"Beep, beep beep!"
"Detecting rapid approach of firepower attack. Estimated arrival in two seconds."
"Attack intensity: Level 9."
"Recomnded counterasures: None."
The Bald Man froze montarily. Through the rearview mirror, he caught sight of hundreds of artillery shells tearing through the night sky, his eyes flashing with terror. Without hesitation, he imdiately activated the "Tycoon Energy Shield" and violently pushed the control lever!
He prepared to flee the area at top speed!
After a quick glance at the Targeting Radar, he couldn't help but curse inwardly.
Damn it!
He couldn't even spot the enemy on the Targeting Radar screen—he didn't know who to retaliate against.
The next mont—
"Boom! Boom!"
Hundreds of shells struck the "Tycoon Energy Shield" outside the train. The Level 8 shield could withstand part of a Level 9 attack, but only barely. The shield was soon riddled with holes.
The shells pierced through the shield and slamd heavily onto the train's Level 3 armor.
Almost instantly.
Inside the train cabin, the Bald Man felt a violent tremor. His eyes filled with fear, yet he grinned in relief—he had survived. He just needed to escape first, then find out who was behind this...
However.
He suddenly saw in the rearview mirror that hundreds more shells were hurtling toward him!
Slowly, despair crept into his eyes.
It seed... he was going to die.
Then, his gaze turned venomous as he stared at the "Imdiate Self-Destruct" button. Even in death, he refused to let anyone else take his train's resources!
Just then, a forced private ssage appeared on his Train Radio screen.
It was from the Stellar Train.
"Beg quickly and I'll spare your life."
Instantly!
The Bald Man snapped to awareness, as if clutching at his last lifeline. Wild-eyed, he grabbed the radio and scread, "Bro—"
But before he could finish the word, the sky filled with artillery shells streaking like teors, completely engulfing the front of the Level 9 train.
The na of the Level 9 chanical Train, "Only One," gradually dimd and vanished from all leaderboards.
The Bald Man—deceased!
This was the first Level 9 train to be destroyed in the Zombie Basin in recent days.
Under the cover of night.
The Stellar Train slowly pulled up alongside the blazing wreckage of the Level 9 train. As the doors of Guard Carriage No. 7 opened, mbers of Teams One, Two, and Three filed in, quickly splitting up to secure the train's Slaves, eliminate resistance, and gather supplies.
Ten minutes later.
"..."
Chen Mang stepped off the train and entered the ruined cabin of the "Only One." Kneeling, he looked down at the Bald Man's lifeless, despair-filled eyes and whispered,
"I told you to beg quickly, and I'd spare your life."
"Why weren't you fast enough?"
The cabin was in shambles, scorched black everywhere. The man's lower half was nowhere to be seen.
Only his shattered upper torso lay sprawled across the floor like autumn leaves.
Then he stood up and turned to Biao Zi, who had co to report, speaking calmly.
"Kill all the Thugs and anyone above managent level."
"Take the remaining residents aboard the Stellar. We'll screen them one by one after the disaster."
"Yes!"
With that done...
Chen Mang had just stepped off the train, leaning on his cane as he stood on the wasteland, gazing up at the distant moon. Behind him, the air was thick with gunpowder smoke mixed with the faint scent of roasted at—a sll he rather enjoyed.
The night was bright.
He had already given up on the plan to save most people from the "Zombie Volcano" crisis. So simply weren't worth saving.
Especially those who tried to sell him copper ore.
He needed the copper to save their lives, yet they demanded paynt. Fine—let them keep their ore and see if their yellow or blue-tier weapons could even scratch a Level 9 Zombie.
He had prepared for the worst.
The Stellar Train, including the locomotive, had 16 carriages in total. Upgrading all of them to Level 9 Armor would cost 8 million units of iron ore.
But—
If things truly went south, he was ready to abandon so carriages. For instance, sacrificing 10 carriages and keeping only the locomotive and 5 carriages would reduce the upgrade cost to 3 million units of iron ore. Or, in an even more extre scenario—
He could retain just one carriage, cramming all people and supplies into the Refrigerator.
Of course, that would an losing much of what he had accumulated over ti—red-tier components like the "Ground Burst Missile," the 10 Doomsday Cannons, the "40-Tube Cherry Blossom Rocket Launcher," and even the carriages with Level 8 Armor.
