“Dead?” Ling Mo froze briefly at Tang Hao’s words.
Tang Hao seemed quite pleased with Ling Mo’s reaction. He brought his blood-stained hand to his mouth and licked it, saying, “A shame, isn’t it? How should I put it… I feel kind of sorry, too. Honestly, I was more interested in playing with that little girl than dealing with you and your pet. Heh, don’t look at me like that-I don’t mean it that way.” His tone was eerily calm, but the things he said and the actions of his hands came off as deeply twisted. “What I like is the fresh blood flowing inside her… and that tender, delectable flesh!”
“To be honest, I kind of agree with the Zombies on this one. Only they have the most natural, the most accurate perspective on humans… after all, aren’t humans just another link in the food chain? And if that’s the case, treating humans by the standards of food isn’t inappropriate, right? Tender flesh is premium… tough meat is inferior… straightforward and crude, but it makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? Hahaha…”
Tang Hao laughed over-the-top, yet his eyes remained as cold as ever. At the same time, however, his body suddenly began to convulse involuntarily, his hands trembling as well.
“Hahaha… do you see it? Just imagining it already gets my body excited… If I could feel it personally with these hands, they’d be even happier! What a pity, though, what a pity! Once he gets his hands on her, there won’t even be a complete corpse left behind…” As he reached this point, Tang Hao suddenly lifted his head and looked at Ling Mo with a hint of surprise. “Why aren’t you saying anything?”
The crazed look on his face eased a little, and his posture straightened again. “You don’t seem that nervous. What’s the matter? Have you already given up? If you hurry over now, you might still be able to recover some of her body parts…”
“That ‘he’ you’re talking about,” Ling Mo suddenly asked in a calm tone, “he’s probably like you-a Monster capable of turning into a Zombie, isn’t he?”
Tang Hao squinted his eyes and retorted, “Monster? I wouldn’t say that. If humans were still the overwhelming majority, then sure, you could claim that anything other than humans is a lower-ranked animal, a beast. But now? Right now, Zombies hold an absolute advantage, both in numbers and strength! A city might have millions of Zombies, while the human population is less than fifty thousand… no, perhaps less than ten thousand. A bunch of skittish prey-what right do they have to call Zombies Monsters? And look at me. I’m not like humans, nor am I like Zombies. I’m something entirely new. A species that abandons the weaknesses of both humans and Zombies, while integrating the strengths of both.”
Ling Mo, however, seemed entirely uninterested in anything Tang Hao was saying. He interrupted bluntly, “If he’s like you and can’t fully transform into a Zombie… then he’s as good as dead.”
“And so are you.”
As soon as Ling Mo finished speaking, Xiao Bai abruptly lunged forward.
The mutation panda was now completely upright, its massive front paws held defensively in front of itself.
At the same time, Ling Mo’s gaze shifted to a point just above Tang Hao. In that split second before Xiao Bai reached him, Ling Mo suddenly hoisted himself upward.
Man and panda, one above and one below, managed to throw Tang Hao completely off guard.
As for Tang Hao… he was partly still drunk on the sound of his own voice, and partly hadn’t expected Ling Mo to suddenly launch an attack in this situation. He hadn’t even fully registered what Ling Mo had just said.
What did he mean by “he’s as good as dead”? Did this guy seriously have that much confidence in the little girl? Under normal circumstances, anyone hearing news about an ally’s possible death would feel at least a flicker of doubt or fear. After all, Tang Hao himself was now in a form infinitely close to a Zombie, and his companion likely had the same ability… Yet this kid, who hadn’t even defeated him, suddenly exuded such trust? Did Ling Mo really think that an enemy he couldn’t take down while outnumbering them two to one would somehow be handled by that little girl all on her own?
As these questions raced through his mind, a hefty panda paw suddenly swung towards his head with a loud “whoosh.”
Tang Hao hurriedly dodged backward, but couldn’t resist sneering, “It’s pointless. Even if I just stand here and let you attack, you still wouldn’t be able to-“
“Even that Flesh Monster couldn’t reach an unkillable level,” Ling Mo’s cold, mocking voice came from above, “let alone a knockoff like you.”
Tang Hao’s heart instantly sank as a chill ran through him.
How does he know?!
They couldn’t even see that alpha zombie, let alone pinpoint the exact nature of its abilities! And when it wasn’t in combat, that alpha zombie only seemed a bit more imposing in stature-that’s all. Ling Mo had just gotten here as a Survivor; there’s no way he could have figured it out so quickly. Even Tang Hao and his group had only come to understand those details through long-term observation! ṜÂＮo͍ᛒĚş
“Knockoff”… For him to use that word meant that not only did he understand, but he might have had firsthand experience. Otherwise, how could he be so confident?
