Free Web NovelChapter 17: The first hunt
The damp mountain air was thick with a heavy, clinging morning fog that reduced visibility to less than fifteen meters.
Lin Qing stepped out of the cabin’s hidden hatch first, her rifle raised and tucked tightly into her shoulder. Her movements were entirely silent, her combat boots finding purchase on the wet pine needles without snapping a single twig. Behind her, Han Ye and Gu An emerged, their small figures clad in dark tactical gear.
Lin Qing didn’t take the lead offensively. Instead, she stepped to the rear, her icy gaze sweeping the dense perimeter. This was not her fight; it was a live-fire evaluation for the children.
"The target is thirty meters ahead, near the granite ridge," Lin Qing whispered, her voice a low, sharpening thread that carried effortlessly in the quiet woods.
"Gu An, you are the vanguard shield. You take the front. Han Ye, you are the executioner; you watch her flanks and strike the moment the target is stopped. I am rear guard. I will only fire if your lives are failing. Do you understand the parameters?"
Gu An swallowed the thick knot of fear in her throat, her knuckles turning white as she gripped the hilt of the steel combat knife sheathed at her waist. Her past trauma screamed at her to turn around and run back into the safety of the iron bunker, but she looked at Lin Qing’s unyielding, calculated expression and locked her jaw.
She nodded once. Beside her, Han Ye didn’t speak. The shadows beneath his boots were already vibrating, coiling around his legs like dark electricity.
The trio moved forward in a tight, tactical triangle, cutting through the low-hanging mist.
Twenty meters away, crouched atop a moss-covered boulder, the advanced tracker zombie was actively hunting. It was a horrifying testament to how fast the virus was forcing the infected to evolve.
It wasn’t one of the heavily armored, massive variants that could crush vehicles, but its physical modifications were terrifying in their own right. Its limbs were elongated and lean, the muscle tissue tightly corded for explosive speed. Its head darted erratically from side to side, its enlarged, pulsing nasal cavities twitching violently as it drew the wet mountain air into its mutated lungs.
Suddenly, the creature’s blind, milk-white eyes snapped directly toward their direction. It had caught the fresh, undeniable scent of living human blood.
SCREEECH!
With a guttural, wet hiss that rattled the quiet forest, the tracker zombie launched itself off the boulder. It hit the muddy ground on all fours, moving with an erratic, zig-zagging speed that would make it nearly impossible for an ordinary human to aim a firearm. It was a pure predator, closing the distance in a matter of seconds, its black-clawed hands tearing up the wet earth.
"Position!" Lin Qing commanded coldly from the rear.
Gu An lunged to the front of the formation, her boots sliding slightly in the slick mud before she fiercely anchored her weight. The sight of the oncoming monster filled her vision, its jaws unhinged and dripping with black, foul saliva.
Her heart hammered violently against her ribs, but she didn’t close her eyes. She focused entirely on the warm, evolutionary spark in her chest, pulling the energy upward with everything she had.
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Right as the tracker zombie leaped through the air with its claws outstretched, the pale blue, translucent kinetic barrier snapped into existence. It hovered like a solid wall of compressed light, glowing fiercely against the gray fog.
The tracker zombie slammed head-first into the kinetic shield.
A loud, resonant CRACK echoed through the trees as the creature’s massive forward momentum was instantly and violently halted by the barrier.
The deflection worked flawlessly. The force of the impact sent a harsh shockwave through the air, shattering the zombie’s wrist bones and staggering the creature backward onto the wet grass, its equilibrium completely broken.
Gu An gasped, her chest heaving as the physical feedback traveled through her core, but she held her ground. The shield didn’t break.
The exact millisecond the monster bounced off the barrier, Han Ye acted without needing a single verbal command. His dark eyes flashed with a cold, lethal intensity. With a sharp flick of his small wrist, the pool of liquid shadow beneath him erupted forward across the mud like striking black vipers.
The dark energy tendrils shot upward from the earth, wrapping violently around the tracker zombie’s elongated arms and legs. With a brutal snap, the shadows pinned the thrashing creature flat against the wet ground, anchoring it tightly to the jagged rocks beneath. The zombie hissed and writhed, its mutated muscles straining against the shadow bindings, but Han Ye’s focus was absolute; he held the predator pinned like an insect on a board.
