When Liang Jing saw Huan Tian pull out a Desert Eagle, her mind went blank. She knew that gun was real—after all, she had personally handled its purchase.
"Huan Tian has a gun… and that kind of combat skill… No wonder Lin Qingqing clings to this man. Compared to him, Liu Tong and those other bastards are nothing but useless trash."
"But… with Lin Qingqing here too…"
Liang Jing pressed her lips together and glanced at Lin Qingqing from the corner of her eye, her expression shifting unpredictably.
Huan Tian's face was expressionless. In his previous life, he had gone through scenes like this hundreds, if not thousands, of times. Back when he was part of the Demon Hunters squad, he had even developed detailed tactical plans for all kinds of complex encounters. The moment a similar situation arose, he could execute the appropriate strategy immediately.
Just like basketball court plays—simple, direct, and effective.
Thwack!
The last zombie's brain was pierced clean through. Huan Tian left the now-dulled short spear lodged in the creature's eye socket.
[Ding! Killed Tier-1 Zombie: 13. Gained Demon Hunt Points: 13. Total Demon Hunt Points: 29.]
He drew a new short spear. He had forged ten in total to prepare for wear and tear—it would last him a while. But then, Huan Tian's face darkened.
Zombies behind them were stepping over the corpses of their kind, charging forward without hesitation.
Something was wrong.
Ordinary zombies would typically stop and feast on freshly fallen corpses, not ignore them and continue the chase.
Unless… there was something on the three of them—something even more tempting than fresh flesh.
Blood. Fresh blood.
"Which one of you is injured?!" Huan Tian shouted sharply, spinning around.
"Not me! I didn't even touch a zombie just now!" Lin Qingqing said hurriedly.
"Me neither!" Liang Jing quickly added, not daring to lag behind Lin Qingqing even half a second.
Huan Tian's frown deepened. Lin Qingqing and Liang Jing, though flustered, had answered decisively. Their eyes showed no signs of lying—no evasive glances, no hesitation. He trusted his judgment as well. Every zombie that had appeared just now had been personally taken down by him. There was no chance anything had slipped through.
And yet… he couldn't think of any other explanation.
There was no time to dwell on it.
Up ahead, the office door suddenly burst open with a loud crash. Seven zombies charged out, instantly blocking the entire path forward. At the same time, the five zombies behind them were steadily closing in. Though Tier-1 zombies weren't fast, they had already sealed off any escape route.
"Shoot! Huan Tian, shoot them now!"
Liang Jing screamed wildly, clutching her head in panic.
Huan Tian abruptly stopped, turned, and slapped her hard across the face.
"If you don't want to get us all killed, shut the hell up! Keep screaming, and I'll throw you out there to clear the way!"
Liang Jing's cries came to a sudden halt.
Gripping his short spear tightly, Huan Tian kicked an approaching zombie to the ground and immediately drove the spear deep into its eye socket.
A second zombie lunged at them. Lin Qingqing, trying to imitate Huan Tian, kicked at it as well. But what had looked effortless in his hands now revealed its true difficulty—the zombie was heavy and strong.
It didn't budge an inch.
Instead, Lin Qingqing's small frame was forced backward by the impact. She staggered, nearly losing her balance, but quickly recovered and thrust her spear into the zombie's eye with precision.
Huan Tian didn't glance at her even once.
Even with her in danger, his focus never wavered. His eyes were locked on the seven zombies ahead—then, suddenly, he charged.
It was a charge, yes, but his body shifted sharply from side to side as he ran, executing a series of rapid tactical dodges. At first glance, his movements seemed erratic—meaningless even—but strangely enough, the seven zombies began to mirror his motion, swaying in response as if caught in some involuntary mimicry.
Unlike Huan Tian, their bodies lacked agility or control. Within a few steps, they were stumbling and staggering. Four of them slipped and fell outright, dragging nearby zombies off balance with them.
At that exact moment—
Huan Tian accelerated.
As Huan Tian swept his leg and knocked one zombie to the ground, his right hand had already driven the short spear cleanly into another zombie's eye socket with a single thrust.
