Chapter 86 - 68: Great Cemetery
Chapter 86: Chapter 68: Great Cemetery
To avoid accidentally getting infected by the corpse poison, they fought with Niu Armor at the center of their formation.
Niu Armor was responsible for drawing aggro, while the others launched opportunistic attacks.
The Rhino Race’s powerful Defense Power became even stronger after their transformation. Although Niu Armor didn’t have talent as strong as Yuan Xiaobo’s, his inherent defense was enough to withstand the zombies’ attacks.
It wasn’t impossible for the zombies to bypass him and attack the people behind, but Niu Armor had two special skills: [Earthquake] and [Mass Pull].
[Earthquake]: Channel the power of the earth’s ley lines to attack surrounding enemy units, dealing Earth-elemental energy damage and stunning them for 5 seconds.
[Mass Pull]: Generate multiple Spiritual Silk Threads to entangle target units. If the target’s strength is less than his own, they will be dragged to his position. If they cannot be dragged, he will fly toward the target.
Thus, any zombies that tried to get past him were all dragged back, then hit with a stun, allowing the others behind him to attack at their leisure.
When the zombies tried to attack Niu Armor, not only could they not break through his defense, but they would also be stunned from time to time.
Coupled with the continuous barrage of ranged attacks from the rear, the burly zombie’s underlings were suffering immensely.
The burly zombie saw the plight of his underlings and wanted to help, but he was blocked by Yuan Xiaobo and couldn’t break through.
He could only watch helplessly as his already small number of underlings were gradually eliminated.
Meanwhile, he himself was accumulating more and more wounds under Yuan Xiaobo’s attacks.
However, as the other zombies died, a cold mist filled with Death Energy emanated from their corpses, eventually covering the entire battlefield.
Seeing this, Yuan Xiaobo’s expression changed. He immediately recalled the scene from last night when the zombies fought the goblin army and swung his club, trying to knock the burly zombie far away.
Unfortunately, the burly zombie seized the opportunity, rapidly absorbing all the cold mist on the ground into its body.
In an instant, all his injuries healed, his body became even more massive, and the energy within him surged.
Seeing this, Yuan Xiaobo actually breathed a sigh of relief. It was a silver lining. The burly zombie had only leveled up; its rank hadn’t changed. He was still manageable.
At this point, the others also closed in. They exchanged a look, deciding to continue with their previous tactic. (A tacit understanding!)
Yuan Xiaobo would be the main tank and Niu Armor the off-tank. The fairies and elves would act as healers, restoring health and providing additional crowd control. The others just needed to focus on attacking and dodging AOE (Area of Effect) skills.
It all happened in a flash. As soon as the burly zombie finished absorbing the cold mist, it immediately charged toward the people in the back line.
Niu Armor hurriedly used his pull skill.
And then, he went flying toward the burly zombie.
The burly zombie had been prepared to be pulled away. He never expected that in the next moment, Niu Armor’s body would come flying toward him, causing him to freeze for a second.
Niu Armor, however, reacted quickly. This sort of thing had happened to him many times before. When he was first practicing his skills, he would often accidentally latch onto a small hill and end up flying toward it along with whatever target he had just pulled.
He quickly activated his [Earthquake] skill. After a slight delay, he landed next to the burly zombie, and at the same moment, the Earthquake effect was released, stunning the zombie.
Yuan Xiaobo seized this opportunity to rush over, bringing his club down on the zombie’s head to add some more vibrations to its already stunned and decaying brain.
The others used the time to reposition and unleash ranged attacks.
By the time the burly zombie recovered from the stun, his pristine body was once again covered in wounds.
He grew angry and recklessly swung his greatsword at Niu Armor.
The greatsword glinted with a sinister, cold light, clearly enchanted with some kind of Magic.
Niu Armor also took out his weapon, a giant alloy axe, and charged forward after infusing it with Spiritual Energy.
CLANG—
With the sound of metal striking metal, the giant axe snapped in two.
Niu Armor staggered, about to be hit. In the next moment, an alloy club shot out and knocked the greatsword aside.
