Just as Lincoln approached the train door, a sound suddenly came from the bushes behind him.
It was a peculiar sound, like the low, heavy breathing of an animal, resonating deep within its nasal cavity.
And it wasn’t coming from just one source: one was to his rear-left, another to his rear-right.
Lincoln moved almost on instinct.
As his body pivoted, his right hand was already bringing the M1911 up, pointing the muzzle toward the closest sound while the flashlight in his left hand swept across the brush.
The moment the beam illuminated the target, he saw them clearly.
Two dogs appeared in his sight.
No—they couldn’t really be called dogs anymore.
They were merely creatures that had once been dogs.
Their size and build resembled Dobermans, but vast patches of skin and fur had sloughed off, leaving dark red, blackened muscle tissue exposed to the open air.
One of them had a gaping hole rotted through its ribcage, revealing blackened internal organs rising and falling with its labored breath.
The other’s jaw could no longer close, leaving its entire row of teeth and gums completely exposed.
Both dogs had milky, clouded eyes without visible pupils.
Seeing these things, Lincoln’s expression darkened instantly.
Before he could process what he was looking at, the one on the right lunged.
In the fraction of a second its hind legs kicked off the ground, its muscles coiled tight, launching the creature forward at incredible speed.
It possessed an explosive power that no creature with multiple rotted holes in its body should have had.
Lincoln’s index finger squeezed the trigger on pure reflex.
*Bang!*
The .45-caliber bullet slammed into its chest, punching through the muscle tissue near the shoulder blade.
The kinetic impact jolted its body sideways in mid-air.
Yet it didn’t stop.
Even with a hole blown through its chest, it merely stumbled half a step upon landing, dug its front claws back into the mud, and began coiling its hind legs for another spring.
Lincoln’s brow creased slightly.
A hit and a complete passthrough, yet it hadn’t stopped moving.
He instantly realized that this thing’s physiological functions differed from normal living organisms; damage to its muscles and bones didn’t impair its ability to act.
There was no time for further thought, as the dog on the left sprang almost simultaneously.
Its front claws even grazed his left forearm, scraping against the cuff of his tactical vest.
It failed to break through the armor, but the force pushed his left arm back.
Lincoln didn’t resist the impact, instead letting his entire body spin half a turn in the direction of the momentum.
Setting his right foot firm and bringing his left around, he created a pace of distance between them as he completed the turn.
The moment he finished spinning, he made a decision.
If the torso wouldn’t kill it, he would target the head.
With that thought, Lincoln instantly aimed the muzzle at the head of the dog on the left.
Its front paws had just hit the ground, and its hind legs were coiling to launch a second attack.
Lincoln gave it no chance.
He squeezed the trigger with the muzzle less than a meter from its forehead.
*Bang!*
The bullet entered through the front and exited through the back of its head, bringing with it a spray of black fluid.
The dog collapsed forward onto the mud, its front legs twitching once before going completely still.
This time, it was dead for good.
Lincoln didn’t relax his guard, because the dog on the right was already lunging at him again.
This time, he didn’t hesitate.
He pointed the muzzle directly at the side of its head and pulled the trigger a split second before it reached him.
The .45-caliber round smashed through its temple.
Its head jerked violently, losing balance in mid-air, and it flipped onto the muddy ground.
After a couple of kicks from its legs, it stopped moving.
Three shots in under five seconds.
Lincoln swept his muzzle between the two carcasses twice to confirm neither would move again before lowering his arm.
He glanced down at his left forearm.
There were two faint white marks on the fabric and a minor trace of blood, but his mobility was unimpaired.
Afterward, he waited in place for thirty seconds to ensure no more creatures were rushing out before squatting down to inspect the dogs.
A .45 round had substantial stopping power; a chest hit was usually enough to drop a grown man, yet this creature had barely missed a beat after taking one.
The head, however, was a different story.
Both were killed instantly with a single shot to the skull, ceasing all activity the moment their central nervous systems were destroyed.
Lincoln remained silent for a moment, making a mental note.
Whatever was driving these things, their weakness lay in the head.
If he encountered similar creatures in the future, his first shot had to be aimed at the skull.
However, he also realized his ammunition supply would be under far more strain than he had anticipated.
Starting with fifty rounds, he had already used three, leaving forty-seven.
If there were more ahead, he had to make sure every single bullet was directed at the head whenever possible.
Carrying these thoughts, he crouched down to examine the corpses.
Right at that moment, a semi-transparent interface suddenly popped up before his eyes.
[Virus Devourer Terminal Activated]
[Trigger Condition: Host’s first contact with virus-infected entity — Met]
Host: Lincoln
Physical Multipliers (Based on peak adult human male baseline of 1.0) Strength: 1.5 Speed: 1.4 Stamina: 2.0 Regeneration: 1.1 Impact Resistance: 1.5
[T-Virus Sample Library] Collection Progress: 2/100 Safety Threshold: 98/100 (Threshold deduction will cease once a single virus type is fully collected) Collection Method: Automatic harvest upon killing a T-Virus infected entity (Subsequent collection of three-color herbs can upgrade the threshold limit) Threshold Rules: Each harvest consumes 1 point of safety threshold.
Dropping below 30% will trigger genetic instability.
Reaching 0 will cause irreversible mutation.
Threshold can be slowly restored through hibernation and nutritional replenishment.
[Specialization Path · T-Virus] (Unlocks at 100/100 collection progress) ▸ Combat Specialization (Locked) Effect: Doubles Strength and Impact Resistance multipliers; enables host to withstand conventional firearm damage.
