The Decaying Dream of America: I Assemble Corpses and Confront Madness

The icy sewage poured into Lin Zheng's shoes, reaching above his ankles.

The clothes were instantly soaked, and a chill ran from the soles of my feet straight to my heart and lungs, but it was nothing compared to the agonizing pain in my heart.

A thin, bony arm gripped his arm like an iron clamp, dragging him roughly toward the dark waterway behind the camp.

Each step was treading on pools of blood and mud, the heavy footsteps mingling with splashes of water, echoing through the narrow passage.

The sound of gunfire was continuous, low but dense, and the muffled groans and heavy thuds of objects falling to the ground could be clearly heard throughout the camp.

Lin Zheng struggled to turn around, his neck veins bulging from the effort, as he tried to see everything behind him.

Mayor Oakes, along with the cane he held aloft, vanished without a trace.

Firelight flickered deep within the camp, outlining the ghostly silhouettes of the "Cleansing Squad".

They wore sophisticated masks that filtered out the polluted underground air, isolating them from humanity.

The optical eyepiece, illuminated by the firelight, gleamed with a cold light, like the eyes of a predator, scanning every moving creature.

These companies' elites move with precision and efficiency; every time they raise a gun and pull the trigger, it is the result of hundreds or thousands of training sessions.

This is a massacre.

Each person's fall was accompanied by a low thud and splattering blood. Those faces that had once been illuminated by the campfire and shared food and water with Lin Zheng were now spreading into shocking dark red patches on the ground.

Those voices loudly announcing their names, those frail figures carrying screwdrivers, kitchen knives, and broken iron pipes, resolutely rushing towards the muzzle of a gun—all these images were frozen in time and imprinted on his retina.

They used their own flesh and blood to build a temporary defensive line, just so that Lin Zheng could escape from here.

With his last glance back, he searched for Mayor Oakes in the crowd.

The arm that had been supporting his suddenly lost its strength and fell silently to the ground. A dark liquid quickly seeped onto his companion's body and spread.

However, he still mustered his last bit of strength and shouted hoarsely, his blood-stained cries reaching Lin Zheng's ears—

"Run!!!"

Lin Zheng lost his balance and stumbled into the waterway.

The murky sewage instantly submerged his head, and the stench assaulted his mouth and nose.

He choked a few times and instinctively struggled, paddling with his hands and feet in the rushing water.

The power of the water flow is beyond imagination; it carries garbage, filth, and some indescribable viscous substances washed down from the upper levels of the city.

They carried him into the darkness, dragging him away from the blood-red purgatory of the camp.

The last thing Mayor Oakes saw before he was swept away by the undercurrent was those upright, tiny, heroic figures as he fell.

He experienced the baptism of filth and despair amidst the ups and downs.

In the underground river, Lin Zheng struggled against the surging water and battled his heart, which was soaked in blood.

"James Smith, Emily Jason, Michael Williams, Liam Davis, Charlie Taylor, River Jackson, Keiros Knight, William Mike"...

Each name became an invisible chain binding his soul.

The river was swift and icy cold, but it could not extinguish the anger burning within him.

In the cold, ever-expanding darkness of the sewer, Lin Zheng gradually stopped struggling and let the water flow at his mercy.

He had lost track of how long he had been drifting; time seemed to have lost its meaning here, with only eternal darkness and the endless sound of water.

He was immersed in a filthy underground river, filled with a nauseating stench, a putrid smell, and unknown slime; he was tainted by the world's malice.

"If you eat, you have to return the bowl."

This sentence embodies the last vestige of human dignity that they defended with their lives.

They risked their lives to repay the debt owed to him, a stranger in a foreign land.

Lin Zheng's body floated numbly in the water, but his consciousness began to enter a strange realm.

At that moment, he sensed countless distorted phantoms lurking in the surrounding environment.

He could feel the flesh and blood of the city pulsating in the darkness.

The occasional heavy thuds coming from deep within the sewers are the city's deepest digestive system writhing, processing the excrement neglected and forgotten by mainstream society.

Something indescribable flows into this vast underground system through underground waterways.

At the level of urban exploitation, any group that attempts to seek refuge cannot escape the fate of being "eliminated".

This is not only a biological cleansing, but also a physical erasure, as if they had never existed.

Lin Zheng closed his eyes, letting the sewage wash over him. The faces of the dead "mouse men" emerged both blurry and clear underwater.

These images clashed sharply with the lies of the "American Dream" he had learned about.

The propaganda for the "American Dream" portrays a glamorous picture: skyscrapers, the Charging Bull of Wall Street, and lush green lawns in suburban villas.

But the real "American Dream" is a massive, bloody machine that crushes countless hopes and uses countless souls as fuel to maintain a false, crumbling illusion.

The "mouse men" are the undercurrent beneath this dream, the residue spat out by the machine.

They proved with their lives that some things are more important than mere survival.

Faced with utter despair, reason and emotion lose their original color, leaving only black and white.

His fear hadn't disappeared, but its nature had changed.

He was no longer just afraid of death, afraid of assimilation, afraid of losing his mind.

What terrified him even more was that if he died, no one would remember the sacrifices of these "mole people," and no one would know why they died.

This world will continue to devour and forget, until all injustices sink to the deepest bottom of the water.

His hands were stained with the blood of the dead, soaked with the sacrifices of the living, and baptized by the filth of the entire city.

The undercurrent carried him through a narrow crevice, where the water gradually calmed down.

Lin Zheng's fingers touched the rough stone wall, and he used his last bit of strength to grab it.

He struggled, poking his head above the water, gasping for breath.

His legs landed on a narrow bank, wet and cold, but at least on solid ground.

Lin Zheng struggled to his feet and slowly and laboriously climbed ashore.

He lay on the muddy bank, coughing and vomiting up acidic fluid mixed with sewage from his stomach.

He was exhausted, but his eyes were wide open at that moment.

In the dark underground space, only a faint light from afar pierced through, outlining a blurry shape.

He slowly turned his head and looked back at the path he had come from. There was darkness, there was blood, there was the beginning of his soul being completely torn apart.

His eyes held no fear or despair, only the calm of the abyss and a chilling killing intent.

Stop killing with killing, stop war with war!