Chapter 116: The Death of Doctor Zombie

"Blue Moon, follow behind me. Your task later will be to catch me!"

After issuing this quiet order to the martial arts girl beside him, Wang Ling stood still, watching the approaching zombie robot. He stood tall and straight, his internal spiritual energy beginning to circulate at full power.

With the souls of the twin dragons within him providing a foundation, his energy recovery was rapid. Though not much time had passed, the spiritual energy consumed by his Dragon-Head Fist had already mostly returned. Sensing the internal circulation of energy throughout his body, Wang Ling whispered to himself, "This should be enough."

As the ground trembled, the zombie robot drew near. Seeing the terrifying giant machine and the disgusting head of Dr. Edgar, where the cerebral cortex was clearly visible, Wang Ling suddenly arched his body and charged forward!

"Seeking death!"

Dr. Edgar shrieked, his fingers darting across the buttons in the cockpit. Following his movement, the robot lifted a foot and slammed it down toward the charging Wang Ling.

"Bang..." With a crisp sound, countless ice-blue crystal specks flashed in the air, and a mushroom formed of countless icicles silently exploded. In that instant, the zombie robot's movements froze, and a layer of blue frost coated its body.

This was an "Ice-shroom." Upon use, it deals 20 points of ice-elemental damage within a 10-meter radius, freezing all freezable targets for 4 seconds, followed by a 15-second slow effect. Although the robot was not a zombie by nature, it possessed biochemically mutated zombie muscle tissue, making it susceptible to the Ice-shroom's freezing effect.

A mere four seconds was not long, but for Wang Ling, it was enough!

At the first second, he stepped onto the robot's foot; at the second, he had climbed to its waist, grabbing its arm to pull himself higher; at the third, he stood on the actuator lever beside the robot's head. The pale yellow biochemical energy shield still shrouded the exterior of the cockpit, protecting Dr. Edgar within, but at this moment, Wang Ling's hands were pressed against the surface of the zombie robot's head.

At the fourth second, Immortal Qi Activation!

A ball of cold white light exploded in front of his palms, expanding outward in a ring. Under the brilliance of the spiritual energy, the robot's entire head was dyed white. The light was incredibly clear; Hassan, who was watching the battlefield closely from the helicopter, had an illusion as he looked down: it seemed that what exploded in front of Wang Ling was not a burst of light, but a disc-shaped moon!

The light orb shattered instantly upon detonating. Amidst the countless scattering specks of spiritual energy, Wang Ling's body was sent flying backward by the immense force of the energy burst. Blue Moon, who had been following close behind, rose into the air and caught the falling Wang Ling.

Executing Immortal Qi Activation not only drained all the energy in his body but also consumed a full 100 points of mental strength! This level of consumption left Wang Ling feeling dizzy. He forced himself to lift his head from Blue Moon's arms and look at the zombie robot. The freezing effect of the Ice-shroom had worn off, and the robot, which should have regained its mobility, instead erupted in violent sparks from its head.

Dr. Edgar screamed as he frantically hammered the buttons in front of him, yet the robot seemed to have lost control. Its massive head trembled violently; as it shook, the yellow light in the robot's eyes faded, its movements grew increasingly sluggish, and finally, it stopped completely and crashed to the ground with a boom.

"Sizzle..."

As the zombie robot fell, the pale yellow biochemical energy shield vanished along with it. A look of disbelief shone in Dr. Edgar's pale eyes. "No! My robot, my masterpiece, the Zombie Robot—how could it break so easily? Impossible!"

With an expression of utter disbelief, Dr. Edgar pried open the base of the cockpit, and a pungent, acrid smell wafted out. His gaze focused; he saw that in the control core below, bundles of metal wires and the insulating plastic casings had been burned to a crisp. Many exposed metal wires were twisted together, emitting tiny electrical sparks.

Dr. Edgar's brilliant brain could not believe the scene before him. He shouted in shock, "What is happening?"

Wang Ling did not have the habit of chatting with enemies. To prevent any unexpected changes that might lead to a reversal, his principle was that once the upper hand was gained, the opponent must be eliminated immediately!

