Chapter 638 - 608: The Situation Worsens

Now that he had completed the first stage of his Divine Demon Body cultivation, he was confident that the full version of the Thunder God Spear could unleash power far exceeding the mere threshold of the Divine Demon Realm.

It might even be capable of inflicting massive damage on those in the Early Stage of the Divine Demon Realm.

However, Lin Xinghai’s cultivation session was interrupted after only half an hour.

The visitor surprised Lin Xinghai—it was Zuo Wenya.

"Teacher Zuo, what brings you here? Is the situation on the front lines okay?" Lin Xinghai asked as he invited the man into his barracks, observing the expression on his face.

He had only been out of sight for half a day, yet the Divine Demon Realm expert’s face was etched with exhaustion.

Lin Xinghai’s heart sank. Clearly, humanity did not have the upper hand when it came to top-tier power.

After all, he had learned from Zuo Wenya himself that the country had mobilized Divine Demon Realm experts from all corners of the nation for this.

The total number of Divine Demon Realm experts had reached an unprecedented one hundred.

In the past, having a full one hundred Divine Demon Realm experts appear on the front lines simultaneously would have been absolutely unimaginable.

But now, even with one hundred Divine Demon Realm experts defending the front, the situation seemed dire. How could that not be cause for concern?

"I won’t lie to you. The situation on the front lines is not good. To be blunt, humanity is at a complete disadvantage."

"Fortunately, the country came with more than enough weapons. Otherwise, it wouldn’t just be a disadvantage—it would be a total rout." Zuo Wenya’s first words gave Lin Xinghai a huge shock.

"How could that be? Just how many Third Level Mutated Zombies came through the Abyssal Passage?" Lin Xinghai asked, astonished.

"It’s not an issue of their numbers being too high. In fact, the Abyssal Plane probably wouldn’t dare send too many Third Level Mutated Zombies over."

"According to the Military Department’s plan, if the number of Third Level Mutated Zombies reaches three times our own—that is, more than 300—we will immediately deploy nuclear weapons to cleanse the entire area."

Zuo Wenya first shook his head, dismissing Lin Xinghai’s guess, before continuing, "According to the latest count, there are around 230 Third Level Mutated Zombies."

"Of course, even though that’s more than double our numbers, under normal circumstances, we’d be able to handle it."

"In fact, last night, the number of Third Level Mutated Zombies peaked at 250."

"But we not only have advanced, high-precision conventional weapons, our coordination is also far superior to that of the Mutated Zombies. We can use a small portion of our forces to pin down the majority of them, creating localized numerical advantages to quickly eliminate groups of Third Level Mutated Zombies."

"Using this tactic last night, we achieved tremendous results. We killed 50 Third Level Mutated Zombies at the cost of only 10 of our people being injured."

Hearing this, Lin Xinghai couldn’t help but look astonished. The country had only dispatched 100 Divine Demon Realm experts. To be able to annihilate so many Third Level Mutated Zombies while being outnumbered was incredible.

Under normal circumstances, the total number of Third Level Mutated Zombies killed across all of the country’s Abyssal Passages in an entire year was probably only about that many.

Otherwise, Third Level Biological Alloy wouldn’t be so rare that many Divine Demon Realm experts couldn’t even get their hands on a single Legendary Level Mecha.

These results were absolutely massive. Once they processed the spoils of this battle, they could probably produce many more Legendary Level Mechas, giving their top-tier forces a qualitative leap in power.

However, Lin Xinghai knew it couldn’t be that simple. Zuo Wenya clearly had more to say.

Sure enough, Zuo Wenya paused, then continued, "But starting this morning, the situation changed."

"And the reason for the shift wasn’t an increase in the number of Third Level Mutated Zombies coming from the Abyssal Passage. It was that their strength had increased significantly."

"Stronger? Do you mean a temporary boost in strength?" Lin Xinghai asked doubtfully. The first thing that came to his mind was a Mutated Zombie’s berserk state.

He believed the Abyssal Plane certainly had other ways to enhance the strength of its Abyssal Creatures and Mutated Zombies.

But Zuo Wenya shook his head and gave an answer that surprised even Lin Xinghai. "No! It’s not that they’ve gotten stronger... it’s more like they’ve recovered their original strength."

Lin Xinghai was shaken. Before he could ask anything, Zuo Wenya continued, "And it’s not all of the Mutated Zombies that have gotten stronger. The strength of the First Level ones is the same as before, but the Second and Third Level Mutated Zombies have become a great deal stronger."

"On top of that, we’ve seen some other Mutated Zombies that are stronger than the First Level ones, but not quite as strong as the previous Second Level ones."

Zuo Wenya paused here and looked at Lin Xinghai. "I’d like to hear your thoughts on this."

"Mutated Zombies at the Marrow Tempering Realm!" Lin Xinghai said with absolute certainty. His eyes glinted as he continued, "And it’s very likely that our inability to discover the Marrow Tempering Realm has been connected to this all along."

"Mm," Zuo Wenya nodded. "In fact, the higher-ups in the Military Department and the Seed Plan Execution Department have come to a consensus. They believe the Abyssal Plane used some bizarre method to hide the existence of the Marrow Tempering Realm."

"But a concealment method like that isn’t easy to pull off. For instance, they would have had to completely erase any and all traces of the Marrow Tempering Realm."

"That’s why we never discovered Mutated Zombies of this Level. To be even more thorough and prevent us from getting suspicious, they even sealed a large portion of the strength of the Mutated Zombies that correspond to our Body Shaping and Divine Demon Realms, making them equivalent to us before we cultivated the Marrow Tempering Realm."

"But because you obtained the true inheritance of the Divine Demon Body and broke through to the Marrow Tempering Realm, their strange method was broken. Now they no longer need to hide it, so those Second and Third Level Mutated Zombies no longer have to suppress their true strength."

Zuo Wenya stopped speaking, and the atmosphere in the room instantly grew heavy.

"So what’s the situation now?" Lin Xinghai was the one to finally break the silence.

"We can’t win," Zuo Wenya said. "In the past, even though we couldn’t defeat Mutated Zombies of the same level based on our own strength, we could pilot Legendary Level Mechas to suppress them."

"But now, even when piloting Legendary Mechas, we can’t beat them. It takes at least two Divine Demon Realm experts just to suppress a single Third Level Mutated Zombie."

The room fell silent once more. Lin Xinghai clearly understood the gravity of the situation. If the high-level battlefield collapsed, it would undoubtedly trigger a chain reaction, causing the entire front line to crumble.

And this time, even resorting to nuking the area wouldn’t be an easy solution.

Now that the Abyssal Plane was no longer hiding its true strength, their Third Level Zombies could pour through continuously.

Even continuous bombing from the military would be useless. After all, this wasn’t the only Abyssal Passage on Earth. If all the Abyssal Passages around the globe erupted at once, with attacks led by these Third Level Mutated Zombies whose strength surpasses the Divine Demon Realm, it would be an absolute catastrophe.

"Then... is there nothing we can do?" Lin Xinghai asked, swallowing hard.

"There is. We wait. We wait until we’ve all recultivated the Marrow Tempering Realm. Then, the balance of power will naturally return to how it was before. Some of us might even break through to a higher Realm and be able to completely suppress them."

"But all of that takes time. And buying that time," Zuo Wenya said, his voice hoarse, "will cost lives."

In fact, this was already the consensus among the Divine Demon Realm experts.

He had even come to see Lin Xinghai this time with the mindset of leaving his last words.