Third-tier Rat Swarm

The dense, dark rat swarm, though not boundless, stretched across the entire highway, a hundred meters long. With each rat beast measuring thirty centimeters, this swarm definitely numbered in the tens of thousands, qualifying as a small rat swarm. Even a Warlord-level Warrior would be devoured and annihilated!

So Luo Feng had only one choice...

"Run!" Luo Feng immediately sprinted down the highway.

"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh~~"

Wan Dong and the other three had long since discarded their battle sabers, shields, and other weapons, each one sprinting for their lives. The rat swarm behind them relentlessly closed the distance, shrinking from twenty meters to fifteen, then fourteen, then thirteen...

"Damn it!"

"Why isn't the military here yet!"

"If they don't come soon, we're really dead this time."

Wan Dong and the others cursed under their breath, gritting their teeth and accelerating sharply, widening the gap with the rat swarm slightly, until it reached over thirty meters. Only then did the three of them slow down a little.

"I can't run anymore."

"Me neither."

Wan Dong and the two exchanged glances, both helpless and in pain. Their maximum sprinting speed was much faster than the rat swarm's. But being a maximum speed, it was inherently unsustainable! Just like humans before the Great Nirvana era, a hundred-meter dash in ten seconds was considered extreme speed back then.

One hundred meters, taking nearly ten seconds.

But what about a thousand meters? Could it be done in 100 seconds?

Ten thousand meters? Would 1000 seconds suffice? In reality, before the Great Nirvana era, the men's ten-thousand-meter record was around 1580 seconds.

It was the same for these Warriors; Wan Dong and his companions could instantly reach a top speed of 60 meters per second, but they had been fleeing for nearly half an hour. Now, they could barely maintain a speed of 40 meters per second! Once the rat swarm got close, they would desperately push themselves to run even faster!

Wan Dong and his team had run almost three hundred li by now! One could imagine their exhaustion!

"Military, come quickly!"

"It's so close to the Military Region, why aren't they here yet?" Wan Dong and the two felt their legs were numb, the extreme muscle fatigue preventing them from speeding up.

Luo Feng, however, carrying his battle saber and shield, maintained an astonishing speed of sixty meters per second, swiftly pulling ahead. After all, Wan Dong and the others were physically drained, but Luo Feng was still in peak condition!

Luo Feng already had a significant lead on the rat swarm and quickly left them far behind.

"Huh?" Luo Feng spotted a dark blue shadow approaching from the distant sky. At first glance, he thought it was a flying beast, but as the dark blue flying object drew closer, Luo Feng finally saw it clearly. It was a flat, circular fighter jet, shaped like a flying saucer!

Most military fighter jets nowadays were of this flat, circular design, as this shape offered advantages in defense and offense when encountering flying beasts in the air.

"The military!"

"It's a military fighter jet!" The utterly exhausted Wan Dong and the two let out excited shouts, their speeds surprisingly bursting forth again.

Luo Feng, who was still running, also stopped, looking up. He saw the fighter jet dive towards the beast horde. When it was still a hundred meters from the ground, the fighter jet hovered directly above the beast horde. With Luo Feng's vision, he clearly saw a massive cannon muzzle emerge from the jet's belly.

"Boom! Boom! Boom!~~~"

Endless scorching flames erupted from the cannon, directly engulfing the rat swarm below. Under the intense heat, likely thousands of degrees Celsius, a large number of rat beasts caught fire and were burned to death. Instantly, the once orderly rat swarm completely collapsed, scattering in terror with cries of fear.

However, under the blanket of flames, most of the rat beasts were directly incinerated. Some managed to escape into the barren fields beside the highway, burrowing into the ground and disappearing.

"Four Warriors, a Third-tier Rat Swarm has erupted within a thousand li radius. Please return to the supply base immediately. It won't be too late to enter the wilderness after the rat swarm alert is lifted." A voice echoed from the fighter jet, and then the aircraft swiftly soared away, breaking through the air to rescue other Warriors.

Wan Dong and the two let out long sighs of relief.

"We got a second chance at life."

"Just a hair's breadth, and it would have been over." The three were utterly exhausted.

"Luo Feng." Wan Dong couldn't help but call out to the distance, "Got anything to eat? Give us some food! And water?"

Luo Feng, from a distance, walked over with a smile. The Wan Dong before him had none of his usual cold indifference; only exhaustion and the joy of surviving a catastrophe remained! Running nearly three hundred li, and fleeing for their lives, was incredibly draining. Luo Feng took a bag from the side pocket of his backpack and pulled out three pills: "These three high-energy sugar pills, and here's a water pouch."

As Luo Feng handed them over, Wan Dong and the two immediately each swallowed a high-energy sugar pill, and the water pouch was quickly divided and emptied.

"Luo Feng, thanks." Wan Dong said gratefully, "Let me introduce you, this one next to me is Wang Ke. The other one is Jiang Tu."

"I've long heard of Luo Lunatic's great name," the handsome Wang Ke said with a smile.

"Luo Lunatic, your high-energy sugar pill tastes better than any delicacy. I was starving, but now I feel much better," the bearded Jiang Tu chuckled.

Luo Feng and the three of them walked and chatted.