With a strength stat of 8, he could now pierce through skulls with ease, without risking injury to his wrist. His movements were seamless, fluid.
The moment the spear struck, his waist twisted sharply, shifting his center of gravity. Right foot landed, left foot followed—another swift kick slammed into the inside of a third zombie's knee. The creature, just starting to rise, collapsed again, this time blocking the path of the zombies rushing in from behind.
—Knock down. Disrupt. Kill.
—Knock down. Disrupt. Kill.
—Then again. And again. And again.
…
His actions flowed like water—smooth, uninterrupted, but every motion carried the force of thunder.
To an onlooker, it seemed as though Huan Tian was fighting six zombies at once. But in reality, no more than two ever managed to get close to him at the same time—and there was always one already on the ground, serving as a living barricade for the rest.
He kept repeating this deadly rhythm: knock down, block, and finish off. One by one, the zombies fell.
To the two women watching, it was as if the undead were hurling themselves at him just to be slaughtered.
Liang Jing trailed behind him in a daze, her pupils completely out of focus, her face blank with shock.
She couldn't understand how Huan Tian was doing it. That kind of precision, that kind of effortless efficiency—it was almost… graceful.
These weren't ordinary zombies. They were enhanced, strengthened. A regular man would need three people to take down one of them.
Liang Jing's fists clenched tightly, trembling with excitement.
"The stronger Huan Tian is, the safer I am."
"I have elegance. Charm. Someone like him—young, strong—he's bound to fall for someone like me. I just have to keep him close. Make him take me with him when he escapes."
"No… Lin Qingqing is still here. Young. Beautiful. A sweet little thing—he must prefer her."
"What should I do…"
The flicker of uncertainty in Liang Jing's eyes was slowly smothered by an icy, ruthless coldness.
She looked down at the zombie corpse beneath her feet and silently murmured to herself:
"I can't die. I have to live. And no one—no one—no one—is going to stand in my way."
From the very beginning, Lin Qingqing's eyes had been fixed on Huan Tian.
She didn't know how to fight? Then she would watch, observe, and learn.
That was Lin Qingqing's greatest strength—she never felt inferior, only determined. She sensed that she was beginning to understand something. A vague concept had started to form in her mind… but no matter how she reached for it, it kept slipping away.
Only one zombie remained on the battlefield.
Huan Tian crouched low, sweeping his leg in a powerful arc. If he knocked the creature down, he could leap in and drive his short spear into its eye socket.
But just as his leg was about to make contact—
His heart suddenly thundered in his chest, pounding so violently it felt as if a hammer were slamming into it.
"Something's wrong!"
Mid-air, Huan Tian forcibly retracted his sweeping kick. The recoil threw off his entire rhythm, and in that instant, the last zombie let out a monstrous roar—
Not from its throat.
But from its belly.
Rip!
Its shirt tore open from the middle, revealing a grotesquely bloated stomach that split apart like a blooming, rotting flower. Three fleshy petals peeled outward, each lined with jagged, gleaming teeth. From within, what should have been intestines had mutated—now a long, whip-like tendril lashed out with terrifying speed.
Huan Tian's pupils shrank to pinpoints. He dove to the side just in time.
The tendril struck the wall where he had stood a heartbeat ago—and sank several centimeters deep into the concrete.
If that had struck a human body, it would've torn straight through.
"A Tier-2 zombie! No—still transitioning! A proto-Tier-2!"
When zombies evolve to Tier-2, the Nightmare Virus crystallizes within a specific organ or region of the body, providing a continuous energy source that mutates it into a powerful weapon.
In this case, the mutated area was the zombie's belly and its intestines.
"Organ-enhanced type... and it's ranged."
Huan Tian's expression turned grim, more serious than ever. Thankfully, it wasn't a brute-force physical type—otherwise, with the weapons he had, he wouldn't stand a chance.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
In one swift motion, Huan Tian drew three short spears from his belt and hurled them with deadly force.
The spears plunged into the blooming center of the zombie's stomach. The creature faltered for a moment—
But only for a moment.
Then, with an even more violent roar, it charged straight toward Huan Tian once again.