The Golden Plan Begins to Take Shape!

Before Martin investigated Richard Town, they had made a complete escape plan.

They had even prepared to shake off a million zombies and mapped out routes that would lead them far away from the farm. But then...

All their preparations came to nothing when faced with the stark reality of Richard Town's zombie distribution, because the zombies there were nowhere near as densely packed as they had imagined! Back in the day, the death of a single Aggregate in Richard Town had drawn at least a million zombies from the surrounding areas, turning the town into a death zone forbidden to ordinary people. But now...

When Martin and the others cautiously approached, they discovered that the zombies within twenty kilometers of Richard Town were as sparse as in any other area! While there were still slightly more zombies overall than the Richard Town area should have contained, Martin's group encountered two skirmishes and had to circle around and clear nearly 120 zombies. But after surviving those two clashes, Martin's group actually charged openly into the one-kilometer perimeter around Richard Town!

Once there, Martin raised his binoculars on land for the first time and carefully looked toward Richard Town.

By then, Richard Town had become a ghost town completely shrouded in zombie fungal mycelium.

Every building in town, damaged or intact, was blanketed in thick mycelium, while countless mushrooms grew wildly throughout the streets. The excessive density of the mushrooms kept Martin's group from approaching any closer, so they merely observed the number of zombies from the outskirts. Yet in truth, aside from slightly larger buildings such as the library and church, which might have become fungal brood nests and held a modest concentration of zombies, there were surprisingly few zombies wandering the fungus-covered streets of Richard Town!

In other words,