Chapter Five: Want to Shake This World

"Oww..."
Huang Xu's incessant groans echoed through the cramped stairwell. Trapped in a double torment, he both longed to reach around and pull the shards of lightbulb embedded in his back, and to clutch his feet, which had been crushed out of all shape.
Yet, whether he tried one or the other, this utterly ordinary building security guard found himself incapable of doing either.
"Hang in there, Brother Huang..." Qi Chen braced himself against the ground and slowly rose to his feet. Now he too felt the pain that had first assaulted Huang Xu: those blood-red high heels gripped his feet like a vice, every inch of skin on his soles under excruciating pressure.
Most of all, his toes—under that twisting force, it was nothing short of torture.
Yet, strangely, despite the persistent, bone-deep agony, Qi Chen found his mind and will growing ever clearer. The rough, primal roar in his head only grew louder, bit by bit.
"Here, let me help you." Brow furrowed tightly, Qi Chen staggered upright. An icy sensation seemed to snake through his arms, his aching muscles filling, bizarrely, with strength once more.
He would not, could not, surrender before the very end.
"Another pair of these cursed high heels..."
The sharp downturn in their fortunes was all due to these new high heels, which had appeared out of nowhere!
The pair on Qi Chen's feet was noticeably different in style from Huang Xu's, slightly larger in size; for now, the impact on his mobility was still bearable.
"Could it be all the victims were turned into these monstrosities? Each pair of shoes representing a victim?"
His head was clear as crystal. Unwilling to give in, Qi Chen racked his brain for a way to escape this deathtrap of a building.
But just as the thought of evading the uncanny beings surfaced in his mind, a wild, thunderous roar exploded by his ear, making his very soul tremble!
"Damn... not again..." Qi Chen's face twisted in pain as a splitting headache seized him. Suppressing the unspeakable irritation welling up inside, he dashed to Huang Xu's side and hauled him to his feet.
"Just go... kid..." Huang Xu, his awareness already clouding, murmured weakly. In the pitch-black corridor, every voice-activated light blown out, the world in the security guard's eyes was nothing but a blurry haze.
In his vision, Qi Chen seemed to have grown taller and more imposing.
"Shut up. Do as I say."
A nameless fury blazed hotter in Qi Chen's heart, a voice within growing ever clearer, shaking his original plan—to escape down the stairs and out of the building.
Now, in his agitation, he wanted nothing more than to smash everything around him to pieces!
Bang!
With a kick, he blasted open the emergency exit door in the stairwell, suddenly acting as if he no longer cared about the uncanny presences lurking within the building.

After gently laying the weakened Huang Xu in a corner, Qi Chen—his powerful night vision of unknown origin guiding him—grabbed a nearby chair.
Bang! Bang!
"Stop screaming! Stop screaming!" He gripped the chair legs with white-knuckled hands, swinging the plastic chair wildly, hammering it against the walls and floor. The clattering, crashing sounds rang through the entire floor.
Soon, the sharp clack of high heels echoed from all directions, as if answering his challenge.
"What am I doing?" Qi Chen's hands froze mid-swing. He glanced down at the battered, shattered chair in his grip, feeling a sudden awkwardness and alarm.
But the approaching chorus of footsteps quickly reignited his urge to destroy.
The voice in his heart rang out—
"Smash them! Break them!"
Just then, the familiar white-clad apparition burst into view!
A chilling gaze, cutting across a dozen meters of shadow and obstacles, locked onto Qi Chen. Fear welled up inside him, yet his fists tightened of their own accord.
He wanted to drop everything and run—but for some reason, his body thrummed with exhilaration.
A shrill, piercing scream split the air as the white-clad phantom shot toward him. Chairs and tables in its path offered no resistance; it passed through them as though through mist!
Blood-red eyes gleamed amid wild, tangled black hair; hatred and murderous intent twisted together, spilling from its sockets as twin streaks of black tears!
"Roar!"
A thunderous bellow crashed through Qi Chen's mind, and he found himself unable to resist roaring back!
"Get lost!"
A grayish-white shadow erupted from Qi Chen's body, muscles tensed to a startling degree, fists the size of stew pots swinging straight for the onrushing apparition!
Boom!
The vengeful phantom shrieked, retreating with a piercing wail.
Qi Chen panted, his mouth open and chest heaving, but his eyes stayed locked on the gray-white specter before him. At last, he could closely examine this being that seemed so intimately connected to himself.
Nearly two meters tall, its bare torso rippled with defined, powerful muscles, black hair tumbling wildly down its back.
From behind, it radiated a sense of unwavering reliability.

Whoosh—
Suddenly, the gray-white figure turned, its face coming into view.
It was not a human visage, but a mask—white as bone, with thick black ink painted around the eyes and mouth, like a weeping face, yet exuding a transcendent, overwhelming might.
Wasn’t this the mask of the Conqueror from his past life?!
Tap tap!
A sudden sharp sound made Qi Chen tense. The gray-white apparition he had repelled moments ago lifted its head, glaring at him with venomous malice.
Worse yet, the crisp clack of heels drew nearer, gathering around the white-clad phantom. More blood-red high heels appeared.
A quick count—exactly matching the number of victims Huang Xu had mentioned!
The temperature across the floor plummeted. From each pair of blood-red heels, new white-clad phantoms grew and joined the first, their crimson eyes fixing on Qi Chen.
"A crowd, now..." With the gray-white figure revealed, Qi Chen’s agitation quickly dissipated. But with so many uncanny beings staring him down, primal human instinct sent a chill through his bones. He shifted his feet, desperate to dash to Huang Xu and drag him away.
On the other side, an unexpected scene unfolded.
As they glared at Qi Chen, the phantoms moved toward one another, their forms slowly merging. One by one, the human-shaped figures melded into a massive, many-legged spheroid.
At the sphere’s center, something writhed. In moments, a twisted man’s face poked out, eyes brimming with filth, a crimson tongue lolling grotesquely from his mouth.
"Is that the killer?!" Qi Chen guessed, shuddering as the freezing air pressed in.
Whoosh!
The gray-white specter born of him lunged at the monstrous entity, its roar shaking the building!
But after only five meters, the gray-white figure abruptly halted, then slowly turned its mask of sovereign authority toward Qi Chen.
"Is this thing... urging me forward?"
......