Outside the ruins of Jiao City, a modified off-road vehicle drove into the urban district from the vast wilderness.
Large quantities of steel plating had been embedded into the off-road vehicle, while its front bumper had been replaced with sharp ramming horns stained with blood and rotting chunks of flesh.
Clearly, reaching this place had not been easy for the off-road vehicle.
The vehicle eventually stopped at the entrance to the main road leading into Jiao City. Farther ahead, the road was completely blocked by countless abandoned cars, and even the modified off-road vehicle could not pass through.
The engine shut off, and four young men and women wearing bulletproof vests and carrying firearms climbed out of the vehicle.
The leader was a burly man with a scar across his face, carrying a broadsword over a meter long on his back. The other two men and one woman gripped assault rifles, nervously gazing at the ruined city before them.
"This is Jiao City?"
"This is the largest ruined city around the Seventy-Third Settlement."
"I heard the Seventy-Third Settlement once tried to reclaim Jiao City. They sent more than three hundred Transcendents into the city, only to be hunted down by at least three Zombie Kings.
"One fifth-tier powerhouse from the Seventy-Third Settlement fell, and the Transcendents were nearly wiped out. From then on, no one dared rashly propose a plan to take Jiao City back."
"The three of us only just reached Transcendent Rank One, while Big Brother Li is a Rank Three powerhouse. Can we really force our way through these ruins of Jiao City?"
The three of them discussed the matter animatedly, clearly having heard long ago just how dangerous the ruined city before them was.
Only Li Kang, the leader, remained calm and indifferent. He said casually,
"Since I brought you here, I naturally have the confidence to retreat intact.
"I lived on the outskirts of the ruins of Jiao City for three years, so I know the distribution of Transcendent Zombies in the surrounding areas like the back of my hand.
"The more zombies gather inside Jiao City, the more likely it is that powerful Transcendent Zombies have been born there. But as long as we don't approach the inner ring of the city, the zombies we encounter will generally be below Rank Three.
"Rank Three zombies and the ordinary zombies on the outskirts pose no great threat to us. As long as we avoid getting contaminated with Zombie Poison, we can deal with them easily."
As he spoke, Li Kang strode toward the ruins of Jiao City. The other three exchanged glances before cautiously following him.
The four of them wandered along the silent city streets, where abandoned, dilapidated cars were piled everywhere. One of the young men looked excitedly at a relatively intact car and tried to search it for anything useful.
"Don't waste your effort. Everything within your field of vision has already been thoroughly picked over by who knows how many scavengers. There's no way anything valuable was left behind.
"The real treasures in ruined cities are hidden inside buildings near the urban district.
"Zombies might be lurking inside buildings that can block out the sunlight. Since scavengers don't dare approach them casually, some supplies can still remain."
The young man's enthusiasm immediately shrank by more than half after hearing this.
The only young woman among them asked cautiously,
"Jiao City has been lost for eleven years. Even if there are resources like food in this city, they've probably expired long ago. What exactly did we come here to find?"
Li Kang moved a scrapped car blocking the road aside and replied casually,
"Canned food, tools, gasoline, cigarettes, and alcohol. Jiao City was a major city that housed several million people. The abundance of its supplies far exceeds your impoverished understanding.
"Some properly stored canned food, cigarettes, and alcohol can last for decades. These things are precisely what the big shots at the top lack most.
"Zombie Poison has contaminated too much of the land. The remaining clean land and existing industrial conditions are already being pushed to their limit just to feed the survivors in the settlements. There's simply no extra capacity to produce other luxuries. These luxuries from before the apocalypse command extremely high prices."
As they gradually ventured deeper into the urban district, Li Kang and the others arrived in front of a large supermarket.
Li Kang looked up at the utterly silent supermarket before him, but his brows drew tightly together.
"Big Brother Li, aren't we going in?"
Li Kang suddenly let out a cold laugh and pointed at the supermarket. "A large supermarket like this should normally have at least dozens of zombies inside.
"Do you really believe that so many zombies wouldn't be able to smell us?"
"There isn't a single sound coming from inside the supermarket. There must be an intelligent Transcendent Zombie that detected our presence and suppressed the noise with some special Transcendent ability, deliberately luring us into a trap!"
The two men immediately wore looks of sudden realization and praised him one after another.
"As expected of Big Brother Li."
"If not for Big Brother Li, we really would have fallen into the Transcendent Zombie's trap by entering recklessly."
Only the woman beside them frowned deeply. As a Rank One Transcendent, her awakened ability was related to life detection, and she could sense that there truly wasn't a single living creature inside the supermarket.
The woman was about to speak, but when she saw the two men praising Li Kang's rich experience, she began to doubt her own detection. In the end, she could only swallow her words.
The group continued exploring the surrounding area, but something unexpected happened.
Whether it was the abandoned supermarket, the shopping centers inside the buildings, or the shops along the streets, they all appeared utterly silent.
One or two locations could still be explained as the work of Transcendent Zombies, but when every place looked the same, the group couldn't help wondering whether some upheaval had occurred in Jiao City.
Even Li Kang was no longer as relaxed as he had been at the beginning, and his expression grew increasingly grave.
"How about we leave?"
The only female Transcendent in the group spoke up.
Li Kang remained composed and did not answer. The young man beside him instead replied unhappily,
"We went through so much trouble to come to Jiao City, and we've already used up quite a bit of gasoline on the way. Are we really going to return empty-handed?"
"If we're leaving, we should at least explore one resource area before we go."
As soon as he finished speaking, the four of them suddenly felt the ground beneath their feet begin to tremble violently.
"What happened?"
The puzzled voice had barely risen when the four of them witnessed a scene they would never forget for the rest of their lives.
At the edge of their vision, all the zombies appeared in defiance of their own habits, emerging into the open beneath the scorching sunlight.
Tens of thousands of zombies surged toward them across the streets of the urban district like a tidal wave.
Running at the very front was a Giant Zombie King more than ten meters tall. Its towering, mighty body completely ignored the buildings in the city, and the high-rises were as fragile as building blocks before it.
Its body smashed through buildings, while its feet crushed the cars blocking its path. Each step carried it dozens of meters, making it seem like a giant from legend.
At this sight, even Li Kang found it difficult to suppress the fear in his heart.
"A Zombie King! It's a Zombie King!"
Only powerful zombies that commanded tens of thousands of zombies and had reached Rank Four or higher qualified to be called Zombie Kings. They could easily destroy a small settlement.
They could never have imagined how a mere scavenging team of four could draw out such a terrifying creature.
Before such a mighty creature, the scavenging team didn't even dare entertain the thought of resisting. They could only watch helplessly as the Giant Zombie King charged up to them, then... brushed past them.
"It wasn't coming for us?"
Confusion rose in Li Kang's heart, and then the female Transcendent spoke again.
"They... seem to be running for their lives."
As soon as her voice fell, the entire sky suddenly darkened. Black fog that blotted out the sky and sun swallowed everything.