[Prompt: Your health is dropping rapidly. Please leave the sewer environment as soon as possible.]
[Prompt: You are at risk of becoming infected.]
After running continuously in the sewers for ten minutes, Fang Heng could no longer hold out.
The rate at which his health was dropping began to accelerate.
Seeing a ladder leading upward to his right, he held his breath, stepped forward quickly, and climbed up.
Holding his breath, Fang Heng pushed open the manhole cover and scrambled out of the sewer.
"Phew!"
Fresh air!
Fang Heng had never felt that breathing air so freely could be such a wonderful thing!
Fortunately, the manhole cover wasn't locked!
Fang Heng felt lucky that he had used his zombie clones to clear the zombies in the underground passage beforehand. Otherwise, he would have had to balance traveling with fighting zombies, and his progress would have been incredibly slow.
Any other player would likely have suffocated in the sewers long ago.
Outside, it was already daylight.
Fang Heng noticed that he was still within Hope Town, specifically in the backyard of an independent villa.
The five zombies lurking in the backyard noticed Fang Heng and immediately lunged toward him with staggering movements.
Fang Heng rubbed his shoulders and drew his machete.
When he first entered, Fang Heng had mostly relied on the muscle memory of this body to fight. After this period of combat, he had gradually integrated the body's various combat memories and physical attribute changes.
Now, with the boost from his high Agility and high Perception, the zombies' movements appeared to him as slow as an old turtle's crawl.
They were simply too slow!
Fang Heng charged forward with his machete.
*Slash! Slash-slash!*
In the blink of an eye, the five ordinary zombies were slaughtered clean.
They were no match for him.
Fang Heng retracted his machete and surveyed the surroundings. This was a three-story villa.
"Not bad. This small house can serve as a base," Fang Heng muttered to himself, stroking his chin.
Since entering Hope Town, things had changed significantly. Fang Heng found himself somewhat reluctant to leave the town so soon.
Just look at it—Hope Town was a place of great spirit and talent. He could scavenge supplies, farm zombies for materials...
With such a good place, why rush back to prison?
Fang Heng decided to linger here for a while longer. He would use this villa as a temporary base; as long as safety was guaranteed, he could farm more points and evolution crystal fragments.
He wanted to complete the Corpse Vine Parasite evolution for all his zombie clones as quickly as possible!
Having made up his mind, Fang Heng controlled the zombie clones that were still exploring the sewers to return via the same route, climbing back up the ladder to the surface.
"I need to set up tonight's shelter before dark," Fang Heng whispered, manually dividing the zombie clones into three groups.
The first group entered the three-story villa to explore, responsible for collecting supplies and clearing zombies.
The second group was tasked with clearing zombies in the immediate area surrounding the villa.
To prevent encountering mutated zombies, each of these two teams took one vine zombie with them.
The remaining two vine zombies were responsible for transporting the Corpse Vines left in the sewers up to the surface.
Watching his dispersed clones, Fang Heng silently took wooden planks from his backpack and began repairing the villa's fence.
...
At noon, a player team of over thirty people appeared in Hope Town.
The team was personally led by An Lindong, the supervisor of the Federation's 19th Resource Point.
Earlier today, the game had officially opened server transfers.
Players levels 1-4 could consume Main God Points to join the District 8 Zombie Apocalypse dungeon.
Within half an hour of the transfer opening, the 100 new transfer players from the Federation's 19th Resource Point had all arrived.
Every year, various nations of the Federation invested massive amounts of capital into the game.
In the Huaxia Nation, the players recruited by the Federation were divided into two types.
One type was core members—players whom the Federation began cultivating intensively starting from their school years. They underwent systematic training in school and were recruited only after passing various background checks and assessments by the Federation to ensure maximum loyalty.
The other type was ordinary players. They answered the Federation's call and signed contracts to accept employment. These contracts were much stricter than ordinary employment contracts. Any act of betrayal would result in severe legal sanctions, equivalent to treason.
Due to the generous benefits, the entry threshold for becoming a Federation ordinary player increased every year. However, in reality, many were unwilling to accept the Federation's multiple layers of control and background investigations. Joining the Federation meant losing a large portion of one's freedom.
An Lindong had entered Hope Town this time to investigate the cause of yesterday's explosion.
Soon, the group noticed a large swarm of zombies gathered near the community hospital.
"Captain An, we can't get any closer. There are too many zombies there."
An Lindong nodded. He signaled the team to stop and raised his binoculars to observe.
A player on lookout noticed something. Staring at the distant street, he whispered, "Captain, look, what is that?"
"Wh-what kind of zombie is that?"
"Is it a high-level zombie? Why does it look so strange?"
Many players also noticed the object in the distance, whispering amongst themselves and pointing.
It was a zombie roughly two meters and twenty to thirty centimeters tall. Green vines were wrapped around its body, constantly writhing.
An Lindong's brow furrowed deeply.
*Damn, it's a special mutant zombie evolved through Corpse Vines!*
*A Tier 4 mutated zombie!*
An Lindong had memorized the Federation's data on mutated zombies; he quickly matched the zombie before him with the Corpse Vine mutant in his memory database!
Did it escape from the secret research lab of the 'Meteor' Company?
But why so soon?
Theoretically, such high-level zombie creatures shouldn't appear in the game for at least another month.
"Captain, it seems to be heading toward us."
"What do we do? The direction it's moving is toward our warehouse..."
An Lindong's fists clenched involuntarily.
Most high-tier mutated zombies would seek out player gatherings to attack. Clearly, the warehouse resource point had become a target for the zombie mutant.
"Second team, head back and report to Director Liu. First team, follow me—we need to find a way to lure it away!"
...
[Prompt: Your zombie swarm has completed transporting Flower Pots * 10.]
[Prompt: Your zombie swarm has completed the exploration of the villa. Total gains: Ceramic bowls * 9, Cutlery * 2, Canned fruit * 5, Canned beef * 7, Mineral water * 8, Red Bull * 3, Nails * 12, Wooden planks * 2, Firewood * 21, Children's bicycle * 1, Skimmed butter * 1, Toy telescope, Cumin seasoning packets * 2...]
[Prompt: Your zombie swarm has killed Ordinary Zombies * 512, obtained Survival Points * 992, Evolution Crystal Fragments * 77.]
At 4:00 PM.
The villa had been cleared. Fang Heng inventoried the searched supplies and couldn't help but shake his head.
Aside from essential survival supplies, everything else was mostly low-value junk.
Of course, "junk" was only relative to Fang Heng; this "junk" could still be exchanged for a decent amount of money at the Federation. Especially the children's bicycle—it was a means of transport, even if its top speed was very slow.
Fang Heng had only just managed to control the zombie clones to move the Corpse Vines into the villa's backyard.
Currently, he was sitting on the second floor of the villa resting. Feeling a bit hungry, he lit a bonfire and set up a grill to prepare some meat.
*Boom!*
An explosion outside the window caught Fang Heng's attention.
(End of Chapter)