Chapter 102 – Tentacle Launcher

Ling Mo had no idea what was happening inside the School Hospital. At this moment, he was stealthily moving through a green belt with Ye Lian and Xia Na. Up ahead, he could already see the wide road that led to the Peace Theater.

A gust of cold wind blew by, making Ling Mo’s nose tingle. Unable to control it, he let out a sneeze.

“Achoo!”

As soon as he wiped his nose, two zombies wandering by the roadside immediately turned towards the bushes and charged without hesitation.

These two zombies were originally only about ten meters away from Ling Mo. His sneeze, though not particularly loud, still grabbed their attention.

The zombies’ heightened senses made them seem like bombs that could explode at any moment, rotating in place as if harmless but capable of incredible bursts of speed.

The true terror of zombies lay in this: once they started moving, they became relentless killing machines. Their sheer ferocity was often enough to scare ordinary people into losing the will to resist.

“Perfect timing. Let’s have you scout ahead…”

Invisible psychic tentacles shot out, instantly controlling the two zombies.

With the current strength of Ling Mo’s psychic power, he could now use his puppet control ability with considerable dexterity. Controlling a couple of ordinary zombies was no challenge for him; even ten at once wouldn’t be a problem. However, controlling them was one thing; making each zombie puppet perform to its full potential was much more demanding. Ling Mo wasn’t at that level yet.

After all, this wasn’t just multitasking; it was simultaneously controlling a dozen zombie puppets. Ye Lian and Xia Na were different cases; one had regained most of her memories, and the other had developed true consciousness. Although they still maintained a psychic link with Ling Mo, they could act independently. Ordinary zombies, however, had lost all rationality, driven only by base instincts. Every action had to be directed by Ling Mo. Even a naturally gifted controller would struggle with this, and Ling Mo had been just an ordinary person not long ago.

However, Ling Mo knew that besides the improvements brought by Ye Lian and Xia Na, his own relentless practice played a crucial role in the evolution of his psychic power.

Psychic power training had to be gradual, with a balance of exertion and relaxation. Otherwise, any damage could result in lifelong impairment. Ling Mo didn’t push himself too hard but instead increased the intensity of his practice slowly.

The two zombie puppets stopped abruptly as they reached the edge of the bushes. They stood still for about a second, then moved their bodies in an eerie manner before turning to walk slowly ahead.

“Rustle, rustle…”

Ling Mo and his group emerged from the bushes right after. To take a shortcut, he had led Ye Lian and Xia Na through this small green belt, getting their clothes and hair damp with dew.

Although Ye Lian and Xia Na wore jackets, their slightly damp hair clung to their ears, giving them an oddly captivating look that made Ling Mo glance at them twice.

Since the outbreak of the disaster, it seemed even the weather was affected. Around this time of year, X City was usually warmer, but now, even an hour past dawn, the sky remained gloomy.

Ling Mo was thankful he had found some relatively thick jackets before entering X City University. Most survivors were probably still wearing summer clothes from when the disaster first struck, making these days particularly hard for them.

The two zombie puppets scouted ahead while Ling Mo followed with the two female zombies. If any ordinary person saw this, they would be utterly shocked.

They kept encountering zombies along the way, but Ling Mo didn’t kill them. Instead, he controlled them as well. Soon, he had a seven-member zombie squad, not counting the two mutated female zombies with him.

To Ling Mo’s surprise, one of these zombies was already on the verge of mutating. However, when Ling Mo had Ye Lian extract the virus gel from its brain, he was disappointed to find only a tiny piece.

“This must have just started forming…”

Even a little was better than nothing. Ling Mo unceremoniously put the gel into his bag and then controlled another unfortunate zombie that had just been attracted.

Controlling seven zombie puppets was Ling Mo’s current limit, but even then, some of the zombies would react a beat too slow. This was partly because Ling Mo wasn’t yet fully proficient with his psychic tentacles, and partly because his psychic power wasn’t strong enough. Therefore, it wasn’t just Ye Lian and Xia Na who needed to improve; Ling Mo also needed to push his psychic power to a higher level.

The next zombies they encountered were dealt with by the zombie puppets under Ling Mo’s control. Although these zombie puppets didn’t have weapons, their advantage was that other zombies wouldn’t attack them proactively.

Zombies that stood still and were ambushed were easy to kill. With the brute strength of these zombie puppets, they could easily snap the necks of other zombies.

However, as the number of zombies around them increased, the zombie puppets Ling Mo controlled began to suffer damage. After all, a delayed reaction in real combat was a fatal flaw.

Zombies, unless extremely hungry, wouldn’t attack their kind, but once attacked, they would retaliate. These zombies were all powerful and fast. If they weren’t killed in one blow, they would latch on like leeches and be impossible to shake off. Ling Mo initially found it difficult to manage, but fortunately, his psychic tentacles were flexible enough. Even if his control wasn’t perfect, he could at least use the psychic tentacles to slow down the attackers.

From Ling Mo’s perspective, he looked like a tentacle launcher, with over twenty psychic tentacles extending from him to Xia Na and the other zombies, constantly harassing the attacking zombies.

With Ye Lian and Xia Na maneuvering around and Ling Mo replacing any lost zombie puppets immediately, the zombies didn’t pose much of a threat to them.

As they moved forward, they left behind over fifty zombie corpses, but Ling Mo remained clean, without even a trace of blood on him.

The combat method of using zombie puppets in combination with psychic tentacles proved to be incredibly effective!

Currently, Ling Mo controlled only a small number of zombie puppets, making the scale of battles relatively minor—at most, skirmishes. However, if his psychic power reached a certain level, he might be able to control hundreds or even thousands of zombies simultaneously!

Right now, he was merely a zombie squad leader, but in the future, he could command an entire zombie legion!

Nonetheless, he wouldn’t become a useless person without self-defense capabilities. As his psychic tentacles improved, their strength would be unimaginable, but even now, their effectiveness was undeniable.

However, reaching that point would require a level of psychic power that’s difficult to fathom…

Ling Mo quickly calmed down from his excitement. The future looked promising, but he still had to take it one step at a time.

At this moment, Xia Na and Ye Lian finished off the last two zombies and quickly returned to his side.

Xia Na’s knife skills were astonishing and her agility was remarkable. Although her long knife was covered in blood, she only had a few splatters on her body.

Ye Lian was similar. Her evolution focused on speed, making her movements nearly impossible to track during an all-out attack.

Her curved knife became more effective with each use. Even when surrounded by more than two zombies, she would instinctively reach out her hand…

“Sigh, grabbing hearts isn’t a good habit. You need to change that,” Ling Mo said helplessly as he wiped Ye Lian’s hands.