After turning in the Blood Corpse's Aberrant Organ, Lin Ye returned to find the door had been pushed open. Inside the room sat a mahogany chest.

Opening the chest, he found a long, straight, blood-red blade. It was about a meter long, perfectly straight, and had no handguard. Though it was called a long blade, it looked more like a single-edged longsword.

The hilt was pure black, and it came with no scabbard.

"Wow, this is great. I needed a longer weapon."

Lin Ye carefully gripped the hilt and lifted it from the chest. The red blade wasn't heavy, but it wasn't light either—the weight felt just right.

There was only one item in the chest, likely due to the effect of the Cat's Tail Amulet.

Lin Ye tested the red blade on the Blood Corpse. It sliced through the creature's flesh with ease, meeting very little resistance.

After hacking the Blood Corpse to pieces, Lin Ye resumed his exploration of the Red Maze. With this new weapon, he was confident that if he could just find enough Blood Corpses, he could upgrade the Sanctuary by the end of the day.

As Lin Ye cheerfully continued his exploration, he came across a Red Room with its door wide open.

He cautiously peeked inside.

The sight made Lin Ye instinctively take a step back.

It was difficult to describe the room's condition. If forced to, one word would suffice:

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Nest.

It was a nest of flesh and blood.

The floor, the walls, the ceiling—every surface of the room was coated in writhing flesh. All sorts of remains were stacked and fused together, forming some kind of new organism.

The most conspicuous feature was a dismembered man, his parts scattered and mixed in with the rest of the mass throughout the room.

'Damn... What the hell is this thing?'

Even Lin Ye, who had seen his fair share of horrors, was startled by the scene. It was an aberration, something that defied all logic.

Before Lin Ye could react, the monster in the room noticed him and attacked first.

The entire corridor began to shake as a mound of flesh squeezed out of the room, roaring as it lunged toward Lin Ye.

Lin Ye turned and fled. This monster was, in every respect, far beyond his ability to handle.

"Don't run!"

"Help me!"

"Have you eaten?"

"Hello..."

All sorts of voices emanated from the mass of flesh, the loudest of which came from the man's head. Though connected only by a few fleshy tendrils, it was still screaming for help.

Lin Ye couldn't save it; he was the one who felt like screaming for help.

The monster wasn't fast, but it certainly wasn't slow. Lin Ye could outpace it at a full sprint, but he couldn't keep that up for long. A few more minutes and he'd be completely exhausted.

Once the monster caught up, it would be his turn to be torn to pieces.

Lin Ye tried to put some distance between them, but even when he was half a corridor away and out of its line of sight, the monster showed no signs of stopping. It pursued him relentlessly, as if it wouldn't rest until one of them was dead.

He could have hidden in a room, but that would cut off his escape. If the monster trapped him at the door, it would be over.

So, his only option was to keep running forward and hope he'd find an exit.

Half a minute later, Lin Ye began to slow down. He could have kept running, but any longer and he wouldn't have the strength left to fight back.

Lin Ye took the Cross Necklace from his backpack and put it around his neck. He had no idea if it had any side effects, but he desperately needed enhanced senses to identify the monster's aberrant parts.

The moment he put on the necklace, Lin Ye was stunned. A flood of chaotic information he had never before perceived rushed into his brain. It was as if he had ascended, moving from a lower dimension into a higher one.

But the feeling lasted only a moment before he returned to normal, as if the Transcendent senses had been nothing but an illusion.

However, a trace of the sensation remained. Drawing on that, along with his experience from the Simulation, he managed to grope his way back to a faint, Transcendent perception.

He could feel his own body in intense motion—his taut muscles, his racing heart, and his brain firing on all cylinders.

His life force was burning fiercely, but it was nothing compared to the monster hot on his heels.

If Lin Ye was a burning torch, the monster was a river of molten magma. They were different on a fundamental level.

Lin Ye slowed his pace. He needed to get closer to the monster to perceive it more clearly.

Since he couldn't outrun it, his only choice was to find a way to kill it.

Based on what he could perceive, a reckless frontal assault was hopeless.

His only chance lay in his ten bullets. He could only survive if he hit the monster's vital spots with them.

Lin Ye feigned exhaustion, letting the monster close the distance. Twenty meters... fifteen... ten... nine...

When the monster was eight meters away, it suddenly paused. A moment later, several whooshing sounds tore through the air from behind him.

*Thwack! Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!*

The moment the monster paused, Lin Ye sensed something was wrong. He threw himself to the ground an instant before the sounds tore through the air, using his forward momentum to roll and scramble around the corner at the end of the corridor.

Bullet-like chunks of flesh slammed into the wall, leaving a trail of blood-red stains.

If he had reacted a split-second slower, if he hadn't had his enhanced perception, he would have been shredded by those flesh bullets.

Once around the corner, Lin Ye scrambled to his feet. Instead of continuing to flee, he pressed himself flat against the inner wall, drew the pistol from his waistband, and waited for the monster to approach.

He was too close; there was no safe distance. If he kept running, he would either be shredded by its projectiles or caught and torn to pieces while trying to dodge them.

So this corner was his only chance of victory.

Lin Ye closed his eyes, his perception spreading out like invisible tendrils. In that instant, time seemed to stretch on infinitely.

Four meters.

Lin Ye raised his twin pistols, their muzzles aimed at the wall, tracking the points of most intense energy within the monster's body.

Three meters.

Two primary points, four secondary points.

Two meters.

Ten bullets. Two for each primary point, one for each secondary point, and two in reserve.

One meter.

He'd have to shift his aim twice. He could use the recoil to help.

Zero.

Fire!

The instant the monster crashed around the corner, Lin Ye's eyes snapped open, stretched wide, his pupils shrinking to pinpricks. His fingers twitched, and the bullets drilled into the monster's body like awls.

Bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang!

The muzzles were less than twenty centimeters from the monster's body. At this range, there was no way he could miss.

Without waiting to see the results, Lin Ye was already backing away as he fired, putting two more shots into the monster for good measure as he retreated.

Bang! Bang!

These two shots were meant to disrupt the monster's balance. Lin Ye couldn't have explained why he fired them; he just had a sudden instinct that it was the right thing to do.

The effect was better than he could have hoped. The monster, which had been about to lunge at him, was instead knocked to the ground by the final two bullets.

The monster lay paralyzed on the ground, struggling for a good while without managing to get back up.

Lin Ye watched from a distance as the monster struggled, waiting until it went completely still. He then waited another ten minutes, and only after his senses confirmed it was truly dead did he dare to approach the corpse.

Just then, his vision went black and a sharp pain lanced through his brain. His stomach churned, and a sour mix of bile and half-digested food surged up his throat.

"*Cough!* Fuck!"

Lin Ye collapsed to the ground, dry-heaving until his stomach was empty. Only then did he feel slightly better.

But his vision was still dark, and the stabbing pain in his head grew even more intense.

Lin Ye hastily tore off the Cross Necklace. As the special senses faded, the piercing pain in his brain finally began to subside.