Chapter 40: Earth Demon

Black pus sprayed.

A fleshy tumor was tossed back and forth in a lean palm.

Its left hand stretched forward, pointing at the train, slowly moving with its trajectory. Its right hand stretched backward. Because its body was hunched over, its eyes had to roll upward as far as possible to catch a glimpse of the train's direction.

With a piercing whistle, the dislocated arm hurled the fleshy ball in its grasp.

"Bang!"

The tumor smashed against the train, and in an instant, a burst of brownish-green pus exploded, completely obscuring the side windows.

The surrounding metal armor began to bubble and sizzle.

However, given the corrosion rate of a Tier-1 Earth Ghost, it might not even pierce through the 15mm steel plate if given a week.

Moreover, the armor thickness at the front of the train even exceeded 27mm.

Yet, the greatest trait of such creatures was their disgusting nature; apart from corrosion, the pus also carried an informational marker effect.

To humans, it smelled like a foul stench, but to zombies, it was equivalent to a signal flare.

"Hey, look what I found here! Delicious food! Come and eat!"

It could trigger a small-scale zombie horde within a radius of dozens of meters.

The best method was to quickly wash it away with a water cannon or scatter some dry powder to neutralize it.

In his past life, the creatures he dealt with the most were these Tier-1 Earth Ghosts. To others, zombies capable of ranged attacks were utterly repulsive, but his profession back then was the "Electromancer."

He could accelerate small objects like steel balls or coins up to supersonic speeds.

Hitting these fragile Earth Ghosts was essentially a one-hit-kill.

However, there were times when things went wrong.

Recalling some unpleasant memories, Su Huan's expression turned chillingly dark. "Ignore him. When Xiao Ba comes over later, have him killed instantly!"

He had not yet formed a specific profession and could not precisely manipulate electromagnetic force.

Even so, some usage techniques remained, so Su Huan directly emitted high-temperature energy to reduce the need for medium manipulation.

The drawback was the high energy consumption and limited range.

Soon, a massive wave of zombies surged from ahead, led conspicuously by a Tier-1 Butcher, dragging a long-dead Tier-1 "Skullcrusher" behind it as a weapon.

On its mountain-like, obese body, two tiny eyes radiated the purest malice.

"Do zombies kill each other too?"

Ever since he had shattered one last time, Liang Kuan no longer felt any fear toward these blustering, evolved zombies.

After all, what he was driving beneath his feet was a steel dragon weighing thousands of tons.

Even a true dragon crawling out of the water would have to give way when faced with a rampaging armored train.

"The Butcher's trait is to hunt for weapons. If there are no suitable weapons around when it breaks out of its cocoon, it will grab another zombie. This unlucky bastard was just casually snatched by it."

Su Huan cast a strange look at the Skullcrusher. Its muscles were massive and robust, and its hands were hammers the size of watermelons.

Originally, it was also a fiercely ferocious zombie, but now its head had been smashed to pieces, and its upper body was ground down to nothing more than a large mass of flesh.

If he remembered correctly, there was a legendary Butcher in his past life that particularly coveted the double hammers of the Skullcrusher, hunting down an isotropic Skullcrusher at every stage to use as a weapon.

Could it be this very one right before his eyes?

"Su, is it time to fight?"

Qi Xiaoba's crisp voice came from behind, the young man seeming to have regained his fighting spirit.

Pulling his thoughts back, Su Huan nodded and said in a solemn voice, "Liang Kuan, prepare to ram through. You can stop once we hit the leading Butcher. Xiao Ba, clear away that annoying Earth Ghost on the wall, and make sure you hit its back."

"Understood!"

The moment Liang Kuan pushed the lever all the way down, the entire train transformed into a roaring steel behemoth.

Qi Xiaoba fixed his gaze on the Earth Ghost chasing the train along the railing, his pupils completely dyed in liquid metal hues.

Su Huan took a deep breath, clutching the remaining Tier-1 pan-energy crystal in his hand, the tungsten steel ram vibrating as azure electric arcs surged through it.

"Don't accelerate! There's a train on the tracks five hundred meters ahead!"

Yue Yue's voice from the second-floor observation deck was clearly transmitted to everyone's ears.

Su Huan frowned and stopped pouring energy into the engine. "Five hundred meters—can we stop in time?"

Liang Kuan replied in a muffled voice, "No problem!"

As the wheels crushed across the forefront group of ordinary zombies, the sound resembled thousands of rotting tomatoes bursting simultaneously.

Dark red blood plasma splashed in a fan shape across the 15mm composite armor, the explosion-proof net instantly plastered with shattered viscera, and half of a zombie's skull wedged at the edge of the observation window. The frozen, greedy, and fierce glint in its empty eye sockets became the first footnote to this bloody tableau.

The instant the Butcher swung the Skullcrusher's remains to smash against the front of the train—

"Sizzle—"

Tens of thousands of volts of high-voltage electricity surged through the ram into the Butcher's body, charring its obese physique into a plume of white smoke.

It was immediately driven into a stiffness state, and then deeply penetrated by the ram.

Bright yellow fat splattered all the way.

The crowd of nearly a hundred zombies was plowed open by the steel like wheat waves, severed limbs tracing parabolas through the air, and the mist of blood kicked up by the ram refracted rainbows in the sunlight.

"Bang!"

Another disgusting tumor slammed directly onto the front windshield. This time, mixed with the Butcher's blood and the Earth Ghost's pus, the road ahead was completely obscured.

The armored train emitted a sharp hum and began to brake.

Qi Xiaoba stretched out his fingers and grabbed into the empty air. One of the side explosion-proof nets suddenly flew off, transforming into a huge metal net that scooped up the Earth Ghost.

The metal wires rapidly contracted, instantly mincing the hunched figure into a pile of pulp.

"Hiss—"

The train finally came to a halt, but without an electronic map for real-time comparison, Su Huan had no idea how far they still were from the South Station of Mojiang City.

"Hum..."

The lighting inside the cab turned on, and the air conditioning began to run at full blast.

Su Huan frowned at the view of the glass smeared with filth and instructed, "Xiao Ba, finish off that Butcher. You can ignore the ordinary zombies. Old Liang, come with me."

With that, he walked toward the rear dining car, just in time to see Yu Jing and her daughter stepping down.

Su Huan spoke up, "Yu Jing, today you are responsible for connecting the dining car's water tank to the front of the train. Hook up the high-pressure water cannon so we can wash the windows at any time."

"Got it."

Yu Jing was slightly startled, then looked at the flesh and blood hanging from the explosion-proof nets on both sides and nodded.

Walking into carriage number 2, Wan Xing was sitting beside a massive table. In addition to the carriage's overhead lights, she had turned on several extra-large desk lamps, all directed at the center of the table.

And resting on the table was precisely the river crab Su Huan had casually brought back that day.

Wan Xing was holding a dagger polished from a Night Demon's claw, meticulously dissecting its carapace.

Seeing Su Huan and Liang Kuan approach, she asked with a puzzled look, "Are we going on a mission?"

Su Huan shook his head. "Not you, just keep gathering materials. Has the pan-energy crystal from this river crab been extracted?"

"Mhm." Wan Xing pointed her chin toward the Tier-1 pan-energy crystal at the edge of the table.

Joy surfaced on Su Huan's face.

Counting this one, they had already obtained three Tier-1 pan-energy crystals. Just two more would upgrade Level 2 "Pan-Energy Conversion" to Level 3.

Just in time, there were still a Butcher and an Earth Ghost waiting outside the vehicle.