Chapter 159: Saving The Next One Is Good Too
The roar of the car engine and the hissing of the zombies approached simultaneously.
Leading the charge was a heavy modular personnel carrier, about 7.8 meters long, three meters wide, weighing 18 tons, with two half zombie corpses hanging on the front, looking just like a rampaging tank.
Relying on its armor capable of omnidirectional defense against 7.62 armor-piercing rounds, it forcefully carved a bloody path through the zombie horde!
“Xiao Ba, Su Huan is on that personnel carrier ahead!”
Yu Yue’s voice appeared in his ear.
The youth’s heart tightened, his pale fingertips swiped through the air, and the steel frame of a cooling tower in the distance suddenly collapsed, intercepting all the zombies surging out from the side street.
“Watch out overhead!”
Lin Jin’s warning rang out alongside the sound of something slicing through the air.
Overhead, the mutated birds and beasts chasing the forefront of the zombie tide grew more numerous, spotting Lin Jin and the others, they screeched and dove down.
“Clang clang…”
Over a dozen steel bars flew out, viciously embedding into the wall in front of them around the two’s position, forming a simple set of steps.
Xiao Ba supported himself with both hands on the wheelchair and stood up, manipulating the exoskeleton, step by step walking up onto the steel barrier.
Steel interlaced above the youth’s head, forming indestructible cages.
Lin Jin’s flames precisely poured into the eye sockets of the mutated birds and beasts through the gaps in the metal grid, the raging blaze instantly igniting their feathers.
Amid shrill wails, the two’s abilities cooperated with each other, tearing through the beast horde, forming a narrow path of death that extended straight up to the high wall.
Meanwhile, the metal barrier underfoot did not stop building; Xiao Ba applied all the fortifications knowledge he had learned from He Jie.
Shock absorption, pressure resistance, stability, impact resistance…
Clanging metal sounds rang out incessantly.
Xiao Ba completed his most complex ability manipulation to date, extracting the steel beam structure of an entire machine repair factory building, constructing a metal dam to block the zombie tide.
Lin Jin understandingly leaped onto the metal barrier, releasing flames straight ahead.
The blazing flames swept out in a fan shape, scorching the zombies pouncing on the personnel carrier into charred remains, the outer armor only slightly heating up.
“How is Su Huan?”
Xiao Ba worriedly asked, looking at the zombie tide chasing the vehicle below.
Yu Yue: “He used the gene primordial agent and is now in a coma. There’s one person who might know his condition; I’ll connect you to him.”
Director Xu, who was dejectedly sitting in the personnel carrier, heard a three-dimensional world constructed from sound gradually emerge in his ear, shock appearing in his eyes.
‘The armored train’s sound manipulator can achieve this level of shared sound field; it’s terrifying.’
‘Looks like using a vacuum barrier against her back then was the right idea…’
‘Otherwise, there would be no chance of victory at all.’
A slightly immature youth’s voice came through; Director Xu “looked” along the sound and “saw” Xiao Ba standing on the metal barrier, metal frames forming a cage, the youth standing in the midst of flames, mutated beasts charging one after another.
Everything was vividly real, though the colors mentally supplemented were faint, close to black and white.
Director Xu glanced back at Su Huan and said with a complex expression, “He previously fell into gene collapse, which is an irreversible breakdown, but just now he used the gene primordial agent again, putting his body into gene evolution, which is also an irreversible generation. He’s now like a paradox; I don’t know if he’ll become a Tier 2 butcher or a gene primordium.”
“Where is my sister?”
Lin Jin’s slightly anxious voice rang out.
Director Xu was stunned for a moment, subconsciously looking toward the only woman in the carriage, the gene primordium Lin Xi. “Your sister?”
“Bro, I’m in the vehicle too; I’m very safe.”
Lin Xi, sitting in the corner, suddenly spoke up in response.
“Good! Hurry over; leave this place to us!” Lin Jin excitedly said.
Hearing his sister’s voice made him sound much more spirited.
The metal barrier opened a gateway; the off-road vehicle roared through. A night demon charging from the side “bang” collided with the metal wall, howling as it got up, wanting to drill through to continue the chase, but over a dozen steel spikes instantly dropped from the wall, all from a height of over ten meters. Using inertia, they easily pierced the night demon’s tough flesh and blood, pinning it viciously to the ground.
The Tier 1 night demon waved its sharp claws, struggling to chop through one metal spike after another, but more and more steel spikes fell, soon turning it into a whimpering porcupine.
Its scarlet eyes stared straight upward, but its head was fixed by a steel spike, its neck twisted.
Four or five survivor vehicles followed closely behind the off-road vehicle through, more zombies blocked by the metal barrier.
