Chapter 70 - Beginning To Clear The Exit Path
No, the time is not the only problem. Bai Zemin shook his head and the frown on his face deepened as he realized that things were even more complicated than they appeared to be at first.
The time was the main problem since currently his enemies were only three low-level zombies that moved at the speed of a turtle. But even if they were moving slow, if the number of zombies was overwhelmingly high to the point where while Bai Zemin took care of killing some others would have already closed the distance then nothing would be meaningful.
But another problem that Bai Zemin almost overlooked was concentration.
In this situation, it was fine as he knew the weaknesses and strengths of the enemy he was facing. However, was it possible to do something like this against enemies unknown to him? The answer that Bai Zemin got after considering every detail carefully was a resounding no.
How could he, while striving to keep his body intact and without suffering as many injuries as possible, even have time to focus on creating and imagining the shape of a weapon or object and then mobilize his Mana carefully while moving around the battlefield? Doing so many tasks at the same time was not only extremely difficult but could also cause him to lose focus on his own safety for an instant and in that instant, his life could be over.
"It really is hard." He sighed as he scratched his head before continuing to move forward in a southeast direction.
Whenever small groups of zombies appeared, Bai Zemin used them as guinea pigs to practice his control over Mana to reduce the amount of concentration he needed to optimally mobilize it. At the same time, he was trying to figure out the best way to imagine the formation of blood spears; instead of constantly changing the weapon's form, Bai Zemin had come to the conclusion that it was better to master one form first before focusing on others.
His First Order Blood Manipulation skill was powerful against living enemies capable of feeling pain. However, while it was possible to use it to shape and control blood from liquid to solid state, the difficulty was very great as it depended 100% on Bai Zemin's imagination.
During the conversion process, he needed to imagine the process of creating the weapon to shape it and doing that in the middle of combat was not easy. In fact, the reason he was able to do it more easily was probably thanks to his work before the apocalypse broke out or the difficulty would be several layers more.
As Bai Zemin advanced, occasionally groups of zombies formed by several dozens would appear and there was even a larger group formed by a hundred zombies that had gotten stuck in one of the paths but when they sensed his presence they began to attack him. In such cases, Bai Zemin wielded the Xuanyuan Sword as he moved in and out of the group of zombies, separating the heads from their bodies and forming pools of blood.
Even after he filled several two-liter bottles with blood there was still blood everywhere he passed by and the decapitated corpses of the zombies began to accumulate very fast.
On the other hand, while Bai Zemin was having a headache trying to multitask, Lilith was watching everything sitting on top of a building.
Her beautiful face had a small smile on it and her lazy eyes looked at the human who occasionally kicked the lifeless corpses to release some frustration.
"Even to me it took me a full year to get used to the existence of Mana back then but you already have an initial idea of how to control it and use it at will... Yet you still have the nerve to complain? Big sister is really, reeeaaally looking forward to punishing you little Zemin hehe~" She whispered to herself before chuckling secretly.
* * *
In the north of the gymnasium, the complete opposite direction from where Bai Zemin and his three subordinates were currently located, the giant elephant beetle was being dismantled from its shell slowly under the constant efforts of fifty people.
The beetle's shell was tough to the point that even Bai Zemin wielding his sword that was capable of piercing through the defenses of almost any creature below level forty would need time to break through it. However, now that the First Order Blazing Beetle had been dead for several days and its defenses had dropped tremendously after Bai Zemin absorbed some of its Soul Power, the shell was no longer as attached to the flesh as in the past.
Using the hole that Bai Zemin had made the day before when he struck hard using Liang Peng's heavy hammer and taking advantage of the cracks that extended through the creature's armor, the survivors began to use knives, iron pipes, and any other object that could be used as leverage.
They lifted the shell slightly and using the small space created, the others quickly cut the flesh, thus splitting the shell apart.
On the ground there was a large pile of metal-like objects already forming a small mountain about a meter high; this was, of course, the remains of the shell that had been successfully pulled off.
As the survivors worked, standing on the third floor of the pharmacy, Wu Yijun, Gao Min, Li Na, Shangguan Bing Xue, Chen He, and Liang Peng looked down. Some of them with curious looks, others with indifference, and others inspecting the surroundings just in case.
"So... Do you want to use this monster's shell to do something special?" Wu Yijun asked while narrowing her eyes with a mischievous glint in them.
Shangguan Bing Xue nodded slightly and slowly explained, "During breakfast today, Bai Zemin told me to keep the shell instead of throwing it away since when we leave here he could put it to good use. Besides we can also use it as metal plates to protect the buses when we clear the exit road."
"Oh? Bing Xue, could it be that you had some private meeting with him?" Wu Yijun held back laughter and asked in surprise, "At what point did something like that happen?"
"Private meeting?" Shangguan Bing Xue furrowed her eyebrows and shook her head as she said in bewilderment, "No. We only exchanged a couple of words before we went our separate ways, with him going south and us going north. But, Yijun, why do you ask that?"
"A-Anyway, that meat sure looks tender and soft!" Chen He suddenly interjected the conversation and pointed to the beetle meat that looked delicious even when uncooked.
The people inside the building looked at him with strange eyes and Shangguan Bing Xue couldn't help but ask, "Chen He, I didn't know you were a lover of beetle meat."
Chen He's face froze and began to blush furiously as he felt as if everyone's eyes were poking him while Shangguan Bing Xue's words were the final stab.
"Pffft- Ha- Hahaha!" Wu Yijun finally couldn't hold back the laughter anymore and started laughing while saying through tears and laughter, "Chen He, you're too obvious!"