The Dark King - Chapter 596

Ch. 596: Return
Translator :  LittleFlower

The scream slowly dimmed down.

Dean felt empty. He laid silently on the ground, watching the clouds in the sky wander by, while listening to a ferocious chomping sound coming from his left.

His lips slightly moved. He slowly raised his right arm, gently hugging her.

If… I could hug you like this forever, wouldn’t that be great?

Gulp!

A low growl came from her throat, as if a hungry beast growling hungrily while feasting.

Dean turned his gaze down to meet hers. A slight sense of gentleness flashed in her empty eyes. His palm lightly caressed her silky hair, as if caressing a kitten curling up to him.

As Dean’s palm reached her head, she suddenly froze, and abruptly raised her head. She stared at him ferociously, holding a half crystalised meat with her mouth.

Dean only watched her silently, with a gentle look in his eyes, as if he was saying, ‘Don’t be scared, I’ll always be here.’

Haisha suddenly opened her mouth, trying to bite his neck.

Dean swiftly moved his right arm, holding her by her neck. His gentle gaze was mixed with pain and sadness. He muttered, “Sorry…”

Roar!

Haisha was unfazed, she growled as she tried to reach further.

Dean held her by her neck tightly, although he felt that his strength was inferior to hers, he still managed to hold her off. Normally, it wouldn’t be hard for Haisha to simply overwhelm him with her strength and kill him. Apparently, her overwhelming strength was no more.

The two struggled in a stalemate for a few minutes. Suddenly, Haisha froze with her eyes widened, as if there was a black hole in between her eyes, pulling the black in her eyes towards the middle. The sides of her eyes showed a hint of white.

Dean was slightly startled.

Roar!

Haisha suddenly raised her head, roaring towards the sky. Her fingernails swelled and sharpened itself, a black horn appeared from her forehead, the same one from her Fourth Awakening.

As her roaring halted, she suddenly fell to the ground, then spasmed as if her entire body had muscle cramps. Sounds of bones grazing against each other came from all over her body.

Dean sat up from the ground and watched the strange scene, stunned. A thought that he didn’t dare to wish for enveloped his mind. Could it be... that her consciousness was still there, still fighting against the virus in her body?

Though the possibility of that was miniscule, he couldn’t help but feel nervous, but still scared that his expectations might be ruined once again.

Ka-ka!

At that moment, noises of bones rattling against each other violently came from her back. The horn on her forehead extended as the rattling sound became more and more violent, as if it was trying to escape from her body.

“Ahh!” Haisha roared into the skies, her beautifully ferocious face filled with agony as she held her head tightly.

Seeing that, Dean couldn’t help but clench his fists, as if he could feel her pain.

Amidst the screams of agony, Haisha held her head, repeatedly smashing it into the ground. Her horn made multiple holes on the ground. Suddenly, she abruptly roared, then lunged towards Dean trying to bite him.

Dean’s expression slightly changed, when he was just about to step back, he stopped immediately.

Her roars suddenly stopped in the middle of her lunge, falling to the ground.

Dean was startled, he immediately went to turn her around, only noticing that she had completely fainted.

“What happened?” Dean’s mind was blank, but he reacted quickly. No matter what, he needed to find a safe place, now that she had fainted. If she regained her senses after waking up, that would be the best thing. But if… she woke up and still remained the same, he would need to find a way to control her!

“Even if it is just a sliver of hope, I will never give up on you!” Dean carried her in his arms and said with determination, “If you can hear me, you need to hold on! You won’t lose to the virus!”

He took a deep breath, and scanned the area. He was surrounded by a rocky wasteland.

Suddenly, he remembered the ruins that he went to earlier. His eyes brightened, the ruins would be a relatively safe place. But he had to risk everything just to get out of there, if he were to go back, there would be a massive horde of zombies in his way, it would be extremely dangerous.

Soon, he threw the thought of danger out of his mind, and went towards the ruins immediately, carrying Haisha in his arms.

After covering a small distance, Dean noticed a horde of wandering zombies from afar. He took out the bottle of Zombie Disguise powder from earlier, and smeared half of its contents on himself. Then, he picked up a rock and threw it in the opposite direction.

