Chương 70: Chapter 67: Commander of the Dead

You have inserted Crystal Core into the Novus control panel. Do you wish to bond Crystal Core to Novus? Yes/No? Caution: once the crystal core has been bound, it cannot be removed unless claimed by someone else. I selected Yes. Instantly, a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree wave of pure, concentrated power rippled out from the control panel, passing directly through my chest and vibrating through the office walls. Before I could even blink, my radio blared to life with Joe's stressed, gravelly voice.

"What the hell was that? Did anyone see where that came from?" Several frantic replies cut across the channel from various guards reporting they had no clue. I keyed my mic, forcing my voice to stay level.

"It's okay, everyone calm down. I slotted the core, and that wave was just what happens when you confirm the bond. Is anyone injured?" The radio went silent for a few seconds. No bad news.

"Joe, we're all good here. Continue operations as discussed, and I'll complete the next step."

"Copy that," Joe replied. I pulled the blinking notification back up. Congratulations, you have successfully bound a crystal core to Novus' control panel, creating a minor settlement. Settlement size: "Hamlet". As the person responsible for bonding the core, you have been granted the title: "Mayor of Novus". Notice: This title can only be removed upon your death. If your death is natural, the title may be passed down to an heir.

If you are slain, the person who slayed you may claim the title and the Hamlet for themselves. Continue to power up Novus to gain access to your new settlement's full capabilities. Curious, I pulled up my status to see exactly what the new title brought to the table. Title: Mayor of Novus. Grants +10 to all stats. Grants a 10% experience bonus when training skills, abilities, and spells. Upgradable.

A massive, warm rush of euphoria rolled over me as the stat increase took effect, making my skin tingle and my muscles tighten. As much as I wanted to just sit back and bask in the full stat screen, now wasn't the time. I immediately tapped into Novus' expanded defensive interface, eager to see what kind of heavy-duty security we'd just unlocked. A clean list of options populated the display: Reinforced Boundary: Increases the physical durability of external structures by 50%.

Sentry Wards: Detects hostile entities within a 100-yard perimeter. Mana-Infused Barricades: Adds shock damage to physical barriers upon contact. My finger hovered over the screen, ready to activate all three, but the text suddenly flashed a harsh, violent crimson, locking me out completely. Warning: Your domain is under siege. You cannot change, modify, or activate power levels, buildings, or walls while hostile entities are inside your perimeter.

"Son of a bitch!" I yelled, slamming my fist into the principal's desk. The force left a distinct, splintered dent right in the center of the wood. I pulled up the facility map on my interface. Sure enough, it was a solid, pulsing sea of red dots swarming the southwestern edge of our property lines. I clicked my mic again.

"Joe, have our dungeon team and all the kill team leaders meet me behind the main office right now."

"Copy that," Joe replied quickly. Exiting the main office, I walked out into the courtyard to find the team already gathering. Looking around, I noticed most of our people had already geared up using the rust-colored leather armor sets we'd stripped from the Kobolds, while a fair number of our veteran guys still wore our modern tactical vests and helmets. I looked straight at Joe.

"What's the situation?"

"Still the same as before," he replied, adjusting his grip on his rifle.

"It looks to be mostly low-level zombies, and they're strictly funneling into a couple of specific points on this side of the property. It's my belief they're being controlled by someone or something."

"Well, you're right, and the defenses are a no-go," I responded grimly.

"The System officially counts this as a siege. We can't lock down the boundaries, turn on the sentry wards, or charge the barricades until the siege is broken. We're going to have to clear every single one of these bastards off the property on our own."

"Well, that sucks," Joe muttered.

"While it doesn't appear that we're under great threat at the exact moment, we're going to have some real issues very soon."

"How so?"

"For one, I feel like we're just waiting for the other shoe to drop," Joe explained, gesturing toward the fence line.

"But logistically, the bodies are already piling up way too high near the double gate. It's a struggle for the zombies to shamble over the dead right now, but eventually, the pile is going to get high enough that they'll just crawl right over the top of the gates and into the quad." The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"Alright," I said, turning to the team leaders.

"Get your kill teams where you see fit, but I want as many people killing zombies as possible. Look at it this way—this is an easy way to level up our people with some safe experience. Post a couple of guys on the roofs with AR's just in case, but everyone needs to conserve ammo. Use melee weapons wherever you can. Alex and I will take care of clearing the bottleneck at the gates." After the team leaders split up and headed toward their designated sectors, I turned around and saw Denise walking my way.

My jaw practically hit the pavement. She was wearing one of the sets of Kobold leather armor, but it didn't look anything like it did on the guys. When the men wore it, the leather kept its stiff, boxy shape; apparently, the System's tailoring was far more forgiving to the female form. The armor conformed to her curves in all the right ways. She stopped right in front of me, leaning lightly on a wooden spear with a knowing smirk on her face. I couldn't help but let out a low, appreciative whistle.

