Published: February 6, 2025
"Thank you to my brothers from Xikan Novel for the 10,000 starting coins, as well as to Leng Qiu, Lingnan, Monkey King, and many other brothers and sisters!"
Sun Shoushan slashed a mutated fly in front of him, cutting it in half, and a slight burning pain began to spread through his lungs.
This was the aftereffect of intense combat.
The battle hadn't started long ago, but its intensity was the highest Sun Shoushan had experienced in over three months of the apocalypse.
He swung his blade almost every second, and nearly every strike sent a spray of foul blood flying.
Sun Shoushan knew he couldn't stop; to stop meant death. He had to move forward because behind him, there were people ready to carve the magic crystals from the mutated creatures he had killed—these crystals were the capital for survival in the future.
Since he formed a small group of just over a dozen people with some friends and family, Sun Shoushan had been fighting fiercely every day, but only today did he realize that what he experienced before was child's play; today was a true life-and-death struggle.
Yet, Sun Shoushan felt an unprecedented sense of security in his heart.
He had never imagined that one day he could retreat unscathed from millions of monsters, never thought he could easily acquire over a hundred magic crystals in just one morning, and never thought that one day he could wield a gray-grade machete.
In the past, he and his companions would retreat upon seeing over twenty zombies, and from dawn till dusk they could only gather a handful of magic crystals. As for weapons, they had to make do with a rebar as thick as a finger found among the ruins for weeks. A gray weapon? That required at least three bottles of One-Star Evolution Elixir to exchange for, yet the one in his hand only cost a Grade 2 Magic Crystal.
These annoying, almost ubiquitous mutated flies, even at one-star level, were bothersome and terrifying, often swarming in groups. Given the number and strength of Sun Shoushan's team, they had always fled upon seeing these creatures.
But today, these pests were as fragile as paper before him and his gray machete.
Sizzle!
Sun Shoushan, caught off guard, was grazed by the silk of a mutated spider. Although he wasn’t stuck, a piece of flesh was torn away, and blood immediately flowed out.
"Flag code! Flag code!"
A shout came from behind, and the bloodthirsty Sun Shoushan immediately looked up. In his field of vision, he saw a figure on a rooftop waving a colorful banner, repeatedly making the same gesture.
"Left front, diagonal insert!"
Those words instantly appeared in Sun Shoushan's mind. This was something everyone had to remember just hours before the battle.
The entire human formation immediately angled left and moved forward.
A team of over a thousand launched an attack from behind the camp, and the Mutated Rat King did not dare to slacken its pace, leading its rat army forward.
Flies, rats, mosquitoes, and bedbugs—these filthy creatures that represented the "four pests" during peacetime were now in such huge numbers that they were incalculable. Their sizes had increased to the size of fists after mutation, and their overwhelming presence would become the deepest and most terrifying memory for every survivor.
Usually, no tactics were needed when facing such numbers; one simply needed to charge in.
But at that moment, the Mutated Rat King was extremely agitated. These humans were playing hide and seek in the camp, much like a type of fish called loach.
These humans were not deeply infiltrating the camp; they merely hovered at the edges, looking for opportunities to swiftly diagonal insert and then retreat, maintaining fluidity in their formation before striking again and withdrawing. Each movement increased the distance from the Mutated Rat King.
The humans at the front were always those skilled in close combat, while survivors wielding ranged weapons like bows, crossbows, or firearms followed behind. They would launch fierce attacks whenever flying mutated creatures approached.