He drew a plant card from the pocket at his waist, and it vanished instantly. On the muddy ground in front of him, a bright red, sharp-headed Jalapeno suddenly appeared. This wide-eyed pepper, seeing Dr. Edgar, immediately bared an angry expression, then rapidly expanded in the air and exploded with a "boom."

A long, wall-like wave of fire appeared, turning everything in its path into a furnace. With the head of the fallen robot engulfed in the flames and lacking the protection of the biochemical energy shield, Dr. Edgar's thin figure was instantly swallowed by the fire.

A shrill scream came from the flames. As the commander of the zombie army, all of the Doctor's abilities lay in creation and command; his physical strength was only slightly higher than that of an ordinary zombie. Caught in the wave of fire created by the Jalapeno, which dealt 1800 damage to zombies, he screamed for only two seconds before the sound cut off.

The roaring flames dissipated, and Dr. Edgar was gone; inside the cockpit, only a small smear of ash remained...

After confirming the Doctor's death, Wang Ling said slowly, "The Zombie Robot is indeed powerful, but my Immortal Qi Activation injected energy into its interior, causing it to erupt violently from the inside out. Your cockpit has control equipment like levers and buttons, and the head below must contain the connecting circuits. Just destroying a few metal wires to cause an electrical short circuit is enough to paralyze your robot."

At that moment, the Dream Badge suddenly transmitted a message: "Zombie faction leader Dr. Edgar is dead. Deprived of their leader, the zombie faction has fallen into chaos and abandoned the attack on Plant Town. Dreamers of the Plant Town faction have successfully completed the main quest. Dreamers of the zombie faction, due to the death of Dr. Edgar, are judged as having failed the main quest and will be subjected to the penalty of erasure."

At the same time, at the house stronghold 70 kilometers away, all the dreamers engaged in the fierce battle—whether it was Caslo’s group or Singh’s—heard the notification suddenly ring out in their minds.

The man with deep-set eye sockets, the dark-skinned woman, and the boy with glasses all screamed and convulsed before collapsing dead. Singh, who was using a small black knife to sever one of Caslo’s arms, suddenly found a faint light glowing on his body.

Singh had seen the helicopter leave, and he immediately understood that Dr. Edgar had been killed. Filled with extreme rage, he roared, "Those Japanese are a bunch of trash! Wang Ling, and that old Arab—you actually made me lose a precious anti-erasure item! I won't let you get away with this!"

Amidst the roar, Singh’s figure gradually faded as he was teleported back to the Dream Space. Caslo and the others stood stunned for a long moment before shouting in disbelief, "Success? They actually succeeded! I never thought they could really kill Dr. Edgar! How did they do it? There was a zombie robot there!"

At the current stronghold, under the attacks of Singh’s group and the zombies, the situation had been precarious, and more than half of the plants planted outside had been cleared. They hadn't expected the main quest to be completed so suddenly, with the opposing side being erased. Only Singh had managed to return by consuming an anti-erasure item. The zombies had also begun to retreat.

Having narrowly escaped death, the group could hardly contain their joy!

Wang Ling was currently staring at the spot where Dr. Edgar had disappeared, where a shimmering key lay.

It was actually a Bronze Flash Key!

Stepping away from Blue Moon’s embrace, he walked over and picked up the key, but hesitated and did not use it immediately. After all, his space bag didn't even have room for plant cards; if he opened it and items appeared, there would be nowhere to put them.

As he put the Bronze Flash Key away, Wang Ling noticed that after killing Dr. Edgar, his reward points had increased by a full 80,000. His current total of 110,000 reward points was enough to purchase a card for the Zen Garden.

The Dream Badge continued to prompt: "Main quest fully completed. Before 8:00 AM tomorrow, all dreamers may teleport back to the space at any time. Please ensure all reward points are exchanged before this time."

"The missions in this world are finally all over..."

Wang Ling let out a long sigh of relief. At that moment, he saw the helicopter landing on the ground, and his guard rose slightly—one can never be too careful. His space bag now contained a key dropped by the final boss of an E+-level world; this old Arab might be tempted—though of course, the probability of that was low, as in a peaceful scene, the chance of insta-killing a dreamer like himself with over 200 health points was almost zero.