"God damn, baby. You look like a warrior goddess. If we weren't in the middle of a literal siege, I'd be dragging you straight back to our room." She let out a soft laugh, her eyes sparkling.

"I knew you were going to like it."

"Things seem like they're going pretty well out here," I said, stepping a fraction closer with a cheeky smile.

"Any chance you want to slip away for just a little bit?"

"You know I do," she replied, her smirk widening.

"But unfortunately, you have work to do."

"Yeah, yeah," I said, throwing my hands up dejectedly. Over by the double gates, Alex was already hard at work, using his magic to whip zombies off the ever-increasing pile of bodies to stem the flow. I jogged over and caught his attention.

"Alex, I'm going to throw down a Spike Growth and root as many of them as I can. Hopefully, that will slow them down enough for you to throw up a fast wall. Once it's up, I want you to use your vines to start chucking the dead bodies back over the wall as far as you can. Can you do that?" Alex gave me a sharp nod, and I immediately began to channel my mana. I placed the Spike Growth about fifty meters out, dead center in the tight choke point created between the main office and the big gym.

Instantly, sharp, barbed spikes erupted from the asphalt, pinning the front rank of zombies in place. Just like in the dungeon, the sheer pressure of the mindless horde pushing from behind forced the back ranks straight onto the spikes, crushing and impaling their own brethren in the process. I was really starting to love this spell; it was quickly becoming my go-to for crowd control.

With the front line halted, Alex moved seamlessly, growing a thick, jagged bramble wall that completely blocked the path of the advancing dead. He extended his green vine whips—and I noticed he was now sporting three distinct vines instead of two. Within moments, heavy, rotting corpses were being snatched off the ground and hurled through the air, flying clean over the wall and back into the parking lot. Right then, a half-dozen blood-curdling shrieks shattered the monotone moaning of the horde.

The cries came from entirely different directions out in the mass. My radio blared to life with a male voice I didn't recognize—one of the lookouts up on the roof.

"The horde is shifting! They're pushing hard toward the large gym doors and the gates between the gym and the pool!"

"Copy that," Joe's voice barked back.

"Can you identify where those shrieks came from?"

"Partially," the lookout reported.

"I can see a couple of individuals standing completely still right in the middle of the horde near the back of the lot, but our line of sight is heavily blocked by the solar covers."

"Kill teams, reinforce the doors in the main gym and cover down on the gate between the gym and the pool now!" Joe ordered. I turned to Alex.

"Clear as many of the bodies near this gate as you can and drop the wall. Let's see if we can't draw them back over to this side. I don't want them breaking through the gym doors."

"Got it," Alex said, his vines moving in a blur. I spun on my heel and ran back into the main office. Travis and Jace were still glued to their monitors.

"Boys, get those drones closer to the back of the parking lot. Try to get eyes on whoever is directing traffic out there." They nodded quickly, their fingers flying over the joysticks. I sprinted past them to the main electrical panel on the wall and flipped the heavy breakers, throwing on all the high-intensity parking lot stadium lights. It was going to pull a massive drain on our limited power reserves, but right now, visibility was life.

I hurried back over to the desks, crowding around the monitors as the drones moved into position. Under the brilliant, white glare of the overhead stadium lamps, the entire parking lot lit up. The subjects the roof guard had spotted stood out instantly. There were roughly seven individuals spread across the mass of the horde, standing completely motionless. The thousands of shambling zombies literally milled and flowed around them like water around rocks, shifting directions whenever the figures turned.

Jace zoomed his camera in on the closest figure. The second the lens focused, the thing's head snapped straight up, locking its milky, dead eyes right onto the drone. It raised a withered hand, and a sickly beam of dark green mana shot through the air. Jace yelped, jerking his controller back just in time to pull the drone out of the path of the beam, sending the quad-copter soaring higher and out of the creature's effective range. Watching the screen, my stomach turned.

The beam had to be necrotic or death energy, and the figures themselves were clearly high-level undead. But as Jace pushed the drone higher into the night sky, the camera briefly panned across a flat roof of the commercial strip across the street from the school parking lot. A lone individual was crouched near the edge, looking down at the chaos.

"Bring it back," I growled, leaning over Jace's shoulder.

"Get closer to that roof. Zoom in on his face." Jace looped the drone back around, hovering steady as the high-powered camera lens clicked and magnified the image, clearing the shadows from the man's features. My breath hitched, and a wave of pure, hot fury surged straight through my veins. I slammed my open palm down onto the desk so hard the plastic cracked.

"Mother-fucking, God damn TJ."