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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: Simzy
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Leaving only two to guard the vehicles, the team leader called the remaining five subordinates and conducted a pre-briefing.
“Our objective is simple. We’re getting the data from the research facility. The problem is that we don’t know which of the more than ten buildings is the research facility.”
There were even cases where the upper floors were commercial buildings, but the research facility was hidden in the basement.
“We brought plenty of ammunition, but don’t just fire indiscriminately. Make sure to space out your shots. Got it? Questions?”
A man with a thick jaw raised his hand.
“What about the cultists? It seems they’ve occupied this area as well.”
When they had gone to the mart where the scent-removing shampoo & body wash had been taken, there was graffiti on the wall that said something about a ‘goddess.’ It was evidence that the cultists were in this area. The team leader answered without much thought.
“Just kill them. The people in the human unprotected zones are, after all, ones who have been abandoned by the Elza government. There’s no good in keeping them alive. Next?”
This time, another team member raised his hand. He was a man with sunken eyes.
“How long will we be here?”
“Well, we have to get all the data backed up, and if that doesn’t work, we’ll have to tear out the hard disks, so it’ll probably take a while. Why?”
“Then if… we capture a cultist, can we have some fun?”
The man with the thick jaw and the woman with the crooked nose immediately rebuked him.
“Are you fucking thinking of doing that? I’m starving to death.”
“Still, it seems more bearable here than in other areas.”
They all looked at the team leader with a certain expectation. The team leader nodded.
“As long as you don’t leave the guard post, I don’t care what you do, but I don’t think there will be much fun to be had.”
The cultists seemed to have learned their own way of life. It was enough to just block the stairs leading from the 1st to the 2nd floor. If there was a need to go down, they could just use a ladder.
Of course, that would make it difficult to move luggage, so the cultists would often attach something like a pulley to the window. When he had done his preliminary reconnaissance, there had been no pulley. Therefore, there would be no cultists ahead.
Well, there was no rule that said they had to have fun only with cultists. The eight of them were enough to have fun.
The six mercenaries, including the team leader, moved swiftly.
Two in the very front, wearing Osberg shotguns and full body armor, and helmets that covered their entire heads with only eyeholes.
Two armed with 7.62mm AKM rifles behind them. A ‘door-breacher’ with all sorts of destruction and infiltration equipment, though he only carried a P40 submachine gun, and the team leader with a mountable PKM machine gun.
There was no dedicated medic. They were all personnel who knew how to perform simple first aid. In any case, if you were attacked by a zombie, there was no other treatment than a bullet to the head.
The six of them approached slowly. There was no need to rush. Running around here and there would only provoke the zombies more.
Most of all, their objective was not infiltration, but occupation. There were no cultists. Only zombies. The mercenaries entered the road with conviction.
Two zombies that had been in the wheat field came forward, stretching out their arms and muttering.
“Cen.”
The two armed with rifles began to fire. They fired one shot at a time, carefully. Shoulder, stomach, lower abdomen, thigh, knee. Not from the bottom up, but steadily neutralizing them from the top down.
The head exploded, the shoulder was torn off, and a fist-sized hole was punched in the lower abdomen. Two of them collapsed like that. The wheat field swayed at the loud gunshot. From the other side of the field, more zombies came running, squirming.
Woof! Woof!
Wild dogs charged. The shotgun team calmly aimed their guns. Thump, a dull firing sound. Not a birdshot with small pellets, but a buckshot with large pellets crammed in.
“Kyaaaang!”
The smaller ones were torn in half, and the torso of a slightly larger one was also torn off. A fatal wound that was impossible to deal with even with the recovery-promoting ability of the Cro-virus.
“Reload!”
The procession stopped for a moment, and then moved again after hearing, “All clear!” It didn’t just end with changing the magazine. They only moved after the magazine was fully loaded. If they endured a little inconvenience now, it would be easier later.
Screee!
“What? What was that sound?”
A nerve-wracking sound was heard. The sound of metal clashing against metal.
But it was a little unclear where it had come from. All that was visible were the wheat and reeds that had dried up while standing, the bizarrely standing buildings, and the dazzlingly brilliant sunlight.
“Hey, 7 and 8. Is there anything wrong?”
– Negative.
“Didn’t you hear something like a metal grinding sound?”
– We didn’t hear anything other than gunshots and screams. By the way, I think we have to start our engagement too. It seems they’re coming because the sound is spreading.
“Yeah. Engage. Good luck. If you think you can’t hold them back, just drive the car and move to our side.”
Why did zombies react to the sound of a gunshot and approach?
The scholars of Minsk had put forward a plausible hypothesis. That zombies also know that when a gunshot sounds, someone or something has died, so they approach, wondering if there’s something to eat.
More than any other creature in the world, the beast that strives to survive on its own is the zombie. Just as a person will survive tooth and nail, no matter what means they use, a zombie also has that instinct.
Each time, the team leader had thought it was bullshit. A person would not stick their body in front of a gun barrel. But a zombie would stick its body out. Even if the head of the guy walking next to it was blown off.
Could you call a beast that had no intention of preserving itself smart? No. That was why the team leader did not hesitate in the slightest to blow a zombie’s head off. Well, thanks to that, he was also getting paid a lot.