In truth, Wang Ling subconsciously hoped Hassan would make a move. After all, his trump cards, Dragon-Head Fist and Immortal Qi Activation, had both been used in this battle; if leaked by Hassan, it would likely alert the Orc Team and the Thug Team.

Killing Hassan would prevent the intelligence leak, but Wang Ling did not want to do so. This old man hadn't left a bad impression; during the previous battle, he had even rescued him while he was fighting Singh, and when the three members of Chrysanthemum and Blade died, he had given up a key he was entitled to.

Killing a companion was something Wang Ling couldn't bring himself to do. However, if the other party struck first, he would have no psychological burden in taking them down—this might be a form of hypocrisy, but at the very least, it showed he was not cold-blooded.

A cold-blooded animal that only pursues profit has no real friends or partners. In these dangerous worlds, how far could one go relying solely on their own strength?

Hassan stepped off the helicopter, looked deeply at Wang Ling, and said, "Please, you don't need to be wary of me. I will not tell anyone about those two powerful moves of yours. I swear it in the name of Allah!"

For an old Muslim, swearing in the name of Allah was the most solemn of oaths.

He continued, "As for killing Dr. Edgar... to avoid causing too much surprise, I suggest we say this: you infiltrated the castle and took him out while he was conducting experiments, without ever engaging the zombie robot. Taking a shortcut to kill the Doctor, while completing the main quest, also brought a penalty: the loss of the reward for killing the boss."

Wang Ling smiled and said to Hassan, "There is still a day left. With the helicopter, it only takes an hour or so to return to the stronghold. Since we've come to the Zombie City, why not go into the castle and take a look?"

The armed helicopter remained outside, with Blue Moon on watch, and Wang Ling and Hassan entered the interior of the castle. The castle was empty, and it wasn't until they reached the top floor that they discovered a group of enemies: zombie plants whose heads had been modified into combat plants!

If Wang Ling hadn't been quick-witted and immediately released a Jalapeno, the rising wave of fire would have incinerated the group of zombie plants—among which were actually Jalapeno-Zombies and Squash-Zombies!

The zombie plants were guards of Dr. Edgar's laboratory. Inside, there were some strange potions, and even mutated potions for zombie-fied bloodlines that could grant precious traits! Unfortunately, they were all plot items that could neither be used nor brought out.

Leaving the Zombie City with some disappointment, the group flew back to Plant Town in the armed helicopter. One could see that the zombie army had already withdrawn from the area; there wasn't a single zombie left in the town, not even a corpse—after zombies died, their bodies would disappear after a while; otherwise, the corpses would have been enough to swamp the stronghold.

Upon entering the stronghold, Wang Ling found that all three martial arts masters were injured, and Wang Long's injuries were particularly severe! However, it was a pleasant surprise to find that Peach Fairy and Chen Heng had leveled up to LV2, and their personal attributes had increased. He discovered that these martial arts masters had a pattern in their attribute growth: the specialty stat increased by four points, while the other three stats increased by one, two, and three points respectively.

The weakness of the martial arts masters was their lack of particularly powerful skills, and their bloodlines were those of ordinary people. The increase in personal attributes provided a relatively significant boost to their strength.

Of the remaining three, besides losing an arm, Caslo had several knife wounds on his chest and abdomen; Suna’s right hand, used for throwing flying daggers, was ruined, and the tendons in her legs had been severed while executing Capoeira kicks; Cai Qing was covered in wounds, even more severely than Caslo! As for the other Japanese dreamer, Yamada, who used a katana, he was already dead!

In fact, this was the result of Wang Ling’s instructions to Wang Long and the others before he left—regarding this guy who had been stalking and spying on his battle with the Whirlwind Team, and whose sinister nature was quite off-putting, Wang Ling had simply reminded the three martial arts masters not to rescue Yamada if he encountered danger, which was enough to ensure that this fellow would die in high-intensity combat. (To be continued)