Chapter 314: This Is The Train’s Hunting Ground!
“Bang!”
With the Skull Crusher slamming into the modified bus from behind, this unequal battle fully erupted.
The zombies that had chased them all the way finally found their chance. Without the protection of vehicles, ordinary people couldn’t even fire a few shots before being torn to shreds like chicks, their blood and guts scattering across the clogged streets.
The sticky, foul stench of corpses filled Li Xinlong’s nostrils, and every moment he could hear his subordinates’ wails and the zombies’ excited roars.
His face tense, he pushed several skills to their limits, instantly killing any zombie that showed its head within ten meters, but it still couldn’t salvage the Black Star Convoy’s defeat.
“Click click—”
The rifle in his hand made an empty chamber sound.
“Reload!”
Li Xinlong shouted, but got no response, his heart sinking like he’d missed a step.
That mysterious woman he’d picked up had actually disappeared!
His hands quickly patted down his body, but the magazines on him had long been depleted during the chase, and the zombies in front had already climbed onto the roof.
“Damn it!”
Li Xinlong’s face twisted in fury as he kicked a Martin boot at the zombie that had just climbed up.
The latter’s cervical vertebrae snapped, its body flying backward.
Looking at the two Night Demons right in front of him, his eyes bloodshot, he swung the rifle in his hand like a baseball bat, and under the immense strength of a Tier 1 Defender, the rifle let out a deep, resonant thud.
This force, enough to burst an ordinary zombie’s head, only made the Night Demon step back.
It charged again, firearm parts on its head flying.
“Bang!”
A heavy sniper bullet whizzed past his ear, blasting the entire body apart with one shot.
Li Xinlong’s heart jolted; turning his head, he saw Wei Tian smashed into a meat patty by a Skull Crusher, while Pang Ke held the heavy sniper rifle and screamed hoarsely at him.
The voice mixed in with the corpse roars, impossible to make out clearly.
But he could tell it was the word “run.”
Li Xinlong looked at the convoy torn apart by the zombie horde and the endless zombie tide in the distance, his heart turning to dead silence.
Run?
Run where?
“Zzzzt zzzzt…”
A faint electric current sound suddenly appeared on the noisy battlefield, but for some reason, it was the clearest among all the noises.
Li Xinlong instinctively looked up, only to see dense electric currents spreading across the entire battlefield!
A blue glow flashed and vanished.
If he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, Li Xinlong would have thought it was his hallucination.
“Rumble—”
First came a muffled coughing from deep in the foundation, like a dying giant’s organs collapsing; the winding cracks on the load-bearing pillars suddenly opened wide like millions of golden solitary eyes—that was the flash of burning explosive fuses.
Li Xinlong blankly looked toward the building to the rear side; a seventeen-story building collapsed with a boom, concrete chunks disintegrating in the fall, smashing straight into the zombie tide like cannonballs. The street they’d fled along was directly bisected by the collapsing building!
The ground shook, dust flew up, and the rumbling sounds had only just begun to spread.
Over a dozen buildings near Chenxi Plaza all simultaneously let out muffled thuds.
As if commanded by someone, they crashed down toward the mountain- and sea-like zombie tide in the plaza.
In an instant, the roar of collapsing buildings, the chaotic corpse roars of zombies, and the crisp snaps of breaking bones and tendons played out a grand crescendo together.
Faced with such massive vibrations, even the dumbest zombies halted in confusion.
“Bang bang bang…”
On the edge of Chenxi Plaza, a twelve-story luxury hotel had dozens of glass curtain walls shatter into a crystal rainstorm. The crowd, like startled birds, looked up.
A figure stood on the hotel rooftop, the hem of a gray-green trench coat flapping wildly in the gale, black combat boots planted at the rooftop edge, blue electric light radiating from him like a spiderweb across the entire building.
Holding the cutting-edge electromagnetic rifle, the thick killing intent through the scope sent an inexplicable chill through everyone’s hearts.
“Silly boy, still not running?”
A sharp, husky female voice suddenly appeared by Li Xinlong’s ear.
Hearing this voice, Li Xinlong felt as if struck by lightning.
“Mom?”
“When they recover, even calling me Mom won’t save you.”
The female voice carried helplessness, softening a bit.
Li Xinlong was like he’d been injected with chicken blood; swinging his rifle to fling away the nearest zombie, he shouted at the remaining crowd, then ran toward the hotel.
Because of the building collapses, the original zombie tide was disrupted, and most zombies ran slower than evolvers in such complex ruin terrain—only a few agile Tier 1 zombies could keep up.
But before they could get close, they were locked down by crossfire.
Li Xinlong then saw that besides his mom, she’d brought two hundred people from the outpost.
