Chapter 153: Night Battle

Rebuilding Civilization

When dealing with zombies, no one dared to attempt combat at night. The reason was simple: darkness severely hindered human vision. Even with lighting equipment, night visibility could not compare to daylight. More importantly, zombies were unaffected by the passage of day and night. To them, darkness acted like protective camouflage, allowing them to approach targets silently and launch sudden attacks.

These factors made humans turn pale at the mere mention of nighttime. Initially, Xie Han had not wanted to leave the valley settlement in such a rush, but a massive number of zombies had gathered around the perimeter. The sounds of artillery and gunfire, especially the violent explosions of high-energy cannons, could carry for miles. Without high walls for defense, the valley settlement stood no chance against a large-scale zombie assault.

Because of this, Xie Han had taken the risk of leading thirty-six thousand civilians away before the zombies could fully assemble. Yet human calculations could never outmatch the heavens; he had never expected to encounter a large-scale zombie attack right here. Xie Han found it hard to understand. He had personally studied the map of this region, and the villages were sparse and far from any towns—how could there possibly be a massive horde of zombies here? Could some past calamity have occurred here, meaning these zombies had gathered long ago? If that were true, his luck truly was abysmal.

Xie Han no longer had the luxury of pondering such questions. This was his first time encountering a battle at night, and the realization made his heart tense up. He shouted out his orders: "Gather all trucks together, point the front of the vehicles toward the zombie horde, turn on all headlights, and have every soldier use the trucks as cover to hold off the zombies. The temporary squad leaders chosen moments ago, lead the people within your sectors and immediately follow the road out of here!"

Following Xie Han's commands, the initial panic among the civilians was quickly subdued. They hoisted their packs onto their backs in an orderly fashion and, guided by the temporary squad leaders, began running along the road.

"Everyone, do not panic! There are soldiers holding off the zombies in the rear; we are completely safe!" These selected temporary squad leaders proved remarkably competent. Anyone could recognize this as an opportunity; if they survived this crisis, the credit due to them as temporary squad leaders would be immense. Leaping over the dragon's gate to transition from ordinary citizens to administrative officials was entirely possible.

Thirty-six thousand people was no small number. Xie Han's greatest fear was a stampede triggered by panic, which would instantly devolve the situation into chaos. Fortunately, the chosen temporary squad leaders possessed genuine capability, successfully ensuring that the retreat of the thirty-six thousand people proceeded without chaos.

The soldiers previously responsible for the square formations all assembled in front of Xie Han's command vehicle. Performing their duties, they climbed onto the roofs of the trucks, released the safeties on their machine guns, and pried open crates of ammunition. Meanwhile, the soldiers acting as drivers started their engines and lined up across the open field at five-meter intervals, turning on all headlights to illuminate the twenty to thirty meters ahead.

Forty trucks formed a glowing silver dragon, guarding the rear of the evacuating procession.

Xie Han, having taken over Qin Biao's elite guards, returned their weapons and ordered them to hold their positions along the flanks of the trucks. Xie Han did not know the scale of this zombie horde, but more people meant greater strength. His current mission was to hold back the zombies for a brief period, allowing the migrating convoy to put some distance between themselves and the threat. Once a gap was established, the speed of the zombies would render them unable to catch up.

Xie Han remained unsure whether Level R or higher zombies were mixed into this horde. If there were, the consequences would be catastrophic; exposed trucks offered no defense against their formidable claws.

At Xie Han's command, the massive wheels of the command vehicle retracted one by one into the undercarriage. Countless anti-gravity repulsors extended, covering the entire bottom of the vehicle. Once activated, the colossal command vehicle slowly hovered into the air.

The wilderness base command vehicle utilized a semi-hover system, primarily because hover technology was still incomplete and demanded massive energy consumption. Normally, it traveled on wheels, engaging the hover function only when necessary. Driven by its repulsors, the massive body of the command vehicle achieved a maximum hover height of only about ten meters. Furthermore, its hovering speed was not fast; even with thrusters engaged, the massive vehicle could only reach a velocity of several dozen kilometers per hour.

Take the supposedly successful hover-bikes, for instance—their speed was terrifying. Propelled by thrusters, they could reach a top speed comparable to express magnetic levitation trains or standard civil aviation aircraft, matching hundreds of kilometers per hour. Unfortunately, mass production of these hover-bikes had not yet begun when the apocalypse arrived, making them exceedingly rare on the market.

The colossal command vehicle cast a massive black shadow as it glided slowly over the truck barricade, soaring forward. Both the soldiers from New City and the elite guards from the valley settlement stared in stunned silence at the passing command vehicle. They could never have imagined that a vehicle with such heavy armor possessed this unbelievable hovering capability.

"Turn on the tactical lighting systems..."

