However, one zombie, slightly more intelligent than the rest, could not stop himself from murmuring, his voice low and hoarse.
"If... if we dare to fight that other side... there’s a chance we might never survive."
His words trembled, as though even he was afraid of his own thoughts.
Isla turned sharply, her expression ruthless.
"Those who don’t survive were never ant to," she snapped coldly. "We are already dead."
The zombie with a little intelligence struggled inwardly, his chest tightening with a strange, aching pressure.
’This is not what I want,’ he thought helplessly.
Sowhere deep in his fractured heart, he knew he should not be attacking zombies nor humans alike.
This was the sa feeling that had driven him before, the reason he had repeatedly tried to stop the forr zombie king from slaughtering humanity.
It was why he had even persuaded the zombie king to approach the Silvy Base, clinging to the faint hope that a solution might exist.
He had heard whispers, fragnts of information drifting through broken conversations, that an antidote for half-zombies was almost complete.
When Isla noticed that the slightly intelligent zombie was still contyradicting her, her fury erupted.
Her lips curled back as she growled, "Who are you?"
Her voice echoed, heavy with authority.
"Are you so blind that you don’t even realize you’re disrespecting ?"
Her aura flared violently as she waved her hand.
A crushing pressure filled the space.
In the next second, the intelligent zombie dropped to his knees.
"It was my mistake," he pleaded hoarsely. "Please forgive ."
Isla narrowed her eyes, studying him with cruel amusent.
"If you’re truly apologetic," she said slowly, "then go outside and stand in the heat."
She knew it well; although they were zombies, they could still feel their skin blistering and lting under the sun.
They could still feel pain, the sa pain they once felt as humans.
Her cruelty ca easily now.
She realized, with a thrill, that she was powerful.
’Perhaps this incarnation did not make as powerless as I feared,’ she thought. At the very least, she could command far more zombies than before.
The intelligent zombie nodded obediently and turned to leave.
Just as he took a step, Isla stopped him. "What’s your na?"
He tilted his head, confusion flickering across his decayed features.
"It... it sounds like sothing with a ’k’," he murmured. "Key... or maybe Kika?"
Isla rolled her eyes in open disgust.
"My tolerance for stupidity is far too low," she scoffed.
"How can I allow soone this foolish into my army?" With a dismissive wave of her hand, she added,
"Leave. I don’t want to see you anymore." Her eyes darkened as she turned away.
Kika, nad so in that mont, walked out.
As soon as he stepped outside, heat washing over his cracked skin, sothing stirred in his mind.
Suddenly, he rembered his real na. ’Mika,’ he realized.
And the news about the half-antidote,it had co from people standing in lines near the bases.
As that thought surfaced, a deeper wave of sadness rolled through him.
He felt as though he had forgotten sothing extrely important.
’Maybe if I go closer to the base, I’ll rember,’ he thought instinctively.
Without fully realizing it, his feet carried him toward the base.
Soon, he arrived at a specific location.
He looked around, scanning faces, but found no one familiar.
A bitter chuckle escaped him. ’I really am stupid,’ he thought. ’What am I even looking for? I don’t even know why I ca here.’
Not far from him stood Greta.
She still hadn’t recovered from her brother’s death.
She couldn’t stop thinking, couldn’t stop hoping. ’If only I could find him,’ she thought desperately.
If her brother had retained even a fraction of his intelligence after turning into a zombie, there was a high possibility that he had beco a half-zombie.
Once the base completed the antidote, her brother could finally return. Ivy had already released news of a half-antidote for a reason.
There were many reasons, in fact.
First, Ivy wanted more people like Moona and Maxi.
An army of half-zombies would be invaluable.
She had countless experints and theories she wanted to test, but compared to Moona and Maxi, whom she had granted many permissions and allowances, she couldn’t demand much from them.
The upcoming half-zombies would be different. She wouldn’t force dissection on them this ti.
Instead, she would test their abilities among the zombies, to see whether they could command them.
If they could, she would organize the zombies until a full antidote was completed.
More importantly, releasing the news of the half-antidote had ignited hope.
Among the citizens and those stranded outside the base, hope blood fiercely.
For the first ti, they believed they could see light at the end of the tunnel.
The dark, endless tunnel might finally have an end.
People discussed it with uncontrollable enthusiasm, voices buzzing everywhere.
It was then that Mika heard it. He also saw Greta.
And Greta, at that very mont, wished with all her heart that she could witness what had truly happened to her brother.
anwhile, Dante sat in his military office when the door was suddenly knocked open.
Dante felt a strange irony twist in his chest.
Once, he had confidently declared that he would never need Ivy’s help for as long as he lived.
And yet, here he was, sitting in an office inside a base owned by Ivy herself.
Taking a deep breath, he finally spoke, his voice steady despite the tension coiling in his chest.
"Co in."
The door was pushed open, and Dante’s eyes widened instantly.
Standing outside was none other than Nina, the very sa Nina who had once tried to steal his confidential docunts.
She was the woman he had personally exposed at the military base, with his son’s help, no less.
Back then, due to insufficient evidence, he had only been able to force her out of the military, not banish her from the base entirely.
’Who would have thought she’d walk straight into my office like this?’ he thought grimly.
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