"Kill!" The fighting raged on in the apartment building's stairwell.
Ten Swadian Footmen held the front line, thrusting their spears forward even within the narrow stairwell.
By the light of the burning torches, they braced their spears and steadily pushed down toward the first floor.
No Undead Monster could withstand the charge of these Swadian Footmen.
In such a confined space, the two-meter standard-issue spears of the Kingdom of Swadia were devastatingly effective.
The Swadian Footmen formed rows of four, while five Swadian Militia behind them, also armed with long spears, stood in rows of three. Step by step, they advanced steadily, using their long spears to stab to death any Undead Monster that dared block their path!
Even Swadian Knights clad head to toe in Heavy Chain Armor or plate armor would not dare charge headlong into a properly formed Pike Square.
Even if they could break through the Pike Square,
they would still suffer casualties.
Much less these zombies and skeletons, with little intelligence and even less combat power, capable only of bullying ordinary people from Blue Star?
It took barely a single clash.
The spearheads and pike tips pierced straight through the vital points of those zombies and skeletons.
They sent these Undead Monsters, which should have long since rotted away in their graves, back to the realm of the dead!
In just around twenty minutes, they had charged down to the stairwell entrance on the first floor.
They saw the apartment building's main entrance hall!
"Hah!"
Shen Mu raised another torch.
The flames flickered.
Near the apartment building's entrance hall, nearly twenty skeletons and zombies were swaying as they turned toward them.
A ghostly blue glow from Soul Fire flickered in the eyes of the skeletons and zombies, carrying a terrifying energy that could be dimly seen even in the darkness of night—an energy that made one's very soul shiver.
It also brought a chill that Shen Mu could feel even through the Cotton Robe beneath his clothes.
A chill that came from the Soul Level!
"Kill!" Shen Mu did not care in the slightest. He pointed his Germanic Sword forward.
The ten Swadian Footmen and five Swadian Militia raised their polearms again. Whether spear or pike, they leveled them toward the front and pressed forward shoulder to shoulder in orderly steps!
"Clack, clack!"
The skeletons raised thigh bones and decayed weapons, slowly gathering to attack them.
The zombies, limping along even more slowly with their stiff bodies, also stretched out both hands as if trying to strangle someone and staggered toward them.
Then the Soldiers of the Kingdom of Swadia crushed them head-on in a single clash.
They tore through them like dry weeds, leaving only scattered bones and shattered chunks of corpses across the ground!
Once they left the stairwell,
these Undead Monsters in the apartment entrance hall could no longer even slow Shen Mu's group's advance!
Or rather,
the reason it had taken twenty minutes to descend from the seventh floor
was entirely because the narrow, steep stairs required the Swadian Soldiers to come down slowly!
"The immigrants and the new soldiers are outside!"
Shen Mu cleaved apart a nearby skeleton with his Germanic Sword, then looked out into the darkness beyond the Apartment Building. From the gray fog outside, he could faintly hear waves of shouting and fighting.
Of course, he knew it was the immigrants and soldiers fighting the Undead Monsters!
The battle seemed to have reached its most intense stage!
"Switch weapons!"
Shen Mu gave the command. "Use Germanic Swords and shields. Stay close to me!"
Then Shen Mu held the torch in his left hand and gripped the Germanic Sword tightly in his right. Leading his subordinates, who immediately discarded their spears and pikes, he rushed out of the Apartment Building. They followed at his side, shields in their left hands and Germanic Swords or Pointed Hoes in their right.
Outside the Apartment Building was an open landscaped square.
There had once been a fountain and greenery there.
But now, the fountain had long become a pool of filthy water, while the plants had grown crooked and wild from years without trimming.
More undead skeletons and zombies wandered slowly among them.
When they noticed Shen Mu's group charging out of the Apartment Building,
they seemed to sense the presence of the living. The ghostly blue Soul Fire in their eye sockets immediately burned brighter.
Then, swaying and limping, they began flooding toward Shen Mu's group.
There were a great many of them.
Shen Mu raised his torch, dispersing the dense gray fog. Even through the mist more than ten meters away, densely packed blue Soul Fires could be seen flickering faintly.
At a glance, there were likely more than a hundred Undead Monsters around them!
"No wonder the wilderness in darkness is an absolute taboo."
Shen Mu recalled the memories of the body's former owner.
