Chương 79: Chapter 76: Into the Night

In the dead of the night, a frantic, rhythmic banging on my apartment door shattered the silence. I bolted upright, instantly alert, and bellowed, "Who is it?"

"Sir, you're needed immediately," a guard's tense voice called back through the heavy wood.

"We've got another horde incoming. It's bearing down on our position right now." My feet hit the cold floor before he even finished his sentence. With a practiced mental flick, I began pulling my tactical gear out of my newly attuned wedding ring, letting the armor and weapons manifest into the room. Beside me, Denise didn't waste a breath; she was already on her feet, systematically donning her leather set and securing her buckles. I reached for my radio, flipping it to the command channel.

"Tony, give me a status report. What are we looking at?"

"We've got a decent-sized undead horde moving in from the south, tracking right along the main street," Tony's voice crackled back instantly.

"They're still a few minutes out from our perimeter, judging by their current shambling speed."

"Copy that," I replied, checking the draw string on my recurve.

"Have you dispatched runners to mobilize the rest of the civilian tier?"

"Yes, sir. Everyone is being woken up and armed as we speak."

"Good. I'll be on the battlements momentarily." When I crested the parapet of our reinforced stone wall, the crisp night air bit at my face. Looking out into the gloom, I spotted the mass of the horde roughly three to four hundred meters away, their silhouettes cutting a slow, jagged path down the asphalt. It was an extreme distance for standard archery, and under normal circumstances, I wouldn't have even bothered attempting the shot. But I wasn't operating under normal circumstances anymore.

I was eager to field-test my newly acquired Powershot ability. I withdrew my bow and retrieved one of the uncommon-rarity arrows I'd purchased earlier. The arrows themselves didn't possess flash-bang enchantments or elemental properties; what classified them as uncommon was the advanced composite material utilized in machining the shaft and the precision-weighted broad-head. Mechanically, they effectively doubled my baseline kinetic damage output compared to the crude fletching I'd been relying on.

I slid my shooting glasses into place. The integrated optical zoom feature was still an absolute marvel; the world ahead sharply magnified, bringing the undulating sea of decayed flesh into crisp focus. I methodically scanned the ranks, searching for any signs of a Horde Master. Admittedly, tracking a commander at this range in the dark was like searching for a needle in a moving haystack. But then I saw him.

While the surrounding zombies had heads that bobbed, rolled, and listlessly sagged as they shambled down the road, this particular specimen stood perfectly upright. His movements were alert, his gaze calculating. He was directing the flow. Locking my focus entirely on the target, I tapped into my internal reserves, drawing deeply from both my mana and stamina pools. A heavy pressure built in my chest as Powershot charged.

It was a rigorous three-second cast time, a tangible siphon of energy flowing from my body straight into the fiberglass arms of the bow, making the string hum with latent tension. I stabilized my breathing, locked the aiming reticle onto the horde leader, and released. The moment the string slapped forward, any lingering doubts about the arrow's range vanished.

The projectile didn't whistle or scream through the night air; it flew with the absolute silence of a standard draw, but it moved with the terrifying velocity of a high-caliber sniper round. It tracked a perfectly flat line across the three hundred meters and neatly erased the leader's head from its shoulders. Even though the arrow was constructed from premium materials, the sheer kinetic energy of the impact caused it to violently shatter upon penetrating the skull.

The resulting localized explosion of razor-sharp shrapnel sprayed outward, tearing through a cluster of zombies directly behind the leader—acting exactly like a tight-spread shotgun blast. The immediate reaction was instantaneous. The forward ranks of the horde let out a massive, disharmonious moan, while a sudden cheer erupted from the guards stationed along our parapet. I lowered the bow, a massive, triumphant grin breaking across my face.

Powershot was going to be an absolute game-changer for my long-range damage output. But my celebration was cut short. Deprived of their synaptic anchor, the zombies' forward momentum ground to a dead halt. Deprived of direction, they simply began to mill about in the middle of the street, wandering aimlessly in circles.

"Crap," I muttered, leaning over the stone crenelation.

"What's wrong, boss?" Tony asked, stepping up beside me over the lingering cheers of the watchmen.

"That was a hell of a shot."

"It was a good shot, but it means there was only one Horde Master anchoring this entire wave."

"Isn't that a win for us?" Tony asked, squinting into the distance.

"It's a win for our walls, yes. But it's bad news for whatever neighborhood they just left behind," I explained, realizing the implications.

"If they scatter into the residential blocks, they'll become a permanent hazard for future scavenging runs." This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it"We can send a light skirmish team over the wall to make some noise, draw their aggression, and pull them back into the kill zone," Tony suggested.

"No, don't risk the men. I'll handle the pull myself," I said.

"No need to put our guards in unnecessary danger if I can use my speed."

"Copy that," Tony responded, checking his sidearm.

"Just keep your eyes open. This layout looks a little too similar to what hit us the other night. We thought we had a clean angle on a distant group, right before a massive secondary flank slammed into us from the intersection's side streets."

"Thanks for the heads-up," I said. Without waiting for a ladder, I vaulted cleanly over the exterior parapet, dropping down to the asphalt below. I hit the ground running, sprinting hard toward the southern intersection before dropping into a low crouch behind a stalled, rusted sedan. I swiveled my head, checking both sight-lines of the crossing avenues. The side streets were completely barren—no hidden migrations, no secondary hordes.

