Kingdom of Corrosion
Chapter 268 - 163 A5 (Part 2)

Chapter 268: Chapter 163 A5 (Part 2)

The three of them slowly entered the door, which led to a small platform. Rotating staircases on either side led both up and down, and they could also walk along the left and right gangways to various parts of the first floor.

In the center of the basement level was an even larger glass container, inside of which was a miniature version of a grey Blood Heart. What was more shocking was the sight of dozens of Frenzies wandering around the base. The Frenzies’ attire revealed the professions they held before death, including researchers in white lab coats, security personnel in bulletproof vests with tactical helmets, and engineers in blue work clothes.

Lin Wu crouched and looted corpses with his left hand, asking, "Why is A5 so dangerous?" It’s not even comparable to A6.

Maya said, "It seems that A6 was only researching the initial virus and was built before the outbreak of zombies. A5 was established during the zombie outbreak, with the purpose of studying Blood Hearts and zombies. There isn’t a single ordinary zombie here; they’re all Frenzies. If our guesses are correct, the Frenzy mutation virus must have leaked from A5."

Nightmare asked, "What do we do now?" Although the Fortress special agents have a relatively abundant supply of bullets, it’s not infinite, and it would take several hundred bullets to take down this group of Frenzies.

Lin Wu pulled a shorthand notebook from the body of a Fierce Corpse and handed it to Maya, who opened it and read, "It’s meeting notes, talking about how we can confirm that the Blood Heart is a cell, albeit a very large one. They speculate that human blood is the source of its life."

"No wonder all the zombies we’ve seen are desiccated." Lin Wu made the connection and asked, "Could the Blood Heart be like a dialysis machine? It absorbs the fresh blood of zombies, then injects the blood back into them, and they become Blood Zombies."

Maya didn’t answer but continued reading, "They’ve been using a variety of animals for experiments, hoping to find antibodies that could provide immunity against the virus." That was all the information the notebook had to offer.

Nightmare reminded, "This isn’t the time for storytelling."

Maya replied, "You stay here. Lin Wu, head to the third floor first; I’ll follow and loot the corpses."

"Okay." In such a large area, over thirty Frenzies made for a relatively low density. Given enough time, Lin Wu alone could wipe out the entire base. Lin Wu turned to Nightmare and said, "Nightmare."

"What is it?"

Lin Wu said, "You mentioned your missions are getting harder each time. Looking at it now, it’s very likely that your next mission will involve facing dozens of Titans."

Nightmare chuckled, seemingly unconcerned on the surface, but a drum of worry was beating in her heart. Titans? Impossible. Yet, before entering A5, if someone had told her that her next mission would involve facing dozens of Frenzies, Nightmare would have never believed it. From this, one could infer that, speaking of the next mission, facing a dozen or so Titans was entirely possible.

...

Wind Stab Stun, Deadly Backstab execution, these movements had become second nature to Frenzy Slayer Lin Wu. One Frenzy’s life ended, and another Frenzy’s countdown to death began. Maya followed Lin Wu silently, joining in on the Corpse Looting. Before the Beast Trap was nerfed, Lin Wu could take on a group of Frenzies by himself; even now, he had no trouble dealing with two. However, three was pushing it. If there were more than three, Lin Wu would have to kite, using Beast Traps, Silencers or other methods to create distance between the Frenzies to handle them.

However, if Lin Wu used the Swiss army knife with Deadly Backstab gifted by Little Knife, bringing on another three would still be no issue. His attack speed was much faster than the Frenzies. It’s just a pity that the Swiss army knife had only a sliver of durability left.

Shadow Base had been helping Lin Wu ask around for a dagger with Deadly Backstab, but to no avail—it seemed no one had ever seen one.

Self-made weapons come with various attributes when created. Take daggers, for instance: they come with attributes like Sharpness, Deadly Backstab, Durability, Added Marking, Weightlessness, and Acceleration. Players have ranked these additional attributes into tiers, with Sharpness belonging to Tier 1 (T1), difficult to find on the market. Durability is Tier 3 (T3), common and of little use. Acceleration is the only known Tier 0 (T0) attribute, which can increase attack speed by 20%; there’s only one in North Town. But dagger expert Lin Wu thought this attribute wasn’t useful, not as good as Sharpness or Durability.

