Chapter 70 - Eternal Life in Flames
Three minutes later, Granny Wang’s skin was covered in horrifying spots. Her teeth and nails grew sharper as well.
But she no longer twitched nor let out terrifying screeches.
The two military doctors looked at each other and removed the helmet.
Granny Wang’s face was as ferocious as ever. Her eyes were still murky, but they no longer let out the fierce light that belonged to wild beasts. There was only a calm look in them.
“Next, we will conduct the final test. Witnesses, please go out. Family member, please go out as well,” the military doctor said.
“No, I want to stay here! I want to stay with my grandma!” Wang Xiaojuan said firmly.
When Meng Chao dragged Bai Jiacao out the door, he noticed that her hands were no longer shaking as badly as before.
The military doctor did not close the door. He only drew his pistol and blocked the entrance. The siblings stood on their tiptoes and looked inside. They saw one of the other two military doctors protect Wang Xiaojuan while the last one quickly removed Granny Wang’s chains.
The zombified Granny Wang jumped up.
She was now controlled by great hunger and an instinct to kill. With her teeth bared, she pounced at the crowd.
The muscles of the military doctor who protected Wang Xiaojuan bulged out. Even his white coat let out ripping sounds.
The military doctor who blocked the entrance quickly lifted the pistol and aimed at the center of Granny Wang’s forehead.
Wang Xiaojuan cried at the top of her lungs. “Grandma!”
It looked like the zombified Granny Wang’s soul was struck by lightning. She froze on the spot.
“Citizen Wang Shufen, do you remember your oath when you joined the Eternal Journey? We are noble humans. Our willpower will allow us to win against all physical and invisible enemies. Even if we die, we will not let ourselves be manipulated by viruses and bacteria!” a military doctor shouted. “Standing before you is your beloved granddaughter! Are you really going to tear her apart and eat her?!”
Meng Chao noticed that the military doctor’s eyes were shining brightly, and the veins at his temples pulsated rapidly.
By the looks of it, he was a superhuman who was skilled in mind techniques.
He was using his brainwaves to stimulate the part of Granny Wang’s cerebral cortex which had yet to completely rot away. It would help him prevent the virus from wreaking havoc on what remained of Granny Wang’s brain cells.
A conflicted expression appeared on the zombified Granny Wang’s face.
The glory of humanity and the instincts of a beast raged wildly in her.
“Grandma, do your best! You can definitely win against this demon! Grandpa, dad, and mom are all watching you in heaven!” Wang Xiaojuan shouted out in a quivering voice.
Her words struck Granny Wang’s rapidly mutating central nervous system.
Her murky eyeballs trembled violently, and a crystalline liquid that resembled tears flowed out of her eyes.
She extended her sharp claws at her granddaughter.
The three military doctors were nervous.
But Wang Xiaojuan went to her grandmother without regard for her safety.
When the sharp claws were about to touch her face, Granny Wang retreated.
She forcibly controlled herself and retracted her fangs and claws before standing in an orderly fashion. She just allowed the cold, crystalline tears to intersect as they slid down her rotting face.
“The mutation of her brain cells has been controlled!”
“The central nervous system was protected perfectly. It wasn’t further invaded by the virus!
“Reaction to sound is normal. Reaction to light is normal. Reaction to fresh blood is normal. The volunteer might have died, but the memory fragments remaining in the depths of her brain cells have turned into instincts that allowed her to control herself!
“As of now, she is no longer a zombie with no humanity left. Instead, she is an Eternal Being who will fight to the death for her hometown and her family!”
“Some people remain living, but they have already died a long time ago. But some people, in their deaths, will burn with eternal life in flames! Salute the Eternal Being!”
The three military doctors gave the zombified Granny Wang the standard military salute.
Then, one military doctor opened the brain cell controller and the spinal nerve control ring and looped them around the zombified Granny Wang’s forehead and neck. Then, with a few circuits, he connected both of them together.
During the entire process, the zombified Granny Wang’s eyeballs kept shuddering. Her sharp claws extended and retracted.
She stared at the military doctor’s neck, which was right next to her. Her eyes were fixed on the slightly protruding vessels on his neck. She was even salivating a little.
But under her granddaughter’s encouraging gaze, the zombified Granny Wang managed to hold herself under control.
When the control system was fully connected, the old lady became completely quiet.
The ruthless expression on her face disappeared, and only calmness remained in her murky eyes.
The military doctor used a controller that was similar to those used for unmanned aerial vehicles to guide Granny Wang out of the house she had stayed in for the past few decades.
The corridor was stuffed full of people. Everyone heard that Granny Wang had completed the Eternal Ceremony, and they came to send her off.
“It’s a joyful funeral! A joyful funeral!” Someone sighed.
“Some people remain living, but they have already died a long time ago. But some people, in their deaths, will burn with eternal life in flames!” another person shouted the oath of the Eternal Journey.
But the majority of the people remained somber and stern as they watched Granny Wang partake in her final journey.
When they arrived at the entrance of the unit, Granny Wang followed the three military doctors into the airtight armored truck, and Wang Xiaojun called out to her grandma for the final time while Bai Jiacao supported her.
“Grandma!”
Granny Wang actually turned around to look at her, and her mostly rotten lips curled up a little.
