Chapter 71 Infiltrating Manhattan—A Military Investigation Team?

BEEP! BEEP!

The driver sounded the Humvee’s horn, forcing the civilians blocking the military vehicle’s path to move aside.

After bidding farewell to Sergeant Major Ryan, Ethan had brought his team to Manhattan, New York.

Before leaving, he assigned Elena a mission:

Search for any surviving intelligence concerning Group 935 and its army of the living dead.

As expected, his departure also triggered new system missions.

[Main Mission: Reestablish the O5 Council, complete three containment missions, and upgrade your clearance to A-Class to assume the position of Supreme Chairman.]

[Side Mission: Investigate Group 935, Nova 6, and Element 115.]

“Commander, we may have to continue on foot. The roads in Block 11 are no longer passable.”

Manhattan was an old urban district filled with narrow streets and alleys.

With the entire country under lockdown, its main roads were now clogged with barricades, debris, and abandoned vehicles.

Even a military Humvee couldn’t cross terrain like this.

Unless they brought in a main battle tank and crushed everything in their path, there was no way forward.

The driver looked apologetically at Ethan and asked everyone to disembark.

“All right. Miss 2B, we’ll continue from here.”

Ethan opened the door.

A blast of freezing wind struck his face.

Manhattan was already covered in white snow.

Winter in New York was gloomy.

The oppressive city, gray skies, desolate streets, and layers of snow created an exceptionally bleak atmosphere.

Only the occasional civilian hurried along the road.

Honestly, conditions in Manhattan weren’t as terrible as Ethan had imagined.

Whenever people heard the word *zombie*, they usually imagined an infection spreading uncontrollably within an extremely short time.

What Ethan saw, however, was a city that remained mostly under human control.

Unless the pathogen could spread extensively through the air, relying solely on bites, scratches, and bodily fluids to create new zombies had considerable limitations.

Before the infected reached sufficient numbers—or powerful mutated variants began appearing—the Zombie Plague alone couldn’t destroy human civilization.

The United States also had an exceptionally high rate of civilian gun ownership.

When practically everyone had a gun, zombies couldn’t act with complete impunity.

In a country where nearly every household possessed firearms, it would take time for the infected to spread on a truly massive scale.

Furthermore, the Joint Task Force, Division agents, and the United States military were all actively fighting the outbreak.

Aside from Raccoon City, none of the country’s other cities had suffered widespread collapse due to infection.

Even in Raccoon City, reports indicated that only approximately seventy percent of the urban area had fallen.

Survivors inside the city continued resisting the infected.

The remaining local police had even launched several clearing operations and eliminated zombies from multiple city blocks.

In Manhattan, infected individuals were almost nonexistent outside a handful of quarantined neighborhoods.

The truly lethal threats were the disruption of supply chains caused by the nationwide lockdown, the collapse of public order, rogue military units, marauding PMCs, gangs, and violent rioters.

These human threats were dangerous.

However, compared with the hell inside the infected zones, civilians could at least remain alive in human-controlled neighborhoods.

Even during this relatively short journey, Ethan encountered several groups of civilians fighting over property and essential supplies.

Elsewhere, JTF personnel exchanged fire with unidentified armed groups.

He even witnessed Division agents eliminating a band of rioters.

Almost no one attempted to provoke Ethan’s group.

The murderous-looking Mobile Task Force operators surrounding him were armed to the teeth and clearly weren’t easy targets.

This was also one of the consequences of widespread gun ownership.

When everyone had a weapon and food became scarce, a well-armed neighbor might visit to “borrow” some supplies.

If a household hadn’t stocked up on guns, its occupants could only smile politely and generously donate everything they possessed to maintain friendly relations with the people next door.

After all, a close neighbor was more useful than a distant relative.

Even church priests needed AR-pattern rifles to continue spreading the gospel.

The ironic scenes of soldiers and civilians living harmoniously—and neighbors treating one another with such “kindness”—disappeared as Ethan approached the infected zone.

He saw Blackwatch helicopters passing overhead more than once.

Towering quarantine walls separated the infected districts from the outside world.

Blackwatch soldiers surrounded those areas and isolated them completely.

Although Blackwatch was an armed force controlled by the Twelve Round Table Council, it remained a legal component of the United States military.

Its troops rarely operated outside the infected zones.

However, under the pretext of maintaining quarantine, they strictly prohibited personnel from other organizations from entering.

Their conduct made them appear almost neutral.

They quietly performed their assigned duties, and no one attempted to attack them.

Ethan had no intention of ordering his people to eliminate Blackwatch either.

Numerous clues suggested the organization was pursuing a larger conspiracy.

It was cooperating with Umbrella Corporation, and intelligence indicated that Blackwatch had helped cause the nationwide lockdown.

Nevertheless, without concrete evidence, it couldn’t be formally designated as an illegal hostile force.

Besides, Ethan needed people like them to remain active.

If no one caused trouble, how could he fish in troubled waters and exploit opportunities as they appeared?

Eliminating every potential enemy would provide no benefit to the Foundation.

Considering the countless wars that might erupt on Earth in the future, Ethan believed humanity needed enemies and conflicts of a controlled scale.

Only then would people maintain a sense of crisis and gain opportunities to become stronger.

Of course, preserving human civilization meant that America and the other advanced nations would have to endure some hardship.

When Ethan reached the edge of the infected zone, his group quickly attracted Blackwatch’s attention.

“Stop! You are approaching a quarantined area!”

“Entry is prohibited. You are not authorized to operate inside this zone!”

Ethan didn’t personally negotiate.

He merely glanced at a nearby Mobile Task Force officer.

The officer immediately stepped forward and thrust a set of documents toward the Blackwatch personnel.

“We have authorization from Washington!”

“These are our orders. Open the checkpoint immediately!”

The Blackwatch soldiers guarding the quarantine wall and checkpoint kept their weapons raised.

Their commanding officer examined the documents several times before reluctantly waving to his subordinates.

“Let them through.”

As Ethan and his personnel entered the quarantined zone, the Blackwatch officer raised his radio.

“Reporting. A military investigation team has entered the infected zone.”

“Understood. Do your best to prevent them from seeing anything they shouldn’t.”

“Tell the experimental teams to restrain themselves.”