Cave Refuge

Since there were no handcuffs to restrain their actions, a member of the Guard Squad who was proficient in joint techniques simply dislocated the limbs of those individuals.

It might seem extreme, but it was just a matter of dislocating their limbs. Under normal circumstances, as long as the joints were not left dislocated for too long, any orthopedic doctor could easily put them back into place without leaving any after-effects.

Of course, the longer the delay, the longer it would take to recover after being reset. The time taken for restoration was directly proportional to the time spent dislocated—the longer the wait, the longer the recovery period.

If these individuals had been original members of the fleet, and something like this had happened, the Guard Squad members would probably just discipline them. Someone nearby could offer a way out, and they would then readily reset the dislocated joints.

Regrettably, although there were fleet members who knew them in the crowd, they were just acquaintances, without the close connections needed to actively help plead for mercy.

Because Ye Liuyun kept sending people over to the park, the crowd there kept growing. The original ten members of the Guard Squad were completely unable to monitor every angle, but since most present were once part of the fleet, the guards easily found a few helpers to assist in monitoring the surroundings.

Zachary followed Madeline to inspect the survivors living in every area of the camp, and it was possible that if those monsters purposefully hid themselves, the chances of evading detection were high.

In anticipation of this, Madeline had already prepared. The reason he chose to inspect the camp's survivors at night was that, besides detectors, he had also acquired an infrared night-vision device. With this device, there was no escaping Madeline's eyes for any living being radiating heat.

With a thorough search, those hidden monsters within the crowd were naturally caught one by one by Madeline. Perhaps because the monsters were too weak in combat, he did not immediately execute the captured monsters, but instead controlled them and escorted them to the park.

Even though Madeline was effectively in charge of the camp, he knew the power of public opinion. So, to avoid giving others in the camp the impression of being a domineering dictator, he decided to publicly reveal the information about those monsters in front of many people in the park.

If he had publicized the existence of hidden monsters within the camp before capturing them, it might have caused panic among all the camp's survivors. However, once Madeline had captured all the monsters and announced it, the outcome would surely be the opposite.

That's why Madeline had captured the monsters alive to later execute them in public.

Although many outsiders had sought refuge in the camp, due to the pervasive threat of the monsters, after gathering all the survivors in the park, the number of survivors who remained alive amounted to just over a thousand.

While that might seem like a large population, the survivors who had managed to live until now were either like Madeline with many family members or had lost their entire families and become Lone Wolves.

Most of those survivors who had followed Madeline since the fleet era were in a situation where they had to care for the old and the young, while the monsters had a habit of sending whole families on their final journey together.

So, despite the seemingly ample numbers, the monsters had killed at least two to three hundred people, and most importantly, many of these were elders who had followed Madeline since the flood disaster.

Looking at the remaining population of just over a thousand, Madeline let out a helpless sigh before finally revealing the infiltration of monsters into the camp.

Upon hearing the news announced by Ye Liuyun and seeing the survivors at his feet, bound up like caterpillars, everyone immediately understood the meaning behind Ye Liuyun's words.

Everyone wasn't foolish; although they highly trusted Ye Liuyun, when faced with the situation before their eyes, despite their suspicions, they found it hard to voice their doubts.

Seeing the expressions of the people opposite him, Ye Liuyun didn't say much more. Picking up one of the monsters that were tightly bound, he didn't waste words; he merely slit the creature's throat with his knife, and a thin, sharp spike immediately slid out from the monster's throat.

Seeing something resembling the joint of an arthropod slide out from the throat, everyone was utterly convinced by Ye Liuyun's earlier statement.

Although the people present had been convinced, Ye Liuyun didn't stop there. Instead, he picked up another monster from the ground. He slit the creature's throat using the same method, and after the object hidden within the monster's throat fell out, Ye Liuyun continued to repeat his previous actions.

At first, people didn't understand why Ye Liuyun was so eager to kill, but as they watched more, their initial shock turned to calmness, and some even began to feel bored, curiously betting on how many monsters Ye Liuyun would kill in front of them.

Since there were only a few bound monsters beneath Ye Liuyun's feet in the beginning, everyone thought that the affair would end once Ye Liuyun finished killing the monsters at his feet.

However, to everyone's surprise, after Ye Liuyun had personally killed all the monsters at his feet, members of the Guard Squad were seen bringing more bound monsters from not far away.

After Ye Liuyun killed the last monster at his feet, he didn't personally continue with the executions. Instead, he chose a member of the Guard Squad to carry on with the task.

Perhaps because the Executioner had been replaced, and although Ye Liuyun hadn't left but merely stood by watching, the previously tense atmosphere gradually relaxed due to overexposure, leading some people to begin whispering conversations with those around them.

After the tenth monster was beheaded, the atmosphere among the crowd gradually improved. When the twentieth monster was publicly executed, the mood in the crowd seemed to reach its climax. However, when someone noticed that members of the Guard Squad were bringing a third batch of monsters, there was a growing unease within.

As the fourth batch of monsters appeared, all faces on-site slowly turned grim. Some people, sensing something amiss with the surrounding atmosphere, though not knowing what was happening, chose not to directly ask their companions. They calmed down and continued to observe the Guard Squad member who had temporarily stepped into the role of the Executioner.

As the Guard Squad members continued to deliver the monsters captured by Ye Liuyun and his team, the initially confused survivors inevitably began to feel uneasy — a feeling that intensified with the increasing number of monsters being brought over by the Guard Squad.

When the count of monsters brought by the Guard Squad no longer summed up to a round number in the tens, the clever ones realized that the night's execution action would likely come to an end soon.

Even so, glancing at the hundreds of monster corpses strewn across the ground, the survivors instantly reflected on their fortune of living among these monsters without being eaten by them.

When the last monster was executed, Ye Liuyun, standing to the side, finally spoke aloud, "From this moment on, the camp is in lockdown mode. Anyone wishing to leave must submit a request in advance. Otherwise, for the safety of the majority within the camp, no one may enter or leave for a short period."

Hearing the order issued by Ye Liuyun and seeing the corpses of monsters everywhere, no one could think of any reason to refuse.