Chapter 680: Horror spills into reality

"Oh, so it went northwest..."

Everyone felt deeply disappointed upon hearing this news. The explosion hadn't affected the zombie horde in the slightest. But then again, considering that three members of the reconnaissance squad monitoring the horde had survived, it stood to reason that the horde would be just fine.

"I've told the brother operating the drone to park it above our current position. You guys watch it and hurry over here. Some parts of the ruins aren't stable, so be careful on your way!"

Shen Linrui gave these instructions, ended the call, and let his three subordinates focus on their journey.

Wu Lue didn't need further orders from Shen Linrui. He cooperatively set the drone to return and hover, then turned on a light. Under the gloomy sky, it was like a lighthouse; forget four kilometers, it could be seen from four kilometers further than that.

He wasn't worried about exposing their position at all. Not to mention that there were few survivors left in the vicinity, even if there were, meeting them might not be a bad thing—like that fanatical "Day of the Mode" survivalist.

"Northwest..."

Duan Wuhu muttered the news he'd received, his finger tracing lines on the map projected in front of him.

"Oh!"

Zhou Haiquan slapped his palm against the back of his hand, frowning. "Northwest... could it be heading toward Qingxian?"

!? The members of "Rush to the Mountains and Seas" looked at each other.

"Quick, quick, get a map and let's see!"

Zhao Dezhu said urgently.

Wu Lue reached into his pocket and pulled out a phone—no, he swapped it for another one, nodded, and handed it to Duan Wuhu. "This phone has a map on it!"

There were plenty of phones at the camp, but not many had maps pre-loaded. Now that there was no internet, phones couldn't acquire any new content.

Duan Wuhu took the phone, opened the map, zoomed in on the area around Qincheng, and pointed to the northeast of the Shanhai District. "The previous zombie horde should have been moving toward the Longtou camp like this, then the shockwave pushed them from here, and then the horde turned northwest..."

Northwest was a very broad area, encompassing everything from the mouth of the Haihe River to Qingxian, naturally including Tianmayu.

"This damn..."

Zhao Dezhu looked at the map on the phone with a twisted expression.

"Heading in this direction, it will inevitably be attracted by Tianmayu. Hmm... things have turned bad."

Duan Wuhu sighed heavily. On the way here, he had hoped the massive horde would suffer heavy losses, or that being pushed into the sea wouldn't be bad either. The best outcome would have been for the head of the line to become the tail, turning around right there to head back to Huludao City. Instead, the result was terrible.

As the saying goes, blessings do not come in pairs, but misfortunes never come singly.

Just as everyone was worrying about how to deal with the zombie horde and waiting for Niuwa and the others to arrive with more detailed information, Lightning let out a sharp shriek.

"Squeak!"

In the quiet environment, it gave the nerve-wracked group a fright.

"You damn..."

Lu Yubo was just about to lose his temper and discipline Lightning when he noticed it exposing its small eyes, staring in a certain direction. He followed its gaze, but there was nothing there.

"Can you stop being so jumpy all the time!"

"I, I'll be damned!"

Of course, it wasn't Lightning that answered Lu Yubo. Wu Lue looked at the screen, his expression grave. "What, what the hell is this?"

Hearing this, everyone looked at the screen. The drone was hovering in the air but hadn't stopped filming. The footage showed a bizarre creature hiding in a pile of ruins, crawling on a tilted stone slab. The proportions of its entire body were grotesque and eerie, and the direction its head was facing was exactly where they were!

Because the distance was too great, its overall image was too abstract.

Lu Yubo couldn't see the footage, but the drone in the air saw it clearly from a further perspective.

"What... what kind of big grasshopper is this!"

Park Canyong covered his head with both hands, his expression strange.

"Is this a zombie?"

Shen Linrui was a bit puzzled and was just about to take Lightning out of his pocket to ask if this was the guy it had been nervous about the whole way, when he heard Lu Yubo beside him make a strange sound.

"Ha-yi!"

Lu Yubo pointed at the screen, his eyes wide, his face changing drastically, his lips trembling. His expression was just like Lightning's, revealing terror. Having spent the journey together, everyone knew Lu Yubo was a guy who was ruthless in his actions but "simple" in his thinking. Even when facing an attack by hundreds of zombies, he remained calm and composed. They had never seen him fear anything, as if he were missing a screw in his brain and didn't understand fear.

