Chapter 379: Double Hit
Meng Chao remembered that after he failed the national college examination in his previous life, zombie viruses also gradually came back from the ashes.
In truth, the zombie crisis had happened around fifty years ago. The survivors had long since formed an immunity to all sorts of viruses, and it had been a long time since they heard of zombies appearing at a large scale.
Sometimes, zombies would appear like Granny Wang. They were people badly injured by monsters, so their lives would come to an end. Thus, their corpses would slowly turn into another lifeform.
But Meng Chao remembered very clearly that during the middle and later stage of the Monster War, Dragon City encountered a zombie crisis once every few days.
It seemed like as the monsters became stronger, the power of the zombie viruses also increased.
The new zombie viruses would not only pass to humans through pests, it would also go through the circulatory system to reach the central nervous system and brain tissue through a few cuts. They did not even need the human to be completely dead to activate.
In just a short half a minute, a living human would turn into a super zombie of any strange shape or form and catch people off guard.
Some zombies could shoot fire or acid. Some zombies could crawl on walls and had terrifying mobility. Some zombies could self-destruct like large biochemical bombs that released poisonous liquid with a bang and sent it more than one hundred meters away.
Strictly speaking, the infected could not be known as zombies, because compared to traditional zombies turned from the dead, their mutation happened really quickly. It was clear that a lot of people were still alive too, but their bodies were invaded by the terrifying virus and controlled.
Perhaps it would be better to call them mutants.
But that was not the point.
The point was that Meng Chao remembered that whenever super zombies appeared, they were just appetizers. Usually, after the zombies wreaked havoc in the streets, ridiculously horrifying monsters would appear in the battlefield and deal a huge blow to Dragon City.
In his previous life, Meng Chao was ignorant and could not understand why the zombies and monsters would appear together each time.
In this life, he had a lot more information from the higher ups, and he instantly saw light, as if someone had lit a light bulb in his head.
‘That’s right. After more than fifty years of sifting out the weak, Dragon Citizens have natural antibodies toward zombie viruses. Even if the virus really activated, the people would just slowly turn into traditional zombies with rotten bodies, staggering steps, and not an ounce of fighting power, just terrifying howls.
Yet the ridiculously powerful super zombie virus reacted fast, was highly contagious after its mutation, and gave the infected great fighting powers. It had to be a biochemical weapon created by the abnormal beasts.
‘Based on the analysis from Dragon City’s experts, the dimensions of Dragon City and the Other World are slowly fusing together. The fog shrouding the entire city and large scale monster invasions are growing lower in number, so it’s difficult for the abnormal beasts to run into a large-scale space-time rift to toss a large amount of fighting power into Dragon City.
‘Then, the pests with the super zombie virus are the vanguards for the abnormal beasts.
‘But zombies alone can’t defeat humans.
‘Still, they can destroy the order in Dragon City and make the humans mobilize their firepower. They can also exhaust the superhumans while helping the abnormal beasts hide their real plans!’
When Meng Chao thought of this, he shuddered and quickly grabbed the communicator.
“Captain Ye, our attention should still be on the abnormal beasts. I think that the rat horde and zombies are just the prelude. They’re just the cover-up to confuse us. The enemy’s real attack should come behind them!”
It was very noisy around Ye Xiaoxing. From the other end of the communicator, Meng Chao could hear the howls of zombies, angry shouts from humans, and the rise and fall of guns.
After a long while, Ye Xiaoxing asked, “Why do you say so?”
“The abnormal beasts have not planned anything major over the past few months. If they don’t act now, are they supposed to just watch us yank them out of their nests?
“No matter how strong the new zombies are, they’re just zombies. They definitely can’t win against the iron fists from the brave Dragon Citizens. This is something we know clearly, and the abnormal beasts definitely know it even better. They won’t wait around foolishly and let the rat hordes and zombies be entertainment for us.
“Don’t forget that Gao Ye is still around. If he eats up the foundation of some skyscraper while we’re all busy suppressing the zombies, that skyscraper is going to collapse, and he will cause damage that is greater than anything a hundred zombies could do.”
Ye Xiaoxing was silent for a while before he readily agreed with Meng Chao’s judgment. “Makes sense.”
Meng Chao might be young, but he was an off-staff investigator of the abnormal beast research department.
Due to the insightful nature of the reports he had been submitting and his foresight, the abnormal beast research department had been able to come up with some plans and regulations. At the same time they managed to rack up their achievements, they also prevented a lot of deaths.
During the battle simulations of Group 9, Meng Chao would often pretend to be the enemy and launch all sorts of extreme attacks. He would resort to every conceivable means to attack Dragon City.
Even the official investigators who were several cultivation realms higher than he would usually lose miserably to his invasion tactics and crazy methods of destruction. They could only smile wanly and say, “Meng Chao, thank goodness you’re not an abnormal beast.”
Gradually, Meng Chao became quite famous in the abnormal beast research department.
The members of Group 9 also treated him as an abnormal beast in human skin instead of a normal university student. They trusted him a lot.