"Finish it," Lin Qing’s voice commanded from the shadows.
Gu An didn’t hesitate. Fueled by a sudden, massive surge of adrenaline and a burning desire to never be a victim again, she dropped her flickering shield and stepped past the vanguard line. She drew her steel combat knife, reversed her grip, and threw her entire body weight forward.
With a clean, precise strike, she drove the heavy steel blade directly through the center of the tracker zombie’s skull.
The blade punctured the bone with a wet thud. The creature gave one violent, final shudder before its elongated limbs went entirely limp, the black light in its white eyes fading to a dull, empty void. Han Ye released his hold, and the shadow tendrils slid smoothly back across the mud, dissolving into his boots.
Gu An stood over the dead monster, breathing heavily, her hands trembling as she pulled the blood-stained knife free. She looked down at her hands, then at Han Ye, who gave her another faint, silent nod of acknowledgment. They had done it. Their first real hunt as a unit was a complete success.
Lin Qing stepped forward from the rear guard position, her rifle still raised as her eyes scanned the tree line for any secondary threats. Seeing none, she lowered the weapon and walked over to the corpse, her expression completely unreadable. She knelt down, using the tip of her tactical knife to inspect the creature’s nasal cavity and altered muscle density.
"Clean kill," Lin Qing evaluated, her voice carrying a rare, subtle undertone of professional approval that made Gu An’s chest swell with pride. "Your reaction times were within acceptable parameters. The synergy is functional."
But as Lin Qing stared down at the dead tracker, her mind immediately began calculating the broader implications of this encounter. Her satisfaction quickly turned into a cold, heavy caution.
This zombie was not a high-tier apex monster. It was a mid-level mutation, a scout. Yet, despite the heavy storm from the previous night and the extensive camouflage netting she had placed over the SUV, this single creature had still managed to successfully track their lingering scents all the way up the mountain ridge. It had brought the threat directly to their doorstep.
The mountain cabin bunker was heavily fortified and hidden beneath the floorboards, meaning standard hordes couldn’t easily breach the iron hatch. But Lin Qing knew that absolute isolation was an illusion.
The zombies in this world were evolving at a terrifying, exponential rate. If a mid-level tracker could find them today, it was only a matter of time before an entire horde of advanced, mutated infected converged on this mountain range, driven by the scent of living flesh.
Even if the monsters couldn’t break through the reinforced iron hatch, being surrounded or pinned down inside the subterranean bunker was a slow death sentence.
Lin Qing stood up, her eyes narrowing as she looked around the foggy forest. Their current survival strategy was fundamentally flawed.
The military rations packed inside the bunker were extensive, but they were not endless. If a massive horde of advanced zombies trapped them underground for months, they would eventually run out of canned food, clean water, and medical necessities. They would be suffocated inside their own fortress.
’I can’t just treat this place as a temporary hiding spot,’ Lin Qing thought to herself, her inner monologue sharp and ruthless. ’A bunker is just a cage if you can’t leave. I need to build a true, self-sustaining sanctuary.’
To survive the long-term evolution of the apocalypse, she couldn’t rely solely on scavenging the dangerous valleys below. She needed a fortress that could produce its own resources.
In the coming weeks, she would have to secure a permanent, clean water source that couldn’t be contaminated by the dead. More importantly, she needed to clear a secure, hidden zone within the perimeter where she could eventually grow food and sustain their lives without ever being forced to rely on pre-packaged supplies.
They needed to become entirely self-sufficient, or the evolving world outside would eventually swallow them whole.
Lin Qing turned back to the two children, her eyes reflecting an iron clad determination. The live-fire test was over, but the real work of reshaping this mountain into an unbreachable stronghold was just beginning.
"Clean your weapons and get ready," Lin Qing ordered, her voice cutting through the damp fog like a blade. "The world is changing faster than we thought. We need to tighten our security baseline immediately, inventory every remaining ration, and map out a perimeter plan for a permanent settlement. Move."
"Yes, Ma’am," Gu An responded instantly, her voice no longer trembling.
The two children immediately turned and began executing the orders, moving back toward the hidden hatch of the cabin.
Lin Qing took one last look at the dark, silent forest below, her hand tightening on her rifle. She didn’t know what lay ahead, but she was going to turn this mountain into an absolute fortress of survival. No matter how fast the dead evolved, she would be faster.
