Steampunk Era: Mad Abield
Chapter 521 - 353: Confirmation (Part 1)_2

Chapter 521: Chapter 353: Confirmation (Part 1)_2

The Church had captured zombies more than once, but no matter how they were educated, there was no way to make them behave like normal humans should, as an autopsy confirmed their brains had seriously atrophied.

Therefore, it was a fight to the death between the two sides.

But this time, there seemed to be an excessive number of zombies in the camp.

Matilda watched the zombies still squeezing out of that narrow exit—the casters had used a spell formation to seal the original large exit, but now the zombies had broken through three places and were continuously drilling out.

The magazine with twenty rounds of ammunition was quickly depleted, and Matilda reached for her waist, finding only one last magazine left.

"Assistant Priest, I have one last magazine," Matilda turned to look at the assistant priest by her side.

The latter was firing his revolver sporadically, and upon hearing her, he looked at Matilda, "Out of bullets?"—Lord have mercy, he had fired less than twenty rounds.

Matilda nodded, "I’ve already shot 120 rounds."

The big-eared fox once again confirmed that she indeed had been conserving her ammunition.

"I finally understand why the firearm in your hand is so expensive," the Assistant Priest said with a bitter smile.

"Sorry, I didn’t bring that many bullets. I thought there were only about a hundred zombies in this camp," Matilda said somewhat embarrassedly.

But after she spoke, the Assistant Priest was the one who felt embarrassed, "If anyone should apologize, it should be us. We could have never anticipated that these zombies would dig underground..." He didn’t finish his sentence when Matilda and the Assistant Priest turned their heads together and saw the mound of earth behind them rising higher.

"They’ve dug through the tunnel!"

As the mound of earth was torn open and zombies crawled out, Matilda turned to glance at the Assistant Priest, who was using carrier pigeons to call for help, "Our reinforcements have arrived, Your Excellence."

"What nonsense are you talking about! I haven’t released my carrier pigeon yet!" The Assistant Priest’s eyes widened as he looked at the big-eared fox, and then a zombie landed with a thud between him and her, taking on a contorted position that a normal human being could never comprehend.

"Mr. Malin has arrived," Matilda said, grabbing a leather pouch full of magazines off the branches of the onrushing Fio.

Malin, like someone playing whack-a-mole, knocked the emerging zombies away and then sent a jet of flames into the tunnel.

Before this, Malin had put on a gas mask for himself and blocked his sense of smell, giving his big-eared fox a pat, but for the Assistant Priest and the other unfortunate souls beside her, that wasn’t his concern.

Leaving the tunnel for the Church of Justice members to handle, Malin approached the Assistant Priest, "I’ve never heard of zombies digging tunnels and underground dwellings."

"Perhaps it’s because zombies detest sunlight that they chose this camp location in a shadowed area," the young man beside them said, and then he extended his hand to Malin, "Hello, I’m David Julius, from the Sage Consortium in charge of the history in the Farole region."

"Is Constantine Julius related to you?" Malin shook his hand and asked out of curiosity.

"My grandfather, he’s currently at our family home in the Capital, Sydney. Do you know him?"

"I know him; your grandfather helped me once. Speaking of which, I have a hypothesis regarding zombies," Malin said while reaching out and snapping a zombie’s neck, then dragging it behind a barricade made of rocks and broken wood.

"Why are you dragging that zombie over here?" David asked curiously.

"When I was coming from Carterburg, I saw zombies covered in abscesses and lumps all over their bodies. But look at this body—it has some skin fissures and loss, but otherwise, it doesn’t look much different from humans," Malin pulled out a stone slab, and Mana opened a surgical kit, pulling out a scalpel and slapping it into Malin’s hand.

David stood up too; he came to face Malin, "Yes, but zombies with abscesses and lumps are usually found in the North. Their shells are very hard, and normal bullets can’t even penetrate them."