Ye Xiaoxing immediately summoned the Group 9 investigators who were scattered all over the southern part of the city and organized an emergency video conference.
“The Red Dragon Army is in position. Most of the communities have been completely fortified. It’s just a matter of time before we get rid of the zombies. Our problem is still the abnormal beasts,” Ye Xiaoxing said.
“Right now, there’s chaos all over the south of the city. The abnormal beasts might use the chaos to invade the vital areas. I’ve already reminded the higher-ups to send manpower to protect the important facilities in the southern part of the city, but our mission is still to catch Gao Ye.
“The problem is, right now, there are gunshots everywhere, and there are a lot of pests underground. It’s difficult to trace the sounds of Gao Ye digging and eating earth.
“So, we can only predict his possible targets and try to arrive at the spot before he does anything so that we can catch him off guard!”
Ye Xiaoxing uploaded a distribution map of the important facilities in the south of the city to the tactical computers of the Group 9 investigators.
The investigators already had more than one hundred construction maps of the underground tunnels and 3D structure charts in their tactical computers. They contained the coordinates where they had recently traced Gao Ye.
If they connected the large number of densely packed coordinates together, they could form Gao Ye’s movement trajectory.
The scratches Meng Chao and Lu Siya discovered were the last place Gao Ye was seen.
When they connected his movement trajectory and the last place he appeared, his path formed an arrow.
Ahead of it were important facilities and a large number of skyscrapers. There were at least dozens of them in the area.
Each group of investigators was in charge of monitoring from three to five suspicious points.
Even so, they were still plagued by problems. There were large unmonitored areas between the targets, and it would be very easy for Gao Ye to take advantage of those areas to cause trouble.
If only they could learn of Gao Ye’s target beforehand…
Meng Chao stared at the map with rapt attention.
At some point, he bit the nail on his thumb to the point that it was uneven.
Suddenly, he saw a small spot at the edge of the map.
He magnified the map and closed in on the real time surveillance footage of that spot.
“Meng Chao, Siya, do you know the area you’re in charge of yet?” Ye Xiaoxing asked through the communicator.
“Captain, we’d like to change locations!” Meng Chao interrupted Lu Siya’s answer.
“Why?” Ye Xiaoxing asked.
“Uh… Instincts,” Meng Chao said. “The important facilities you marked are naturally good targets, and if they’re destroyed, they will cause a lot of deaths among the citizens. Parts of the area will collapse as well.
“But I think that Gao Ye won’t choose those places. His next target might be the construction site of Subway No.20!”
Ye Xiaoxing was silent and waited for Meng Chao’s explanation.
“I understand Gao Ye. He’s a true technical nerd. When he was a human, he racked his brains and even broke the law to achieve his goal just so that he could get the construction deal for Subway No.20.
“I think that even if he completely lost his humanity and forgot his pride as a human, he would still refuse to accept things the way they are deep in his nerves, even if just a bit.
“Recently, the construction of Subway No.20 has reached the point where they’re about to dig a tunnel under the river.
“This is the first tunnel under a river, and it will cross Red Dragon River. Aside from construction, the parties involved will also test a lot of advanced technology.
“Once the technology is verified, soon, there will be tunnels going under rivers everywhere. They will connect Jiangnan with the main city area, and it’s highly likely that this will increase Dragon City’s centralization and overall fighting power.
“But what if the gigantic Ultimate Sandworm dug into the tunnel during the crucial period of the construction and water flooded the tunnel, thereby making the tunnel collapse and perhaps even making the space for the underground railway that has already been dug out collapse? A lot of workers, architects, and specialists would drown, and it would lead to a major delay in Dragon City’s development.
“I think that this target is the only one worthy of the abnormal beasts racking their brains to launch the rat hordes and zombies at us as a smoke bomb to provide cover for Gao Ye!”
Ye Xiaoxing was silent for a while, then said, “The construction site of the tunnel under the river is at the edge of the southern part of the city.”
“If we calculate the time since the rat horde appeared, this amount of time should be enough for Gao Ye to run to that place and cause destruction!” Meng Chao said.
“Alright!” Ye Xiaoxing did not hesitate. He immediately made his decision. “There are dozens of important facilities here, and they concern the safety of millions of citizens. We can’t give up on searching for Gao Ye here and set up defenses around them too.
“But I’ll send your target to another squad. Go at full speed to the construction of the tunnel under the river with Lu Siya. If you discover Gao Ye’s tracks, the attackers will immediately head to you!”
“Roger that!” Meng Chao and Lu Siya said at the same time.
Both of them brought out different metallic boxes from their backpacks.
Meng Chao pressed a triangle shaped button on the metallic box, and as the whirrs from sophisticated gears and machines moving rose, the metallic box opened up layer by layer and revealed a shiny 3D mobile gear that looked like a metal skeleton.
Lu Siya’s metallic box turned into a flying backpack.
A pair of alloy wings that were as thin as cicada wings spread out from the backpack. A mini engine filled with crystal fuel released steam, which allowed her to make subtle changes in her movement direction.