The robed figure was a man in his early thirties. Facial scarring. Voice with a slight rasp to it.

Shen Cong levelled the QJY-88 at him and responded without warmth: “Who are you?”

“You can call me Chieftain.” The man immediately started walking toward Vajra, apparently encouraged by the response. “Wow — a normal person, out here. That’s something. Friend, what do I call you?”

“What are you?”

“Me?” The man kept walking, speaking as he went. “Before the end of the world, I was a walking corpse without any reason to exist. After — I’m the great chieftain of a tribe. A prophet who guides the fallen beastmen toward the light through love. Friend, I can see you’re also a person — have you found your reason to exist?”

Reason to exist. ‘Beastmen.’ Someone’s logged too many hours in World of Warcraft.

Shen Cong filed this person under “mentally unwell” and addressed the immediate concern: “You’ve come twenty metres. Stop there. Don’t come closer, or whatever happens is on you.”

Optimal distance from unhinged strangers: maintained.

“Friend, refusing to embrace is a symptom of insufficient love. We should lower our guards and have a genuine conversation.” The man spread his hands in an open gesture. “The apocalypse has already come. Whether human or beastman, everyone should set aside old conflicts and cooperate. Only together can we face the threat of heaven’s wrath. Isn’t that right?”

Reasonable enough, if you edited out the word “beastman.”

Shen Cong looked at him carefully. No visible mutation. No physical distortion. Either an ordinary person or a very subtle evolved one.

“I said don’t come closer. I won’t repeat it a third time.”

“Friend, that phrasing concerns me.” The man stopped, adopting an expression of patient diplomacy. “Let me try this: I, in the name of the Great Chieftain of the Beastmen, hereby declare a covenant of friendship between beastmen and humanity. Does that help lower your guard? Still no? My friend, this is making things very difficult for me. I’ve been working very hard to engage with humanity through love.”

Shen Cong said nothing. The man might genuinely be unstable, or this might be a performance designed to get him to lower his guard. The calculation was the same either way — maintain alertness. He’d seen that particular play before: present as harmless, eccentric, manageable; let the target relax; act.

He kept the machine gun trained and asked the question he actually wanted answered: “You’re enslaving half-beasts.”

“Enslaving?” The man’s expression shifted to theatrical outrage. “No, no, no, no, my friend. This is a colossal misunderstanding. They are beastmen, not half-beasts. Half-beasts are dirty, lazy trash. Beastmen are a noble race, equal to humanity. I am their chieftain, their prophet. How could I enslave beings I love?”

“Chains. A whip. That’s love?”

“This is beastmen tradition, friend. Deep love expresses itself through demanding standards. When beastmen pass through the Dark Portal, they sustain cognitive damage. I must use unconventional methods to tame the wildness and restore them to their true nature.”

Shen Cong said, flatly: “There’s a half-beast corpse near your feet. I killed it.”

The man immediately adopted a mournful expression. “Their souls return to the beloved homeland of Draenor. Do not grieve, do not be confused, my friend — this is the destiny of the beastmen.”

Shen Cong’s mouth moved slightly. “Stop performing. How did you survive out here? How did you get control of the half-beasts?”

“My friend, I must repeat: they are beastmen, not half-beasts. ‘Half-beast’ is an insult to our people. Please retract it.”

The conversation had arrived at a wall.

Shen Cong fired twice. Stone chips flew near the man’s feet.

“You’re a beastman? Show me the green skin.”

The man flinched hard and immediately shouted: “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot! I come in love!”

Two more shots.

“Say ‘beastman’ one more time.”

“All right, all right, all right — don’t shoot — I’m not a beastman, I’m not a beastman—!” The man threw both hands over his head and crouched.

Much better.

Shen Cong rested the machine gun barrel on the window frame. “Now. Tell me what you’ve been through, and what you actually want. Start talking.”

The man deflated visibly. “You win. I’m not any kind of chieftain.” He straightened up, shoulders dropping. “My name is Sun Laiqun. I’m from near here. After the disaster, I was the only one who survived in the area. The outside was full of enormous beetles — I was lucky to be living on the lake island. The beetles couldn’t cross the water. Occasionally one made it over. I killed them and ate them.”

Giant Stag beetles. Had to be.

“Then one day, someone came. I thought — finally, another person. Turned out he wanted to bite me. I kicked him into the water and chained him up when I pulled him out. That was when I realised he wasn’t a person exactly.” He paused. “After that, more came. More and more. I kept wondering if it was some kind of monster invasion.”

He sat down on the ground abruptly, seemingly absorbed in his own recollection.

“Because there wasn’t anyone else, and the beetles were out there, I couldn’t go far. I was stuck on the island. But gradually I figured out — these creatures had some awareness. So I started training them. Getting them to follow commands. And they did, eventually.”

His energy began returning. “I really am meant to be a chieftain. I’m the only one who can lead them toward something better. Give me a beastman army and I’ll bring peace to this disaster — I’ll make a world full of love, where humans and beastm—”

“Did you mutate?” Shen Cong cut across him.

“What mutation? I’m human, not a monster.”

Shen Cong noted this internally. No visible mutation, physical capability within normal human range, no evolved-person indicators. Probably an ordinary person.

But an ordinary person who had organised half-beasts into a functioning unit, directed them in repeated coordinated approaches against Vajra, and maintained that pressure across multiple exchanges without escalating to all-in assault. That was tactically competent behaviour. It didn’t fit the rest of the presentation.

The man was still talking. Beastmen, love, prophet, guiding them through the darkness. The full performance had resumed.

Shen Cong ignored the content and asked what he wanted to know: “How many half-beasts are on the island?”

“Many, many — beastmen are endless, you’ll find them in every—”

Two shots at the ground.

“—nine dead, seven remaining. Our tribe has seventeen beastmen total!”

“Did you see a vehicle convoy fighting in this area? Did you hear explosions?”

“I remember only the great mage battling the Lich Kin—”

Two shots.

“—I didn’t see anything. I heard explosions. There were a lot of beetles at the time, I didn’t go out.”

Another dozen rounds wasted total. Sun Laiqun had exhausted his useful information. Shen Cong was preparing his final question when the man suddenly lurched to his feet and pointed directly at the cab window.

“Where is my son?!” His voice had changed completely — raw, sudden, all performance stripped away. “What did you do with my son?!“

(End of Chapter 121)