Era of Magic and Martial Arts

Zhou Hu was caught in a frenzied escape along with the crowd at school, his mind a whirl of chaos, as if stuffed with a tangled mess, leaving him dizzy and disoriented.

He couldn’t understand it—this was a school! It was the Martial Arts Joint Examination! There were cameras everywhere. It was the safest place he had carefully chosen!

Why had such terrifying monsters suddenly appeared out of nowhere?

Screams and cries filled his ears, and everywhere he looked was stained with the color of blood. Zhou Hu felt his understanding of reality being violently challenged.

His worldview was being crushed by an invisible black hand and tossed into the trash.

"Is this a damn school or a slaughterhouse?!"

At that moment, Zhou Hu’s gaze was suddenly caught by a familiar figure.

"Feng Mu? He’s here too!"

Zhou Hu instinctively slowed his pace, his pupils shrinking sharply into pinpoints.

He saw Feng Mu on the phone, his expression disturbingly calm and gentle, as if the chaos around him had nothing to do with him.

The bizarre contrast sent an indescribable chill through Zhou Hu’s heart.

Even more alarming was that Gong Qi stood next to Feng Mu, a sickly and playful smile on his face.

Gong Qi casually kicked a student like passing a ball, sending him flying toward a monster in the distance.

The monster didn’t even turn around, catching the student neatly, its bloody maw opening wide to snap the student’s neck in an instant, blood spraying out.

The entire scene seemed like the result of relentless practice, each motion flawlessly synchronized.

If it ended there, Zhou Hu would have simply cursed them as inhuman in his heart.

But what made his skin crawl was that the monster mumbled indistinctly, "shei—shei—"

"Sheishei??? Thank you!!"

Zhou Hu’s mind buzzed, as if something had exploded inside, and he felt as if he had plunged into an icy cellar, frozen from head to toe.

"Feng Mu, Gong Qi, monster, thank you... That monster spoke! No, that’s not the point. The point is the monster was saying thank you to Gong Qi?!"

Zhou Hu’s brain spun wildly, piecing together a horrifying truth like a jigsaw puzzle—these monsters were brought by Feng Mu!

"Is Feng Mu bringing these monsters to kill me?"

As soon as this thought emerged, Zhou Hu’s heart nearly stopped.

Though it sounded like a wild tale, it wasn’t entirely impossible.

After all, he had just witnessed Gong Qi "feeding" the monster. Didn’t that clearly indicate that the monsters were in cahoots with them?

As for how Feng Mu could summon or control these monsters, Zhou Hu sorted out the logic in just a second.

Feng Mu might not have that ability, but that doesn’t mean Warden Qian Huan doesn’t!

Behind Qian Huan was the Bright Group, and rumors online had hinted more than once that the research institutes under the Bright Group were conducting secret inhuman experiments.

Although those rumors quickly died down without making much headway.

Countless images flashed through Zhou Hu’s mind like a rapid slideshow analysis.

He remembered the posts that were swiftly deleted, the whistleblowers who suddenly retracted and apologized, the so-called "official denials."

In summary—those who understand, understand...

At this moment, Zhou Hu’s intellect hit its peak,

Zhou "Detective" Hu went online!

"No, it’s not just to kill me, but rather..."

Zhou Hu’s brain worked furiously, cold sweat sliding down his forehead.

"By using more bloodshed, making casualties even worse, and with monsters to capture attention, a much larger news event is created. That way, who would still focus on the Second Prison’s riot... Yes, it must be this!"

Zhou Hu’s lips trembled, his head lowered almost to his chest, trying to shrink into the crowd like an ostrich attempting to bury itself in the sand.

He wished he could kill everyone blocking his way, but he didn’t dare make too aggressive a move, so he let himself be pushed along by the crowd, moving out bit by bit, each step as cautious as walking on thin ice, fear that a single sneeze would reveal him to Feng Mu and those monsters.

His eyes scanned around, glancing a few times at the slightly thinned blood mist pit, a cold sneer on his heart:

Since the monsters were brought by Feng Mu, they couldn’t have possibly killed his sister. This was merely a show of self-inflicted deception, a sleight of hand to clear suspicion.

"Ha—quite the performance!"

Zhou Hu, while dodging and fleeing for his life, hastily pulled out his phone from his pocket, his fingers trembling almost too much to press the screen accurately.

He dialed a number, speaking into the phone with a voice suppressed to the extreme, filled with panic:

"Save me, Station Chief Lou! Qian Huan and the others are simply insane, they actually let monsters into the school! Feng Mu and those monsters are looking for me, I could lose my life at any moment... Lou, you must send someone to save me immediately, or it’ll be too late..."

The voice on the other end of the line seemed incoherent, almost frenzied, as if utterly terrified.

But Lou Duan’s mind turned a bit, and he understood, because he was watching the live broadcast on TV.

His brow slightly furrowed, and his tone carried a hint of displeasure:

"Are you at the Eighth Academy? Didn’t I give you an address..."

"I thought the scene of the Martial Arts Joint Examination would be safer. Who knew, Qian Huan and his people lost their minds!"

Lou Duan was silent for a full second, then calmly stated,

"Don’t panic, I’ll send someone to rescue you immediately!"

Ending the call, Lou Duan stared at the television screen, roughly guessing Zhou Hu’s thoughts from his few disorganized words.

A disdainful sneer curled at the corner of his mouth, a look of contempt in his eyes.

"Fool, Qian Huan already has the upper hand; why would he stir up such a big event just to kill you? The one really eager to silence you is me."

Lou Duan dismissed Zhou Hu’s speculations with disdain; he held another guess closer to the truth in his heart:

"Those monsters are clearly the ones I hired at a high price. After all, what else looks more like an ’accident’ than monsters crawling out of the sewers and going on a killing spree?"

Lou Duan took a deep breath, slowly sitting back in front of his desk, his fingers tapping swiftly across the keyboard, illuminating the computer screen.

He withdrew a USB stick from a drawer, plugging it into the computer to secretly log onto the "Libra" website.

On the screen, the dark red interface unfolded gradually, like revealing a corner of an underground world’s secrets.

His eyes scanned the screen, quickly locating his task order—[Dispatched, Currently Acquiring for You].

Beneath the order, a prominent section for rating and tipping was displayed, accompanied by a line of small text—"Your support is our motivation!"

Although the task wasn’t completed yet, Lou Duan impatiently clicked the five-star rating and entered a series of numbers in the tipping field, pressing confirm without hesitation.

Before, to expedite the "acquisition," he had agreed to the website administrator [Clown] asking for a triple increase in payment.

At the time, he was so mad he could grind his teeth, feeling he had been thoroughly ripped off.

But now, watching the chaotic and horror-filled images on TV, seeing those enormous and ferocious monsters wreaking havoc across the campus, a strange satisfaction welled within him.

"What worthwhile expenditure this was."

.....