Earth Ghost (Seeking Monthly Votes)

Black pus sprayed out.

The tumor in the gaunt palm tossed up and down.

His left hand stretched forward, pointing at the train, moving slowly to track its direction. His right hand stretched backward; because he was hunched over, his eyes had to roll upward to their limit to see the train clearly.

With a shrill whistle, the double-jointed arm hurled the ball of flesh.

"Bang!"

The tumor slammed into the train, and in an instant, a spray of brownish-green pus erupted, obscuring the side windows entirely.

The surrounding metal armor began to bubble and hiss.

However, given the corrosive speed of a Tier 1 Earth Ghost, it wouldn't even be able to eat through 15mm steel plating in a week.

Not to mention that the armor on the front of the train exceeded 27mm in thickness.

But the most troublesome trait of this creature was its foulness; beyond corrosion, the pus acted as a tracking beacon.

To humans, it smelled of putrid rot, but to zombies, it was the equivalent of a flare.

Hey, look what I found here, delicious food! Come and eat!

It could trigger a small-scale zombie horde within a radius of several dozen meters.

The best way to deal with it was to quickly wash it off with a water cannon or neutralize it with dry powder.

In his past life, he had dealt with these Tier 1 Earth Ghosts more than anything else. To others, these long-range attacking zombies were disgusting, but his profession at the time had been "Electromagnetic User."

He could accelerate small objects like steel balls or coins to supersonic speeds.

Taking down these fragile Earth Ghosts was a one-hit affair.

But there were times when he missed.

Thinking of some unpleasant memories, Su Huan's face turned grim. "Ignore him. Once Xiaoba gets here, kill him directly!"

He hadn't formed a specific profession yet, so he couldn't manipulate electromagnetic force with precision.

However, some techniques remained, so Su Huan simply emitted high-temperature energy to reduce the need for manipulating a medium.

The downside was high consumption and a limited range.

Soon, a large wave of zombies surged ahead, led by a Tier 1 Butcher, dragging a long-dead Tier 1 "Skull Crusher" behind him as a weapon.

From his mountain-like, obese frame, two small eyes radiated the purest malice.

"Do zombies kill each other too?"

Ever since he had smashed one to pieces last time, Liang Kuan no longer feared these blustering evolved zombies.

After all, he was driving a multi-thousand-ton Steel Dragon.

Even if a true dragon crawled out of the water, it would have to give way to this charging Armed Train.

"A Butcher's trait is to seek out weapons. If there isn't a suitable weapon around when they break out of their cocoon, they grab other zombies. This poor guy was just snatched up by him."

Su Huan looked at the Skull Crusher with a strange expression; it had massive, powerful muscles and a pair of hammers the size of watermelons.

It had been a fierce zombie in its own right, but now its head was smashed, and its upper body was ground down into a mass of flesh.

If he remembered correctly, there was a legendary Butcher in his past life who was particularly covetous of the Skull Crusher's dual hammers, so at every stage, he would hunt down a peer-level Skull Crusher to use as a weapon.

Could it be this one right here?

"Su, is it time to fight?"

Qi Xiaoba's clear voice came from behind; the boy seemed to have regained his fighting spirit.

Pulling his thoughts back, Su Huan nodded and said sternly, "Liang Kuan, prepare to ram them. Once you hit the lead Butcher, you can stop. Xiaoba, clear that annoying Earth Ghost off the wall. Make sure to hit his back."

"Understood!"

The moment Liang Kuan pushed the throttle to the floor, the entire train transformed into a roaring steel beast.

Qi Xiaoba watched the Earth Ghost chasing the train along the fence, his pupils completely stained with the color of liquid metal.

Su Huan took a deep breath, clutching the remaining Tier 1 Pan-Energy Crystal in his hand, the Tungsten Steel Ram humming and vibrating from the infusion of azure electric arcs.

"Don't increase speed! There is a train on the tracks five hundred meters ahead!"

Yu Yue's voice was clearly projected to everyone's ears from the second-floor observation deck.

Su Huan frowned and stopped pouring energy into the engine. "Five hundred meters—can we stop?"

Liang Kuan replied in a muffled voice, "No problem!"

As the wheels crushed the leading group of ordinary zombies, the sound was like thousands of rotten tomatoes bursting at once.

Dark red plasma splashed in a fan shape across the 15mm composite armor, the anti-riot mesh instantly draped in shattered viscera, and the half-skull of a zombie became wedged on the edge of the observation window, the frozen, greedy, and vicious light in its hollow eye socket serving as the first footnote to this bloody scroll.

The moment the Butcher swung the Skull Crusher's corpse toward the front of the train:

"Zzzzt—"

Ten thousand volts of high-pressure electricity surged through the ram and into the Butcher's body, burning his obese frame into charred white smoke.

He was instantly stunned into a rigid state, and then the ram drove deep into him with a violent impact.

Bright yellow fat splattered all along the path.

The horde of a hundred zombies was plowed through by steel like waves of wheat, severed limbs tracing parabolas in the air, while the blood mist kicked up by the ram refracted rainbows under the sunlight.

"Bang!"

Another disgusting tumor slammed directly onto the front windshield; this time, mixed with the blood of a Butcher and the pus of an Earth Ghost, it completely obscured the road ahead.

The Armed Train emitted a sharp hum and began to brake.

Qi Xiaoba reached out and gripped the air, causing an explosion-proof net on the side to suddenly fly out, transforming into a massive metal mesh that scooped up an Earth Ghost.

The metal wires contracted rapidly, strangling the hunched figure into a pile of minced meat.

"Screech—"

The train finally came to a halt, but without a real-time electronic map for reference, Su Huan had no idea how far they were from the Mojiang City South Station.

"Hum..."

The lights in the driver's cabin flickered on, and the air conditioning accelerated its operation.

Su Huan frowned at the sight of the glass smeared with filth and ordered, "Xiaoba, go finish off that Butcher; don't worry about the regular zombies. Old Liang, come with me."

After speaking, he walked toward the dining car in the back, just in time to see Yu Jing and her daughter coming down.

Su Huan spoke up, "Yu Jing, today you are responsible for connecting the dining car's water tank to the locomotive. Once the high-pressure water gun is hooked up, ensure the windshield can be washed at any time."

"Understood."

Yu Jing was stunned for a moment, then looked at the flesh and blood hanging on the explosion-proof nets on both sides and nodded.

Walking into Carriage No. 2, Wan Xing was sitting next to a massive table, illuminated not only by the carriage lights but also by several extra-large desk lamps focused on the center of the table.

Resting on the table was the river crab Su Huan had brought back the other day.

Wan Xing was holding a dagger fashioned from a Night Demon's claw, meticulously dismantling the creature's carapace.

Seeing Su Huan and Liang Kuan approach, she asked in confusion, "Are we heading out on a mission?"

Su Huan shook his head, "Not you, just keep collecting materials. Has the Pan-Energy Crystal from this river crab been extracted?"

"Mm," Wan Xing gestured with her chin toward the Tier 1 Pan-Energy Crystal on the edge of the table.

A look of joy appeared on Su Huan's face.

Counting this one, he had already obtained three Tier 1 Pan-Energy Crystals; two more would be enough to upgrade the Lv2 "Pan-Energy Conversion" to Lv3.

As it happened, there was still a Butcher and an Earth Ghost outside the train.