Translator: AnubisTL
In the blink of an eye, the entire mountaintop had fallen. The low-tier trains were quickly melted away by the zombie horde. Thousands of zombies and monsters swarmed the trains, attacking every part. The shattering of their energy shields signaled the arrival of death.
"Boom!!!"
Explosions echoed continuously as the trains self-destructed!
Meanwhile, the few Tier 9 Trains stood firm amidst the horde, swiftly eliminating Tier 9 Monsters. They had already collected all the copper ore from the surrounding trains, but it still wasn't enough.
"Thank goodness," the burly man in the locomotive cabin sighed in relief, watching the zombies and monsters now swarming his train and scaling its Energy Shield. Though the situation was dire, they still had a chance as long as their copper ore reserves held out!
These low-tier monsters couldn't breach their defenses. All he needed to do was kill the Tier 9 Monsters.
But just then—
Countless monsters began clinging to the Energy Shield. His Doomsday Cannon shells detonated among the low-tier monsters clinging to the shield, wasting all his ammunition. The gaps blasted open were instantly filled by an endless stream of monsters.
Only three out of ten cannon shells successfully hit the Tier 9 Monster.
"Damn it!"
Watching two Tier 9 Zombies rapidly charging toward the train on the target acquisition radar, the middle-aged man's expression darkened. He immediately pushed the control lever forward, intending to accelerate sharply and fling off all the zombies clinging to the energy shield.
The energy shield offered no handholds, making it easy to shake them off.
But—
Countless zombies and monsters had swarmed beneath the train's wheels, effectively blocking its path and preventing it from gaining speed.
That brief delay was all it took.
The two Tier 9 Zombies had already roared and caught up, slamming their fists against the train's energy shield. The sturdy Tier 8 energy shield shattered almost instantly, cracking and crumbling into fragments!
"No!!!"
The middle-aged man let out a desperate, despairing roar. He wanted to abandon everything, ignore the Tier 9 flying monster, and escape by taking to the air, but there was no time to switch to the "Bunny Cloud" wheels.
He didn't even have time to burrow underground.
The energy shield shattered completely.
The train's primary advantage lay in its speed. Once it couldn't move, it often became a steel tomb.
The middle-aged man, dead.
He didn't self-detonate.
Before his final breath, the middle-aged man stared fixedly at the horizon, his eyes filled with bitter resentment. He had been waiting for the Stellaris to arrive on Seven Colored auspicious clouds and rescue him from danger. Many trains on the train radio had claimed to have been saved by the Stellaris.
But...
Even in his final moments, his Seven Colored auspicious clouds never appeared.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!!!"
High above the Zombie Basin, the Stellaris, soaring through the air, continued firing its Doomsday Cannon from its roof. It blasted another Rot Hawk out of the sky. Chen Mang had already lost count of how many 9th-tier flying monsters he had killed!
As he flew through the air, almost every flying monster in the vicinity locked onto him as their primary target.
Just then, Chen Mang noticed a cluster of about seven or eight trains gathered on a nearby hilltop. The surrounding slopes were swarming with a dense mass of zombies, pushing upward against the relentless barrage of fire. It was clear they were on the verge of collapse, teetering on the brink of annihilation.
Frowning slightly, Chen Mang turned the Stellaris toward the hilltop. He first took out a Tier 9 Zombie with a precise shot before sending a mandatory message to the beleaguered trains.
"Dive underground."
The trains hesitated for a moment, but ultimately obeyed his command, quickly extending their drills and boring into the mountainside.
Then—
The Stellaris followed suit. As soon as it entered the earth, its target acquisition radar detected two 9th-tier worm-like monsters rapidly approaching from below.
Chen Mang maneuvered the Stellaris deep underground to intercept them. He easily dispatched the two 9th-tier worm monsters before resurfacing.
He then flew back toward the village.
The underground would remain safe from worm monster attacks for a considerable time. Hiding there was temporarily secure. He couldn't possibly clear the entire hillside of monsters—he lacked the time and ammunition.
"Why no Legacy Value for saving people?"
Inside the locomotive cabin, Chen Mang glanced at the control panel screen, pouted, and said nothing more. Trains received Legacy Value for taking in children, as it was a sacrifice for the continuity of human civilization. But wasn't saving these trains with copper ore also for the sake of human civilization's survival?
