Chapter 23: A Foreboding of Danger
Translator: Law Editor: Hitesh_
Huang Xiao’s face was flushed as he caught the jacket with one hand, then slightly turned and quickly wrapped it around his waist. His already red face darkened as he hissed through gritted teeth, “Not ‘some one’!”
While speaking, he scanned the area but failed to find even a trace of that high-level female zombie. The others were shocked by his words, and one of them asked, “Not some one? It couldn’t have been some zombie, could it?”
Huang Xiao didn’t know how to respond.
Xie Dong finally threw out the question, “So then, where is this high-level zombie that you mentioned? There seems to be not a single zombie in this area, eh?”
He looked around and found that this area was strangely empty. Leave alone high-level zombies, not even a regular zombie could be found here. The figures of zombies could only be seen hundreds of meters away from here.
Huang Xiao did not concern himself with this. He moved suddenly and swiftly toward the regular zombies some distance away. He selected a relatively clean-looking male zombie and sliced off its head with a wind blade, then rushed up and ripped off its pants.
Instead of being grateful toward Lin Qiao for not killing him, his teeth were clenched with hatred.
She was just an intelligent zombie, but she had humiliated him so badly. How could he possibly let it go after being humiliated by a zombie like that? Next time he saw her, he would slice off her flesh, turn her into a skeleton, and then cut open her head to take out her nucleus.
…
Not far away from this squad of people, a lone figure stood in a corner on top of a dozen-story building, staring down at them. Its cold eyes sparkled with a desire to kill and a greed to feed.
On the ground, Xie Dong’s heart skipped a beat as a strange sensation washed over him. He didn’t recognize this feeling, so he looked around in confusion but found nothing abnormal.
On the other side of the road, Lin Qiao was hiding in another building, leaning against the wall next to a window with her back to Xie Dong and his teammates. Her eyes sparkled dimly as she glanced upward from the window.
She sensed a strong vibe from the sixteenth floor of the building opposite, but she wasn’t the target of its owner. Clearly, this creature was coming for this group of living human beings.
Although she knew that the vibe wasn’t meant for her, she still felt a strong sense of danger. It seemed that this creature was especially powerful. However, she couldn’t tell what it was based merely on the vibe. Was it a high-level zombie? A zombie beast? Or a mutant animal?
Whatever it was, she felt that these people were in danger, because she knew that they were no match for that creature.
As Lin Qiao was wondering what that creature would do next, she suddenly lost track of its vibe. She hurriedly fixed her eyes in that direction, but that dark silhouette was gone now, and so was its vibe, without leaving a trace. Her feeling of danger had faded, but it hadn’t disappeared entirely.
While puzzling over this, she suddenly sensed a few other vibes and smells of human beings. No, not just a few… These smells belonged to many people and were all tangled up together.
However, only a few among all the human vibes she sensed were powerful. Although, one of them even made her feel suppressed.
No wonder that creature had hidden its own vibe or left temporarily. It couldn’t defeat this group of people who were now approaching this area. That was it, a group of people was coming in this direction.
Lin Qiao took the opportunity to leave as well while the group was still some distance away. She quietly sneaked away from the area where n.o.body was present.
Not long after she left, a group of people showed up from afar.
“Look! That looks like a zombie-hunting army from the base.” Xie Dong’s people had spotted the gradually emerging army as well.
“Looks like it.”
“Yeah! The army out here for hunting zombies and collecting resources is led by Wu Chengyue this time. That should be them.”
“Let’s go. No high-level zombie is in this area anymore. Even if there is one, we won’t get a chance to kill it now that they’re here.” Wearing a pair of pants s.n.a.t.c.hed off a zombie, Huang Xiao looked at the army which was coming this way, his face filled with fear and jealousy.
Xie Dong shook his head and said, “No, we should follow them. It’ll be safer that way.”
He now knew what had made his heart flip earlier on and had given him such a strange sensation. It was the kind of feeling of danger that people would experience when they were targeted by fierce beasts. He felt that his squad had already been targeted by a powerful zombie, which could well be the one that had led them here.
Therefore, as the zombie-hunting army from the base was pa.s.sing by, the squad could follow them for a while. There were some powerful members in that army—many of them were at level-four, and a couple of them were even at level-five. Furthermore, as one of the leaders of the base, Wu Chengyue surely possessed a high-level superpower. In the Sea City Base, only three level-seven superpowered human beings existed after all.
Together, these three level-seven powerful beings controlled the entire Sea City Base.
Because of the characteristic wisdom, as well as learning and adaptive abilities of human beings, the human survivors had been growing stronger at quite a steady rate since the apocalyptic era began.
Not only had the strongest superpowered human beings from the Sea City Base achieved level-seven, but the leaders of many other bases were also mostly at level-seven or above. This post-apocalyptic world was dominated by zombies. Therefore, a primitive hierarchy was naturally formed, according to which, the powerful ones commanded respect.
Hearing Xie Dong, Huang Xiao immediately knitted his brows and said, “Follow them? What can we possibly get by following them? They might even use us as cannon fodder and make us defend against zombies for them.”
He surely didn’t want to go with the powerful ones in the army, because he knew that those people would claim all high-level zombies which could be found. In that case, what would be left for them? At the very most, they would end up helping the army in dealing with some average level one to two zombies. However, the nuclei of those zombies were hardly valuable.
He came out of the base for an adventure to win riches and honor. How could one make a harvest without taking the risk? If so, they didn’t need to form a zombie-hunting squad to hunt zombies outside then.
Besides, if they joined this army, they would be required to hand over all the resources they had gained in the action except for zombies nuclei.
Xie Dong felt that Huang Xiao’s words did make sense, but he also knew that the situation had changed. Earlier on, he had felt that his squad had been targeted, and he believed that to be true. After all, he was always exceptionally alert toward danger.
Moreover, the enemy’s power was so mysterious that he couldn’t sense it at all. Without the feeling of danger in his heart, he wouldn’t have even known that his squad had already been targeted.
Therefore, at this point, saving their own lives should be the top priority. If they were dead, all that they wanted would become meaningless.
With a somber face, he said seriously, “I feel that we’ve been targeted. If we insist on acting by ourselves, we might encounter danger which won’t be easily overcome.”
Huang Xiao t.i.ttered, mocking Xie Dong’s words, “You always say that you have sharp feelings. But look, we’ve been out here for so many days following you, yet have found nothing. Except for the great number of low-level zombies that we dealt with every day, we haven’t seen even a trace of any high-level zombie. Finally, I spotted one today, but we lost her because of your slow movements.”