had she spoken than everyone felt the ground shake—thud, thud, thud—like something massive was pounding the earth. The nearby black mist suddenly thinned, as if something was sucking it up in bulk.

Then, a giant appeared in their line of sight.