All he wanted was to minimize losses.
Yet so people still acted as if they had him by the throat.
Soon—
Half an hour later.
Lao Zhu ca jogging over to report: "Lord Mang, we've finished inventorying all the supplies."
"Everything's here."
Chen Mang took the list from Lao Zhu and skimd it before chuckling. "As expected of a Level 9 Train—quite the stockpile. No wonder they spoke so boldly. They had the capital to back it up."
At the mont of the attack, only one thing had worried him—
What if the enemy pressed the "Imdiate Self-Destruct" button? Then all his efforts would've been for nothing, and he'd have lost a significant amount of copper ore for no gain. That's why, at the last second, he had given them a sliver of hope.
A drowning man will clutch at straws.
Sure enough—
Over the Train Radio, he heard a desperate cry of "Brother!"—just that one word before silence fell. The shells had already landed.
When death is imminent, there's no ti for deep thought.
Even as the shells were about to hit, the enemy hadn't considered how to beg for rcy. It wasn't like snapping their fingers would make the shells veer off course.
—
「1,201,000 units of Iron Ore, 1,080,000 units of Copper Ore, 10,000 units of Wood.」
「Various living supplies.」
「700
Survivors.」
「.」
—
Ti was tight, so Zhang Yi and Zhang Er had tossed all the miscellaneous supplies into the Refrigerator without detailed sorting, focusing instead on the key resources.
No Murphy Stones or blueprints.
But the haul was substantial.
Chen Mang strode back into his train compartnt and checked the resource panel.
「3,101,000 units of Iron Ore, 2,235,000 units of Copper Ore, 1,509,000 units of Wood, 4,480,000 units of Crimson Heartstone.」
Those two salvos earlier had cost him 140,000 units of copper ore—800 shells fired.
But he had seized 1,080,000 units of copper ore in return.
A full recovery.
"."
Chen Mang glanced at the Train Panel with a light chuckle. "Wouldn't listen to nice words earlier, huh? Now that the shells are right above your head, you start calling
'bro.' What were you doing earlier? Wouldn't it have been better if you'd just called
'bro' sooner and kept things friendly?"
He shook his head.
First, he spent 500,000 units to upgrade the Armor of the train's head carriage to level 9.
This way, even if sothing went wrong, at least the head carriage would remain intact.
The head carriage was the core of a train. As long as it survived, the train would have a chance to rise again!
This was the advantage of the Armor attachnt.
The Armor, a defensive attachnt, could be upgraded separately for each carriage.
The Energy Shield, however, was different. It was a unified attachnt—once activated, it would envelop the entire train. It couldn't be upgraded piece by piece, and each upgrade consud a staggering amount of resources, far exceeding the cost of upgrading Armor.
He also had the Energy Shield attachnt, which he had upgraded to level 3.
He knew how it worked.
The cost of upgrading this attachnt was determined by the number of carriages—the more carriages, the higher the cost per upgrade. This was similar to Armor, except it couldn't be upgraded individually. It had to be upgraded as a whole.
After upgrading the Energy Shield, adding any new carriage would also require an additional corresponding amount of Iron Ore.
"Now then—"
Chen Mang searched the rankings and found one of the six trains belonging to the n Xiao Ai had just killed.
「Level 9, B-grade potential chanical Train—Horizon.」
He sent a ssage:
"Let's make a private deal. I'll give you 100 Murphy Stones, and you give
1 million units of Iron Ore. Don't tell anyone—if the market price gets disrupted, I won't be able to sell later. We'll trade in person. I'll send you the coordinates."
"Oh? Finally ca to your senses? I thought you could do remote trades?"
"The condition for remote trading is that the ssage has to be pinned in the chat. That would expose . Yes or no? If not, I'll find soone else."
"Smart. Send
the coordinates. We'll et."
"Sent. I'll be waiting."
Good.
Chen Mang smirked, then spent 300,000 units of Iron Ore to upgrade the red-grade attachnt, the Geothermal Furnace, to level 9. The head carriage slowly opened, revealing countless rapidly spinning gears inside.
It swallowed the entire Level 9 train whole.
The sound of crushing tal buzzed incessantly.
「Obtained: 870,000 units of Iron Ore.」
"Tch."