Yet there was not the slightest fear on his face.
With a swing of his Germanic Sword, he sliced off half the skull of a nearby skeleton.
These decayed skeletons simply could not withstand the sharp, sturdy Germanic Sword.
The Swadian Footmen around him were similarly equipped. They had long been seasoned in battle on Calradia, and facing these slow, swaying enemies was no different from striking targets on a training ground!
Thus, following at Shen Mu's side, the skeletons and zombies blocking their path were cut down almost instantly.
They could not stop their advance at all!
"The residential complex's main gate is less than a hundred meters to the left."
Shen Mu knew this residential complex like the back of his hand.
The four Apartment Buildings stood in four different directions.
The main entrance marked by the Mount & Blade System was roughly eighty meters to the left of the building where he lived.
The gray fog was dense now, making it impossible to see clearly.
But based on his impression from when he had come to this residential complex before, combined with the direction marked in Shen Mu's vision by the Mount & Blade System,
he knew exactly where the immigrants and soldiers were!
"Kill! Kill! Hold them back!"
"Long live the Lake Rats!"
After Shen Mu walked sixty or seventy meters, faint firelight appeared ahead, along with hoarse shouts.
When he led the group closer again,
he found more than twenty Swadians outside the iron gate of the residential complex. Dressed in worn cloth robes and armed with pitchforks or wooden clubs, they had gathered together to fend off swarms of skeletons and zombies.
Around the outer perimeter, ten sturdy young men wearing Belted Leather Armor, Kite Shields in their left hands and Small Bladed Axes in their right, with eight short Fishing Darts slung over their shoulders, were fighting fiercely with their nimble axes.
Many skeleton and zombie corpses already lay at their feet. Every swing of a Small Bladed Axe split open an undead creature's skull.
Their combat strength was clearly formidable!
"Over there!"
Shen Mu immediately led his group over and joined them.
"Is that Lord Shen Mu?!"
"It's Lord Shen Mu!"
The faces of the new immigrants and new soldiers immediately changed from grim tension to excitement and joy.
"It's me!"
Shen Mu answered, waving for the Footmen and Militia behind him to move forward and protect the farmers from the Kingdom of Swadia behind them first.
Shen Mu strode over.
Among these new immigrants, men and women alike, he saw a temporary bonfire built on the road using old clothes. He nodded lightly.
These immigrants had stumbled upon the right idea.
With a bonfire, they could disperse the dense gray fog and effectively weaken the Undead Monsters' combat strength.
That was also why this group had managed to hold out for so long.
"Stay close. It's time to leave." Shen Mu also knew that gathering a large number of people together in the darkness was not a good thing.
It would trigger a special reaction from the Necromantic Rules.
More and fiercer Undead Monsters would descend from the surrounding darkness, making the situation more complicated and dangerous.
This was not the time to linger in battle.
"Let's go!" The newly arrived immigrants and the Lake Rats newcomers immediately followed Shen Mu.
Escorted by fifteen Swadian Soldiers, they began returning to the Apartment Building where Shen Mu had previously lived.
But Shen Mu, who was walking at the front and slashing with his Germanic Sword, suddenly changed expression.
"Wait!" Shen Mu raised a hand, signaling the group to stop moving.
"Something's wrong!" The Swadian Footmen also raised their Fan Shields, staring tensely ahead.
From the Apartment Building they had come from, fierce low growls were emerging ahead.
At the same time, figures roughly 1.7 to 1.8 meters tall silently appeared in the darkness at the edge of the torchlight.
As the torchlight flickered,
the occasional flare of light dispersed the darkness and gray fog.
They could vaguely see gray-white-skinned, humanoid but terrifying Undead Creatures with enormous claws on both hands, standing there coldly.
The Soul Fire in their eye sockets was icy and utterly emotionless, filled only with intense hatred toward the living as they let out low growls.
"Ghouls." Shen Mu narrowed his eyes slightly.
Of course, he recognized these powerful, highly lethal Undead Creatures. He had simply not expected them to appear here.
"As expected, the more people there are, the more attention they draw from the Necromantic Rules?" Shen Mu recalled a rumor that had been circulating for a long time.
Yet there was not the slightest fear on Shen Mu's face.
Instead, his mind directly connected to the system.
He immediately used the item he had just obtained—
Item: Kingdom of Rhodoks Top Shooting Competition!
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