But in the split second Tang Hao froze, he was suddenly struck by an overwhelming wave of pain. Unlike the previous attacks that had been utterly futile, this pain was entirely different. It didn’t come from his body-it came directly from his mind!
“Damn it!”
Tang Hao let out a sharp cry of pain. Though he forced his eyes open, everything in front of him became uncontrollably blurred. On top of that, intrusive thoughts began bubbling up from the depths of his consciousness, sending his entire mind into chaos. His body and his psyche, which were already disjointed, now felt as though they were being forcibly ripped apart. Even though he’d sustained no physical injuries, Tang Hao was experiencing the most excruciating agony he’d felt since the beginning of the fight.
“What was I just talking about? Why was I even saying those things to him… Oh, right, it’s because of the transformation-because of this body! Agh! What did he do to me? Why does it feel like my head’s about to explode?”
“That’s right… He’s a mental ability user! How did I forget that?!”
But this damn kid-he hadn’t used a single psychic attack until now!
Anyone who fought against him would naturally fall into the trap of thinking, “This guy only knows how to use energy attacks.”
But the timing… The timing was everything.
It was so precise, so flawless! To catch such a fleeting moment-it couldn’t have been a coincidence. No, it meant this Youth had been looking for an opening from the very beginning, ever since he walked in that door! And even after all his attacks had proven ineffective, he still managed to hold back and bide his time, waiting for that perfect opportunity…
Just like how Tang Hao himself had been capable of calm strategy before the transformation. But, as Tang Hao had just admitted earlier, ever since his body had changed into this, he had lost the ability to maintain that level of self-control.
“Ah!” Tang Hao staggered backward, flailing as he desperately tried to retreat. At the same time, he raised his fist and began pummeling his own stomach as hard as he could.
Pain-he needed to use physical pain to shock himself back into clarity! He had to snap out of this!
At this point, while Tang Hao was alarmed, he wasn’t actually afraid-after all, he still had a body built to take a beating! Even if he was temporarily out of control right now… it wasn’t like his opponent could inflict a fatal injury in such a short amount of time.
“That’s right, stay calm… Just having some sneaky ambush technique isn’t enough to change anything fundamentally. Sure, he can attack my mind, but does that mean my body’s suddenly going to get weaker or something?”
Tang Hao kept pounding on his own chest, gradually suppressing the panic that had gripped him earlier. Slowly, his frantic emotions began to settle, and even amidst his somewhat dazed expression, a faint, mocking smile began to emerge on his face.
“Heh, useless. It’s all useless! I’ll admit, I was caught off guard, but so what? One little trick-what does that actually accomplish? And as for everything else you’ve tried… You’ve seen it yourself. None of it works on me! Go on, keep attacking! Show me how you descend into despair! That’s the feeling all humans experience when facing Zombies, isn’t it? Hahaha…”
In the haze of his confusion, Tang Hao suddenly caught the sound of Ling Mo’s cold laughter. But with his unfocused mind and staggering movements, he found himself completely unable to pinpoint Ling Mo’s location. Even Ling Mo’s voice seemed to drift, sometimes closer, sometimes farther.
“Did you get something wrong?” Ling Mo’s mocking tone broke through the haze.
“What?” Tang Hao reflexively replied. In his current disoriented state, though, he wasn’t even certain if he had actually said it out loud or just thought it. Did any sound escape his lips?
But before he could figure it out, a subtle realization dawned upon him-the faint white blur in his field of vision had disappeared entirely.
“Or should I say… when did you get the idea that I was the only one attacking you?” Ling Mo’s voice sounded out again, laced with ridicule.
“BANG!”
A tremendous force slammed into Tang Hao’s back, sending him flying forward like a sack of flour, his body flung mercilessly through the air.
“Heh, nothing’s changed…” Tang Hao thought, momentarily uneasy but quickly finding reassurance as he hurtled forward through the air. After all, Ling Mo couldn’t possibly have made any significant changes in such a short amount of time, right?
Yet just as the thought crossed his mind, Tang Hao realized something was wrong… Instead of hitting the ground as expected, it felt as though something was pulling him. And almost simultaneously with this realization, his body was yanked backward with tremendous force, snapping him toward the direction he’d just come from with an alarming “Whoosh!”
The abrupt momentum doubled his speed, escalating the force of his rebound. At the spot where Tang Hao had stood just moments earlier, the mutation panda, Xiao Bai, stood upright on its hind legs, its front paws sweeping through the air in rhythmic, rapid movements.
Tang Hao’s body flew straight toward Xiao Bai, who tilted its head for a moment, letting out a cheerful “MeGu!” sound. Then, without hesitation, it swung its massive right paw upward.
“What the hell is this?! Ah! They’re treating me like a punching bag! A literal punching bag! Of all the ridiculous tactics!” Tang Hao’s mind raced in realization, but his body simply couldn’t catch up to the panda’s increasing pace.
“MeGu!”