▸ Perception Specialization (Locked) Effect: Enhances dynamic vision, expands danger perception range, enables preemption of traps and ambushes.
[Virus Adaptation Overview] Identified Virus Type: T-Virus (Primary Strain) Unidentified Virus Type: ???
Tip: Different virus types correspond to different specialization paths.
Completing the collection of the current virus will unlock further information.
Lincoln froze.
He instinctively reached out to touch the display, but his fingers passed straight through it, touching nothing, though the panel continued to track with his field of vision.
The surrounding forest remained unchanged, and the corpses of the two dogs still lay where they had fallen.
It seemed he was the only one who could see this interface.
Lincoln stared at the panel for a long time, his brow never unknitting.
*Virus Devourer Terminal.*
Those words caused his heart to drop.
He knew Umbrella had conducted modifications on him.
Having grown up in their facilities, he lost count of how many injections he had received, how many pills he had taken, and how many physical examinations he had undergone.
Yet the company had never told him what those modifications specifically entailed, referring to them only as a “physical enhancement project” designed to make him faster, stronger, and tougher than average humans.
He had never pressed for details.
In Umbrella’s system, the more you knew, the faster you died—that was a rule he had learned in childhood.
However, the information currently displayed on this screen made him realize that what the company had done to him went far deeper than a simple “physical enhancement.”
Strength 1.5, Stamina 2.0.
He couldn’t verify the exact precision of these numbers, but they matched his physical experience.
He was indeed significantly stronger than most professionally trained individuals.
He had always assumed it was the result of his training, but now it seemed that wasn’t the whole story.
Furthermore, the trigger condition of “first contact” with the “T-Virus” indicated that this monitoring system had been designed from the very beginning to interact with this specific virus.
The company had buried this thing inside his body, waiting for it to be activated.
In other words, his arrival in the Arklay Mountains tonight might itself be part of their plan.
He had a distinct feeling that his assignment to investigate this area was actually a test orchestrated by the company through him.
At this thought, Lincoln’s face turned cold.
He reviewed the contents on the panel once more.
Collection Progress: 2/100.
Those two mutated dogs just now had counted as one collection unit each.
That meant he needed to kill one hundred T-Virus infected entities to completely fill this progress bar.
Safety Threshold: 98/100.
Killing just two dogs had dropped it by 2 points, meaning every single collection consumed his threshold.
Although the panel stated it could be restored through rest, it didn’t specify the rate of recovery.
If recovery was slower than consumption, then engaging in continuous combat would eventually drive his threshold down to zero.
The consequence of reaching zero was stated plainly: *irreversible biological mutation.*
Lincoln remained silent for a few seconds, shifting his gaze from the safety threshold to the specialization paths below.
*Combat Specialization:* Doubles Strength and Impact Resistance, enabling him to withstand conventional firearm damage.
*Perception Specialization:* Dynamic vision and danger perception.
If these enhancements were real, either one would raise his survivability to an entirely new level.
However, the unlock condition required maxing out the collection progress, and every step of that collection consumed his safety threshold.
Without a doubt, this was a double-edged sword.
Looking further down, the “Virus Compatibility Overview” listed the discovered virus types as 1/?, followed by a question mark.
This implied the T-Virus wasn’t the only one out there.
There were other strains of viruses, each with its own corresponding specialization paths.
Lincoln stared at the question mark for two seconds before withdrawing his gaze.
Now was not the time to analyze this.
He re-evaluated his situation.
He was currently stuck in a mountain region crawling with mutated creatures, equipped with limited ammunition, and the nearest safe zone was Raccoon City, dozens of kilometers away.
Whether this system was planted by the company or inherent to his modified body, it was active now and automatically harvesting data.
Regardless of whether he chose to kill those two dogs or not, his threshold had already dropped.
Since he couldn’t avoid it, he needed to master the rules.
He needed to figure out the exact recovery rate of the safety threshold, whether killing different types of infected yielded different collection amounts, and what actually happened if the threshold hit zero.
None of these questions had answers right now; he could only test them slowly during the upcoming operation.
However, one thing was certain: he couldn’t kill indiscriminately.
Until he understood the threshold’s recovery mechanism, he would avoid fights whenever possible, engage only when necessary, and seek out places to rest immediately after combat to monitor the threshold’s recovery.
Lincoln dismissed the interface.
With a simple thought, the panel vanished, leaving his field of vision clear once more.
He glanced down at the carcasses of the two mutated dogs, then raised his head to look at the train resting on the tracks ahead.
Bloodstains smeared the steps near the train door, several windows were shattered, and the interior of the carriages was pitch black.
Lincoln took a deep breath and walked toward the train.
As his foot touched the metal step, low, garbled groans echoed from deep within the carriage.
It wasn’t just one; there were several.
The noise didn’t sound like the painful moans of injured humans, but rather like the raspy breathing of wild beasts whose vocal cords and mouths were mostly rotted away.
It belonged to the exact same category as the panting of those dogs from earlier.
Only this time, the creatures making those sounds had very likely once been human.
Already anticipating what lay ahead, Lincoln raised his gun and stepped into the carriage.
The stench inside hit him like a wall—a suffocating blend of iron blood and rotting flesh so thick it nearly made him gag.
As the narrow beam of his flashlight swept forward, it revealed overturned seats in the front half of the car, the floor covered in dark, sticky stains.
And at the far end of the beam, deep within the darkness, something was slowly dragging itself forward.