Chapter 2: The Nameless World 01
The smell of blood lingered between the low-hanging sky and the earth.
A murky rumble came from all directions, and a decaying atmosphere filled the air beneath the sky.
—A zombie siege. The army of the dead had surrounded the human base.
The human army was in formation, helicopters hovering in the air, tanks in the front, infantry in the back, and the fortress in the center, like an isolated island in a storm. The front was dead silent, not even the sound of breathing could be heard.
In this deathly silence—a dejected, self-abandoning voice suddenly rang out.
“It’s over.”
“We’re done for.”
“This is it.”
“We’re going to be left here.”
The person muttering to himself was a fat man with a shiny bald head. He was standing on the platform of a tank, holding a pair of binoculars and looking ahead. At this moment, everything was dim and gloomy. He stood at the very front of the army, and his bare bald head seemed to be the only source of light.
A person shrank closer to him.
“Cap… Captain,” that person asked, trembling. “Didn’t you say you were the best at zombie instances?”
Another person also said, “Didn’t you say that cutting off a zombie’s head is like slicing a watermelon?”
“—A crispy-skinned watermelon.”
The bald captain’s voice also trembled.
“You… you look—can you call these zombies?” He pointed a trembling hand forward. “This is a fucking undead scourge!”
Ahead, a purple-black horde of corpses slowly advanced. Their flesh was rotten and spoiled, and semi-dried internal organs hung from their exposed ribs. This was originally a common sight in zombie instances, but now, they had also undergone additional mutations and had even evolved a leader.
They turned their gaze to the center of the zombie tide. There was a huge, slowly moving monster, almost as large as the entire human fortress, like a mountain range walking on the earth. Each step caused a slight tremor in the ground.
This was that zombie leader, which human scientists had named “Black Satan.” After having a leader, the combat power of the zombie horde had a terrifying increase. The human front line had retreated again and again, until now.
The leader Black Satan was indeed the military’s number one worry, but it was not the only one.
“Have you seen the A1407 individual yet?” the bald captain said.
His teammate on his right, operating the binoculars, said, “Not yet, still looking.”
Another teammate operated the display screen. The image stopped on a partial close-up of Black Satan. On its rugged shoulder, there was a blurry shadow, which seemed to be a human figure.
This was one of the abnormal images discovered by reconnaissance planes in recent months.
After comparison, this blurry human figure had appeared several times in close proximity to Black Satan, and had also appeared like a ghost in the heart of the zombie kingdom many times. Its range of movement was extremely large, and its trajectory did not conform to the characteristics of ordinary zombie humans. It also showed signs of being able to control other individuals.
Human scientists, facing a great enemy, gave it the code name “A1407,” suspecting that it was the second highly intelligent individual to appear after Black Satan.
The big monster was already difficult to kill, and now a new suspected leader had evolved. It was really adding insult to injury.
“This is too hard.” His teammate’s eyes were vacant. “But, but wasn’t our plan very good?”
“Who said it wasn’t? We even hired outside help,” the bald captain’s voice also wavered slightly. “It was agreed, we would split into two groups. We and God Yu would hold back the zombie horde, and Xia Sen would assist the base in developing a vaccine, win the defense battle, complete the mission perfectly, and go back to the paradise to get our rewards—isn’t that great?”
“Who knew, God Yu would kneel at the beginning.”
“His ashes were scattered by the zombies, haha.”
“Is this the sky-high priced outside help, Yu Feichen? Haha, I don’t want to live anymore.”
“Now the zombies have evolved, and the direction of the base’s vaccine has also been declared wrong.”
“Our little Xia Sen was also captured by flying zombies with the virus sample.”
“The whole thing is a bust, Captain.”
“It’s over, Captain.”
“Yes, Captain.”
“What should we do, Captain?”
“Shut up!” The captain’s facial muscles trembled slightly. “Now whenever I hear the three words Yu Feichen, I get worked up. Damn it, I’ve never seen such an unreliable thing—”
At this moment, a sharp, long cry sounded, and the alarm blared. A military helicopter at the forefront of the army formation dived too low. Its propeller collided head-on with a zombie bird. The fuselage burst into a thick cloud of smoke and fire, tumbling and drawing a black, smoky parabola as it plunged downwards.
“Bang—”
The first cannon blast lit up the dark sky. The next second, the sound of guns and cannons shook the sky, and smoke filled the air.
The battle had begun.
The bald captain roared and shouldered the giant mortar heavy cannon next to him—but this thing was too heavy. Even his exceptionally burly physique couldn’t handle it. The roar changed its trajectory midway into a “fuck,” and with a clang, the heavy cannon slammed back onto its original landing gear.
He checked the loading magazine, pulled down the scope, and looked ahead, his posture as natural as if nothing had just happened.
“How do we fight?” Perhaps because the situation was urgent, his teammate did not laugh at this embarrassing scene, but asked anxiously.
The captain said, “But according to my experience in zombie instances, this kind of seemingly indestructible large monster must have a fatal weak spot. Remember my seven-word mantra: a blind cat bumps into a dead mouse. As long as you fire enough cannons, the weak spot will be hit.”
Unfortunately, no one listened to his nonsense. His teammates were all trembling.
“What are you afraid of?” the captain returned to the cabin and roared, “At worst, we’ll wait for our boxed lunch! This isn’t the Gate of Eternal Night!”