At Xie Han's command, the tactical lights designed specifically for small-scale close-quarters combat all illuminated. Countless lights flashed across the entire surface of the massive command vehicle, transforming it into a glowing sphere. This blinding laser light, suspended ten meters in the air, resembled an artificial sun, illuminating a radius of hundreds of meters around the command vehicle as brightly as day.

In truth, when these tactical lights were first designed, some had raised objections. Activating the tactical lights would completely expose the command vehicle to enemy firepower, which was tantamount to suicide. Ultimately, however, the design was approved for one simple reason: the command vehicle's formidable armor. Furthermore, tactical lights were generally only meant to be turned on once the tactical situation was firmly established. Who would be foolish enough to turn them on in the dark during active combat?

It was based on these two premises that the command vehicle's tactical lighting system was finalized. Viewed now, the command vehicle proved exceptionally formidable in night combat against zombies. Hovering at a height of ten meters, only Level R-tier zombies stood a chance of attacking it, leaving even ordinary ranged threats helpless.

Guided by the tactical light of the command vehicle, hideous zombies came into view, packed densely across a radius of hundreds of meters. After scouting the area from above, the command vehicle confirmed that the horde numbered around one hundred thousand. Their movements were utterly chaotic as they surged toward the location of the forty trucks. Xie Han deduced that they were not controlled by a controller; this was simply a zombie horde formed purely through clustering effects.

The command vehicle, shining like a sun, illuminated the area ahead. Individual zombies stood exposed in the glare. As the surging mass entered the effective firing range of the machine guns, the weapons mounted atop the forty trucks roared to life under Xie Han's command system, spitting streams of fire and sweeping bullets into the bodies of the zombies, felling them one by one.

The fragile bodies of the zombies were torn open by fist-sized holes under the impact of machine gun rounds, but to the undead, such wounds were entirely negligible. Even when knocked down, they would struggle back to their feet and press forward.

Behind the silver dragon formed by the trucks, the migrating convoy was now hundreds of meters away from the vehicle line. Illuminated by flickering torches, the winding procession stretched rapidly into the distance—a remarkably grand sight.

"We only need ten minutes," Xie Han thought silently, watching the meandering migration column. While one hundred thousand zombies might not sound like much compared to the million-strong hordes of the past, one only had to imagine the terrifying scene of them surging forward together—especially knowing that the soldiers holding them back possessed only forty machine guns and a small number of automatic rifles. For creatures that felt no pain, unless their heads were destroyed, they would continue their charge until their limbs were shattered or their skulls blown apart, never stopping.

The energy consumption of the tactical lights was almost negligible. However, the repulsors acted like massive power sinks, draining the command vehicle's energy bit by bit. According to design specifications, a full charge could sustain the command vehicle's hover time for half an hour.

The thought caused Xie Han a mild headache because his concerns extended far into the future. Apocalyptic hover technology was incomplete—more like a semi-finished product. Though functional, engineers had never successfully balanced hover duration with energy consumption. One could only imagine: if humanity ever attempted to build a spaceship, the vessel's entire energy reserve might not even sustain a journey of any significant length.

"Although hover technology brings humanity closer to the sci-fi concept of starships, actually allowing a ship to soar through the cosmos is not something that can be achieved overnight. This is an apocalyptic era of extreme technological imbalance. While many technologies are exceptionally advanced, many others are only slightly ahead of modern times. The arrival of the apocalypse feels more like a technological fracture."

While Xie Han let his thoughts wander, a hundred meters ahead of the trucks, layers upon layer of zombies piled up. This continuous firing consumed ammunition at a terrifying rate. The standard cargo configuration for each machine gun was a single box containing ten thousand rounds. At maximum rate of fire, it took a mere minute and a half to exhaust those ten thousand rounds. This did not mean every single bullet eliminated a zombie; the primary utility of machine guns lay in fighting living targets rather than unfeeling undead.

Xie Han worried that at this rate of fire, even with controlled bursts, the defenders could hardly sustain ten minutes.

The surging zombie horde pressed heavily against the front of the trucks, their line gradually widening and stretching, showing signs of encircling the truck formation. Even though the front lines were being reaped like wheat, countless zombies merely fell, scrambled back up, and pressed onward. The scattering fire of the machine guns proved relatively inefficient against the horde.

"Unless we use heavy machine guns and explosive rounds, machine guns are far less effective against zombies than rifles." Observing the situation, Xie Han reaffirmed his rifle-centric theory for combating zombies. Just as when fighting the million-strong horde previously, rifle efficacy far outmatched machine guns. With attached scopes and concentrated fire, eliminating a zombie horde dozens of times their own number was an absolute breeze.

The distance of the zombies steadily closed in on the trucks, causing the machine gun firing frequency aboard the vehicles to spike sharply—which in turn meant ammunition consumption would accelerate, raising the embarrassing prospect of running completely dry within two or three minutes.

