Chapter Seventy-Four: Madness

On the dim street, a cold wind swept through. Several people knelt on the ground, not daring to breathe. Their bodies trembled violently; despite the icy air, beads of sweat the size of beans dripped from their skin. Each one was terrified, for they had encountered a god of slaughter—a being of utter terror.

“Who’s the leader?” Yang Fan’s voice cut through the silence. Each word landed on their hearts with the weight of a mountain. They had thought they’d run into some harmless thugs, but instead, they’d slammed into an immovable iron wall—harder than anything they could have imagined. Standing before the car, Yang Fan looked down at those kneeling, his gun trained on a burly, bare-chested man. His gaze swept over to the women curled up in the shadows nearby, expression as cold and grim as death itself.

No one dared to answer. Yang Fan aimed his gun at the man who, just moments before, had been so arrogant. Now, the man lost control of his bladder, his whole body shaking violently with fear. In the face of death, only a madman wouldn’t be afraid. He was merely a brute, seeking to vent his pent-up rage; he was no madman, no lunatic. And so, he quaked, terror-stricken.

“I was wrong! I’m sorry! I deserve a thousand deaths! I’m not human—I’m a beast!” The man begged for his life, all pretense of bravado gone. Even though he possessed an apocalypse system, that didn’t make him a god, and now he could only plead, sobbing wretchedly.

A gunshot rang out.

Yang Fan pulled the trigger. The bullet struck not the man’s head, but his leg.

The man shrieked in agony, his face contorted, rolling on the ground with tears and snot streaming down his cheeks. Even so, he tried to beg Yang Fan for mercy, crying out, “I was wrong! Just kill me—kill me! Please, don’t torture me, don’t torture me!”

He knew there was no hope for survival, so he asked only for death. Yang Fan strode toward him, pressing a foot onto his head, his voice chilling: “You say you needed to vent, and no one could stop you. But you went too far. Now you beg for mercy. Did those women not beg you for mercy too? And what did you do? You killed, you tortured, you violated—whatever you pleased. And now you regret it?”

Yang Fan’s voice rose with passion. At the end, the submachine gun rattled, bullets slamming into the legs of the seven or eight survivors. Their screams were piercing, each more anguished than the last. Inside the vehicle, Fu Gaobin and Wang Cheng swallowed nervously, while the two women clamped their hands over their ears, unable to watch. Wu Liang’s face had gone pale—now he understood completely.

Yang Fan was a true god of slaughter, a being without law or limit. No—this wasn’t just Yang Fan. In this world, everyone was lawless, everyone was mad—a world of lunatics, each more deranged than the last.

“Please, spare us! Spare us!”
“I’m begging you—kill me, just kill me! Don’t torture us anymore!”
“Give us a quick death, please, a quick death!”

Eight men screamed in torment. Some begged Yang Fan for mercy; some simply wished for a swift end. All of them just wanted the pain to stop.

Yang Fan chuckled coldly, gazing at the survivors. Most were women—six or seven, battered and bruised, their eyes blank with despair. A few men survived as well, but they were in a wretched state, bloodied and abused. All had been driven to madness, numb, utterly disillusioned with the world.

“I’ve dealt with them for you,” Yang Fan said, exhaling heavily. He could barely stand to look at the people in the distance, his heart churning with sorrow and guilt. In his previous life, hadn’t he been just like them? But he had never suffered as much as these women—they had endured far worse.

Dusk was falling. Yang Fan climbed into the vehicle and told Fu Gaobin to drive. The broken men lay sprawled before them, but Fu Gaobin, cold-blooded now, simply drove over them. Again, cries of pain filled the air; one man, luckier than the rest, had his skull burst beneath a tire, his blood and brains spilling across the snow.

The car rolled away through the darkening streets, shadows stretching long behind them. Snow fell in thick, swirling flakes. The wounded men writhed in agony, yet even in their pain, a glimmer of relief flickered—they would suffer no more torture, and for that, they were grateful.

But as the car pulled away, in a shadowy corner, a man whose back had been scraped raw staggered upright. His wounds reopened, blood welling up, but he no longer felt the pain. His eyes were lifeless as he shuffled toward the writhing men, stooping along the way to pick up a sharp iron rod.

Step by step, he limped over, taking several minutes to reach the group. The wounded men saw him approach and felt a chill run through them. Some began to howl with fear, for this was a man they themselves had tormented for a long time. They saw the black iron rod, its sharpened tip capable of tearing flesh and inflicting torment beyond endurance.

A scream tore through the night.

The closest man shrieked as the survivor drove the rod into his body again and again. Though his strength was weak, the sharp rod easily pierced flesh, blood spraying across the snow, melting it red.

A ghastly sound echoed—the rod being pulled out, then plunged in again, accompanied by more agonized screams.

He laughed, wild and maniacal, stabbing again and again, face twisted with madness.
The others stared in horror, crawling desperately to escape. They were terrified—this was worse than death by a bullet. Some even envied those whom Yang Fan had killed outright; at least they no longer suffered.

“Spare me! Spare me! Please!” Wails, pleas, and cries of agony rang out, echoing in the darkness as night descended.

A few trembling women rose unsteadily, approaching with hollow laughter. One of them found a stone slab and slowly walked over to a man trying to crawl away. She smashed the stone down on his head; he howled in pain, rolling on the ground, but it was useless. The apocalypse, terror, and fear had seeped into their bones. She smashed the slab down onto his bleeding leg wound, making him convulse in agony—he had forgotten how he had once treated her.

Madness!
Absolute madness!
The tormented had become the tormentors. Darkness swallowed the street, leaving nothing but screams, wailing, and the frenzied cries of the newly mad.

At last, true darkness fell. The men were tortured to death. From the rooftops, a few figures appeared—then one by one, they leapt into the void.

Wild laughter echoed through the ruins—mad, broken, unending.
This was the apocalypse. The cruel, remorseless apocalypse.