Niu Armor hastily retreated, leaving the space to the other two.
Yuan Xiaobo clashed with the burly zombie once again, while the others attacked it from a distance.
Only this time, the burly zombie clearly had the upper hand. Since the alloy club and the alloy axe were made of the same material, Yuan Xiaobo was afraid his club would be shattered. Every time they exchanged blows, he made sure to strike the side of the greatsword.
His agility was higher than the burly zombie’s, and he successfully avoided a direct clash of their weapons every time.
However, this meant he couldn’t keep the burly zombie as tightly engaged. The zombie kept finding opportunities to attack the others in the distance.
As a result, the ranged attackers could only dodge in a panic.
Watching from afar, Meiying saw this and wanted to step in to deal with this tough nut. He was actually reluctant to make a move. If word got out that the territory’s Military Commander was stealing experience points from his subordinates, it wouldn’t look good.
Just then, Niu Armor, who was lingering at the edge of the battle, unable to find an opening and afraid to rashly charge in, suddenly saw Rose stand up in the middle of the clearing. An idea sparked in his mind.
He ran to a spot between the burly zombie and Rose.
He aimed his Mass Pull skill at both Rose and the burly zombie.
Two transparent Spiritual Silk Threads flew toward the burly zombie and Rose respectively.
Then, unsurprisingly, he was pulled toward the burly zombie, while Rose offered no resistance and let himself be pulled toward Niu Armor.
The burly zombie was prepared this time. He raised his greatsword, about to strike the incoming Niu Armor.
Then, to his surprise, he saw a rotting tree stump flying rapidly from behind Niu Armor.
"I..."
The next moment, he felt the strength in his body begin to wane, his energy plummeting.
Terrified, the burly zombie dropped his greatsword and turned to flee.
Unfortunately, he was still connected to Niu Armor by a transparent Spiritual Silk Thread, and Niu Armor was rapidly closing in, bringing Rose with him.
Just as he was about to fly past the burly zombie, Niu Armor timed it perfectly and unleashed an [Earthquake]. The burly zombie was stunned.
Rose caught the burly zombie.
The burly zombie typed GG.
The burly zombie fell to the ground, motionless. All the Death Energy in the clearing was swept away.
After absorbing all the Death Energy, Rose stored some of it in his body, converted some into his own experience, and transformed the rest into Life Energy, which he then released.
Nourished by the Life Energy, the clearing turned into a grassy field.
Seeing the battle was over, Lin Kong followed Meiying into the clearing to inspect the information on the zombie graveyard.
[Name]: Necropolis
[Category]: Undead Comprehensive Building
[Rank]: Legendary (Purple)
[Description]: A large-scale building of the zombie race. It provides shelter for zombies and nurtures their bodies.
The dense Death Energy can be used to summon zombie soldiers and can also transform ordinary zombies into Hero-rank zombies.
[Recruitable]: Walking Dead x1000, Iron Corpse x200
[Special Effect 1]: Any creature can transform into a member of the zombie race by slumbering within the Necropolis, freeing them from the limitations of their natural lifespan and granting them immortality. Additionally, zombies can consume a certain amount of Death Energy to be promoted to Heroes, though their rank will be reduced by one tier.
[Special Effect 2]: The Necropolis will absorb surrounding Death Energy and store it within.
[Special Effect 3]: The abilities of zombies within the Necropolis will gravitate toward those of the Necropolis’s Zombie Commander.
[Special Effect 4]: Regardless of a zombie’s original body type, as it levels up after zombification, it will gradually transform into a humanoid zombie.
[Summon?]
[Destroyable. Upon destruction, receive 100 Building Fragments—Necropolis]
[Destroy?]
"Destroyable!!!"
’It’s confirmed. This is this month’s Catastrophe Camp.’
Lin Kong was overjoyed. He didn’t know if the Undead Camp was responsible for this continent’s March attacks, but this time the catastrophe that had been deployed was also Undead-related.