Maya, who was looting corpses, didn’t find any good equipment from the Frenzies but did acquire quite a few personal items. Through reading these personal items, she had learned about the general situation of the A5 laboratory.

The A5 Laboratory was a research facility hastily set up by Fortress Company after humanity established the quarantine zones, led directly by Vice President Davis. Davis, as a radical member, even commanded his subordinates to involve humans in the experiments in hopes of finding an antibody and obtaining comparative data.

Davis categorized humans, infected humans, and zombies into three groups of samples, injecting the synthesized viral antibodies from animals into each of the three samples.

During the research process, the lab discovered that bats infected with the virus did not mutate. Due to a lack of time, after hurriedly conducting tests, they injected the synthesized antibodies into the three groups of comparative samples.

The first group of samples was the zombies, showing no reaction whatsoever.

The second group of samples was humans, who developed multiple diseases simultaneously and died quickly.

The third group of samples was humans infected but not mutated; after being injected with the antibodies, they exhibited similar symptoms to humans, infected with multiple viruses. However, they did not die; instead, they completed the mutation from humans to zombies and became a new breed of zombie: Frenzy.

Originally, specimens like the Frenzy were orderly confined and guarded, and the lab would be destroyed to eradicate them if no solution to the virus was found in the end. However, a problem occurred at A5 Laboratory when an employee learned that his family had all died from a zombie attack a month ago, although they should have been protected by Fortress Company in a shelter. To keep the experiments on track, the lab’s head had concealed the news of his family’s death.

Bereft of hope, he not only released the Frenzy, but after being bitten, he also became an adherent of the Frenzy. In the dead of night, with defenses down, people either committed suicide or mutated into zombies. After being bitten, the person in charge killed the Blood Heart by pouring various concentrated acids into the vessel containing it. Regrettably, since the head of security had turned into a zombie, the lab could not be blown up with just the authority of the person in charge.

The secret of the A5 Laboratory is that the mutant zombies originate from human research on the zombie virus. The reason this issue arose is that humans were constantly losing ground in the fight against the virus, unable to provide researchers with enough time for safe experiments. It was a gamble with death, but a gamble they had to take, and no one expected a new breed of mutant zombies to evolve.

The crisis for humanity lies not with the zombies but with the virus. The zombie virus has a long incubation period, no effective detection methods, and strong transmission capabilities, making it impossible to completely cut off the source of infection.

When Maya obtained the chief engineer’s work records, the A5 puzzle was completed. The secret mission for Lin Wu and Maya went from 1/10 to 2/10 completion.

Lin Wu and Maya were not excited about this; they both believed it was impossible to explore the ten secret locations within two years. The good news, based on the description of Nightmare and the information Maya found, was that it was almost certain the secret locations were divided by county. In other words, each county region had ten secret laboratories.

With Maya’s redployment and the assistance of Lin Wu, the Frenzy killer, Nightmare managed to complete this mission with both surprises and dangers. Comparing the rewards she was to receive and the Skill Books for the supermarket base, Nightmare seemed to have found a new path for missions. However, there was a catch to this path, it wasn’t about having the money to hire Lin Wu, but about having what Lin Wu wanted to offer his services.

After completing the mission, the three of them descended the mountain together and said their farewells at the railroad tracks. Lin Wu escorted Maya past the Sentry Card and returned to the supermarket base. Shana showed Lin Wu something good; she had borrowed a novel about Survival from the library, which detailed the techniques and lures for ice-fishing. However, breadworms, earthworms, bloodworms, and other such live bait were not available in this weather. So, Shana suggested they scavenge a fishing supplies store.

Lin Wu asked, "Do you know where the fishing supplies store is?" Fishing supplies stores were not common. There were only two or three in a county town.

Shana replied, "Left County, Road No. 2, I saw it last time I was driving on Road No. 2." One side of Road No. 2 was lined with buildings, and the other side faced Riverside Park, where many people fished.

Lin Wu did not agree immediately, not because he had no desire to do so, but because he was not particularly keen on scavenging a fishing supplies store.

Shana said, "If I remember correctly, there is a mutton shop next to the fishing supplies store."

Thus, with a high five, they confirmed their plans for the afternoon.