Bab 54: Panda Zombie!
Editor: Atlas Studios
The night was dark and cloudy, and there were no stars or moon.
"Captain, you should rest. Kelly and I will keep watch at night."
Around one in the morning, Angeline and Kelly came to replace Chen Gou and Bo Guang, who had been on guard for half the night.
"Be careful. Immediately send an alert if there's any movement!" Chen Gou nodded.
A sudden bang was heard in the open area opposite the door. The armored vehicle that had been parked there fell sideways without a warning and rolled forward continuously.
The doors and roof of the car were visibly caving in and deforming, obviously hit by an external force.
Strangely, neither Chen Gou nor Angeline and her sister saw any creatures near the armored car.
At the same time, the armored car was filled with screams of panic and anger. Blackface, Renegade, and Broken Tail hadn't wanted to stay in the dormitory building and had been forced to huddle in the armored car for the night. Not wanting to have a conflict over such a trivial matter, Chen Gou had agreed.
As a result, these three were now trapped in the armored car with the deformed doors that couldn't be opened, as if they were being suffocated in a coffin.
"What's going on?"
Due to this sudden and strange event, the four people who had happened to see the scene were shocked.
"Captain, we can't see or even perceive anything with our minds… That thing is too weird. Let's hurry up and leave," Angeline said in a dignified manner, advising Chen Gou to just give up on the three of them.
The armored car wouldn't just roll for no reason, so just because they couldn't see their enemy didn't mean that the enemy didn't exist. They just couldn't perceive it.
"That's right, sir. Those three were never on the same page with us, so we might as well take this opportunity to deal with this hidden peril."
Kelly spoke with a sad expression, directly saying what her sister had meant.
"Captain, save… save us…" Blackface and the rest were shouting from inside the tumbling deformed armored car.
"You can't leave!"
Chen Gou's eyes flickered as he said in a deep voice, "Don't forget what our mission is!"
They were all in a state of shock. Failing a mission of the Blood Umbrella Organization was 10 times worse than failing a mission of the Covenant Church.
"But how can we kill it if we can't see anything?" Angeline wanted to say something but hesitated. The Wildfire Team would have run away as quickly as it could if they had encountered such a thing in the past.
There was obviously nothing around. It seemed as though the air was attacking the armored car. The more bizarre this was, the more frightening it was.
Chen Gou didn't say anything. As the armored car once again rose into the air as though an invisible giant was lifting it with both hands, he summoned the Radiant Dawn, who raised her longsword high with her right hand. The newly-fused Wrath of Solari turned into a beam of light that landed directly on the armored car seven or eight meters away.
The sunbeam this time was radiant and dazzling.
The white-golden sunlight illuminated the area within a radius of 100 meters and made it as bright as daytime.
Boom!
When the Wrath of Solari landed on the armored car, it made it crash to the ground, and the steel plates on the surface all turned red for a moment and showed signs of melting.
Previously, the Solar Flare had only inflicted 250 points of magic damage. When the Wrath of Solari landed, its damage was as high as 500 points. In combination with the silver flame of the ancient cross necklace, the damage almost reached 600 points.
Even before the second stage of the skill was activated and the Solari Giant Warrior was condensed, the power of the skill had changed qualitatively.
Such high damage could even kill a Level-5 or similar Awakener instantly.
When the armored car landed on the ground, a rich beast-like scream was heard before something finally revealed itself. There was also a smell of burnt fur in the air…
A bear-like creature appeared before everyone.
Its body was plump, and it had a round head and a short tail. Even though it had the decaying features of a zombie, it was still kind of cute.
"What kind of zombie is this?"
Angeline and the rest were surprised to see such a thing, as they had never seen one before.
"Is this a… national treasure?"
Chen Gou was dumbfounded. Its decaying, burned fur was still black and white, and it had round cheeks and black circles around its eyes. Wasn't it a panda?
"I got it. This beast zombie is the real zombie lord. The one we killed during the day was fake. It showed weakness during the day so that we would lower our guard and it could sneak up on us at night."
The expression of a few people, including Arrowhawk, changed. If Chen Gou hadn't made it appear with his skill, they would probably have been in a precarious situation, especially the three people in the armored car.
There were still several hours left until dawn, which was enough time for this zombie lord to play with them.
Whoosh!
Arrowhawk's response was fast. She made use of the time while the panda zombie was stunned by the Wrath of Solari to shoot a red Arrow of Power.
The Arrow of Power was the slowest ability of the Three-Phase Arrow, but it flew over to the panda zombie in just two seconds.
It ripped through the fur, causing dark red blood to splatter around.
Arrowhawk had a cold gaze as she raised her palms, wanting to use the same trick again and condense the arrow light once more to cause damage from within.
"Wait, don't kill it! Cough…"
Suddenly, an old man's shout was heard, followed by an urgent cough.
The source of the sound was a weak man that emerged from the shadows beneath the trees.
As he walked on crutches, he covered his mouth and coughed. He was wearing rags and a pair of glasses with a broken leg on his face.
"Don't kill it. I'll do anything you ask."
The man looked like he was probably only 50-something years old, but his body was worse than the body of an old man at 70 or 80. He walked up to the painfully-howling panda zombie and gently stroked its round head while the latter actually allowed him to stroke it and even rubbed gently against his feet.
They looked fondly attached to each other, like a father and son.
Affection could actually exist between a human and a zombie?
"What is he saying?" Angeline and the others frowned.
The man was speaking Chinese with a Sichuan accent, so they couldn't understand.
"It seems to be the language of the Oriental Academy…"
As the few of them were muttering, Chen Gou walked over and very skillfully asked in normal Mandarin, "Who are you and how did you tame the zombies? Were you also the one who ordered the zombies during the day?"
The man was not surprised to see Chen Gou, who had black hair and Asian skin, nor was he surprised that he could speak normal Mandarin. He answered with a cough, "I was originally the breeder of this park. After the disaster outbreak, the people in the park either fled or were infected, and the pandas ran away or died. I was also infected by a virus, but just as I was about to become a zombie, I suddenly awakened a magical power and activated my innate skill."
"What kind of ability do you have?" As Chen Gou looked at the docile zombie panda at his feet, he could actually almost guess the answer.
"I'm a tamer!" the man replied. "I can tame the zombies and make them my pets. I raised Little Panda ever since it was young. It became like this after saving me and getting wounded by a zombie. However, I've never thought of separating from it. I would've died if it had not been with me all these years."
-- Hadiah diterima