"And why do these southern relatives appear so incredibly frail?" Malin’s scalpel easily cut through its exterior.

David reached out, Malin handed him the knife, but as he watched the young man struggle to cut anything after quite some time, he took it back, "I think this might be your problem."

"...Alright," Malin nodded, "but regardless, their appearances are extremely different, and that indeed is my biggest doubt. Do you think there might be a disastrous zone in the mountains that we have never discovered before?" Malin said, looking at the young David, waiting for his answer.

"It’s possible, but the mountains are swarming with zombies, the Tech Hunters haven’t been able to get in deep. They’ve found plenty of small settlement ruins and some large buildings from before the great destruction, we don’t know their function, and those areas are too infested with zombies for in-depth understanding and investigation." David said while watching Malin open up the zombie’s abdomen: "The organs have numerous mutations, look at this lung, physiological changes."

"Yes, and the heart, humans don’t have two hearts, one large and one small." Malin’s scalpel made two cuts without force; the valves stopped the scalpel’s slicing motion in Malin’s hand.

"I’m more curious about their reproductive system, look, retractable organs similar to those of animals. Compared with humans, they are more like animals. The more I understand them, the less I can believe that their ancestors were exactly like us." David said, listening to the reminder coming from the Assistant Priest.

Malin and he turned to see a sharp-toothed juvenile zombie appear behind the charging zombies.

"We need it alive!" David shouted loudly.

Malin blew a whistle, and Melo immediately leapt out of the defensive line, taking on the form of a treeman and sweeping through the incoming zombies, while Lorrin charged through the crowd and tied up the juvenile that was about to flee.

Malin used Spiritual Energy to grasp and pull it over.

"My God, it has normal skin." David looked at the juvenile in front of him, touching it lightly: "Just like ours."

"A very interesting find, hadn’t you encountered juveniles like this when you dealt with such camps before?" Malin also touched the juvenile’s face, finding it to be the kind of softness only found on humans, and when he pried its mouth open, he found it to be not human at all—it had extremely sharp teeth.

"Do we need to dissect it?" David asked.

"I won’t cut into a juvenile, even if it’s not human." Malin shook his head, and Mana promptly packed away the tools; the used scalpel was placed in a dedicated recycling box: "Besides, I think a living zombie juvenile that looks so much like a person might make an excellent taming subject."

Having said that, Malin looked towards the Assistant Priest, "What do you say, Your Excellency?"

"We will follow your direction, Mr. Malin," the Assistant Priest nodded in response, "By the way, Mr. Malin, can we really take this juvenile to raise?"

"Leave it to you. I don’t think there are many of them left. Their recent attack must have been covering this live juvenile’s retreat. Have you confirmed a live juvenile in your operations before?"

"I’ve been through seventeen operations, and no, Mr. Malin," the Assistant Priest replied.

"I’ve had a few more, twenty-three, and also no," another voice answered.

The responses reassured Malin somewhat about his hypothesis: "Then I can confirm the existence of a Dark Zone in the mountains. Zombies there have developed all kinds of mutations, and similarly, their children have adapted to survive in that environment. When they come here, their offspring have a hard time surviving. In your previous operations, have you confirmed the stomach contents of the zombies and the shape of the skeletons’ skulls?"

"We haven’t, but we can. We just completed another clearing operation a week ago," said the Assistant Priest to Malin.

"Notify me when there’s news," Malin said, looking at the entrance where no new zombies were appearing. "I’ll leave this place to you, I’m going to take Matilda away."

"Thank you, Mr. Malin," the Assistant Priest said honestly, grateful to Malin. If it weren’t for the World Tree Saplings holding the line, the zombies would have broken through long ago.

"No need to thank me, helping you is the right thing to do." Malin said with a smile, then patted Matilda on the head: "Let’s go."

"Don’t pat my head, I’m not a child," the Big-eared Fox protested.

Malin laughed, then patted it twice more.

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