As the rock fell, the horde was attracted by the sound, and immediately followed towards it.

Dean swiftly moved on, carrying Haisha in his arms. The only thing he could take advantage of was the fact that zombies had little to no IQ.

As he passed by the horde, some zombies heard Dean’s footsteps and turned around towards him, looking at him with their rotting faces. With their slanted heads, they swayed left and right as they limped and walked towards Dean.

Dean’s expression changed, but he soon realized that the zombies weren’t lunging after him. He let out a sigh of relief. The Zombie Disguise powder did well to cover his smell, the zombies could not identify him at all.

But the powder wasn’t completely invincible. If he came across higher leveled zombies, it would probably not work. Especially for a creature like the Zombie King, it would’ve been completely pointless.

Whoosh!

Dean swiftly sped across the vast and empty wasteland. In normal circumstances he would’ve chosen to do a detour for safety. But compared to the scattered horde, he was more worried about Haisha waking up. If she remained like earlier, it won’t be easy for him to escape from her grasp.

He thought of being able to stop her advances earlier, and it left a question in his mind. But he had little to no knowledge on the structure and transformation of a zombie, so he could not make any assumptions and theories.

In a blink of an eye, half an hour passed. The scattered hordes that Dean came across on his journey back were all in small numbers. The menacing horde had fallen apart after the rule of the Zombie King was no more.

“Shit!”

A huge silhouette appeared from a pile of rocks before him, his expression immediately turned grim. It was a Titan Zombie. Their physique and strength was close to a high leveled Limit Breaker, but their mindless way of attacking made it so that even Scavengers will have a hard time against them.

It was extremely close, taking a detour wasn’t an option anymore.

Dean tightened his fists, a flash of frenzy appeared in his eyes, he was ready for a fight to the death.

As they closed in towards each other, the moment when Dean was about to do a preemptive strike, he suddenly stopped. He couldn’t believe his eyes as the Titan Zombie had knelt down in front of him! Its two arms wrapped around itself, shivering as if it was in fear.

Fear?

Zombies who can’t even feel pain know fear?

Dean was stunned. Suddenly, he remembered about the head of the Zombie King that was strapped onto his waist. Could it be that this Titan Zombie caught on its scent, so it was scared?

He examined the Titan Zombie carefully, it wasn’t putting up an act. Other than the Zombie King and the Huge Titan Zombie that ambushed from underground, he did not see any other zombies doing anything intelligent.

Whoosh!

He did not stay for long, and swiftly ran away.

After he was a few hundred meters away from it, Dean noticed that it stopped shivering, slowly stood up and continued wandering aimlessly.

Seeing that, Dean let out a sigh of relief. He turned around and took a glance at the Zombie King’s head, he didn’t think that the target of his hate would help him so much.

He felt more confident, and continued on his journey at full speed.

After the Titan Zombie, he also came across other Special Zombies, but as they came to a hundred meters near him, they would all without question kneel down or curl up and shiver in fear.

And for the other normal and lower leveled zombies, they did not have such a reaction. But when he passed by, they all immediately turned towards the opposite direction, as if they wanted to be far away from Dean. Dean felt that it was the effect of the Zombie Disguise powder.

After some time had passed, when Dean felt his legs were sore, he had finally returned to the ruins.

Dean picked up a few rocks and threw them around, the noise soon attracted the zombies from inside the tunnel to come out and investigate. Leaving a single Titan Zombie inside. It curled up on the floor, shivering, causing it to roll down the slope in the tunnel.

Dean waited for the zombies to come out, then picked up Haisha and entered the tunnel. He was soon back at where the Eureka had battled. Corpses littered around the area.

Dean briskly arrived in front of the gate of the ruins. The huge gate was still open, there were a few zombies wandering around inside the dark ruins. He slightly frowned, picked up a rock and threw it outside.

The zombies inside the ruins noticed the sound, they immediately headed out slowly with their swaying bodies, but they suddenly stopped halfway. Dean had to throw another rock, he noticed that the zombies had short term memory. The most interesting part is, even though they weren’t intelligent, they are attracted to sound, but they won’t get attracted to the footsteps of their own kind.

Dean had an urge to study them, but it wasn’t a good time.

