When the cleaners arrive, the contaminants are usually long dead. This was his first time seeing a living contaminant.

He had just snuck out from work to catch his breath. No wonder he felt off today—the more he tried to relax, the more tense he became. Turns out, there was a living contaminant here.

Nancy Clark observed for a while. The fish-man only twitched. She asked a key question: “How long after death do the spores begin to emerge?”

Nathan Thompson’s mind buzzed, and he finally reacted. “Immediately. As soon as there are no vital signs, the spores emerge right away. That means it’s not dead yet!”

Nathan Thompson raised the gun he had just lowered, aiming it straight at the fish-man’s corpse. The contaminant still showed no reaction.

Not a single spore. The fish-man was dead, but not completely dead.

Nancy Clark was a total rookie—today was her very first day on the job. She’d only been happily picking cotton for half an hour before running into this mess.

Nancy Clark wanted to be a slacker, not to run into an actual “salted fish.”

Nancy Clark humbly sought advice from her senior. “What do we usually do in this situation?”

Nathan Thompson: “Wait for rescue.”

Nancy Clark: “……”

Nathan Thompson was just as frustrated. “First, the odds of this happening to us are way too low. I’ve been in this job for a year and a half and never even heard of a demon hunter missing a contaminant after sweeping the scene. Second, we’re not as skilled as the demon hunters. If we act rashly, we’ll probably die early. All the protocols say we should stay put and wait.”

“Did you send out a distress signal?” Nancy Clark asked. Even if they were waiting for rescue, someone had to know where they were.

Nathan Thompson: “I sent the signal as soon as the fish-man appeared.”

But there was no response. He thought, as the senior, he should comfort Nancy Clark. “The distress signal is out. We just need to wait patiently.”

Nathan Thompson sighed again. “It’s all my fault. If I hadn’t come out for some air, you wouldn’t have gotten dragged into this.”

Nancy Clark shot him a glance. “Don’t say pointless things.”

Saying meaningless things was a waste of time.

Nancy Clark asked, “Did you notice anything off?”

Nathan Thompson had already noticed that Nancy Clark seemed more alert than he was. She’d realized there was a contaminant a full minute before Nathan Thompson did—she was like a human radar.

When Nancy Clark brought it up, Nathan Thompson nearly jumped, thinking there was a new contaminant. He gripped his gun and asked, “What’s wrong?”

Nancy Clark: “Megan Carter still hasn’t contacted us.”

When the fish-man first appeared, Nancy Clark only heard the captain lift the weapon restriction, then Megan Carter’s voice disappeared.

Their channel was public, and as captain, Megan Carter could clearly hear what was happening on Nancy Clark’s end. When Nancy Clark and Nathan Thompson were suspecting each other of contamination, Megan Carter’s silence might have been her weighing the situation, but now there was still no word from her.

Nancy Clark asked, “Was she killed?”

Nathan Thompson’s face was hidden under his helmet, but he was deathly pale. “Worse.”

Nancy Clark frowned.

Nathan Thompson: “This means the contamination zone has already expanded. We’re in the core contamination area. Outsiders can’t get in for now. With the psychic contamination, the channel is cut off, and Megan Carter can’t reach us.”

“We’re just two trash-sweeping rookies with no equipment. The channel’s down, and we can’t receive any outside information.”

Nathan Thompson spoke rapidly, took a deep breath, and looked at Nancy Clark as he said the final words: “Nancy Clark, we’re done for.”

……

“Nancy Clark? Nathan Thompson? If you hear me, please respond!” Megan Carter was calling for them, but there was no reply.

When the gunshots rang out, Megan Carter was still containing the contaminant. At the time, she thought one of them had been psychically contaminated. When Nancy Clark drew her gun for the first time, Megan Carter didn’t think much of it.

Megan Carter still had contaminant spores left to contain. If the spores spread throughout District 103 of the city, the whole area would likely be infected.

Megan Carter knew how to prioritize. No matter what happened, the first priority was always to contain the contaminant spores. She kept listening for any movement on their end while working.

If this really was just a routine E-level contamination cleanup, everything should have been under her control. But things on their end were getting more and more chaotic, and the channel was filled with static.

At that moment, Megan Carter immediately sensed something was wrong. Her instincts told her this wasn’t just a simple E-level mission.

When Nathan Thompson said there was a contaminant, she knew things were bad. Nancy Clark might be a rookie, but Nathan Thompson was a veteran. Unfortunately, it was too late—she soon received a message from the tech department.

A once-in-a-decade stroke of bad luck had occurred: the contamination zone had been misclassified. This wasn’t an E-level area at all—it was a D-level contamination zone.

A D-level mission wasn’t hard for a demon hunter, but inside were just two trash-sweeping logistics staff. The demon hunters thought they’d finished the job and had already left.

But what they didn’t know was, if you compared the contamination zone to a devil’s lair, the demon hunters had at most cleaned up the trash at the entrance—the real lair was inside.

It would take at least half an hour for the demon hunters to return. Every extra second in the contamination zone was a risk of early death, especially since Nancy Clark was a rookie.

Megan Carter tried to contact Nancy Clark and Nathan Thompson, but no matter how she called, there was no response. She immediately guessed that the D-level contamination zone had expanded, and the psychic contamination had cut off the channel.

Megan Carter had lost contact with them.