’Isn’t this just serving up a free meal for Lin Yu’s territory? With a Death Devourer around, I don’t care what kind of undead they are, they’re all going to die!!’
He hurriedly relayed this news to his main body through their soul connection.
Then, he checked the information on the zombies.
The zombies’ stats weren’t anything special. They had moderate health, average attack, and were very slow, making them easy to kite. Their strengths were high defense and attacks that inflicted corpse poison.
[Zombie Corpse Poison]: Deals 100 + 0.05% of max health as damage per second. Stacks and lasts permanently. Cannot be removed without corresponding Healing Magic from the Nature, Life, or Holy Light factions.
When a creature infected with Zombie Corpse Poison dies, it transforms into a new low-level zombie (Walking Dead).
Corpse poison was an unsolvable problem for territories without a way to cure it, but for Lin Yu, it was basically useless.
Moreover, these zombies had a special talent.
[A Worthy Death - Catastrophe]: When allies of the same race fall nearby, the energy within their dead bodies does not return to nature but is instead absorbed by living zombies. This can be used to heal wounds and increase levels. When a certain amount of Death Energy is absorbed, the zombie’s rank will be promoted.
This was the main reason this group of zombies could become the Catastrophe Corps. Not only did their numbers increase the more you fought them, but they could also continuously increase their level and even rank during battle, growing stronger and stronger.
If it weren’t for the Death Devourer absorbing their Death Energy, by the time they finished off the low-level zombies in this Necropolis, this leader might have been promoted to a Legendary Hero. At the very least, he would have gained many levels.
It wouldn’t have been nearly as easy as it was now.
It could only be said that these zombies were unlucky to have run into their nemesis, Lin Yu.
-----------------
Back in the territory, Lin Yu was on his way to the Jade Sanctuary when the message from his clone brought him a delightful surprise.
He immediately turned around, returned to the Lord’s Mansion, and began to arrange the next steps.
The exploration teams to the west would continue their work, while the forest to the east required reinforcements.
The eastern forest contained many goblin buildings and concealed many types of goblins. He decided to tentatively name it the Goblin Forest.
Those goblins seemed to have reached some sort of agreement with the zombies. At night, they would gather a large force and march to the zombie Necropolis to die, providing the zombies with fresh corpses.
A battle would ensue between the two sides. The goblins would kill some of the zombies, and these slain zombies would provide energy for the surviving ones. At the same time, the goblins would also gain experience and level up.
He didn’t know if this behavior occurred every night; it remained to be verified.
If this was a common phenomenon, then it meant there was a goblin Commander in the Goblin Forest. It would definitely be Hero-rank, but he didn’t know its grade.
Just in case, he needed to find this goblin Commander and eliminate him.
At the same time, he also had to wipe out the zombie Necropolises in the forest.
Considering the size of the Goblin Forest, Lin Yu dispatched another 100 exploration teams.
These teams were no longer composed entirely of heroes. Instead, they were mainly comprised of smaller, more agile members of the Beast Race. Those who could use stealth were the top choices.
They would work in groups of three to search the entire Goblin Forest, locating all hidden Recruitment Offices and the zombie race’s Necropolises.
There were also 50 reconnaissance teams made up of nocturnal races (rats, hedgehogs, owls, etc.). They were responsible for observing whether the goblins and zombies were secretly in contact and for searching for Necropolises at night. Since zombies would crawl out of the Necropolises to patrol during the night, scouting then would offer a higher chance of finding them.
Meanwhile, in the center of the Goblin Forest, Lin Yu dispatched 100 assault teams. Each team was built around a core of 10 Death Devourers, supported by 100 Druids.
There were also ten Hero Squads. Each squad had at least one Legendary Hero as its captain, plus 10 hero members. They were responsible for mobile engagement and stalling the Necropolises’ Zombie Commanders.
Once a zombie Necropolis was discovered, an assault squad would be sent to clear out the zombies, while a Hero Squad would confront the Necropolis’s zombie hero. Meanwhile, Meiying would be stationed in the center, ready to provide support if any unexpected situations arose.