"How did you encounter the rat swarm? The fighter jet said it was a Third-tier Rat Swarm?" Luo Feng's county town was too close to the Military Region, so he hadn't personally experienced the rat swarm.

"I've truly seen how terrifying a rat swarm can be," Wan Dong couldn't help but say, "Before, we were resting on the rooftop of a residential building in a county town. But suddenly, countless rat beasts emerged from many places on the ground throughout the entire county town. That was truly boundless! We were so scared that we immediately used steel cables to escape from one residential building to another rooftop. We didn't dare go down to the ground at all!"

Luo Feng was startled, fully able to imagine the scene of countless rat beasts appearing on the ground of a county town.

"Fortunately, our squad was in the outskirts of the county town. We gritted our teeth and desperately ran along a path with relatively few rat beasts!"

"Along the way, we encountered a rat swarm. We had no choice but for our squad to split up and divert the rat swarm! We were lucky; the ones chasing us onto the highway were just a small wave of the rat swarm! During our escape, Wang Ke and I also met this guy, Jiang Tu. His experience was similar to ours."

Wan Dong then gave a bitter smile, "I wonder how our captain and the others are doing now."

In places like streets and alleys, they dared to split up to divert the rat swarm's pursuit. But on the highway, they didn't dare, because next to the highway were barren fields and wilderness. In these wild areas, human running speed would decrease. However, the geographical environment of the wilderness had little impact on the rat beasts' speed.

This was also why everyone only ran on the highway and didn't venture into the wilderness.

...

Luo Feng and the four of them arrived at the Warrior supply base in the Military Region. At this time, a large group of Warriors had gathered at the entrance of the supply base.

"Lunatic, I knew you wouldn't die."

"Lunatic, in county town 0231, did you see Old Liu and the others?"

Upon entering the supply base, many Warriors who knew Luo Feng came to ask and greet him. After all, a rat swarm outbreak was an extremely dangerous event. Fortunately, this was only a 'Third-tier Rat Swarm,' so the harm wasn't too great. If it were the legendary First-tier Rat Swarm, that would be a catastrophe for the entire Jiangnan Base City!

"Old Wang, have my captain and the others returned?" Wan Dong immediately went to ask around.

"Haven't seen them."

"Your captain and the others haven't returned, there's no record here."

...

Today was destined to be a sad day for the supply base. Many Warriors who were out in the wilderness lost their lives. Even among the three War God-level Warriors who entered the wilderness today, one War God-level Warrior was actually heavily surrounded by the endless rat swarm, engulfed in a vast ocean of rats.

The rat swarm, regardless of casualties, attacked frantically, and actually... killed a War God!

Yes, today, a human War God fell!

Within the rat swarm, there were not only soldier-level rat beasts but also Warlord-level ones, and the leader of the rat swarm possessed extremely high intelligence. Once they selected a target, they would spare no effort! It was said that during the human War God's struggle, dozens of high-rise buildings were destroyed and collapsed, and probably over a million rat beasts died.

Unfortunately, over a million rat beasts were nothing compared to a rat swarm numbering in the billions.

Therefore...

This War God died!

"Boom! Boom! Boom!~~~" Dark clouds rolled, fierce winds swept across the land, and occasionally thunder rumbled. With a clap of thunder, heavy rain poured down.

On the rooftop of a row house in the supply base, Luo Feng sat on the veranda.

"Captain, I'm fine, I was lucky. I wasn't surrounded by the rat swarm."

"Brother Chen, hmm, I'm fine."

"Tie Ge, haha, you can hear my voice. Of course, I'm alive and well."

Luo Feng answered several calls; clearly, the news of the Third-tier Rat Swarm in the surrounding area had reached many Warriors in Jiangnan Base City. Every time a rat swarm or the even more terrifying 'ant swarm' occurred, it was a time of heavy casualties for human Warriors. This time, a human War God had fallen, which was an even greater loss for the entire Jiangnan City.

"Just a Third-tier Rat Swarm, and so many people died."

"What about the legendary First-tier Rat Swarm?"

"And what about the even more terrifying war between humans and beasts?"

The war between beasts and humans was a war between two civilizations, two races! Once the war began, countless various types of land beasts in swarms, and various flying beasts, those that won by speed, those with immense strength, those that burrowed, those that were poisonous, those that flew, those with sonic attacks...

They would cover the sky and earth. The sky would be filled with countless flying beasts, the ground with countless beasts, and even underground and in the lakes, there would be beasts.

Rat swarms, ant swarms, and the like were just a part of it.

This was the most terrifying war!

"Beasts are truly humanity's mortal enemy. Currently, the oceans are dominated by beasts, on land, humans have a slight advantage. In the air, beasts have the advantage! Humans are forced to defend and counterattack within various Base Cities!" Luo Feng had never realized this before, always feeling that beasts were just slaughtered by Warriors, but today he finally understood...

Beasts could completely wipe humanity off Earth.

If humanity perished, what would be the point of parents, family, culture, or morality?

"My strength is not enough, far from enough." Luo Feng's gaze fell upon the endless world in the distance.

Boom!

Crack!

Thunder rumbled, and occasionally a bolt of lightning struck directly from the sky.

"Lightning..." Luo Feng looked at the lightning in the distant sky, vaguely grasping something.