“Can’t you find a more plausible excuse?” Even Alice, who had consistently stood by Chu Feng, found his explanation impossible to buy.
She wanted to trust him, but saying he transmigrated through time and space sounded more absurd than anything else.
Claiming to be an alien would have been more believable!
Chu Feng shrugged helplessly.
They kept asking for the truth, but when he gave it to them, no one believed him anyway.
Clank!
Following the Red Queen’s instructions, the group quickly located the access hatch to the maintenance passage.
The moment Chad pulled the heavy steel cover open, a stomach-churning stench hit them like a wall.
This didn’t feel like a maintenance passage—it smelled like an abandoned sewer.
But with their lives on the line, nobody was in a position to complain about a foul odor.
Every non-smelly exit was already overrun by flesh-eating corpses.
One by one, they climbed down the rusty iron ladder into a narrow, subterranean utility tunnel running with water, gas lines, and high-voltage wiring for the entire Hive.
Since Spence had depleted the handguns and Rain’s combat knife was lost in an earlier explosion, the group was down to a single weapon: Chad’s tactical military dagger.
“Chad, hand me the dagger,” Chu Feng said directly after they walked a short distance down the dimly lit conduit.
Recalling the original sequence of events, Chu Feng knew a massive cluster of zombies was waiting just ahead in the dark.
In close quarters like this, no one could utilize a metallic blade better than he could.
“What do you need it for?” Chad asked, instinctively pulling back.
With no threats in sight, Chu Feng’s sudden demand made him defensive.
“There’s a horde up ahead,” Chu Feng explained plainly.
“When they push through, try to climb up onto the overhead pipe racks.
I’ll handle the front line.” “Ha!
Zombies down here?!” Alice, Rain, Chad, and Matt exchange bewildered glances.
This was an isolated utility duct.
How could zombies get inside?
If Chu Feng had scouted ahead, it would be one thing, but he had been walking right beside them.
Was he claiming to see the future?
“Chu Feng, we appreciate you taking down Spence, but saying there are zombies in an empty maintenance shaft is nonsense,” Chad scoffed.
“Unless a pipe breaks, nobody ever comes down here.
If nobody comes down, how could there be—WOAH!
HELP!
SAVE ME!” Before Chad could finish his sentence, several rotting, bloodstained arms burst through a wire-mesh partition right behind him, grabbing his tactical vest and pulling him violently against the metal fence.
ROAR!
ROAR!
Decayed corpses pressed against the mesh, snapping their jaws and drooling dark bile, desperate to drag Chad through.
Rain and Matt rushed forward, grabbing Chad’s shoulders to pull him back, but the zombies held on with unnatural, post-rigor strength.
“Give me the dagger!
Now!” Chu Feng demanded.
“Here!
Take it!” Chad yelled in panic.
Trapped against the mesh, he couldn’t reach behind himself to strike the corpses.
He unclipped the sheath and tossed the blade to Chu Feng.
“Hah!” Chu Feng caught the dagger cleanly.
His internal magnetic field resonated through the steel blade, causing it to vibrate at a high frequency.
He thrust the knife through the wire mesh straight into the skulls of the two zombies gripping Chad.
Pfft!
Pfft!
The blade pierced through decayed bone like warm knife through butter, instantly neutralizing both corpses.
[Ding!
Congratulations!
You have killed an ordinary zombie.
Reward: 10 points.] [Ding!
Congratulations!
You have killed an ordinary zombie.
Reward: 10 points.] The system notifications sounded in Chu Feng’s mind as Chad broke free, stumbling forward while gasping frantically for air.
He was pale with fear—Chu Feng had been completely right.
CLANG!
CLANG!
Dozens more zombies slammed against the chain-link gate, their combined weight threatening to burst the frame open.
Rain, Matt, and Chad threw their weight against a reinforcement bar to hold the gate shut.
“That fence won’t hold them long!
Move!” Alice called out, turning around to lead the group further down the pipe rack.
ROAR!
The moment Alice turned, a stray zombie stumbled out from an alcove, lunging directly at her face.
BANG!
Alice reacted with her signature aggression, driving a brutal right hook into the zombie’s jaw.
But human fists were ineffective against dead flesh.
The zombie merely staggered back a step before lunging again.
Alice leapt into the air, catching the overhead support pipe with both hands, wrapping her legs around the zombie’s neck, and snapping its spine with a sharp twist.
ROAR!
ROAR!
ROAR!
More infected swarmed into the narrow passage from the shadows ahead.
Without a weapon, Alice’s striking capability was severely limited.
As she kicked one corpse back, another lunged from her blind spot, aiming its jaws directly at her throat.
SHING!
A flash of cold steel cut through the air.
A flying dagger whistled past Alice’s shoulder, impaling the zombie straight through the forehead and pinning it to the wall behind her.
[Ding!
Congratulations!
You have killed an ordinary zombie.
Reward: 10 points.] “Thanks!” Alice gasped, catching her breath.
“Drink!” Chu Feng extended his hand, magnetically recalling the dagger back to his grip.
Stepping up beside Alice, he prepared to hold the narrow corridor against the incoming wave.
While Alice possessed superior martial reflexes, she lacked lethal weapons.
Chu Feng lacked formal martial arts training, but with his magnetic manipulation, a single piece of metal in his hand was exponentially more lethal than a standard firearm.
Giving the dagger to Alice would risk it getting stuck in a skull; in his hands, it was a precise, infinitely retrievable weapon.
A seamless rhythm instantly formed between the two.
Alice acted as the vanguard, using her acrobatic kicks and parries to deflect, redirect, and pin incoming zombies against the narrow walls.
The moment a target was immobilized, Chu Feng’s magnetically driven dagger flicked forward, driving straight through the eye socket or brainstem with pinpoint lethal accuracy.
Pfft!
Pfft!
Pfft!
One infected after another lunged forward, only to be systematically dismantled and dropped onto the wet concrete floor.
[Ding!
Congratulations!
You killed an ordinary zombie.
Reward: 10 points.] [Ding!
Congratulations!
You killed an ordinary zombie.
Reward: 10 points.] [Ding!
Congratulations!
You killed an ordinary zombie.
Reward: 10 points.] System notifications flooded Chu Feng’s mental log in rapid succession.
His point balance climbed steadily from 310 up to 460.
Within minutes, the entire corridor was quieted, leaving a pile of motionless corpses stacked in the narrow pipe trench.