New York State University’s east gate.
In the east gate’s stronghold.
Benedict sat on the bed as he slowly wiped the pump-action shotgun in his hand. He was still in the midst of cleaning the gun when he suddenly discovered the zombies outside seemed to be rioting. Soon after, he thought he saw a flash of shadow flitting across the campus. However, when he tried to have a better look, he did not see anything out of the ordinary.
For some reason, the zombies had gotten agitated. They seemed to be attracted by something. One after another, they roared and howled as they ran in the direction of the south gate in a frenzy.
This strange scene, naturally, raised the alarm in Benedict’s mind. He could vaguely feel that something was amiss.
He did not bother to put the gun in his hand together again as he rose to his feet and hurriedly picked up another shotgun. He put on his self-made protective suit and rushed to the top of the highest building near the east gate.
When Benedict arrived on the rooftop, there were already quite a number of survivors there. All of them were looking at agitated zombies in confusion as they discussed the matter excitedly among themselves.
As he walked in, the conversations in his surroundings became clearer and clearer in his ears.
“F*ck! What’s going on? Are these zombies on drugs?”
“All the zombies on campus look like they’re rioting. Heavens! They’re all rushing to the south gate! What’s going on?”
“F*ck! Isn’t this too terrifying? Aren’t these zombies too tough? It hurts just looking at them. That’s real blood! It isn’t special effect makeup or ketchup! I don’t know if they feel pain, but I know I feel pain just looking at them!”
Benedict hastened his steps as he rushed toward the edge of the rooftop when he heard the conversation in the surroundings. When he looked down, he was greeted by a shocking scene!
Although there were not many professors, other staff, and students on campus, there were still more than 20,000 people in total. Among these people, more than 98% had turned into zombies.
How could Benedict not feel shocked when he saw more than 20,000 zombies rampaging and rushing toward the south gate as though they had gone mad?
The zombies were densely packed together, and the mass of figures looked terrifying. Even if the zombies were not rushing toward them, it was still a scary sight.
What frightened Benedict was the zombies’ bizarre behavior. As the sea of zombies tried to make their way to the south gate, one after another, they rushed forward unhesitatingly and charged into the wall in the courtyard repeatedly until their heads exploded with blood.
As a mountain of zombie corpses finally piled up high enough, the zombies at the back rushed up the mountain of corpses in a frenzy, using their fallen brethren as steps to climb over the wall. They looked like the zombies in World War Z.
As the zombies stampeded over the wall, some of them fell. Even with broken legs and arms, they remained unaffected. They would rise to their feet or crawl toward the south gate as they roared.
Everyone was still baffled by what they were seeing when…
From afar, waves after waves of zombies with savage expressions and bloodstains on their bodies appeared on the horizon like a flood.
Like streams and rivers merging into the sea, the zombies swarmed from all directions and merged into one as they stampeded toward the same direction.
The earth-shattering roars resounded in the air. As they charged to their destination, the ground began to quake. Benedict and the other survivors could even feel the floor of the rooftop shaking.
“What the f*ck? What the f*ck is this?”
“F*ck! This is heaven-defying!”
“We… We… won’t be crushed by these zombies, right?”
The students on the roof were anxious now. They could not tell how many zombies there were. Everywhere they looked was filled to the brim with zombies.
It was the same process as before when the zombies encountered the wall that obstructed their path. If there were a car on their path, they would charge at it relentlessly. One by one, the corpses would pile up, allowing the other zombies to continue on their way. These zombies who had become steps for their brethren were soon turned into meat paste by their stampeding brethren. This applied to all the obstacles that stood in their way.
At this moment, the sounds of glass shattering with a loud crash resounded from the tall buildings that were located to Benedict’s left and right.
Shards of glass fell as figures after figures leaped out of the buildings into the sea of zombies below. Zombies after zombies continued to leap out of the buildings and were drowned by the sea of zombies, as though they were committing suicide. The scene was like water being poured into the sea.
As Benedict and the others continued to watch in trepidation, the scene became more and more terrifying. At this moment, it was no longer a sea of zombies. As more and more zombies from all directions gathered and made their way to the same destination, they seemed more like a tsunami of zombies now!
Their savage expressions and their bone-chilling roars caused the survivors on the rooftop to shiver.
Rumble!
Even their roars resembled the roaring sound of a tsunami at this moment.
Faced with the endless waves of zombies, the students were frightened out of their wits. They did not even dare to breathe loudly or make a sound. They watched in fear as the endless waves of zombies rushed past them.
Rumble! Rumble! Rumble! Rumble! Rumble!
The deafening noises from the stampeding zombies resounded to the heavens. The earth-shattering footsteps were like a net cloud. Benedict and the other survivors’ faces paled, and they almost vomited blood. However, none of them dared to move, afraid of somehow alerting the tsunami of zombies. If that happened, it would be impossible for them to escape, and they would surely meet their end.
The floor beneath their feet shook violently. The magnitude of it was comparable to an earthquake in the range of 4-5 on the Richter scale.
The survivors at the front of the crowd who were filming this with their phones almost lost their grip on the phones. Fortunately, despite the shaking, their cameras continued to dependably record this shocking scene.
The deafening roars and the quaking caused by the stampeding continued for an unknown amount of time.
As the last of the zombies finally walked away, Benedict and the other survivors looked as though they were boneless; they felt weak all over and fell to the ground. Their faces were pale, and their clothes stuck to their back from the sweat.
After a long period of silence, someone finally said, “T-the… the zombies are gone…”
The person’s voice sounded grating to the ears like the nails on a chalkboard.
“T-they… T-they s-should have gone to the south gate. W-what are they after?”
“I’m really terrified!”
“How many zombies were there? There are, at least, tens of thousands of them, right?”
“No, no, no. The waves of zombies appeared at 9 in the morning. It’s 2 in the afternoon now. Even if there aren’t 10 million of them, there should be, at least, 8-9 million of them, right?”
Someone inhaled sharply upon hearing the number. “8-10 million? Are there even so many people in our university town?”
“How the hell do I know? It just feels like there are millions of them… With this terrifying number, short of using nuclear bombs, I don’t know how we’re going to deal with them!”
“That’s right! No matter how destructive incendiary weapons are, they would still run out of fuel. Even howitzers and cannons need to be reloaded. Not to mention, the amount of ammunition would probably be insufficient…”
“Have they gone crazy? Why are they rushing toward the south gate? What’s attracting their attention over there? Since when did zombies act with such one-track minds, apart from when it comes to food?”
Benedict rose to his feet; his legs still felt slightly weak. He looked ahead at the buildings and the streets; as far as the eyes could see, they were empty. The entire area near the east gate was empty.