After luring the zombies out, he carried Haisha and swiftly entered the ruins. He turned around and scanned the area around the gate, but there weren’t any contraptions to close the gate. Could it be that the gate can only be closed from the outside?

He deduced that his theory wasn’t possible, there weren’t any hidden switches outside, even if there was, it wasn’t probable that the gate can only be closed from outside.

He entered the dome shaped hall in the ruins and gently placed Haisha on the ground. He glanced at her serene sleeping face, and then turned and looked around the area. He swiftly checked the walls around him for any hidden contraptions.

Halfway through his search, he suddenly remembered about the hidden door amidst the pile of skeletons. He swiftly arrived before the pile of skeletons, and pushed them away. The bones rattled violently as they fell over, scattered on the ground, kicking up dust clouds of dirt and bones.

Dean covered his nose and walked forward towards the door. It was made entirely out of metal, and stood at two meters high. It was the standard size of doors from the old age. At the eighth of the height of the door, there was a horizontal window that seemed to be made of hardened glass, it was covered with dust.

Dean wiped the dust away, peeking into the room through the glass. It wasn’t a treasure room like he thought, it was something resembling a plane’s cockpit. There were many devices and contraptions. A few corpses laid dormant on the floor, with some torn papers and books.

Dean was slightly disappointed, but it was still within his expectations, no doubt that it was the control panel of the bunker.

He looked left and right, the door didn’t have a handle. He noticed a contraption that seemed like a doorbell on the wall to the side of the door. He examined it, and lightly pressed it… There was no response.

He tried pressing it a few more times, but nothing happened. He cursed in his mind, slamming his fist on the door.

Thump!

The door opened.

Dean was startled. The next moment, he realized that the door was never closed. There was a bone stuck at the corner of the door.

He immediately pushed the door open, revealing the messy control room. There were four corpses on the floor… Oh, there were actually five. He saw a set of bones scattered all over.

Other than that, as for the other four corpses, two were hugging each other. A man and a woman. The woman had snow white hair, with a ruby necklace on her neck covered in dust.

As for the last two, one was on the control panel, the last one laid on the ground by the door.

Dean took a quick glance, and noticed that the stomach part of the corpses had some crumbled paper. He slightly frowned as he could guess what happened here.

If the survivors outside starved to death, the people inside here probably did as well. The only bookshelf in the room was pushed over, the books were torn and shredded, scattered all over the floor. The people here used them to fill their hunger. But even with that, they could not last long enough for help to come, and all died of starvation.

No doubt that the pile of corpses probably swarmed this room, trying to get something from inside. Food, or a meaning to live on.

Dean stayed silent for a moment, then pushed down the corpse on the control panel. It instantly fell apart and scattered on the floor.

He picked up a shred of paper on the control panel, and noticed that it was a part of the Bible from the old age. His eyes widened, and turned to the fallen bookshelf. He wiped away some of the dust, and picked up a few books. He soon found out that the books were about different expertises, they were the symbolism of the prosperity of human civilization.

“So they planned to have these people live on, and inherit the human civilization…?” Dean’s eyes sparkled, feeling slightly touched. His father had the same wish for him.

But such a grand mission was still no match for the natural instinct of hunger.

The torn books scattered all over, they were the only source for these five to sate their hunger. As for that scattered and incomplete corpse, it most likely turned into another source of food for the remaining four.

Dean took another glance at them, then placed down the books. He turned to the control panel, as he looked over the numerous contraptions and controls, he frowned.

At the same time, a low voice came from his back..

Dean abruptly turned around, his cold, wary gaze immediately turned warm. Haisha had silently stood up, slowly making her way towards him, her body swayed left and right like a toddler learning to walk.

Dean let out a sigh of relief as he saw that she was awake. When he was just about to speak, he suddenly realized her completely dark eyes and her claw shaped palms. It was as if she was about to attack any moment.

His heart sank.

Roar!

Seeing that Dean had noticed her, Haisha growled ferociously, and lunged towards him.

Seeing that, the final ray of hope in Dean’s heart had been completely snuffed out. He abruptly kicked out, slamming the door shut.

Thump!

Haisha’s head slammed on the door. She raised her head back slightly, and tried to lunge forward with all her strength again.