These were the elites he’d left to protect Jiang Rong—not the old, weak, women, and children. Under Jiang Rong’s cover fire, Li Xinlong and the others reached downstairs; the group scrambled up hand and foot, climbing through broken third-floor windows.
Over eight hundred people, and in less than three minutes, half were dead or wounded.
In this environment, injury was almost equal to death.
One of the Black Star Five Tigers, Wei Tian, died on the spot; the remaining Tier 1 evolvers were all wounded.
Li Xinlong panted as he rushed to the rooftop, seeing Jiang Rong at the edge holding her gun to cover everyone climbing up.
Her black hair tied in a simple ponytail, bouncing slightly with the recoil of firing, the gray-green shoulder line sharp and clean; her entire aura like a freshly cleaned new gun—dangerous and tough. In the corner sat that huge backpack she never parted with.
Li Xinlong suddenly felt his familiar mom had become so strange.
A pile of questions stuck in his throat, not knowing which to ask first.
“Leave ten people at each stairwell to block the stairs. That Old Yang—can’t he manipulate corpses?”
Jiang Rong turned sideways, detaching a grenade from her tactical belt, loading and firing it.
A clump of zombies on the ground instantly exploded in flesh and blood, but Jiang Rong’s face showed no expression; blue light flickered on her rifle as bullets, propelled electromagnetically, calmly picked off zombies one by one.
“He can plant plague to make corpses explode, but it takes a little time.”
“What about living people?”
Jiang Rong asked.
“Living people work too—better effect than zombies.”
“Side effects?”
“Can control them until detonation.”
“Good. I’ve placed over thirty corpses on each floor below—have him plant them. Then with the two hundred I brought and your remaining four hundred, plant everyone except Tier 1 evolvers.”
Looking at his mom’s calm face, Li Xinlong inexplicably felt a chill in his heart, but thinking of the terrifying zombie tide outside, he gritted his teeth, his face hardening.
“Alright, I’ll have him do it now. But Mom, you have to listen to me.”
Li Xinlong gave an eye signal to a subordinate nearby.
The latter was one of the train deserters; lately he’d been Jiang Rong’s driver. Though not her direct soldier on the train, he’d fought under her command. Now without Old Wu, he’d been living comfortably.
Seeing Li Xinlong’s look, he inwardly struggled—old boss on one side, new boss on the other, and damn it, they were mother and son. Who to listen to?
The gunfire suddenly stopped.
Jiang Rong shot him an icy glare.
Zhang Yi shuddered reflexively and hurriedly handed her a magazine; electromagnetic rifle bullets were much smaller than firearm ones—a magazine was half a base count.
Lucky it was Jiang Rong; if it were another officer, he’d have been beaten already.
Zhang Yi decided to stop overthinking—obey orders and done.
Ignored, Li Xinlong stood awkwardly in place, suddenly feeling like his mom had seized power.
Jiang Rong slightly turned her head, pretending not to have heard, “Ah, Longlong, what did you say?”
Li Xinlong had no time to think, urgently saying, “You have to evacuate!”
“Evacuate where?”
Jiang Rong asked back while slaughtering the zombies below.
Li Xinlong looked at the endless zombie tide downstairs, mouth agape, gaze dimming.
Just reunited with Mom—did it have to end like this…?
“Hold on a bit longer; support will come soon.”
Jiang Rong said.
“Support?”
Li Xinlong was somewhat dazed; he couldn’t imagine what support could solve the scene before him.
Could it be like in the movies, a helicopter coming to rescue them?
Or an off-road vehicle crushing through the rolling zombie tide, with a hot-bodied woman getting out to save them?
“If you don’t command, the floor below will be breached.”
Jiang Rong tossed two grenades to blast open the piled stone mountain; her eyes flickered. Actually, she didn’t know if support would come. The only thing she was sure of was that the train had received the signal.
But would the train conductor risk it for someone like her who’d gotten off?
Li Xinlong dazedly ran downstairs.
Halfway down, he realized Zhang Yi was clearly his younger brother—why listen to his mom over him?
……
The hotel was a spot Jiang Rong had carefully chosen: narrow internal space, small windows, right in front of Chenxi Plaza with open sightlines—easy to defend, hard to attack.
The following battle validated her choice.
Black Star, relying on six hundred people, held out for over ten minutes against a tide of over ten thousand zombies, losing only a dozen.
But as ammunition dwindled, Black Star’s firepower grew weaker.
Zombies piled up eight or nine stories high downstairs. Luckily Old Yang’s corpse explosions were effective, collapsing the piles; through this method, Black Star held on for another dozen minutes.
After half an hour of fighting, Black Star had suffered casualties down to over four hundred, but the zombies in the plaza showed no sign of decreasing.