But at this moment, Lu Yubo was showing fear; the look in his eyes couldn't be faked!

"Little Brother Lu, this... could it really be that guy?"

Zhao Dezhu had been deep in thought, feeling that the figure on the screen looked familiar. But after Lu Yubo's scream, his heart skipped a beat, and some not-so-distant horrors surfaced in his mind.

"Hey, you two big brothers, what guy... what guy is it? Stop talking in riddles, it's scary."

Park Canyong squeezed between Lu Yubo and Zhao Dezhu, looking confused. Seeing the extremely grave expressions on both their faces, he couldn't help but feel nervous too.

Gulp.

Zhao Dezhu swallowed hard, his finger trembling slightly as he pointed at the screen. "Little, Little Brother Wu, pull, pull back and take a look!"

"Pull back? You must be mistaken..."

"No, no, pull back!"

"Oh."

(Reading the original!)

Wu Lue was a bit confused—what could be worth being this afraid of? He was about to zoom in, but hearing Zhao Dezhu insist on pulling back, he raised the drone higher and adjusted the camera's focal length.

After some maneuvering, the figure of the guy on the ground became smaller and more abstract.

"No need to look, it's him, one hundred percent sure!"

Lu Yubo took a deep breath, closed his eyes tightly, shook his head, pulled out a cigarette, and flicked his lighter with trembling hands.

"Zero-Zero-Four... that monster's name is Zero-Zero-Four!"

Zhao Dezhu pulled a cigarette from Lu Yubo's pack and lit it. Without waiting for the others to ask, he said, "It's a modified zombie created by the Green Dragon Legion. Its whole body was stretched—long legs, long arms, long head, even its mouth is long. Its teeth, eyes, everything—it's like looking into a funhouse mirror!"

He didn't understand photo editing, but the description of a funhouse mirror made it clear to everyone present, except for Park Canyong and Lu Yubo.

"Holy crap, Zero-Zero-Four, Zero-Zero-Three's little brother?"

Wu Lue's expression was quite colorful. He clearly didn't know the severity of the situation because he hadn't participated in the night raid on the Green Dragon Legion that day.

"Stop talking nonsense, hurry and see how far it is from us!"

Zhao Dezhu pointed at the screen and urged.

Seeing Zhao Dezhu suddenly turn serious, Wu Lue knew this wasn't the time for jokes. He turned the camera, and a moment later, he had the answer: "It's about a kilometer or so away from us. At such a distance, it can actually lock onto us?"

"Squeak squeak, squeak squeak squeak!"

Lightning jumped onto Shen Linrui's shoulder, pointing at the screen and chirping incessantly, its voice filled with anxiety and terror, then gestured wildly at Lu Yubo.

Lu Yubo was very dry, knowing what Lightning wanted to express. He pretended not to see it and stared straight at the screen. Who the hell could have imagined such a big guy was hiding in the shadows!

"Um, I'd like to ask..."

Shen Linrui's eyes were still red, but the sorrow in his heart had been swept away, completely filled by the tense atmosphere of the moment.

He frowned and said, "I know the Green Dragon Legion; they were the most powerful force in Qingxian before. We had trade relations with them, but I had no idea they were doing this kind of research... Is this Zero-Zero-Four very special?"

"More than special!" Lu Yubo stared nervously at the screen, the scene he had seen through the binoculars that night surfacing in his mind. He then used his limited vocabulary to explain to everyone: "It can jump several stories high in one leap, jump twenty or thirty meters in a single bound, and killing people is as simple as killing dogs. It flies around with a 'clack-clack' sound, and it's damn fast!"

It was a good thing Good Luck wasn't there, otherwise Lu Yubo would have been clawed again—a typical enemy of animals!

"Is it that fierce? Can't we just use guns to blast it to death?"

Park Canyong patted the small submachine gun under his armpit.

His trust in firearms seemed so ridiculous and laughable in the eyes of Zhao Dezhu and Lu Yubo.

"Heh, guns? You haven't seen its speed, so it's hard to understand. Try hitting it first!" Lu Yubo sneered and shook his head.

The five people from the Longtou camp looked at each other, not daring to say they didn't believe it, but they could only say it was hard to believe.

Hong Laosi just watched quietly from the side, not feeling afraid because of the sudden appearance of "Zero-Zero-Four," possessing a kind of indifference toward life and death...

(End of chapter)