Chapter Two

"Bang—Boom!"

The heavy alloy security door let out a bloodcurdling scream as its hinges were violently kicked apart. Three thugs, their eyes bloodshot and skin covered in disgusting pustules from the initial radiation, burst in, laughing maniacally, brandishing homemade shotguns.

"Hands up! Hand over all the purified water and potions, or I'll beat you to a pulp..."

Before the leader could finish his curse, a blur of dark golden lightning erupted from beneath my feet. It was Terra, who had just completed its initial genetic reshaping.

A sickeningly sharp "splat" of skin and bone tearing filled the air.

Even in its larval form, Terra's sharp Titan bone spikes were like a military meat grinder, instantly shredding the leader's throat. Hot blood sprayed onto the mottled wall. The remaining two thugs were stunned by the brutal scene. Before they could pull the trigger, my tactical knife sliced through the night like a venomous snake.

The blade precisely severed their carotid arteries, and the two men collapsed in pools of blood, convulsing, their throats gurgling like leaky bellows.

I expressionlessly stepped over the corpses, pulling a low-grade anti-radiation agent bearing the "Rustwater Camp" stamp from the inside of the leader's bulletproof vest.

"Basic reorganization is clearly insufficient for a mythical monster like you." I glanced at Terra, who was greedily licking the crimson blood from her claws, a mad, decisive glint in my eyes.

The true devastating nuclear dust storm hadn't reached its peak yet; the red rain outside was merely a prelude. To achieve absolute dominance in the upcoming "meat grinder," Terra needed to undergo a profound awakening, a leap beyond its initial stage.

I needed the highest purity fission-grade radiation source.

Donning a heavy, radiation-proof lead coat, I tucked Terra inside, grabbed a heavy shotgun I'd snatched from the thugs, and vanished into the red rainy night.

The "Rustwater Camp" black market beneath the slums was, by day, a den of iniquity for outlaws. At this moment, the panic of the apocalypse had driven the black market merchants here into a frenzy of price gouging and infighting.

When I, reeking of blood, pushed open the door to the largest black market drug workshop deep underground, a fat, burly merchant was checking his ledgers, gun in hand.

"Get out! The anti-radiation drugs are ten times more expensive tonight! If you ca

n't afford them, die!" he sneered, pointing the gun at me. Instead of getting angry, I smiled and strode forward. Before his heavily armed bodyguards could react, I threw a homemade miniature corrosive poison mist grenade.

"Sizzle—"

The inky purple poison mist instantly detonated, filling the narrow space with the desperate screams of the bodyguards as their skin carbonized and their eyeballs dissolved. In this Darwinian wasteland where unrestrained violence reigns supreme, mercy is the greatest cruelty one can inflict upon oneself.

I stepped over the splattered flesh and blood, grabbed the black marketeer by the hair, and roughly shoved the shotgun into his gold-toothed mouth, coldly looking down at him: "Take out those three vials of the prohibited 'Fission-grade Fluid' from the freezer. I'll only count to three."

A minute later, carrying the blood-stained incubator, I strode away through the mud and corpses, amidst the terrified gazes of the black market crowd.

When I returned to the safe house, the sky roared like the end of the world.

The true "Red Dust Storm" had fully erupted! The sky was like a ripped wound, pouring down a rain of highly toxic acid that could melt metal. The mournful howls of mutated beasts echoed throughout the wasteland, and countless lives were crushed into genetically mutated carcasses that night.

Outside was purgatory, while inside the safe house, my eyes burned with fanaticism.

I skillfully opened the incubator and, using Breaking Bad's micro-management techniques, perfectly harmonized the fission fluid with Terra's genetic extract. The pale golden liquid boiled in the syringe.

"Come, prove to this world what true dominance is."

I plunged the cold, thick needle deep into Terra's spine!

A surge of high-pressure radioactive energy instantly coursed through the cub's entire body. This time, it wasn't a subtle transformation.

"Crack—bang!"

The chilling cracking of bones was like a barrage of firecrackers. Terra threw its head back, letting out a soul-shaking roar of pain and rage. Its body began to frantically regenerate and expand at a visible speed! Its petite 30-centimeter frame swelled to the size of an adult bull in a minute. Its

jet-black fur transformed into keratinous armor resembling dark gold, massive saber-toothed fangs pierced its jaws, and turbulent blue lightning flashed between the white bony spurs of its back!

This piece of scrap that Sophia Adam had discarded as garbage had now completed an astonishing Titan leap.

“Well done, buddy.” I reached out and stroked its neck, as hard as steel and crackling with lightning heat, my eyes filled with an absolute, domineering ferocity.

Just then,

“BOOM—!!!”

A massive explosion, a hundred times more destructive than before, instantly ripped off the entire wall where my door was located!

Amidst the billowing smoke and debris, the scattered soldiers outside were no longer a threat. A dozen blinding heavy tactical laser infrared beams intertwined, locking onto my brow. The crushing sound of heavy armor tracks echoed in the rainy night; a group of heavily armored thugs, clad in advanced exoskeletons and driven into an extreme bloodlust by the red rain, had completely surrounded the area.

The dark, multi-barreled Gatling guns had begun their preheating for death.