Xiao Ba initially tried to kill them, but after all, he hadn’t reached Tier 1; his skill mobilization speed and intensity were far inferior to Lin Jin’s, wasting much time just to kill one Tier 1 night demon.
Later, he only blocked the zombies, leaving the killing to Lin Jin.
Finally, the pickup truck carrying Liang Kuan and He Jie rushed through the metal barrier, the temporarily opened city gate slamming shut.
“I’ll go up and check on Xiao Ba.”
Liang Kuan instructed He Jie from the truck bed, tossed his shield to the top of the wall, then crouched and jumped from standstill.
“Bang!”
The rampaging pickup truck staggered slightly, but the burly figure had already leaped to a height of four or five meters, stepping on the metal steps left by Xiao Ba, jumping again to reach the top of the wall. He yanked out the metal shield embedded in the wall and looked down.
The chasing zombies smashed their heads bloody against the iron wall.
The wall trembled violently but withstood the first wave of impact.
Lin Jin’s flames turned the metal wall into a fire wall, madly burning any zombies and mutated beasts daring to climb.
Whether ordinary zombies at the wall base serving as foundation stones, or Tier 1 zombies like night demons and jumpers, any that dared to climb the city wall would have their limbs instantly burned off.
This was Lin Jin’s flame.
Nothing special about it; it just burned fiercely.
But the high-intensity ability use caused huge consumption for Xiao Ba and Lin Jin, especially Lin Jin, whose complexion was now two shades whiter than Xiao Ba’s.
Mutated beasts glared covetously around at the zombies impacting the flames, and farther away, the terrifying zombie tide was surging and spreading.
“Everyone’s through; withdraw quickly.”
Liang Kuan said gruffly.
Lin Jin breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing this, gradually cutting off the energy maintenance; the flames on the wall quickly extinguished, disappearing as fast as they had burned fiercely before.
Leaving only the reddened metal wall and the smell of scorched protein.
Suddenly, a wave of dizziness swept over his heart; this was also his first time expanding “high-temperature barrier” to such an area.
“Good.”
Just as the three prepared to withdraw, vehicle sounds came again from behind the wall.
Xiao Ba and the others puzzledly turned their heads.
Only to see survivors in twos and threes driving various vehicles, fleeing wretchedly from streets on all sides, each vehicle covered with crazily tearing mutated beasts and zombies.
The entire Steel Council, excluding the fifty to sixty thousand survivors on the periphery, had nearly twenty thousand core personnel living in the heavy industrial zone.
But the zombie tide came too fiercely, breaking through the defense line almost instantly, swallowing tens of thousands.
Except for the top echelons who had advance notice, almost no one escaped.
The scant hundred people before their eyes might be the last survivors.
“Damn it! When did a wall appear in front!”
“Hurry and drive; they’re catching up!”
“Boom—”
The first vehicle crashed into the wall, creating a dent a meter deep, the front end protruding through to the other side of the wall.
Mutated beasts already poised pounced forward to drag out the survivors inside the vehicle.
Piercing screams and wails rang out.
The other vehicles were forced to block the road, metal wall ahead and raging zombie tide behind.
No way to escape.
More and more zombies began surrounding these vehicles; car windows shattered, chaotic gunshots rang out, and an even more terrifying aura came from the end of the street in the depths of the night.
Yu Yue’s “shared sound field” was still maintained beside the few people’s ears.
From the heavy footsteps, it was as if they could see the Tier 2 butcher’s terrifying figure over five meters tall, dragging a massive metal club as it approached.
Xiao Ba stared blankly at the tragedy below.
Liang Kuan narrowed his eyes and glanced over, showing no emotional fluctuation, reminding again.
“We should go.”
At that moment, a shrill voice came from inside a vehicle.
“Mom, it’s gnawing my leg—”
In an instant, every vehicle turned into a steel porcupine, skewering the zombies and mutated beasts piled on top into sieves.
Liang Kuan turned his head and saw Xiao Ba’s eyes had turned ice-cold metal color.
He sighed, “The disaster is something we brought; they won’t be grateful to you.”
“Saving one is still good.”
Black smoke from scorching corpses obscured the youth’s eyes, making it impossible to see the emotions inside.
The ground trembled; over a hundred tons of metal were extracted from surrounding buildings, dragging down structures one by one amid roars that drowned out Liang Kuan and Lin Jin’s surprised exclamations.
The Tier 1 profession that had trapped Xiao Ba for so long, “metal construction,” was achieved.
Desperate survivors saw the metal barrier open a new gateway.