The collapsed buildings in the distance were already covered by zombies surging from the city center.
One terrifying figure after another appeared in Chenxi Plaza.
Five-meter-tall Tier 2 Butchers, Tier 2 Jumpers leaping hundreds of meters, Tier 2 Night Demons with arms over three meters long that could pierce reinforced concrete casually…
And at their feet and behind, waves of city-center zombies stacked over ten meters high.
“Master Rong, this time we’re really done for…”
Chen Shan’s voice carried the exhaustion of overindulgence.
Holding out this long, he and Old Yang, the two Tier 1 Manipulators, deserved much credit.
Yin Yinan said bitterly, “Better to die—I still want to go down and ask that bastard Wei Tian what he meant, daring to covet me, dying without a word. Who asked him to save me? Self-righteous bastard…”
As she spoke, the woman’s eyes grew wet.
“Wei Tian liked you—for a long time.”
Pang Ke chuckled.
Then it tugged at his shoulder wound, making him grimace in pain.
He’d been ambushed by a Hunter; his entire collarbone pierced, a ten-centimeter through-and-through wound. If not for Jiang Rong’s timely rescue, he’d have been gutted.
Nearby came empty chamber clicks; a red-haired boy of sixteen or seventeen viciously threw his gun out, drew his ice axe from his waist, and tried to jump out the window, only yanked back by the ashen-faced Li Xinlong.
“Master Rong, don’t hold me back—I want to fight these beasts to the death!”
The boy was like a lit fuse, eyes bloodshot from killing.
“Bombs!”
Pang Ke roared; the boy snapped awake as if jolted.
Looking at the increasingly close zombie tide in the distance, he slumped to the ground, eyes soulless.
Empty chamber sounds multiplied around them; some futilely shouted for bullets, but the entire hotel corridor was silent—only clear gunshots still came from the rooftop.
From morning fight to afternoon, they’d exhausted ammo and food; every evolver’s energy squeezed to the limit.
“Master Rong, is there really rescue?”
Old Yang, the eldest, suddenly asked.
“Yes! There definitely is!”
Pang Ke answered before Li Xinlong.
Everyone looked at him in surprise; Pang Ke’s round fat face showed a sly grin. “Didn’t you notice Aunt Rong’s clothes? Same as when Zhang Yi and them first arrived!”
“Armored Train?” Director Nan shook her head; her purple hair glowed faintly gold in the sunset. “Far water can’t quench near thirst.”
A Tier 2 Jumper impatiently leaped over; its elongated shadow plunged everyone’s faces into gloom.
The golden glow extinguished.
Blue glow took over.
Everyone looked up in shock to see a blue light streak across two kilometers of sky, suddenly piercing the Jumper above.
Including Li Xinlong, everyone crowded to the windows.
“Get down!”
A muffled thunder-like roar exploded on the hotel rooftop.
Just as everyone puzzled, a terrifying metal shield two meters wide and palm-thick whipped through the air at the Jumper.
The latter plummeted like a falling star; the shield overtook it, striking again with muffled thunder explosion. Both crashed into the horde; violent blast wave swept, blood waves raining from under the shield.
Only then did everyone notice a figure half-crouched on the shield; gray-green trench coat stretched tight over bulging muscles, wind from his breaths dispersing the blood mist, his iron-blooded ferocious aura shaking everyone’s minds.
“Holy shit!”
“Is that even human?!”
Pang Ke let out a cry of shock.
Looking at the surrounding five-to-six-meter-tall Tier 2 Butchers, Liang Kuan calmly stood.
Twisting his thick neck with a crackle of tendons and bones, he boldly struck!
At the same time, countless fireballs appeared from nowhere, weaving wildly through the zombie tide; moments later, thousands of zombies blazed, forming a fire dragon charging madly at the Tier 2 zombies on the edge.
Everyone suddenly felt vibrations underfoot; the metal window frames they leaned on flew out, then kneaded by immense force into a massive barrier. In their shocked gazes, a three-meter-thick, ten-meter-high barrier rose around Chenxi Plaza, sealing all roads to the plaza, turning it into a steel arena.
At the top of the barrier stood a bear-like figure, an vehicle-mounted anti-aircraft gun under his arm, one underfoot, and a windproof lighter in hand lighting the cigar in his mouth.
“Click, click, click…”
For some reason, though far away, everyone heard the sound of him flicking the lighter.
Three tries to light it, making Li Xinlong and others twitch inwardly in anxiety.
He Jie took a deep drag, thick smoke blown away by the gale; glancing at the Black Star crowd huddled in the hotel, he pointed a thick finger below, encompassing the entire Chenxi Plaza—or rather all of Zhijin City—and grinned contemptuously.
“This is the armored train’s hunting ground!”
