The scene shifts to Yu Jing, who is still deep within the slaughterhouse—his designated test zone.
"How is he still alive? His head was pierced straight through!" Yu Jing gritted his teeth, eyes flicking to the roaring meat grinder. "The only chance now is to throw him into that thing."
Having just leapt backward to evade the butcher's attack, Yu Jing lost his footing and crashed to the floor. He struggled to move, his body refusing to cooperate in the face of mounting fatigue.
The butcher, now free of his bindings, was in a full-blown berserk state. One hand gripped a butcher's cleaver, the other held a bloodstained hatchet—both raised and ready to dismember Yu Jing where he lay.
Boom!
A sudden, violent tremor struck the slaughterhouse. The floor shuddered. The walls groaned. The butcher staggered, losing his balance momentarily.
Yu Jing seized the moment, regaining enough control over his body to scramble away, desperately widening the distance between them.
But his full attention remained locked on the butcher, wary of a sudden thrown attack. Because of this focus, he failed to notice what had begun to stir beneath him.
Unbeknownst to Yu Jing, a strange green plant was silently infiltrating the testing chamber. It slithered its way through the high-density flooring, creeping in from below.
In his scramble, Yu Jing's hand happened to land right on the sprouting tendril. A sharp, stinging pain pierced his palm.
"Tch—!"
He winced, assuming it was simply a shard of glass or metal embedded in the floor. There was no time to worry about such minor injuries while the butcher was bearing down on him.
But what he didn't realize was this: the green root had already burrowed beneath his skin, threading through his flesh and quickly spreading up his arm.
Strangely, unlike its behavior with other test subjects, the plant didn't drain Yu Jing of life force. It merely lingered quietly within his limb. The ground cracked no further, and no more vines appeared.
Yu Jing remained unaware of the infection, his senses dulled to the change.
Still, the tremor had bought him precious seconds.
While the butcher was struggling to stabilize his massive body, Yu Jing sprinted toward the meat grinder, looping around its edge with a clear plan in mind.
"I can't just keep running. That's a death sentence. The meat grinder—it's the only way out of this."
As he reached the machine, his eyes darted to the central ventilation shaft where Jiang Tian was still hiding. She'd done more than enough—risked everything to save him. If it weren't for her, Yu Jing would have long since bled out and died.
"Come on, then!"
Yu Jing roared at the butcher.
The beast seemed to hear the call, turning with a guttural growl. The quake had ceased. Now he thundered forward, massive feet pounding the trembling floor. The gaping wound in his abdomen writhed as grotesque, twitching hands extended outward, as though eager to drag Yu Jing inside and make him part of the horror.
"Stay calm."
Yu Jing stood directly before the grinder's gaping mouth, unmoving.
The butcher charged faster. And faster.
This was it.
Yu Jing's eyes, focused to razor clarity, could suddenly trace the arc of the cleaver descending upon him. Whether adrenaline or something else entirely, time seemed to slow. His body responded before his thoughts did.
In one smooth motion, he crouched low—just in time to let the blade slice the air inches above his head.
The butcher, too committed to his swing, overextended. Momentum betrayed him, and his enormous body lurched forward.
"Redirect his weight—use his strength against him."
Yu Jing gritted his teeth and shoved with all he had.
The force was enough.
The monster—easily over five hundred pounds—toppled forward. His legs were swept out from under him as his massive torso plummeted headlong into the grinder's open mouth.
"Got him...!"
Yu Jing's eyes widened. Half of the butcher's body was already caught in the churning gears.
But just as Yu Jing began to step back in relief—
A final, bloodied hand, writhing from the very bottom of the butcher's mangled abdomen, shot out and latched onto his arm.
The grip was inhumanly strong.
Before Yu Jing could react, he was being dragged toward the grinder.
He struggled. Pulled. Fought.
But it was no use.
From above, Jiang Tian dropped down from the shaft, sprinting with everything she had toward the grinder.
"Yu Jing!" she screamed, stretching her hand toward him, desperate.
Fingers outstretched.
So close—
They missed.
Her fingertips grazed his... and slipped past.
Yu Jing froze.
The grinding machine roared louder and louder in his ears, a metallic wail rising in pitch and pressure.
In that final moment, Yu Jing's eyes—just for a second—softened.
Peaceful.
Resolved.
Then, all that remained was the machine's terrible drone...
And the sound of bones shattering.
The incident involving the desert vegetation has been fully resolved.
The small number of offshoots that had spread to the subterranean testing zone on the outskirts of Tier-A City in District 19 were swiftly eradicated by the project's supervisor. Along the desert perimeter, not a single breach was reported—the alien organisms had been entirely eliminated.
Under the state's total media blackout, the event was covered up seamlessly. To the public, it was as if nothing had ever happened. People merely believed the military was conducting weapons tests in the desert, blissfully unaware that, had the threat not been contained, the casualties would have been catastrophic.
Some samples of the plant entities, collected by Espers during the event, were transported back to the National Central Laboratory for further research. However, many of these samples perished en route. It appeared that the core essence or origin structure of the plant had either been destroyed or severed. Once detached, these offshoots could not survive independently for long.
"How did the testing results turn out?" the supervisor asked upon returning to the research facility. "The girl with guaranteed admission goes without saying—but did anyone else score above 80?"
The four-hour evaluation had concluded by the time he arrived. The supervisor had placed high hopes on one candidate in particular—Yu Jing. But the monitor currently displaying his footage showed nothing more than the cold, spinning blades of the meat grinder.
"A pity," one staff member reported. "The berserk Butcher was a high-tier threat—fully capable of taking out standard combat personnel. That candidate managed to stay calm and drive the Butcher into the grinder... but in a brief lapse, he was dragged in himself. His final score before death was 92.3."
The staffer did his best to explain the context, but the supervisor raised a hand to cut him off.
"There's no point discussing the dead. A true warrior has no margin for error. One mistake means death. We don't waste time evaluating the fallen."
He turned his gaze toward the other results.
"What about the rest?"
"No other participant exceeded a composite score of 90," came the reply.
The supervisor's expression darkened.
"The academy term is about to begin. If District 19 fails to submit enough qualifying 'disciples,' those slots will be seized by other districts. Remove all unqualified candidates. One week from now, purge and reset the test zones. Begin recruitment again."
His eyes held no trace of pity.
Except for Yu Xiaoxiao, who passed with an exceptional score of 97.8, every other candidate across all test zones who failed to meet the threshold of 90 would be eliminated without exception.