"The high-energy cannons have six charges remaining, and machine-gun ammunition storage dropped by a third during the battle at the valley." Calculating the current combat capacity of the command vehicle, Xie Han decisively issued an order: "Charge the high-energy cannons and scan for high-density target clusters." The devastating power of the high-energy cannons had to be unleashed before the zombies fully dispersed to maximize their destructive potential.

The high-energy cannon barrels radiated white light. Under the glare of the tactical lights, their charging process was completely imperceptible. The energy required for the cannons was immense; drawing and compressing it took roughly half a minute. In actual wartime, high-energy cannons were typically pre-charged, and if unused, the energy could be dissipated and replenished. Yet such luxury was beyond Xie Han's reach. Energy reserves within the base dwindled with every fraction used, forcing him to order charges only when execution was certain.

The command vehicle's onboard computer possessed formidable processing power. Barely a second later, it scanned and calculated the seven densest clusters within the zombie horde. Much like modern combat aircraft, the command vehicle possessed multi-target locking and engagement capabilities. The moment the scan completed, the cannon's internal computer automatically updated its firing parameters, locking onto the transmitted coordinates.

The four high-energy cannon barrels pointed in various directions beneath the command vehicle. Once charged, they emitted four beams of light far brighter than the tactical lights. Four energy spheres detached from the command vehicle, striking their targets almost faster than the eye could follow.

A violent roar shook the earth, causing the ground itself to tremble. The sheer destructive power of the high-energy cannons vaporized the zombies within their radius, leaving craters over four meters deep and seven to eight meters wide. The underlying principles of high-energy cannons mirrored nuclear weapons, though their primary lethality stemmed from sheer shearing force and extreme heat, followed only by a nuclear-like shockwave.

The shockwave of the blast even knocked over zombies a hundred meters away, sending a dozen bodies flying through the air before they slammed heavily onto the ground.

This marked the third time Xie Han had witnessed the direct destructive power of the high-energy cannons. Compared to underwater use or striking fortified walls, the display across open terrain offered a far greater sense of awe. It was little wonder artillery was dubbed the god of war; these high-energy cannons surpassed traditional artillery by multiples. In Xie Han's view, even the heavy armor of the command vehicle might not survive a direct hit from one.

With the high-energy cannons fired, the eight-barrel heavy machine guns extending from the command vehicle launched their metal tempest. These heavy machine guns were specialized vehicular armaments differing from infantry-portable versions, possessing a much larger caliber. Anything struck by their fire risked being severed cleanly in half. Using vehicular heavy guns against zombies meant that once hit, a target lost all capability of moving forward.

Hovering ten meters in the air, the command vehicle swept across the field. Circles of zombies collapsed. The terrifying tearing power of the vehicular heavy machine rounds meant that individual zombies often had their entire upper torsos blasted apart into a soup of flesh and bone. The kinetic impact of the rounds was so ferocious that a single bullet would often pierce through several zombies before finally spending its momentum. Under this terrifying assault from the command vehicle, a third of the horde fell dead by the time its ammunition reserves emptied.

For humans operating in the wilderness, as long as no high-tier zombies were present, wiping out the undead could hardly be considered a battle—it was a slaughter. Right now, provided the command vehicle had sufficient ammunition, a single vehicle could eliminate those one hundred thousand zombies in half an hour.

The durability of the command vehicle's armor even tempted Xie Han with the notion of testing it against Sky City itself, but the reminder that the vehicle possessed only half an hour of hover capacity quickly deflated the thought. Losing power in the heart of a city center and dropping to the ground would transform the vehicle into little more than a massive metal coffin.

Inside the convoy, machine gun after machine gun fell silent as their ammunition ran dry. The moment a truck emptied its magazines, it immediately withdrew from the battle line, backed away from the zombies to a safe distance, executed a sharp turn, and sped off to follow the migration column, which had already advanced over a kilometer ahead. Within less than two minutes of each other, all forty trucks disengaged from combat.

Though this zombie horde had appeared abruptly, it failed to inflict any substantive damage upon the migrating populace. In Xie Han's view, their harvest from this ordeal was immense; at the very least, they had acquired valuable experience in night combat against zombies. The next time they undertook nocturnal operations, they could rely on this experience to execute orderly evacuations and precision ambushes.

As the trucks pulled away into the distance, the command vehicle engaged its thrusters and sped to catch up. Reaching a wide stretch of road, the command vehicle descended slowly until it hovered just a meter off the ground. Its retracted wheels extended once more, and the tactical lights clicked off.

The landscape plunged into darkness, resembling a sun setting beneath the horizon, leaving only the faint red glow of the truck tail-lights visible in the distance.

Far away, suddenly deprived of their targets, the remaining zombies wandered aimlessly, occasionally turning to tear into one another.