Apocalypse: King of Zombies

As Ethan stood lost in thought, the white-furred apes and the Glacial Bear stopped fighting. The apes ran over and crowded around him excitedly.

Ethan smiled, took several corpses of the Cathay Republic’s Stage SS fighters from his spatial ring, and tossed them over.

The apes each grabbed a corpse and eagerly began tearing into it.

The Glacial Bear had followed them over, but it could only stare at Ethan in shock.

When it had first arrived, everyone around it had been pathetically weak, so it had naturally looked down on them. If they hadn’t healed its broken leg, it never would have lowered itself to remain among such weaklings.

Not long after its arrival, however, Ethan had grown strong enough to fight it to a draw. That had curbed some of its arrogance.

Now Ethan had completely surpassed it.

The Glacial Bear couldn’t tell exactly how strong he was, but it sensed an overwhelming danger from him. If Ethan attacked, it knew it wouldn’t even have the chance to resist.

His terrifying rate of growth left it stunned.

Ethan smiled when he noticed its reaction. He took out another Stage SS corpse and tossed it over.

”Here, big guy. This one’s yours.”

The Glacial Bear caught the corpse and gave Ethan a complicated look before nodding.

”Roar...” Thank you.

The once-untamable Glacial Bear had finally accepted its place.

”Screech!”

A cry rang out as the roc flew over from somewhere, looking at Ethan expectantly.

Ethan smiled and stroked its head, then took out the last corpse and tossed it over.

The Cathay Republic had only possessed seven Stage SS fighters in total, just enough to go around.

As for the corpses of Briggs and the others who had attacked the Atlas Federation the previous day, Miles had already disposed of them. They had most likely ended up as food for these Beasts as well.

With so many Beasts around, getting rid of bodies was easy enough.

Ethan was enjoying this rare moment of peace when a soldier suddenly ran over.

”Commander, Deputy Commander Miles asked me to bring you to the Council Chamber.”

”All right.”

Ethan followed the soldier to the Council Chamber.

Miles, Maxwell, and the rest of New Atlas’s senior leadership were already gathered inside. As soon as Ethan entered, everyone rose to their feet.

”Sit down. There’s no need to be so formal.”

Ethan waved them back into their seats and took the chair at the head of the table.

”Why did you call me here?”

Miles and Maxwell usually handled everything within the compound. If they needed Ethan, there had to be an important decision they couldn’t make on their own.

”Captain, they have a few things they’d like to discuss with you,” Miles said. ”More specifically, they want your opinion.”

Ethan nodded and looked toward the others, signaling for them to speak.

”Ethan... No, Commander.” Maxwell sounded tense. ”Will the Void Realm passages really open again in two days?”

”Yes.” Ethan nodded.

He had originally learned about it from the ferocious beast, but he had also sensed it himself while returning from Eldoria. The spatial forces within the passage had clearly become much more active since his arrival.

His confirmation left everyone in the room grim-faced.

”Commander, what are our odds of handling it?” General Cross asked quietly.

”There’s no way to know until it happens.” Ethan shrugged.

”But you’re Stage SSS now,” Rowan said in surprise. ”Even you aren’t confident?”

”No.” Ethan shook his head.

”Between Eldoria’s other species and the Outland Beasts, they already had more than a hundred Stage SSS fighters. Earth is connected to an unknown number of worlds, and there are probably at least a hundred comparable to Eldoria. You can imagine how many Stage SSS fighters might come through when the passages open.”

”I’ve only just reached Stage SSS. I can handle Tier 42 or Tier 43 opponents, but anyone much stronger than that will be too much for me.”

The room fell silent as everyone’s heart sank.

Were they still doomed in the end?

”But there’s no need to be too pessimistic,” Ethan continued. ”The Void Realm creatures aren’t united. They’re all competing against one another, so we won’t have to fight all of them at once.”

”And Beast Sovereign is at peak Tier 47. Ordinary Stage SSS fighters won’t be a threat while it’s here.”

”That makes us feel a lot better.”

”Is there anything we should do over the next two days?” Maxwell asked.

”Two days isn’t enough time for much. Search for Beasts at Stage SS or above. If we can collect more Stage SS crystal cores, we can still increase our strength by quite a bit.”

”Captain, I was just about to bring that up,” Miles said. ”I sent the Fallen Star Guard to search for Stage SS Beasts before you returned.”

”We’ve found several so far, but even the weakest is Tier 38. Their environments also make them difficult to attack, so we haven’t dared make a move.”

”As long as you found them. Send me their locations later, and I’ll take care of them.”

”All right.” Miles nodded. ”There’s somewhere else I think we could obtain a huge number of crystal cores.”

”Where?”

”The ocean.”

Ethan’s eyes lit up.

Of course. How had he forgotten about the ocean?

Earth’s strongest creatures were all in the sea. With so many fish devouring one another, incredibly powerful mutant beasts must have emerged by now.

The problem was that although he was now strong enough to survive underwater, his combat ability would still be significantly reduced in the ocean.

That could make things difficult.

Still, it was another potential source of crystal cores. He would have to investigate when he had the time.

After the meeting ended, Ethan had originally planned to hunt down the Stage SS Beasts Miles had located. Then he remembered something and flew off in a different direction.

There was a Void Realm near Atlas City. Its entrance had once been dozens of miles from the Atlas City compound, but it was now located within New Atlas’s territory.

Miles’s reasoning had been simple. If a major war broke out, they could move the elderly, children, and other vulnerable civilians into the Void Realm. They would be safer there, so he had incorporated its entrance into New Atlas.

However, one problem inside that Void Realm remained unresolved—the ferocious beast known as the Dread-Eyed Lion.

Ethan had led it into the Void Realm before. He had eventually left, but the Dread-Eyed Lion had remained behind.

Ethan was still grateful to it.

It was the one who had told him that Dopey’s power had been sealed. That discovery had eventually allowed Dopey to break the seal and tear through Eldoria’s forces.

Without Dopey, Ethan’s journey through Eldoria would have been immeasurably harder.

More importantly, without Dopey’s help at the end, every one of them would have died there.

Ethan needed to check on the Dread-Eyed Lion.

If possible, he also wanted to talk it into joining the Atlas Federation.

When he reached the Void Realm entrance, Ethan didn’t linger. He activated Riftwalk, opened a dimensional rift, and stepped inside.