Kael hit the outpost with such force that it cracked the foundation. As the structure shook, the enforcers inside came rushing out.
At first, they were angry at the interruption, but soon became horrified.
"What the hell is this...?" one mumbled.
The ground before them was painted with fresh blood. Several corpses were strewn about, all of them belonging to the initiates.
While the zealots could maintain some distance and attack them, the lower ranks didn’t stand a chance. After all, they all had been chained together.
Angela had her head between her knees, unable to see the sight before. Juan was the first to fall from fever. Back then, she had hoped the healers would fix them, but not long after, things went to hell.
Juan turned into a strange creature and struck everyone around. Now, with blood all over him, he turned towards Angela. His wife and the woman he had sworn to protect.
"H-Husband..." Angela stuttered, wishing some part of Juan would listen to her.
For a moment, it seemed to work as he stopped. He tilted his head as if wondering who Angela was.
The woman thought there was a way out of the situation and inched closer to what once was her husband.
"It’s me. Do you remember..."
Her words never left her mouth as Juan swung the whip at her head. For a moment nothing happened, but then a jet of blood shot out of her face.
A strained smile remained on her face before her head split open as she fell to the ground... dead.
Juan, no, the sporeform didn’t spare her a second glance. It blew some spores over the woman and went on in search of a new victim.
The enforcers saw it all in stunned silence.
No one had any idea when these zombies appeared there. However, they quickly noticed these zombies were strange.
"Use your light!" June yelled, rushing next to Girl.
The light. It was the reason the cult had sent most of their healers to the battlefield. Usually, they’d stay back and focus on healing the vanguards, but in this war, they were the vanguards.
Girl nodded, and a blinding light shot out of her palm. The ray hit a sporeform in the chest, throwing it back.
She quickly turned to aim at another one, but her eyes widened when the first sporeform stood back up, completely unharmed.
It wasn’t just her. None of their healing abilities seemed effective against the strange zombies.
Their ace... proved utterly useless against the enemies.
With no other choice, the enforcers joined the battle.
Even if the divine light, as they used to call it, was useless against the zombies, they still had brute strength to kill them.
An enforcer wielding a massive axe charged ahead. With one swing, he severed the heads of multiple zombies and initiates alike.
"So weak," he scoffed. "Aim for the heads and they’ll die sooner than I finish working out with your wives, haha—agh!"
The man was built like a mountain, but crumbled like a pile of garbage. His chest was pierced by a bony fist, which ripped his heart out.
No one could believe it. The zombies the enforcer just killed were back on their feet... without their heads.
The head, technically, the brain, was a zombie’s weak point. As long as critical damage was dealt to it, the undead would die.
Always aim for the head.
That was one rule the survivors followed by heart.
But how will someone kill a headless zombie?
While everyone wondered about that, June was fixated on something else.
The initiates killed by these strange zombies rose to fight alongside them. However, it wasn’t the case with the dead zealots and enforcers. They remained dead, but the sporeforms fiercely protected them.
June wondered why, but she knew it couldn’t be good.
"Forget about the zombies," she said, grabbing hold of one of her lackeys. "Burn the corpses around them first."
The lackey, an enforcer, pointed at the rain above.
Even with his pyromancy, even dry wood wouldn’t burn properly, forget about a corpse.
"You think I don’t know that, Johnny?" June snapped, pulling on the guy’s collar. "Just do what I say!"
Johnny shook her off and took out a lighter. He placed his palm on top of it and flicked it on. In an instant, the fire shot through his skin, spreading across his entire hand.
The flames hissed as the dense rain struck them, but they didn’t get put out. It was Johnny’s special ability. Basically, being near a fire turned his sweat into petroleum.
He had almost burned down an entire block after awakening his power, but under the cult’s guidance, he had learned to control it. However, he could only use it in moderation, for short durations.
He slammed his fists together to light the other arm before rushing towards the sporeforms.
The sporeforms saw fire and immediately backed away.
After all, these creatures only feared one thing.
The sporeforms snarled as the man got closer. They were torn between fleeing or fighting and getting burned.
Meanwhile, their reaction didn’t go unnoticed by the others.
"Change of plans," June said. "Forget about the corpses. We’ll kill these bastards first!"
They tore off parts of their clothes and ran towards Johnny. The man was confused when all of a sudden they began wiping the sweat off his upper arms.
The cultists quickly wrapped the Johnny-petrol soaked clothes around fallen sticks and lit them on fire. Once again, with the courtesy of the human lighter.
The sporeforms screeched as the torches turned their way. They snarled and lashed out with their whip-like limbs, only to get burned. The whip fell off like a lizard’s tail.
As it twitched on the ground, June burned it with the makeshift torch.
"Surround them!" she yelled at the others. "We can kill them if we go after them one at a time!"
With Johnny leading the charge, they targeted the nearest sporeform. He grabbed the zombie’s limbs and yanked it away from the horde.
The others moved quickly, keeping the rest of the sporeforms inside the circle, and didn’t interfere while a small group of zealots burned the lone sporeform to death.
"It works!" a zealot cheered on. "They don’t stand a chance!"