Zane and Shelby walked in silence, putting distance between themselves and the three cloaked agents. After Kassam's rudeness, neither of them felt like engaging further with people who clearly had no respect for them.
Their boots echoed against the cracked asphalt as they made their way through the city ruins. Debris of shattered concrete, bent streetlights, and twisted rebar lined their path—silent witnesses of a civilization long fallen. Entire buildings leaned like dying giants, and the wind carried nothing but dust and decay.
There wasn't a single soul in sight—not human, not beast. Even the usual hum of insects or birdsong was absent.
Too quiet.
Too dead.
The only sound breaking the silence was the steady rhythm of their footsteps.
Finally, Shelby sighed and broke the oppressive stillness. "Oi, boy, we've walked nearly five miles, and all we've met are broken buildings and ghosts. This place is a damned graveyard. Doesn't it seem off to you?"
Zane nodded slowly, eyes scanning the horizon. "Yeah… A ravaged world. Still, I feel like something's watching. Something's alive—just not showing itself. Judging by the infrastructure, this place was once a hub of intelligent life. Something must have gone horribly wrong."
Shelby rubbed the back of his neck. "You think they were like us?"
"You mean human?" Zane raised an eyebrow.
Shelby nodded.
Zane's gaze lingered on a shattered skyscraper, now crumbling into the earth. "Not necessarily Homo sapiens, but… humanoid, probably. No reptilian species would build such urban architecture on this dry land. And no mindless beasts would raise skyscrapers."
"Hmm. Makes sense," Shelby muttered, his boots crunching over broken glass.
They kept walking at a steady pace, casually exchanging theories about what might've caused the city's fall. Two hours passed.
Then, finally—green.
Far ahead on the horizon, the ruins gave way to a dense forest. Lush and alive.
"If we're gonna find something living, it'll be there," Shelby said, pointing toward the treeline. "And if we're hunting some Celestial Wolf King, that's probably the right direction. Damn, the sun in this place is murder."
Zane wiped the sweat off his brow, nodding in agreement. He welcomed the heat, though—every drop of sweat was another tick upward in his stamina.
Then, without warning:
Ding!
[Alert! Alert!]
[A Horde of Zombies Incoming.]
[Avoid getting hurt at all cost.]
Zane froze mid-step.
His pupils dilated as he processed the System notification.
"What's wrong?" Shelby asked, instantly alert. He knew Zane's instincts had saved them before. He wasn't about to ignore them now.
Zane hesitated, then said, "You might think I'm crazy."
"Try me."
Zane pointed to the ruins behind them. "I figured out what happened to the people who lived here."
"Oh?" Shelby tilted his head. "Let me guess."
"Zombies."
Shelby blinked once, then exhaled a sharp laugh. "Not even surprised. Of course, it's zombies. Honestly, I've seen worse."
Not long after, they reached the outer edge of the fallen city. Before them stretched the remains of a dried-up riverbed, now a deep trench of cracked earth.
And in that trench, crawling, shambling, snarling—hundreds of zombies.
Their decaying bodies twitched erratically, skin blackened by rot and mana corruption. Some dragged broken limbs behind them. Others had glowing red eyes and snarled like rabid dogs. They moved in jerky, twitching masses.
The banks of the dried river were lined with tall metal fences, strung with barbed wire—still mostly intact.
Zane tensed at the sight.
Then, the System chimed again:
[New Quest Available.]
[Kill all the Zombies.]
[Reward: Extra +5 bonus stat points whenever Host activates Divine Radiance.]
Zane's heart skipped a beat. That was massive.
His current Divine Radiance already granted him a +5 boost to all stats. With the new quest reward, that bonus would double every time he activated a skill. That meant +10 to all stats with each ability used—enough to change the tide of any battle.
His lips curled into a smile.
Shelby stood at the edge of the ruined city, overlooking the trench below where the long line of zombie hordes meandered on both sides of the dried-up river.
"They're easy targets," Shelby said, arms folded. "Zane, deal with them. Let's call this a warm-up—just a simple stretch before we head into the forest." His tone grew slightly somber. "One thing's for sure: these poor bastards… they were once like us. Human. Before everything went to hell."
Zane nodded silently.
He stepped forward, leapt from the high ledge, flipped midair several times with acrobatic grace, and landed with a soft thud on the cracked riverbed.
But he wasn't light.
The sheer weight he bore—more than a tonne from the Arcane Rings—sent tremors across the hardened earth, leaving two deep craters where his feet touched down.
The landing didn't go unnoticed.
The undead turned.
Dozens of heads snapped toward him with sickening cracks. Their rotten eyes glowed faintly. Groans and snarls rose in a chilling crescendo as they began shambling, then stumbling, then charging toward him.
Their hunger had no patience.
Zane watched them approach and muttered under his breath, "They really do look like those zombies in movies back on Earth. Guess the directors might've seen this world—or something like it. Alright then, come on, all of you."
He reached over his shoulder and drew the long blade strapped to his back.
Suddenly, a childish voice echoed in his mind. Soft, almost petulant:
"No-no… I don't want to drink their blood. It stinks."
Zane sighed.
The soul within his sword was having another tantrum.
"Then don't," he said calmly, eyes on the undead. "I'll handle them myself. Afterward, I'll give you a proper polish with sweet-smelling oil. And I promise, I'll feed you snacks—some tasty ones soon."
The voice huffed and went silent. The coaxing had worked.
He began to channel mana—
But then Shelby's voice echoed down from above.
"Oi!" the older man called. "If you use mana here, then all that training we did will be pointless. You're carrying a tonne—your body is a war tank now. You don't need magic to squash bugs."
Zane hesitated. The idea of fighting dozens—if not hundreds—of virus-ridden zombies without mana felt dangerous. One bite. One scratch. That could be it.
But after five grueling days under Shelby's brutal guidance, Zane had learned to trust him.
If Shelby said this was necessary, it was.
He took a deep breath, tightened his grip on the broadsword, and raised it over his head.
Then he ran toward the horde.
The first zombie lunged—jaw wide, arms flailing.
Zane cleaved clean through its skull.
Thud.
Its head dropped like a stone.
He didn't stop. Another came—then two more. His blade blurred left and right, severing heads, splitting torsos. The sword felt like a feather in his hands, his own mass amplifying each swing with terrifying momentum.
Slash.
Crack.
Split.
His movements began slow—precise—but as his body warmed up, the flow became seamless. His strikes grew faster, sharper, each decapitation cleaner than the last.
The zombie horde surged forward, but they were no match.
To Zane, his sword weighed like a blade of grass. His strength had risen so far that his muscles didn't even register the burden. If this pace kept up, he thought, he could swing it a million times.
The riverbed became a killing ground.
Rotting heads rolled like pebbles. Limbs flew. Corpses piled on corpses.
And still—he kept going.
With each breath, each swing, Zane honed not just his blade, but his mind. This wasn't about survival anymore.
It was about control.
It was about mastery.