…
On the personnel carrier that had just arrived at the north freight platform, Su Huan slowly opened his one black and one red eyes.
Two completely opposing states inside his body formed a strange balance.
Collapsing genes and rapidly generating genes offset each other.
Accompanied by the heart’s slow beating, general energy slowly circulated through his body; to use skills with fingers or other body parts, he no longer needed to divert attention to draw energy from the heart.
The originally disintegrating “fighter” profession recovered again; the main profession “energy storage core” had all three skills reach lv5, “general energy perception” at lv5, “energy cycle” at lv3.
These two skills were tied to the main profession, so they were relatively stable.
Besides that, there were some miscellaneous skills, like asteroids around a star, randomly disintegrating after a period, but usable beforehand.
Such as “cell regeneration,” “infrared vision,” “iron bones,” “energy doubling”…
At this moment, Su Huan used lv1 “infrared vision” + lv5 “general energy perception” + Yu Yue’s “shared sound field” to see Xiao Ba standing on the metal wall blocking the Tier 2 butcher.
Though influenced by him, Xiao Ba was still Xiao Ba.
Upright and distinct.
‘Tch, these people are really lucky…’
Su Huan’s mouth curved up.
The remaining thirty percent general energy in his body, under “energy doubling,” turned into electric current gathering at the vehicle roof. In the horrified gazes of surrounding survivors, the flashing electric arcs gradually compressed into a deep blue liquid spear, its tip aimed at the metal wall’s direction.
The next instant, from Yu Jing and Wan Xing in the platform train, to Jiang Rong and Yu Yue on the vehicle, to Liang Kuan and Xiao Ba on the metal barrier, all saw a bolt of lightning coming from the north.
In a flash, the heavens and earth lit up like daylight.
Echoing the burning heavy industrial zone from afar.
When they saw the lightning, with the Tier 2 butcher at the center, everything within hundreds of meters was enveloped in thunderstorm.
On the train, Tong Zizhan looked at the distant electric light and flames, his voice hoarse. “This power and distance… has it already reached Tier 2?”
Gao Yuan swallowed. “Not quite in intensity, but five hundred meters away, how did he lock on the target and throw it so far? This clearly involves more than one ability.”
“The train conductor has secrets.”
“During this time, let’s keep a low profile; don’t get promoted too high, or the company will suspect.”
“Wasn’t it you who confessed first?”
“Did you confess any less?”
The two immediately fell silent.
Xiao Ba on the metal barrier, looking at the hard-controlled Tier 2 butcher, had surprise light up in his eyes. “Su, you’re awake?”
Su Huan’s slightly teasing voice appeared in the few people’s ears.
“Finished showing off and still not running? Addicted to playing hero?”
“I didn’t…”
“Lightning can’t electrocute this thing. Liang Kuan, bring these two back quickly.”
Xiao Ba shyly scratched his head, saw the Tier 2 butcher strenuously trudging through the lightning below, and hurriedly closed the metal barrier, heading down the wall.
But before two steps, he was grabbed by Liang Kuan’s large hand.
Along with Lin Jin, one in each hand, he jumped down the ten-meter-high iron wall.
Casually picking up Xiao Ba’s wheelchair, he strode meteor-like toward the freight north station, his speed no less than the rampaging pickup, even superior in obstacle terrain.
Seeing the three return, Su Huan also breathed a sigh of relief.
His peripheral vision caught the survivors around the freight station, but exhaustion from excessive energy consumption made him too lazy to care.
“Discovered a train fully loaded with supplies on the platform, total of ten carriages, locomotive TS-20000 diesel-electric dual-mode power freight locomotive, max towing capacity two ten thousand tons of cargo, currently linking to the armored train.”
Yu Jing’s calm voice suddenly interjected.
Su Huan raised an eyebrow in surprise, glanced at Director Xu by his feet, roughly understanding the situation, and sneered.
“The rest is under your command; aim to leave within ten minutes.”
“Received.”
After having Yu Yue cut off others’ listening to him.
Su Huan twisted his body, bones grinding with a dull sound like colliding gravel.
He straightened the fractured bones, then coughed and spat out a mouthful of stagnant blood.
Rustling sounds came from beside him.
Black wide sleeves appeared above Su Huan’s chest cavity; five fair fingers clenched into a fist. Just as he puzzled, a warm sensation transmitted from his skin.
The muscles under the subcutaneous fat itched.
Su Huan’s brow twitched.
Healing-type skill?
Not sure if manipulator direction or collector direction.
‘This isn’t a newly evolved skill.’
Director Xu deeply glanced at Lin Xi, not expecting this seemingly innocent girl to hide so much.
(More tonight, today’s goal ten thousand)