While the old lady was alive, she caused a lot of fuss. Her voice was shrill and high. When they ran into something, she liked to butt in by telling people what they should do, so quite a lot of people in the area did not quite like her.
But she was dead now, and a lot of people wept for her.
“Citizen Wang Shufeng joined the Red Dragon Army’s Eternal Journey. Based on the rules to give out rewards to the martyrs in the army, the direct relatives of Eternal Beings who have yet to come of age will have ten marks added to their test when they go through their national high school examination, and they will be rewarded with an extra five marks during their national college examination. Go back and study well. Don’t let your grandmother down.”
The three military doctors saluted Wang Xiaojuan and left with Granny Wang.
“Young Juan, don’t be too sad. Your grandma is a hero. Perhaps we’ll be able to see her showing off her skills during the next monster invasion.” When Meng Chao saw that his neighbor was deep in the throes of despair, he could not help but comfort her.
He was not lying.
While zombie cells might be highly active, most the zombie’s organs and limbs had rotted away, so the zombies were not actually very strong.
During the first ten years Dragon City transmigrated, normal people could use chainsaws or lawn mowers to deal with zombies. As long as they overcame their fear and avoided being injured or bitten, they could fight against a few zombies on their own.
The military, however, had spent a lot of effort in creating Eternal Journey, so it was impossible for them to send zombies to the frontlines just to be food for the monsters.
When the zombies— No, when the Eternal Beings entered the military camp, they needed to go through more than ten modifications. All sorts of powerful armor, crystal engines, and light or heavy weaponry were fixed to their bodies until they became war fortresses that could be controlled by human brain cells and spinal nerves.
With the continuous development of runic symbols, spirit energy, and crystal technology, the ability to strengthen bones and improve the fighting capabilities of a lone soldier became better. Thus, all sorts of battle armor became popular.
But the human body was a weak sack of flesh. The stronger the battle armor was, the more damage the people wearing it would sustain, because it meant that they would have to endure greater noise, higher temperature, and greater impacts.
With just a thin layer of armor, they had to shift from supersonic speed to absolute stillness. Then, from stillness, they needed to instantly reach Mach 3 or Mach 5. And while doing that, they had to maneuver their bodies and withstand high-speed impacts from monsters. Even if the armor itself could withstand such torture, a normal person’s muscles, bones, brain, and organs were not capable of that.
Only the superhuman martial artists who specialized in refining their bodies could withstand such a thing.
But all of them focused on walking down the path of using spirit energy and meditation to create and refine their energy armor.
Since there was no need for them to use physical armor and there were too few people who could use them, there were just not enough people who could fight the rampaging monster hoard.
There were simply too few people in Dragon City. So, for the sake of survival, even the dead had to fight heroically.
Since they were already dead, their reflex system was just impulses granted to them by bioelectricity. Hence, they did not need to care about damaging their own bodies.
The weapon designers could pile up their most insane ideas on the Eternal Beings.
For example, they could install the Eternal Beings’ remaining brain cells and spinal nerves on super war trucks that were tens of meters tall, had dozens of crawlers, and dozens of huge cannons.
Because of it, the Eternal Journey became one of the most powerful forces in the Red Dragon Army. They were a frenzied suicide squad.
No… it would not be too accurate to use the word “frenzy” to describe them.
When the Eternal Beings drove the super machines over the monsters, their spirits in heaven should be feeling peace. They should be happy.
The Eternal Journey armored truck had two red crosses painted on the sides. They were surrounded by flames.
Once the truck was driven out, Bai Jiacao mentioned her worries once again. “Young Juan, I was the one who did this to your granny. If I weren’t so useless, Granny Wang might not have died.”
“Why would you say that?” Wang Xiaojuan looked at Bai Jiacao with slight surprise. “When I came back, Grandma still had some semblance of consciousness left. She told me that it’s all thanks to you rushing to the forefront without a care for your own safety and using a small kopis to kill two Demonic Halberd Pigs that she managed to lift her shotgun and fight to her heart’s content.
“If it weren’t for you, many of the neighbors and she herself would have been separated by the Demonic Halberd Pigs. A lot more people would have died because of it!”
Bai Jiacao was stunned. “Really?”
“Of course. Grandma said that you’re the bravest girl she has ever seen, and she told me that I was to learn from you.” Wang Xiaojuan squatted down and touched the Sword-toothed Hunting Dog’s head. She whispered, “Young Cao, I have to stay in school. I’ll have to impose on you and ask you to take care of Big Tooth. Is that okay?”
“Don’t worry. I’ll take good care of Big Tooth.” Bai Jiacao’s eyes sparkled once more.
“I almost forgot.” Wang Xiaojuan removed Big Tooth’s collar and took out a large, heart-shaped pendant.
She pushed down on it gently. The pendant had space inside it, and photos fell out.
One of them was Granny Wang’s wedding photo. The people in it were a young man and woman. They were both heroic looking and appeared to be in high spirits.
There were also a few colored baby photos. The child was smiling, and he looked really similar to Granny Wang when she was young.
A lot of numbers were written behind each photo.
“Granny said that she’s old, and her memory isn’t that good. She always lost things, so she decided to write all the passwords in the house on the pictures and hid them in Big Tooth’s collar. This way, if something happened, I would be able to find them.” Wang Xiaojuan put the pictures into her pocket.
At that moment, a small and very old paper crane fell out of the deepest part of the pendant.