Supporting Li Ban, Nana said indignantly, "Luca, I told you, I'm willing to give him half my rations!"
The bald Luca glared at her. "Sure, you can give him half your food. And then when the Mechanical Dogs show up, instead of fighting, you'll just hide behind the other warriors like a spineless coward."
Nana opened her mouth but couldn't find the words.
"That's not how it works, Luca." An older woman stood beside Nana.
Judging by her voice, it was the woman named Ah She.
"If this man recovers his mobility, he'll be another source of labor."
The bald man hefted the massive, nearly two-meter-long multi-barrel cannon in his left hand. "Look at those scrawny arms and legs. What kind of labor is he good for? Labor in bed?"
Li Ban slowly leaned away from his support, using his core strength to sit up.
He couldn't speak the local language yet, but he wasn't about to just sit there and let two women argue on his behalf.
He slowly raised his hand and aimed a finger gun at the bald man.
Nana and the others didn't notice, but Luca, facing Li Ban directly, saw it clearly.
The bald man narrowed his eyes, entirely unfazed by Li Ban's gesture.
Or perhaps he didn't even understand what it meant.
Just as Li Ban was about to hit him with a Mental Piercing to teach him who the real inferior labor was, a few bizarre barks suddenly cut their argument short.
"Woof! Woof!"
The sounds were loud and rhythmic, laced with mechanical static.
Li Ban watched the bald man's expression instantly change. Luca stopped paying attention to him, raising his massive multi-barrel cannon and aiming it in several directions behind Li Ban.
Nana immediately hoisted Li Ban onto her back, drawing a short gun from her thigh in the same breath as she went on high alert.
"Careful. The Mechanical Dogs won't necessarily come from where the sound is," Luca warned the group.
The moment they heard the barking, everyone clustered together, each person covering a different direction.
Carried on Nana's back once more, Li Ban finally got a clear look at their surroundings.
It looked like a massive wasteland, but instead of just sand and dirt, the ground was littered with towering piles of garbage.
Moreover, this garbage consisted mostly of various metal frames; there was hardly any everyday household trash in sight.
The mechanized barking was coming from behind a trash heap directly in front of him.
Underneath him, Nana was trembling slightly. He couldn't tell if she was struggling under his weight or just terrified.
At first, the barking came only from the front, but soon it echoed from all sides.
The group didn't even know which way to run.
Li Ban rolled his neck and scanned their surroundings.
He had to rely on his past combat experience to pinpoint the source of the barking.
Except these sounds were strange—too identical.
It was like a recording being played back from different locations.
'Could they all be traps?' Li Ban thought.
Suddenly, he shifted his barely movable hand and tapped Nana on the shoulder.
Nana jumped, nearly pulling her trigger.
Li Ban then pointed at the ground.
"Underground?" Nana repeated.
Her voice wasn't quiet. The others heard it and assumed she was warning them.
"Underground?"
The people near her immediately looked down.
Almost at that exact moment, several spots on the ground beneath them caved in.
One of those sinkholes opened right beneath Nana's feet.
Her foot plunged into the dirt.
A sharp clack rang out as a maw full of razor-sharp teeth viciously clamped shut around her left ankle.
But instead of teeth tearing into flesh, there was only the grating screech of metal striking metal.
From his angle, Li Ban could just barely see a mechanical prosthetic leg exposed beneath her torn pants.
The beast had bitten right into her prosthetic. It didn't hurt, but her flesh-and-blood right leg lacked the strength to pull her trapped left leg out of the pit.
As she pitched sideways, she lost her grip on him.
Li Ban's body slid right off Nana's shoulders.
Gunfire and shouts were already erupting all around them.
"Watch out!" Ah She screamed from the side.
The teeth gripping Nana's mechanical leg released their target, snapping open again as they lunged toward the falling Li Ban.
Li Ban couldn't turn his head to see the danger behind him, but one look at Ah She's eyes told him an enemy was closing in on his back.
He immediately fired a Mental Piercing backward.
However, there was no feedback indicating it had hit anyone.
An instant later, blinding agony flared from the right side of his lower back.
Li Ban felt himself crash onto something rock-hard before the sharp teeth clamped deeper into his flesh.
It hurt, but he could tolerate it.
He didn't rush to exit the Shadow World. Instead, using what little strength he had left, he pushed off the mass behind him and rolled onto the ground.
The teeth in his back didn't let go; they naturally twisted a half-circle right along with him.
Through that rolling turn, Li Ban finally got a clear look at their attacker.
A Mechanical Dog. It truly was a canine robot built entirely out of machinery.
The jaws clamped onto him resembled the long, narrow maw of a crocodile.
Looking at the structural design of its head, it appeared capable of a full three-hundred-and-sixty-degree rotation—meaning it could effortlessly replicate a real crocodile's death roll at any second.
But right now, the only element Li Ban could use was "Flute Sound," which seemed completely useless against a machine.
"Don't move!"
Nana's voice rang out.
Because Li Ban had drawn the Mechanical Dog's attack, Nana was able to break free.
She spun around and immediately saw Li Ban trapped in the dog's jaws. Her heart ached terribly at the sight.
So much blood was spilling out—what a waste!
