Volume 1, Chapter 40: Securing the Yida Shopping Mall
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Yida Mall — 12:17 p.m.
Three CSK181 Mengshi armored vehicles stood in a triangular formation at the unloading zone on the mall’s eastern side. The barrels of their roof-mounted 12.7 mm heavy machine guns gleamed with a cold, murderous sheen beneath the blazing sun.
Xie Jin crouched behind the lead Mengshi, studying the latest thermal image transmitted by the drone on his tactical tablet.
At least two hundred heat signatures were clustered in the mall’s second-floor dining area, growing increasingly agitated with every burst of gunfire.
“Team B in position.” A Snow Leopard operative’s report crackled through his earpiece. “C4 has been planted in the western fire-exit passage. We can create a diversion at any time.”
Xie Jin tapped the microphone twice to acknowledge receipt, then turned to the fire-support squad leader beside him and signed:
Thirty seconds after detonation, saturate the eastern entrance with heavy fire.
“Clang!”
A tremendous metallic crash suddenly erupted in the distance.
Team B had detonated the explosives.
The rolling fire door covering the entire emergency passage was blown away by the shock wave. The thunderous blast was like a boulder dropped into still water, instantly stirring the horde inside the mall into a frenzy.
“Raaagh!”
Hundreds of zombies surged toward the sound on the western side, smashing through the glass storefronts along the way.
Xie Jin watched the red dots representing the horde move like a receding tide. Then he suddenly clenched his fist and drove it downward.
“Now!”
Boom-boom-boom-boom!
All three heavy machine guns opened fire at once.
A metallic storm of 12.7 mm armor-piercing incendiary rounds tore through the remaining obstacles at the eastern entrance, cutting more than a dozen zombies in half before they could relocate.
The incendiary compound ignited the splashing corpse oil, building a wall of fire across the entrance.
“Assault teams! Move, move, move!”
Six combat teams surged forward in an arrowhead formation. The muzzles of their QBZ-191 rifles carved dense lines of fire through the dim interior.
The point man suddenly raised a halt signal.
Five mutants in security uniforms were sprawled across the escalator, their rotten fingers already gripping the power switches.
Bang!
Muzzle flash burst from Xie Jin’s rifle. The round punched cleanly through the first mutant’s eye socket.
But the other four had already worked together to throw the switches. The mall’s emergency lighting system sprang to life all at once.
Under the glaring red lights, more zombies hidden behind the counters rose to their feet.
They knew how to ambush.
“Crossfire! Team A, suppress the second floor!”
Xie Jin rolled aside as a zombie lunged at him. He jammed the barrel of his 191 rifle beneath its chin and pulled the trigger. With a wet pop, fragments of skull splattered across a GUCCI advertisement.
The sound of shattering glass suddenly rang out from the second floor. Six Snow Leopard operatives burst through the windows on fast-ropes.
Their QBZ-191s were fitted with suppressors. At close range, their gunfire sounded like the whisper of the Grim Reaper. In barely ten seconds, they had cleared the ambushers from the corridor.
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“Platoon leader!” A soldier suddenly pointed toward the atrium. “Survivors!”
Xie Jin turned. In the children’s playground on the third floor, more than a dozen figures were waving glow sticks desperately.
But the steel dome above them was already swaying on the verge of collapse.
The horde’s running was causing the entire structure to resonate.
“Team C, rescue them! Everyone else, provide cover!”
Two combat teams immediately sprinted toward the escalators, advancing upward under alternating cover.
Suddenly, a small zombie in a princess dress sprang out of the ball pit. Its mouth was smeared with blood as it lunged for a soldier’s calf.
“Damn it!”
The soldier reacted quickly, kicking it away before smashing its skull with the butt of his rifle.
“Son of a bitch, we’ve got a sneaky little bastard here!”
Xie Jin had just begun to relax when Chen Feng’s warning exploded through his earpiece.
“Parking lot! The horde is coming back! Repeat, the horde is—”
Before he could finish, the entire glass curtain wall exploded inward.
Hundreds of zombies drawn back by the gunfire surged in like a black tide. At the very front were five zombies with grotesquely swollen muscles.
“Thermobaric rocket!”
Xie Jin’s voice tore through the chaos.
With a hiss and a roar, a PF-97 thermobaric rocket slammed into the center of the horde. The high-temperature blast wave instantly carbonized every organic thing within twenty meters.
But more zombies continued charging over the charred bodies of their own kind. The nearest sprinter was barely ten meters from the fire-support squad.
Rat-tat-tat-tat!
At the critical moment, three Mengshi armored vehicles smashed through the outer wall and burst into the mall.
The curtain of fire from their roof-mounted machine guns swept across the horde like the scythes of death, cutting down the front ranks in unison.
One Mengshi even rolled directly over a muscular zombie. Its tracks dragged mangled flesh into a cosmetics counter.
“Fall back! Get the survivors out!”
Xie Jin retreated while changing magazines.
“Team B, cover the rear! Team A, clear us a path!”
The Snow Leopard operatives threw fast-ropes down from the second floor. The soldiers secured the survivors to stretchers and rapidly lowered them to safety.
The last person to leave was a bespectacled boy. Suddenly, he pointed behind Xie Jin and screamed:
“Uncle, behind you!”
Xie Jin spun around.
A zombie with only its upper body remaining had clamped its teeth around his tactical boot.
A short burst from the 191 rifle blew apart its head, but even more zombies had already broken through the firing line.
“Platoon leader! Jump!”
Xie Jin vaulted over the second-floor railing. A gunner on the roof of a Mengshi reached out and hauled him aboard.
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The vehicles roared out of the mall as the final defensive line detonated behind them.
When the convoy burst through the smoke, a message from Chen Feng appeared on Xie Jin’s tablet:
The mall’s main structure has been rigged with explosives. Detonation may proceed once all survivors have been confirmed evacuated.
Xie Jin looked back. Beneath the setting sun, the outer walls of Yida Mall were riddled with bullet holes, resembling a bleeding steel beast.
And they had just rescued seventeen lives from its belly.
“Contact the Marshal.” Xie Jin wiped the blood from his face. “Mission complete. Requesting final purification.”
Lin Ye’s voice came through the earpiece, carrying a rare note of approval.
“Approved. Starting tomorrow, this will be the eastern forward outpost of Dawn Base.”
As the remote detonator was pressed, Yida Mall collapsed amid towering flames, burying more than ten thousand zombies forever.
And much farther away, countless similar structures still awaited conquest.
Xie Jin watched the sea of fire shrink in his rearview mirror and silently loaded a fresh magazine into his 191 rifle.
This was only the first step of the journey through the apocalypse.
And already, he could imagine the Marshal leading them in the conquest of the entire world.
...
Inside Cloud Villa.
Ding! The Marshal’s forces have killed 11,234 zombies. Calculating rewards...
Ding! Merit points gained: 11,234.
Ding! Blueprint acquired: PP93 60 mm mortar system, including mortar crew. Quantity: 1.
Ding! Blueprint acquired: AH-64E Apache Guardian attack helicopter. Quantity: 1.
Ding! Special supply blueprint acquired: Advanced maid uniform, featuring stain resistance, slash resistance, and temperature control. Quantity: 1.
Ding! Special supply blueprint acquired: Nano-grade isolation protective suit. Quantity: 1.
Lin Ye’s pupils contracted sharply. The coffee cup in his hand nearly shattered.
A 60 mm mortar?
An Apache?
Holy shit!
Even the usually unflappable Lin Ye let out a rare, emphatic curse.
...
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