The end of his voice dissipated in the deafening sound of cannon fire, but these words seemed to have indeed appeased the emotions of those present. The teammates in their respective positions all began to operate normally.
The tank’s sunroof closed, and the tracks firmly gripped the ground as it rolled forward, deep into the zombie horde.
This was an extremely dangerous thing to do, but the situation was critical, and they had no other choice.
“Be on guard for A1407 at all times,” the captain said to the crew in the cabin. “Just thinking about such a ghost thing not having appeared yet, I have a bad feeling.”
“Roger that,” a teammate said.
The cabin vibrated slightly. Zombie creatures or splashing pieces of corpses constantly hit the tank’s outer shell, and the dull thudding sound came through faintly, like a gloomy drumbeat.
“Watch your right side!”
In the gray-white dust and smoke with extremely low visibility, a five-meter-tall zombie behemoth slammed into the side of the tank. The steel plates creaked, and the tank was almost overturned. But their reaction was not slow. The armor-piercing shell blasted through its neck at the moment the behemoth stepped back to gather its strength, successfully intercepting it.
“It’s a bit hard to hold on,” a teammate said. “But it’s a little better than I thought. I thought we were going to kneel at the beginning too.”
He turned his head, but saw the captain staring at the external scene screen, muttering, “Something’s not right… the situation is not right.”
“Not right,” said another teammate who was also looking at the screen.
“Not right,” another voice sounded.
“Are you guys a broken record?” The captain had had enough of them.
“It’s indeed not right,” there was finally a different voice in the team. “A portion of the zombies are in a static state, with no offensive behavior. So we didn’t feel particularly great pressure just now.”
“The one at ten o’clock seems to have frozen. There are also two at one o’clock.”
Following the direction, there were indeed two pale corpses with their heads bowed at the one o’clock position. Wherever the zombie tide moved, they went with the flow, but they had no other movements, nor did they bite or prey on anything.
Looking at the battlefield, there were actually quite a few such zombies.
The captain’s brow gradually furrowed, and his voice also sank a lot. He said quickly, “Open the sunroof, I’m going out to have a look.”
As if what the naked eye saw would be clearer than what the electronic screen displayed, he leaned half of his body out of the top of the tank, set up his binoculars to observe the surrounding scene, his face gradually turning pale, and he repeated in a low voice, “Not right, not right…”
“What’s not right?”
“I’ve seen this situation in a zombie-type instance a long time ago. That’s when they were controlled by the leader and started a second mutation. We were almost wiped out in that instance,” the bald captain seemed to recall something extremely terrible, his voice trembling at the end, and he suddenly roared, “Cease fire! All hands on alert! Communications officer, transfer to the unified command center! Strengthen the leader’s surveillance!”
He added, “Black Satan doesn’t have this ability. Where are the people looking for A1407? Monitor!”
“Not, not yet…”
“I raised you for nothing!” the captain cursed. While picking up the communicator to contact the unified command center, shouting “Cease fire, prepare for defense!”, he angrily looked into the cabin, but suddenly met the eyes of his teammate in the cabin looking up at him.
—Wide open, vacant, as if suddenly frightened eyes.
As if the sound of cannon fire had suddenly stopped, being looked at like this, the captain couldn’t help but shiver, and a chill suddenly went down his back.
“What are you staring at me for?” he sneered. “This isn’t a horror instance.”
As he spoke, he seemed to have felt something and slowly turned around—
On his shoulder, a force was transmitted. It seemed to be a hand lightly resting on it.
The bald captain’s turning motion stiffened. Thinking that zombies couldn’t perform such a highly human-like action as “patting on the shoulder,” he glanced at his right shoulder with the corner of his eye.
It was indeed a hand. The angle was limited, and only the middle finger, ring finger, and little finger could be seen.
It was a human hand, or rather, a man’s hand. The nails were neat, and the knuckles were long and distinct.
It was just that the skin of this hand was too pale, and the blood vessels faintly showing under the skin were an ominous eggplant purple. This was clearly a color that belonged exclusively to zombies.
And, he didn’t hear any breathing.
In an instant, a terrifying thought crossed his mind.
There was a zombie behind him.
One of his hands was already on the hilt of his cold steel military knife. He held his breath and continued to turn his head.
His field of vision expanded, and a pale, slender index finger came into view, with a familiar black thin ring on it. Everyone in their team wore one on their hand.
The captain was stunned.
At this moment, a voice came from the communicator. It was an inquiry from the unified command center.
“Please report the abnormal situation and the reason for the ceasefire.”
“Please report the abnormal situation and the reason for the ceasefire.”
And right behind him, another voice sounded, its tone flat, its timbre cold, without any inflection.
“Why cease fire?”
Without waiting for an answer, the cold fingers took the communicator from the bald captain’s hand without any explanation.
“Follow my command,” the creature, which was unclear whether it was a person or a zombie, said to the other end of the communicator. This voice was somewhat familiar.
The captain was stunned.
The stunned captain looked down at his stunned teammate.
The teammate’s vacant gaze returned to the captain. He opened his mouth and slowly mouthed a few words.
“There’s… a… traitor.”
The captain’s mouth twitched a few times. His right hand went behind his back, grabbed his beloved rocket launcher, and he took a few deep breaths, as if to steel himself.
Then, an angry voice resounded through the battlefield.
“Yu—Fei—Chen—!!!!”
“I—want—to—complain—about—you—!!!!”
