After I Fully Prepared for the Apocalypse, the Ungrateful Cried with Regret-Chapter 169: Dire Straits

The cooldown on "Five Senses Enhancement" ended.

Nina Jacobs controlled the Little Zombie Rat as she awaited the completion of her level-up.

The Little Zombie Rat could better sense the surrounding situation from its vantage point in an open area.

Nina Jacobs could even hear the panicked shouts of some Superpower Users.

The world outside was in chaos.

It felt as if everything could be destroyed at any moment.

But within her own little world, it was exceptionally quiet.

So quiet she could clearly hear the sound of every single water droplet falling.

There were fewer droplets than before—so few, in fact, that it seemed she could count them.

The pond beneath the droplets had grown larger again.

She quietly waited for the last droplet to fall.

Just then, Wendy Marshall stumbled back, her face deathly pale. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝒆𝔀𝒆𝙗𝓷𝒐𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝓶

They had been using their Superpowers continuously for hours since the fighting started.

During that time, she and Jessica Vance had even fallen back to rest twice.

But now, she couldn’t muster even a shred of her Superpower.

The same went for Pascal Paige.

She had been busy healing the wounded, but now, regrettably, she had the will but no longer the strength.

"Are you guys okay?"

Yvonne Willow took out a few bottles of water and handed them over.

Outside, the sky was already darkening into evening.

She couldn’t imagine what they would face that night.

"At our usual rate of Superpower recovery,

it’ll take at least three more hours to get back half of our Superpowers."

Pascal Paige lay on the ground.

Superpower exhaustion felt like being completely hollowed out. She was weak all over, like the enervating collapse that comes with a high fever.

It was an awful feeling, and she believed the others felt the same way.

Let alone trying to fend off zombies in this condition.

"Gold Element Superpower Users, with me!

We’re going to repair the main gate below!"

Julian Dempsey shouted, his head beaded with sweat.

The main gate downstairs had been barricaded with steel plates, but there were just too many zombies below.

The plates were in danger of breaking loose.

"But if we pull the Gold Element defenses from here, people are going to die."

Yara Garcia said, pointing to the people on the platform outside.

It was dangerous enough just standing there killing zombies; they also had to guard against Superpower-wielding zombies making ranged attacks.

Their best protection at the moment was the Gold Element defenses.

"We can’t worry about that now!

If the entrance is breached, we’re all finished!"

Julian Dempsey shouted.

Even though their chances of survival were slim, every extra second they could live counted.

But strangely, after some of the Gold Element Superpower Users left, the people on the platform felt the zombies’ attacks from below weaken.

"No, wait—look over there!"

Someone pointed to the nearby basement entrance.

The zombies seemed to have gone mad, swarming like a tidal wave toward the basement entrance.

"No! No, don’t!"

One glance was all it took for Eric Stone to understand what was happening.

She let out a heart-wrenching scream.

It was the members of the Lockwood Squad, who had been hiding in the basement. They had opened the door on purpose.

Tears blurred everyone’s vision.

They were taking the pressure off those fighting upstairs.

Using their own lives to draw the zombies’ attention.

The scent of fresh blood drove the zombies into a frenzy. Like starving beasts, they abandoned their assault on the platforms and lunged toward the survivors in the basement.

Down on the first floor, Julian Dempsey and the others repairing the steel plates seemed to have realized what was happening as well.

"Dempsey, what’s wrong?"

a nearby Superpower User asked, watching Julian Dempsey suddenly collapse to his knees.

"You damn zombies... I’ll kill every last one of you."

Julian Dempsey knelt on the floor, his head bowed. Large tears splashed onto the ground.

’So these were the people we were protecting.’

’Not a single one of them was a coward.’

"Dempsey, we’re still here.

We have to kill every last zombie here

and avenge Uncle Stone, Miss Warner, and the others."

Having finally understood what happened, several team members offered grim words of comfort.

"Let’s go. Back upstairs."

Julian Dempsey wiped away his tears.

’That’s right. Not a single person from the Lockwood Squad had backed down.’

’He couldn’t afford to break down here either.’

’With over two hundred team members behind them, how could he give up so easily?’

Holden Shaw hadn’t been idle, either.

He infused any object he could throw with his Speed Element Superpower, relentlessly hurling them down at the zombies below.

The massacre downstairs did indeed buy the people upstairs a moment to breathe.

Many people sat quietly to one side, slowly waiting for their Superpowers to recover.

However, less than an hour later, people on the platform began to be hit by Superpower-wielding zombies once more.

Even Finn Hart was on the verge of passing out.

But the zombies below seemed to know no fatigue.

Even late into the night, the ground below continued to boil with them.

"We’ve held on for so long... We’ve killed thousands of zombies,

but it’s useless. It’s all been for nothing."

"We’re at our limit. Maybe we shouldn’t have fought back.

Maybe we should have just stayed down there and waited to die..."

"Just how many more zombies are there?

How much longer do we have to last?"

"...No one is coming to save us.

All of City J is finished..."

BANG.

Unable to bear the pressure any longer, someone in a corner took their own life with a single shot.

As true night fell, fear began to spread even more rapidly.

"Eric Stone, you can’t stay here any longer.

You have to go back and rest."

Kurt Garrison frowned as he watched Eric Stone.

She was like a robot, ceaselessly unleashing her Superpower on the horde below.

Her Superpower was almost completely depleted, and she could only conjure a few faint sparks of electricity, but still she persisted.

"If I do nothing,

it’ll feel even worse."

Eric Stone said.

But in the next instant, a vine snaking up the wall wrapped around her ankle.

THUD!

Eric Stone was yanked violently against the railing by the vine.

The zombies below grew even more frenzied.

Some zombies even began climbing over one another, forming a grotesque human pyramid.

"Eric Stone!"

Kurt Garrison tried to sever the vine.

But a Wood Element zombie was already scrambling up it!

Catching sight of it out of the corner of her eye, Eric Stone kicked Kurt Garrison back and away from the edge.

The Wood Element zombie’s hand was just about to close around Eric Stone’s throat.

She closed her eyes, resigned to her fate.

’Perhaps this is it...’

Just then, a brilliant jet of flame shot through the night sky.

The flame struck the Wood Element zombie hanging from the vine, instantly turning it into a human torch.

Feeling the pull on her ankle vanish, Eric Stone and the others looked over in astonishment.

On a platform not far below, they saw a vaguely familiar woman standing there.

Seeing that Eric Stone was out of danger, Nina Jacobs turned her attention to the zombies below.

"Is that..."

"Chase Gallagher’s friend?!"

Molly Ulrich recognized Nina Jacobs, and Wayne Warner standing beside her.

’She’s awake?’

"That’s the second-floor platform!

It’s easy to get grabbed by zombies from there!"

one of the team members exclaimed.

For safety’s sake, they had only dared to fight the zombies from the fourth-floor platform.

’But she went straight to the second floor?’

"Nina Jacobs... is awake?"

Finn Hart also made his way to the platform upon hearing the news.

Nina Jacobs stood on the second-floor platform below.

From their position above, they had a clear view of her every move.

That was where the zombies were thickest.

"Does she have a death wish?"

someone murmured.

"My God, what is that?"

Molly Ulrich thought her eyes were playing tricks on her.

She watched as Nina Jacobs placed a hand on the wall behind her.

The surface of the wall seemed to become coated in a layer of bright orange liquid, which slowly slid down toward the ground.

Sparks erupted wherever it passed.

It was like flowing lava.