Inside the Horizon, a Level 9 train in the Zombie Basin—
A woman sitting in a chair tossed a cigarette into her mouth, her eyes filled with disdain as she looked at the information of the Stellar on the Train Panel. She could guess exactly what the Stellar was thinking—trying to rush to Level 9 to escape the Zombie Basin.
Too bad.
Even at Level 9, it wouldn't be able to leave.
But it didn't matter. She'd take those 100 Murphy Stones first. By the ti the Stellar realized it couldn't escape and ca begging, she'd organize all the trains to band together and prepare to resist the crisis collectively.
As for that million units of Iron Ore—
She had no intention of handing it over.
Her train was B-grade potential, equipped with a 「Train Stunt」 and a blue-grade large-scale firepower attachnt, the Light Energy Cannon. Even as a Level 9 train, she wasn't too afraid of the Stellar.
Even if the Stellar had an absurd number of Supermodel Effects and S-grade potential.
When it really ca down to a fight, the outco might not be so certain.
But she wasn't planning to fight. She just intended to say she'd hand over the iron ore after the Zombie Volcano event—would the Stellar Train really dare to rob her at such a critical mont? Would they risk offending her now?
Two facts were clear before her.
First, without the united call of all Level 9 Trains, the trains would never gather together. The Stellar Train alone didn't have the influence to rally them.
Second, even if all the trains heeded the Stellar Train's call and even surrendered all their copper ore, it would be useless. How could the weapons on a single train like the Stellar possibly withstand so many waves of the Corpse Tide?
They needed these Level 9 Trains.
Only they, along with so veteran Level 8 Trains, possessed the ability to kill Level 9 Zombies!
Completing the "B-rank difficulty" chanical Class Change mission required a considerable amount of Murphy Stone.
She had tasted the sweetness of Murphy Stone before.
This only intensified her desperate craving for it.
"If they can casually offer 100 pieces, that must an they have even more, right?"
A strange light flickered in the Woman's eyes as she eagerly pushed the control lever, turning toward the coordinates.
Zombie Basin.
On a desolate stretch of land, a Level 7 Flesh Train sat quietly to the side.
It was the Stellar Train, disguised using its "chanical Tentacles."
Currently, it was about eight kiloters from the coordinates.
He wasn't sure if that Level 9 Train, the "Horizon," would co. All he could do was wait patiently.
Then—
"It's here!"
The Targeting Radar showed a Level 9 Train rapidly approaching.
The Stellar Train's drill bit swiftly extended from the front and began spinning at high speed, soon disappearing into the ground as it burrowed deep beneath, racing toward the Level 9 Train.
Soon, it was moving parallel beneath the target.
Only 300 ters remained to the coordinates.
But he wasn't going to wait any longer.
The next mont—
Train Stunt: Death Spin!
A whirling tal storm erupted from the ground, aid directly at the Level 9 Train's control room. In an instant, the spinning drill bit bored straight into it.
Then, the high-speed rotating Car Blades on both sides of the carriage enveloped the control room as well.
In the blink of an eye—
The battle was over.
The Level 9 Train, the "Horizon," was dead!
Completely undetected by radar, the Stellar Train had lain in wait like a venomous serpent coiled in the earth.
A single strike, a fatal blow.
The Level 9 Train hadn't even had ti to activate its Energy Shield—another flaw in the shield's design. It only activated automatically upon sensing an attack. Against a sudden ambush from below like the Stellar's, the shield couldn't react in ti.
The control room, protected only by Level 3 Armor, was instantly shredded.
Even the second and third carriages, carried by montum, crashed into the Stellar Train as it burst from the ground and were nearly torn apart on impact.
The remaining carriages lost balance and careened into the open field beside them.
Like a centipede with its head cut off.
The wheels spun on the overturned carriages, their rotation slowing as the energy supply faded.
The entire battle—
From start to finish—had taken less than three seconds.
If Chen Mang hadn't extended the Car Blade just one ter—not too far—the full ten-ter blade could have shredded nearly half of this 19-carriage Train in one sweep.
Building a Level 9 Train...
It really takes an incredibly long ti.
Even for Chen Mang, upgrading from a Level 1 Train to his current Level 7 took almost three months.
For others to build a Level 9 Train, even at his speed, it would take at least four months.
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