In Minsk, there were still many who saw zombies as people. They believed that if a vaccine was developed, they would return to normal.
The ones who argued most strongly were the insurance and financial companies. If zombies were to be considered dead, they would have to pay out a huge amount of death benefits all at once, and if that happened, they would go bankrupt.
“Hey, you bastards. Keep your wits about you.”
The team leader said to his team members what he should have said to himself.
“We have to make a killing in Elza and get out, don’t we! Look carefully for a bank sign or something. See if there’s any gold bars or something, not that useless Elza currency!”
In Elza, you could do whatever you wanted. It wasn’t Minsk, where a lawsuit would come flying just for grabbing someone’s clothes.
Enjoy, take, and kill, and that was the end of it. There were occasionally some attractive women and men, but everything had to be a one-time thing. There should be no witnesses left.
A game that should not be held responsible for. That was their rule.
‘I won’t be able to live like this when I get married and settle down in Minsk, so I have to do what I have to do while I’m young.’
The job of killing zombies was boring and monotonous. That’s why mercenaries would often fall into contemplation. It was no different from just shooting at targets that kept appearing, so it was better to empty one’s mind, but…
Today was a little different.
“Are there usually no zombies here?”
The sound of a machine gun echoed from where 7 and 8 were. It must have been from the gun mounted on the truck. But that sound was also intermittent.
“Isn’t it because it’s not a city? This is the complete countryside. If there weren’t many people originally, there wouldn’t be many zombies either.”
“Even so, it seems like there are too few. Well, if there are none, it’s a good thing. Let’s just have a snack and go. The barrels need to cool down a bit too. Are we short on ammunition?”
They had each brought 4-5 magazines and an ammo box. If the target had been an agile person, it would have been an excessive armament, but their opponent was the sluggish zombie. Since they had left things like combat rations, blankets, and quilts in the camper and truck, there was no problem.
Screech.
It wasn’t just a sound. Something had flashed. It was in the wheat field. But the team leader only aimed his muzzle, he did not shoot.
‘Is there a farm tool stuck in the ground or something?’
He didn’t know. The simple maintenance was over. They decided to visit the houses on the left of the road in order.
6, the ‘door-breacher,’ gripped a metal can with a handle. He stood in front of the door in his body armor. All the mercenaries aimed at the door. The team leader stomped his foot. One. Two. Three!
Bang!
The metal can blew away the doorknob. The ‘door-breacher’ fell back. Beeeeep… Thud. The door swung backward.
Thump!
“They’re inside! Fall back! I said fall back!”
The shotgun repeatedly spat fire. The team members slowly backed away. The zombies swarmed out from inside the door in a frenzy.
Crash!
“Up!”
Suddenly, the window above shattered, and a zombie threw itself into the air. The thing that had fallen flat on the bare floor had its neck broken from the impact, but it spewed bloody foam from its mouth and charged toward them.
“Guard the flanks! Guard the flanks! I’ll break through! Yaaaaaah!”
He hadn’t risen to the position of team leader for nothing. He had to have the strength to hold a light machine gun with both hands and shoot while advancing. Of course, it wasn’t a precise aim, but it was enough to grind the zombies in the house like tomatoes in a blender.
Before long, the gunshots stopped.
“Hoo. Whoa. Haa. Damage report!”
“None!” / “All safe!” / “My clothes got a little bloody, but I’m fine!”
The team leader gestured to enter. The shotgun team entered the building first.
“Gyaaaak!”
A thing that had been lying on the floor pretending to be dead lifted its head.
Bang! As the shotgun spat fire, it was scattered like paint spilled on a carpet.
“Shit, that scared me.”
“Good job, number 2.”
“This, we’ll have to be on our guard. Team leader? This has never happened before. Normally in a situation like this, didn’t the zombies come out of the house first? But what on earth is this?”
Unfortunately, the house was empty. The 1st floor was just a commercial building, and the 2nd floor was a residence with nothing to see. The mercenary squad went to the next house.
“Look at this.”
The all-glass wall was covered with curtains, so the inside could not be seen. The problem was the entrance. The entrance was blocked by a desk and a chair.
“There must be a zombie in this house too. What on earth happened?”
“You should see this.”
Someone pointed to the wall. In red paint, the words 『The Goddess will look down upon us all. She who heals us, she who cares for us, she who lets us live as people!』 were written. From the gloss and sheen, it was something that had been written not long ago.
The team leader nodded as if he now understood.
“It seems this was a space where they quarantined the infected cultists. That’s why there’s no pulley. They must have piled up what they needed inside. No wonder there were blankets scattered everywhere, but strangely no trash.”
“Then let’s bring the incendiary bombs from the vehicle.”
At number 1’s suggestion, the team leader got angry.
“Are you crazy? Our objective is not to burn this village. It’s to get the data and get out. No. Fire extinguishers, at best, smoke grenades are all I’ll permit. Nothing more.”
“Then what about this house?”
“Let’s give it a knock. Not on the door, but on the wall. Shotgun team, break it.”
Just as the men with the shotguns were about to fire a shot each at the all-glass wall.
“Hey!”
It was the wall next to them. A piece of cloth tied to a wooden pole was seen, waving like a flag.
“Need help?”
It was a young man’s voice.
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