For Dan Lee, the crisis was already over.
However, for Jessie and the others, two Mutant Cannibals were still lurking in the shadows.
Their main priority was to get away and call the police.
The four of them stuck together as they fled.
Halfway through, Dan Lee slipped away.
He had to head back and take a look—if the Mutant Cannibal boss actually died without being contained, it would be a massive waste.
In a world where serial killers could pop up at any moment, he couldn’t feel safe without containing a few more monsters.
Following the location provided by the second Mutant Cannibal…
Dan Lee found the two Mutants in a patch of woods.
Eldest was pinned to a tree by Second Brother, unable to move, growling continuously.
Dan Lee couldn’t understand his growls and didn’t care to.
With a thought, the 2 of Clubs appeared in his hand.
[Containable entity detected: Mutant Cannibal.] [Contain entity?
Yes/No] “Contain.” The 2 of Clubs flew out on its own, plunging straight into the Mutant Cannibal boss’s chest.
Instantly, it absorbed his entire body into the card before flying back into Dan Lee’s hand.
Dan Lee caught the 2 of Clubs.
On it was the image of the Mutant Cannibal boss, though it looked different from his first capture.
This one was taller and much more muscular.
Meaning he was the most severely mutated—he must have chugged more chemical waste than the others.
He looked over at the second Mutant standing beside him.
Even in a pitch-black forest, he felt completely secure.
That was the importance of having a minion.
Dan Lee hadn’t forgotten that these Ghost Cards had another feature.
“Extract.” Every card had a chance to extract one of the contained entity’s abilities, though the extracted ability might only be fifty percent—or even ten percent—as strong as the original.
It all came down to luck.
Of course, if he got an undesirable ability, he could choose to discard it immediately.
That was a remarkably convenient feature.
If he drew Chemical Mutation and couldn’t discard it, ending up merging into a hideous Mutant himself, that would be disastrous.
Dan Lee was quite satisfied with his current appearance and had no desire to turn into a monster anytime soon.
Besides, if he ever actually wanted to transform, he could just choose to fuse with the card directly.
[Contained Entity: Mutant Cannibal Eldest] [Extractable Abilities: Chemical Mutation, Strength Amplification, Endurance Amplification, IQ Reduction, Pain Immunity.] Quite a few abilities, but only two were useful.
Three were useless trash—Chemical Mutation and IQ Reduction went without saying.
As for Pain Immunity, someone could slit his throat in his sleep and he wouldn’t even realize it.
Dan Lee checked Second Brother’s abilities next.
[Contained Entity: Mutant Cannibal Second Brother] [Extractable Abilities: Chemical Mutation, Strength Amplification, Vision Amplification, Endurance Amplification, IQ Reduction, Pain Immunity.] He had Vision Amplification on top of the boss’s traits—as expected of the archer.
Dan Lee chose to extract from both simultaneously.
The options on the two cards began spinning rapidly through the list of abilities before finally landing on: [Mergeable Abilities: Chemical Mutation, Vision Amplification.] Decent luck—it was a two-in-five chance, after all.
Seeing the result, Dan Lee discarded Chemical Mutation and selected Vision Amplification.
Though a bit situational, it was better than nothing.
“Merge.” The next second, Dan Lee closed his eyes, feeling a cool sensation spreading through them.
When he opened his eyes again, the dark forest had become clear enough that he could at least see the path ahead.
It was a bit like wearing night-vision goggles, though slightly less effective.
Even at fifty percent effectiveness, it was already pretty good.
Mutants were just mutated humans, not particularly top-tier monsters in the horror genre.
Now Dan Lee wondered: where had the remaining Mutant Cannibal run off to?
As far as he was concerned, a family ought to stay together, whole and neat.
Running away on your own was not what a good Mutant should do.
*** On the highway.
Chris looked like a man who had barely survived a nightmare.
He was just an ordinary guy taking a shortcut to Raleigh for a job offer, only to run into Mutant Cannibals.
That job was definitely gone now; no boss would ever believe an excuse about cannibals.
Just as Chris was about to keep walking, Jessie and Carly got into a heated argument.
The reason was that Dan Lee had vanished halfway through.
Jessie insisted they shouldn’t leave Dan Lee behind and ought to go back and search for him.
But Carly, having just reunited with her boyfriend, was utterly unwilling to step foot in that place again.
Scott wanted to go back and save him; Dan Lee had saved his life, after all.
Chris’s logic told him to reach safety and call the police first, but his conscience told him he shouldn’t just abandon Dan Lee.
Dan Lee stood in the tree line listening to their argument.
He had just arrived.
The third Mutant was hiding who knows where, so he had decided to loop back and meet up with Chris’s group first.
Chris and the others might be a little dumb, but they were decent people.
Dan Lee stored the two Mutants into the Hearts and Clubs cards, then stepped out into the open.
The initial rustling gave the group a scare.
But when they saw it was Dan Lee, everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
Jessie rushed forward and threw her arms around him, excitedly blabbering things like “Thank God you’re okay.” “Alright, Jessie.
I don’t believe in God.
Let me go, and let’s get out of here first.” Dan Lee found Jessie’s enthusiasm a bit overwhelming.
More importantly, she was dressed quite lightly for the season, and having her cling to him so tightly set his mind wandering.
She looked like she wanted to hang off him like a backpack.
Fortunately, everyone kept their heads.
After a brief reunion, they started walking along the road toward the main highway.
As they approached the main road, their cell phones finally got a signal.
They called the police without hesitation.
Watching the traffic passing back and forth brought them a needed sense of security.
Dan Lee made two cards appear in his hand like a magic trick, then vanish again.
American police couldn’t give him security, but Mutant Cannibals could.
Once the police arrived on the scene…
Chris explained the situation, but the officers refused to believe any story about Mutant Cannibals, saying only that they would investigate.
Jessie and the others almost cursed them out on the spot.
Ultimately, the group was taken to the station to give formal statements.
This was mainly because a young couple had died—the couple from earlier who had refused to go for help and stayed behind to guard their vehicle.
Only when they reached the police station did Chris finally relax.
Surely those monsters wouldn’t burst into a police station to kill people.
After finishing their statements, Dan Lee’s group found a motel in town and checked in.
It was too late to keep traveling; they needed to rest for the day.
Chris took a single room.
Scott and Carly were a couple, so sharing a room was natural.
As for Jessie, after witnessing Dan Lee’s strength, she insisted on staying with him.
In this country, both men and women respected power.
If Jessie had merely been interested in Dan Lee at first, his display of strength and competence had transformed that interest into desire.
[Jessie Illustration] But Dan Lee didn’t have much interest in Jessie.
Not because he was impotent, but because Jessie simply didn’t meet his standards for a girlfriend.
She either had to be an exceptionally gorgeous trophy girl or possess unique abilities.
Jessie fit neither criteria, though Dan Lee was fine with a one-night stand.
On the second floor of the motel.
While Jessie showered in the bathroom, Dan Lee sat with a rented laptop, searching online for information regarding Mutant Cannibals, ghosts, and vengeful spirits.
When he first transmigrated, Dan Lee thought this was just an ordinary world.
Combined with his encounter with the Demon Nun, he had simply wanted to leave Yuanha Town to lay low.
Now that he had time, he naturally needed to look into it online.
The deeper he looked, the more terrifying the number of cases on the internet became.
And the more he searched, the more hauntingly familiar it all felt.
He even discovered a TV show specifically dedicated to confirming whether ghosts existed.
The more he looked at this show, the more it resembled…