Chapter 89 - 88: Ceremony
In an unfamiliar living room, a zombie’s corpse lay in front of the TV stand. Foul blood was splattered on the television and the coffee table, making the once-homey atmosphere feel somewhat eerie.
Lin Fan’s group stood by the zombie’s corpse. Su Qing was somewhat clumsily helping Chu Zhaozhao tighten the armor plate on her forearm.
Not only Chu Zhaozhao, but everyone had pieces of sliced-up car tires fastened to their most vulnerable body parts with cloth strips or wire, like armor.
These armor plates, made from small tires, were something Lin Fan had gotten from Liu Bin.
According to him, it was practically natural anti-zombie armor. A regular zombie couldn’t possibly bite through either the outer rubber layer or the tough inner fabric in one go.
As long as you weren’t bitten through in one bite, a teammate’s spear would immediately follow up, greatly increasing the margin for error.
And this piece of tire rubber, strapped to the forearm, had already saved three people’s lives.
To arm these forty to fifty people, he had even specifically organized a team to collect and cut up the tires from small passenger cars.
...
Watching the group readjust their gear, Lin Fan, holding a short spear, pointed at the corpse on the floor and began to speak:
"The zombie’s weak point is its head. On the front of the skull, the eye sockets and nasal cavity are both good targets. But don’t aim for the mouth—it’s too low and might not damage the brain..."
Meanwhile, Su Qing and the others stood to the side, fully armed and holding long spears. They listened intently, occasionally making practice motions with their spears, aiming at the corpse on the ground.
Liu Bin’s group had originally been clearing this building. Lin Fan contacted him and took over this unit.
Behind the group stood two men Lin Fan had borrowed from Liu Bin, whose job was to pry open doors.
...
"Alright, each of you stab it once to get over the mental block... Chu Zhaotian and Xu Qian, you two stab the chest. Chu Zhaozhao and Su Qing, you two go for the head..."
Seeing that they all seemed mentally prepared, Lin Fan gestured with his hand and stepped aside to make way for them.
Su Qing moved first. Her face was hidden by a mask, so her expression was invisible, but a hint of struggle could still be seen in her furrowed brow and tightened gaze.
Watching others kill zombies was one thing, but facing a corpse that was once human yourself was something else entirely.
But she hesitated for less than a second. Gripping the spear with both hands, she recalled Lin Fan’s posture in battle and thrust down decisively.
SQUELCH!
The spearhead sank into the eye socket. When she pulled it out, thick, foul blood dripped from its tip...
"Ugh..."
Seemingly disgusted, Su Qing’s shoulders trembled slightly, but she immediately suppressed it. She took half a step back, clearing the way for the next person.
Next was Chu Zhaozhao. She didn’t hesitate like Su Qing; it was as if she had long been prepared for this. Her strike was filled with a sharp intensity.
"Hmph..."
With a low grunt, she drove the spear down like a long nail!
Her strength was so great that it pierced through the eye socket and skull, striking the concrete floor beneath with a CLANG.
She turned her head to glance at Lin Fan, a cryptic smile in her eyes.
Then came Chu Zhaotian, and finally, Xu Qian.
Both of them knew this was something they had to do to survive, so they just did it. That was all.
What surprised Lin Fan was Xu Qian. Although he hesitated for two seconds longer than Chu Zhaotian, the moment he finally thrust the spear down, he gripped it tightly and used even more force than Chu Zhaotian had...
One by one, they thrust their spears into the corpse on the floor, overcoming the last vestiges of their fear of these humanoid monsters...
Although only a few short days had passed, it seemed Lin Fan had already forgotten what went through his mind the first time he faced that zombie in the hallway.
’Was it fear? Or a bit of excitement? Or maybe just curiosity about that health bar...’
He looked at the health bars above their heads: [105], [67], [56], [55]. ’The three of them are still at half health, but the main force this time was always going to be Chu Zhaozhao, the athlete, and Su Qing, who’s at full health. Chu Zhaotian and Xu Qian just need to hold the zombie off.’
’This was the very same battle formation he’d learned from watching Liu Bin’s group. Except their team was five burly men, while his was two scrawny college students and two women—the budget version, really...’
’But the two guys should have no problem holding off a single zombie. There’s a first time for everything, after all.’
He led the group out of the room and into the hallway. He knocked on the door of the apartment opposite them, and the roar of a zombie came from within.
"Give it to me..."
Lin Fan’s expression was calm as he took the crowbar from one of the men and jammed it into the gap of the door with a CLANG.
This was another thing Lin Fan had learned from those two men.
This type of old-fashioned security door only had one locking point if it wasn’t deadbolted. If you wedge a crowbar in at the latch and give it a hard wrench, you can force the door open.
The downside was that it made a lot of noise, which would alert the zombie inside.
Sure enough, as soon as Lin Fan shoved the crowbar into the doorframe, the zombie inside immediately grew more agitated, banging against the metal door. BANG! BANG! BANG!
"Get ready..." Lin Fan said to the group.
Hearing the command, Su Qing and the others quickly and orderly fell into formation. The two with cross-headed spears aimed at the doorway, while the other two staggered themselves half a step back, pulling their spears back to prepare for a fatal strike.
As for the two door-breaching specialists, they had already slipped into the room the group had just come from to hide, as they were not responsible for combat.
"3, 2, 1..."
Lin Fan stood on the side shielded by the door. As he counted down, he gradually applied more force. The metal door and its frame began to deform, creating a gap. The gap widened and widened, until it reached a critical point!
CRASH!
The security door instantly burst open. The swinging metal door concealed Lin Fan completely, while the other four were left fully exposed to the zombie inside.
This was something they had all agreed on...
Originally, Lin Fan had planned to have the two men open the door while he stood behind the group, ready to intervene in case anything went wrong.
But this plan was jointly rejected by Su Qing and Chu Zhaozhao.
Lin Fan wasn’t their babysitter. He had no absolute obligation to protect them, and he couldn’t possibly stand behind them in every single fight.
That being the case, it was better not to form that habit from the very beginning.
It was just one zombie. If four people with four long spears couldn’t handle a single zombie, then that would just mean they weren’t suited to survive in this world.
That’s what they all said.
So, Lin Fan stood behind the door and closed his eyes.
He listened to the heavy footsteps and roars of the zombie charging out of the room, to the somewhat panicked clatter of steel pipes hitting the staircase railing, and to the sound of a spearhead piercing flesh—that incredibly familiar sound of a skull being broken.
When the zombie’s roars came to an abrupt halt, followed by the THUD of something heavy hitting the floor, Lin Fan finally opened his eyes. He stepped out from behind the door and looked at the group before him with a complicated expression.
"Congratulations. You’ve graduated..."