The intense suffocation made Ejie's breathing labored.
He tried to expand his lungs, which seemed flattened like deflated balloons stuck together.
Drip, drip, drip—the sound came from a spot an inch above his right elbow, where blood was dripping.
The falling droplets had nearly formed a continuous line.
On the ground below was a large pool of blood, but at the current dripping rate, it should have been impossible for so much blood to accumulate.
The reason was that seconds earlier, the blood had been spurting out.
Now, thanks to the panacea he had taken, the cleanly severed wound where half his arm had been cut off was quickly forming a scab.
No, it seemed as if new flesh was growing.
Looking straight ahead as the smoke—like that from meat being seared at high temperature—dissipated, Ejie could now see that Astartes warrior.
The power armor on the opponent's chest was half-melted like plastic under a welding torch, revealing a tragically dissolved flesh beneath.
Nearly a third of his upper body had been melted away, including an entire arm.
Part of his face had also been melted, with what appeared to be a third of the head dissolved away.
This damage was, of course, caused by the melta bomb.
This was the price of Ejie's injury-for-injury strategy, like a car sacrificing a wheel to save itself.
In a straightforward head-on confrontation, he would have certainly lost.
So he had employed a trick—his arm wasn't actually severed by his opponent, but deliberately detached through a perfect cutting mechanism he had designed into his power armor.
This design was, of course, at his request.
The detached arm had been thrown at his opponent, and the gauntlet contained something similar to a tank's reactive armor—actually a melta bomb, which then detonated.
Naturally, to execute such a maneuver, he needed to distract his opponent's attention.
So, during their sword clash, he had exploited his opponent's blind spot, making him believe that the great sword had sliced through both Ejie's weapon and his arm.
Clearly, his calculation had succeeded.
However, his injuries weren't limited to just losing an arm. The tip of the great sword had still managed to reach his chest, carving a horrifying wound.
Yes, it was similar to the cut Zoro received from Hawk-Eye in One Piece.
So, an intense feeling of weakness was now invading his body, making his consciousness somewhat hazy.
But the excruciating pain also sharply stimulated his nerves, paradoxically making him more alert.
He sighed inwardly—it was a pity that the damage inflicted on the Chaos Astartes before him wasn't fatal.
As for the opponent's claim that he would spare Ejie if he survived this attack?
Let's not be so naive.
Therefore, he remained extremely vigilant. If worse came to worst, he would ensure they both perished—that should be achievable, right?
"Go. I'll handle these garbage."
Was the Astartes really letting him go?
Since the opponent turned to slaughter the demons after speaking those words, Ejie didn't plan to stand there idly.
He ran toward a place where a machine with a giant drill was located—an Imperial tunneling machine called "White Ant."
He intended to use this to drill through the metal door leading to the elevator that went upward.
No, he would detonate it directly, as drilling through the thick metal wall would take too much time. He would place melta bombs on it and detonate the machine along with them.
"Sparing you doesn't mean I'm merciful. Above is even more hopeless."
The fallen Astartes warrior grinned as he spoke to the already vanished figure.
The opponent might regret not dying at his hands.
However, perhaps this person might actually surprise him by doing something unexpected.
After all, in all this time, this was the first time he had encountered such a special untouchable.
And the way he claimed to serve the Imperium, with that somewhat mocking tone, clearly indicated he wasn't someone loyal to that hypocritical Emperor.
...
BOOM—!
The explosion provoked screams all around, making the metal structure feel very unsafe.
Looking at the breach created by the blast, Ejie unhesitatingly crawled through.
What entered his vision was a massive elevator shaft.
Then, with the assistance of his new power armor, he climbed upward toward what seemed like an endless height, as agile as a monkey.
The new power armor was the second set he had stored in his personal space, as the first set was almost completely ruined.
It seemed that the power armor brought from the A2 world couldn't fully demonstrate all its capabilities here.
Perhaps because the planets were different, it wasn't adapting well, or due to other factors. It appeared to only exert about sixty to seventy percent of its performance power.
He repeatedly dodged the fluids falling from above—the smell of blood mixed with what seemed like long-decayed, putrid odors.
Clearly, the situation above was likely quite dire.
So, Ejie suddenly understood the meaning behind that meaningful gaze the Chaos Astartes had given him after letting him go.
He might be jumping from one hell into another, possibly an even more treacherous one.
But no matter what, he had to go up.
In the blink of an eye, how high had he climbed?
According to the power armor's indicator, he had ascended over seven hundred meters from his initial position.
Along the way, he had seen some passages, but they all led to the lower nest areas of the hive city.
Simply put, they were still within the sewer range of the city.
Just as Ejie was using the giant cable as support to swing himself toward another higher point, while still in mid-air—
He suddenly sensed something and immediately moved to defend himself without hesitation.
BANG—!
Something pounced on him, pinning him against the metal wall.
At that moment, his two short knives had blocked, no, had pierced two claws, preventing them from grabbing him.
This creature had three arms, and the remaining arm, along with its two legs with claws, were like nails fixed into the wall behind to secure its body.
His pupils dilated as he sharply moved his head aside. The creature's tongue missed and pierced the metal wall behind.
The next instant, a gun barrel opened from the shoulder plate of his armor, and with an orange flash, a melta round vaporized the creature's head.
Then, with a kick, he sent the monster falling into what seemed like the bottomless abyss of the elevator shaft.
This was troublesome, because Ejie knew what this thing was.
This creature wasn't a demon; it had reptilian characteristics.
This thing was a Genestealer!
...
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