After several dozen minutes, Chen Mang successfully reached the village.
The train slowly descended, plunging headfirst into the depths of the earth to continue its exploration.
Soon, it once again spotted the L-shaped cavern.
This time, the cavern was empty, devoid of monsters. Chen Mang drove the train deeper, and after penetrating over 20,000 meters, the Tier 50 Drill successfully bored through into the cavern's space.
Without the support of the earth, the train plummeted like a falling object from the sky, hurtling straight down into the cavern's depths. But in mid-air, Chen Mang switched to the Bunny Cloud Wheels, causing the train to hover in place.
"This place..."
Chen Mang gazed around, a flicker of shock in his eyes. Seeing it with his own eyes was completely different from what he had observed on the target acquisition radar.
This place resembled a colossal heart!
The surrounding walls were a bloody, fleshy mess. Zombie limbs lay scattered on the ground, likely torn off during the chaotic crush.
At the heart's center, a small red dot pulsed faintly.
It was directly ahead of the train, about a few hundred meters away.
It was a head.
A zombie head, roughly 50 meters wide, lay on the ground with its eyes closed.
"..."
Chen Mang glanced at the faint red dot flickering on the target acquisition radar. The information displayed read:
Monster Information: None.
Current Tier: 9th-tier. Complete Form Tier Unknown.
Just then—
The enormous zombie head suddenly opened its eyes. It bounced a few times on the ground, swiveling its head to stare directly at the Stellaris train hovering in the cavern's midair. Its eyes blazed with malice as it let out a deafening roar!
"ROAR!"
The sound reverberated throughout the Zombie Basin.
Immediately afterward, a powerful, violent gust of wind erupted from the zombie's mouth, blasting toward the Stellaris train. Under the force of the gale, the hovering train was instantly slammed against the wall, tumbling through the air.
Fortunately, the Stellaris, equipped with Tier 9 Armor and a Tier 10 Permanent Shock Absorber, sustained no significant damage. However, external accessories like the Audio System and powerful magnet saw their durability plummet to single digits.
"Hmph."
Chen Mang maneuvered the Stellaris to hover in midair once more, gazing at the colossal zombie head. He suddenly chuckled. As expected, this zombie head was the mastermind behind the Zombie Volcano incident.
It was clearly in a severely damaged state.
Those zombies and monsters must have gone out to gather flesh and blood. Perhaps all the monsters in the Zombie Basin were now rushing here to protect their king!
As expected.
The train radio crackled with Erdan's urgent voice.
"Lord Mang, all the monsters in the Zombie Basin have suddenly retreated and are rushing toward the deepest part of the basin!"
The next moment—
Without hesitation, Chen Mang locked the Doomsday Cannon onto the giant zombie head and opened fire. Each shell, carrying an overwhelming aura, enveloped the entire head in a terrifying barrage.
It had no chance to fight back.
The head bounced a few times on the ground, trying to escape, but it was futile. It could only let out a final, desperate roar as it watched hundreds of shells rain down upon it!
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
Countless explosions erupted in rapid succession.
It was even easier than he had anticipated.
The zombie head had no means of retaliation. Its only attack method was the violent air currents that had created the Zombie Volcano, but it was clearly unable to use that again. Even if it could, it wouldn't matter; it couldn't break through the Stellaris' defenses.
Then—
Two lines of text appeared on the train control panel screen:
[You have slain the Tier 11 Ancient Boss 'Giant Zombie King.'
You have gained 50 Reputation Value.]
"..."
Chen Mang gazed at the scene before him. The massive zombie head, now shredded meat in midair, along with its dropped items, had been sucked into the train by the powerful magnet.
He chuckled softly.
Then, he once again steered the Stellaris train away from the Zombie Basin.
As the train burst through the ground and soared into the sky, sunlight bathed the Zombie Basin. The land finally returned to its former tranquility. The zombie head had been the mastermind behind all the monsters, and with their commander dead, the crisis naturally ended.
"Hmm... I suppose it's peaceful now?"
Sitting in the locomotive cabin, Chen Mang lit a cigarette and gazed down at the Zombie Basin from above.