Satisfied that the coast was clear, I jogged forward until I was within a hundred feet of the scattered, listless dead. I stopped, planted my feet, and began clapping my hands sharply, throwing my voice down the avenue with a series of loud shouts. The auditory pull worked like a charm. Hundreds of decayed heads snapped simultaneously in my direction. The collective hunger re-ignited, and the mass locked onto my position, their shuffling steps aligning into a singular heading.

Maintaining a disciplined, rhythmic pace, I stayed just a short distance ahead of their vanguard, acting as a living beacon as I lured the entire parade back toward our battlements. Reaching the base of our defensive wall, I didn't even slow down. I launched myself upward, caught the stone lip of a crenelation with my fingers, and effortlessly hurdled myself back onto the parapet. It felt no different than vaulting a low playground fence. The physical reality of my stat growth was genuinely staggering.

Athletic feats that would have been physically impossible for me before the System integration were now executed with absolute fluidity. I turned around to address the assembled guards, drawing my melee gear.

"Alright, team! Let's clear the field. Conserve your firearm ammunition wherever possible. Lead with the bows and spears to thin the dense clusters, and then we'll drop down to clean up the remnants." Tony stepped into my line of sight, placing a reassuring hand on my shoulder.

"No worries, sir. We've actually got this completely handled." He grinned, pointing a finger over the edge of the wall. What hadn't clicked in my mind during my frantic sprint was that Tony had already split our defensive teams into left and right flanking elements while I was performing the pull. The exact moment the horde pressed its nose against the center of our stone barricade, those flanking squads dropped seamlessly from the side walls directly into the street below.

They fell upon the undead like a hammer, methodically waylaying the flanks with swords, thrusting spears, heavy axes, and weighted blunt maces. I just stood there on the walkway, entirely shocked, watching our people execute a textbook tactical envelopment. They were operating like seasoned professionals.

"Well... alright then," I muttered, turning back to Tony with a chuckle.

"Remind me again why you guys woke me up?" Just like our previous engagement where we cleared the parking lot, the skirmish was entirely wrapped up within roughly fifteen minutes of sustained fighting. By the time an individual zombie even registered that it was being systematically dismantled from its blind spot, a cluster of two or three guards had already put it on the ground permanently.

The single longest phase of the entire cleanup was simply waiting for the trailing ranks to trip and crawl over the mounting carpet of their own fallen brethren. When the final target dropped, a massive, unifying cheer echoed from the street. And I had to admit, I cheered just as loudly as the rest of them. While that brutal first siege had taken a heavy emotional and physical toll on our community, the resulting cascade of System level-ups had fundamentally changed the playing field.

This pocket horde was nothing compared to the absolute ocean of teeth we had faced nights before, but watching our people handle it with such cold, practiced efficiency proved that our baseline confidence had skyrocketed. By the time I had returned from baiting the line, Denise had joined me on the high platform, standing tall in her tailored leather set with her spear held loosely in her grip—and frankly, she looked absolutely stunning under the moonlight.

She leaned her weight into my side, and I instinctively looped my arm around her waist, both of us smiling down at the men as they organized the perimeter.

"Incredible work, brother," I said, turning to Tony and patting his shoulder armor.

"First thing in the morning, let's get a dedicated labor detail organized to figure out how we're going to process and dispose of these bodies. I highly doubt the school's passive System repair function is going to clean up bio-waste dropped outside our walls. Denise and I are heading back inside to catch some sleep. Don't hesitate to knock on my door if another wave shows up."

"You got it, boss," Tony nodded, turning back to direct the watch rotations. As Denise and I neared the entrance of the main administrative office, a figure dropped lightly from the low roof-line above, a heavy Remington. 308 rifle cradled expertly in his arms.

"Nice shot out there," Joe said, a wide grin cutting through the shadows.

"New active ability?"

"Yeah, Powershot," I replied, rolling my shoulders.

"It brings an incredible amount of front-loaded kinetic damage to the table. But listen, while I've got you standing here under the moonlight, I think we have an issue we need to address." Joe's expression sharpened, his casual demeanor vanishing.

"What's on your mind?"

"Why are we still receiving organized undead migrations against us?" I asked, laying out the puzzle.

"We all saw the kill notification when your rifle shot landed on TJ. He was the regional anchor. He had to have bled out or collapsed somewhere in the wilderness after he fled the field. So who—or what—is still pulling the strings out there?" Joe's eyes widened slightly as the weight of the realization hit him.

"Oh… Oh, wow. You're right. If the command structure didn't die with him..."

"Exactly," I nodded.

"We need to create a definitive scouting and intelligence plan first thing in the morning to unpack what we're actually dealing with. Can you ensure our core leadership team—along with anyone who has a direct stake in the workshop facilities we're upgrading tomorrow—meets in the office around eight sharp?"

"Consider it done," Joe confirmed, adjusting the sling of his rifle. Denise and I finally made it back to our quarters, gladly peeling off the heavy layers of leather and tactical gear before collapsing back into the warmth of our mattress. I lay there in the dark for a long time, my mind racing at a million miles an hour with thoughts of local economics, hidden dungeon portals, and whatever threat was still directing the dead toward our gates.

But eventually, the steady, comforting warmth of my wife curled up in my arms pulled me under, and I drifted back into a deep, well-earned sleep.