She raised her gun, aiming right at the Mechanical Dog.
"Bang! Bang!"
Two shots rang out. The bullets struck the Mechanical Dog's body and hind leg, only to be ruthlessly deflected by its solid metal frame.
"Aim for the brain chip and the spinal wiring!"
Someone shouted from the side.
Nana's voice cracked with tears. "I'm afraid of hitting him!"
Her cry drew the attention of the bald Luca, who was busy protecting the old man in the chair. Seeing Li Ban pinned to the dirt without any ability to fight back, Luca narrowed his eyes once more.
'This team has enough dead weight as it is,' he thought, before ruthlessly swinging his gun barrel around to aim squarely at both Li Ban and the Mechanical Dog.
His weapon possessed extreme firepower. If he pulled the trigger, it would definitely shatter the dog's skull—but it would also blast Li Ban's stomach apart, blowing him clean in two.
Since Li Ban was facing Nana, he naturally caught Luca's subtle shift in aim.
His heart sank. Just as he considered backing out of the Shadow World, a sudden, throbbing pain pierced his brain.
Without knowing why, Li Ban instinctively tried circulating his spiritual rhinoceros.
A split second later, he heard the system's voice.
[Discovered superior creation-type element "Virus". Initiate fusion?]
'Why would the "Virus" element appear on me?' Li Ban couldn't figure it out, but he had no time to dwell on it.
Back in the Ring World, the system had never once prompted him that the "Virus" element could be fused.
Which meant that back then, he had never truly grasped the element at all.
Yet now, the system was giving him the prompt.
Which meant—
'Fuse!' Li Ban roared in his mind.
—It could be fused!
[Fusing "Virus" element. Acquired ability "Infinite Replication".]
Li Ban had no time to study what "Infinite Replication" actually did. He immediately unleashed the ability right at the Mechanical Dog biting into his back.
The next second, the Mechanical Dog, which had been locked onto him with a death grip, froze entirely.
Its glowing blue eyes suddenly went pitch-black, a massive stream of data symbols seemingly cascading rapidly through them.
Both Nana, who was still taking aim, and Luca, who was waiting for the perfect shot, noticed the machine's bizarre behavior.
Li Ban vaguely understood what had just happened to the Mechanical Dog. He let out a sigh of relief and, gritting his teeth against the pain, reached down to pry apart the jaws still clamped onto his waist.
But he still hadn't recovered his strength. No matter how hard he pulled with one hand, the teeth wouldn't budge.
He looked up, saw Nana still frozen in place, and called out helplessly, "Nana!"
Thankfully, her name was easy to pronounce; he was able to mimic it perfectly after hearing it just once.
Snapping back to reality at the sound of her name, Nana hurried over and crouched down to help him pry the mechanical jaws open.
In the distance, Luca could no longer fire with Nana in the way. He shifted his muzzle again, blasting a shot at another Mechanical Dog that was about to pounce on a comrade.
His movements the entire time had been incredibly subtle. In the heat of such a chaotic skirmish, no one normally would have noticed.
Except, apart from Li Ban, someone else had seen his intentions.
"That man is rather special. Luca, leave him be for now."
The voice belonged to the old man who had been sitting quietly in the mechanical chair this whole time.
His expression was peaceful and serene. Though he sat right in the middle of a battlefield, he looked as relaxed as if he were resting on his own sofa at home.
Luca quickly backed up against the chair and murmured to the old man, "Priest, that man really is a bit strange. For the Mechanical Dog to not kill him... could he be a lapdog for Trash City?"
The old man slowly shook his head, paying no mind to the fact that Luca's position meant he couldn't even see the gesture.
"No, the Mechanical Dog didn't release him on its own. It was attacked by him."
Luca stiffened. "Attacked? But I didn't see him make a single move."
The Priest stared at Li Ban. "Yes. He is using a Priest's spellcraft. Luca, Nana and the others might have just picked up a Priest."
Shocked, Luca couldn't help but look back at the old man.
The elder offered a slow nod, confirming that what Luca had just heard wasn't an illusion.
The Priest spoke again. "Go help him, Luca. If he joins Ashes, perhaps you all will have a new Priest to protect you after I die."
Luca raised his gun, his expression resolute. "Even if the Alliance gets another Priest in the future, you will always be our leader."
With that, he charged into the fray.
Though he still didn't approve of Li Ban, he would never disobey the Priest's orders.
Just as Nana finally managed to rescue Li Ban's waist from the Mechanical Dog's jaws, another hound suddenly broke away from its original battle and bolted straight toward them.
"Watch out!" someone shouted in warning from across the field.
Nana instantly spun around and fired.
Unburdened by a "hostage," she fired rapidly, though her shots still failed to strike the Mechanical Dog's vital points.
The hounds moved incredibly fast and could anticipate and dodge. The targets for the brain chip and spine were tiny, making it nearly impossible for an average marksman to hit them in a split second.
Most had to rely on firing massive amounts of lead and hoping for the best.
Just as the Mechanical Dog leaped high into the air to pounce, it was abruptly shredded by a hail of bullets, its entire body disintegrating mid-flight.
The severed head flew right in front of Li Ban, and he raised his hand, snatching it right out of the air.