The zombie horde had completely separated from the monsters, no longer forming an army. Instead, they scattered, each group claiming territory.
The good news: the monsters would no longer attack the train in organized formations.
The bad news: they were still alive.
The number of monsters in the Zombie Basin had increased tenfold, and the number of Tier 9 Monsters had multiplied even more. Mining would become significantly more difficult, but there would also be more unmanned mines to discover, as few trains remained intact after the disaster.
Train Rankings
11 Tier 9 TrainsOnly 3 remained: one flesh train and two mechanical trains.The lower-ranked trains had suffered even greater losses.
Nearly 60-70% of all trains had been destroyed in this crisis, with no escape possible. Tier 9 Monsters had blocked all three escape routes—land, sea, and air.
Chen Mang steered the Stellaris toward Erdan's location, needing a rest. He hadn't slept in days, and it was already noon. He needed to find a place to rest.
He was utterly exhausted. The adrenaline of battle had masked his fatigue, but now that the fighting was over, the overwhelming exhaustion crashed over him.
About an hour later, Chen Mang landed the Stellaris on a mountaintop. Not a single train under his protection had suffered any casualties, each maintaining a perfect record of zero losses.
"Lord Mang..."
Erdan approached Chen Mang, who stood at the edge of the slope, gazing blankly at the distant horizon. "Is it over?"
"I suddenly realized I've been going down the wrong path all along."
"I prefer exploring fortuitous encounter maps. I have more experience with them, and I always thought that with enough accessories, I could create more combinations to handle any crisis."
"Mining all the time only lets me craft the accessories available after Train Upgrade, which doesn't seem very promising."
"But now I see I was wrong."
"If I had kept mining, I might have upgraded my Zaibatsu Energy Shield to 9th-tier. Perhaps even without Lord Mang's help during this crisis, I wouldn't have faced the risk of death."
"You're mistaken," Chen Mang said, leaning on his cane at the edge of the hillside. He chuckled as he pulled out two cigarettes, offering one to Erdan and putting the other in his own mouth. With a snap of his fingers, Xiao Ai, standing nearby, immediately held out his finger beneath the cigarette tip and produced a small flame.
Huuu
After exhaling a long plume of smoke, Chen Mang stretched languidly, inhaling the acrid scent of gunpowder and blood mingling in the air.
"The Zaibatsu Energy Shield is a blue-grade accessory, and its maximum upgrade level is Tier 8."
"To reach Tier 9, you need murphy stones, which you won't find by mining alone."
"You need to explore fortuitous encounter maps and mine."
"Even if you had a 9th-tier Zaibatsu Energy Shield, how many resources would you have to keep it active? And how would you deal with Tier 9 monsters?"
"A train needs many things to develop."
"The Stellaris will face many challenges ahead."
"It's impossible for me to explore every fortuitous encounter map. I don't have the time, and deciding between two simultaneous encounters would be incredibly difficult. How about you join my train as a captain? You'd be responsible solely for exploring and clearing fortuitous encounter maps. You wouldn't have to worry about anything else."
"Impossible."
Erdan shook his head helplessly. "Lord Mang, many fortuitous encounter maps require the train conductor to drive the train. If I joined your train, I wouldn't be able to enter those maps."
"No."
Chen Mang patted Erdan's shoulder, his expression serious. "Captain is just a title. You'd remain the train conductor of the Azure Dragon, but nominally, the Azure Dragon would become a subsidiary of the Stellaris. All your slaves and other assets would belong to me."
"You wouldn't have to worry about iron ore, slaves, or Train Upgrades. I'd provide all the resources you need for Train Upgrades."
"All you need to do is explore the fortuitous encounter maps. Isn't that what you're good at and enjoy? You won't have to worry about the train's development, and everything you find in the maps will belong to me."
"In other words," Lord Mang said, "you'll be a Subsidiary Train."
"Of course, I'm not forcing you. I'm just putting this idea on the table for you to consider."
As soon as he finished speaking, Erdan nodded solemnly and earnestly. "Lord Mang, I think this is a fantastic idea! This way, I can stay with my mother, focus entirely on exploring the fortuitous encounter maps, and not have to worry about the iron ore."
"I think this train development model suits me perfectly."
(End of the Chapter)
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