Chapter 32: WZ-10

Every soldier of the Tiger Squad could be called a veteran of a hundred battles. Each possessed the ability to break through enemy lines alone, yet not one chose to do so. Instead, they handed their firearms to the students behind them, relying solely on cold steel to engage the endless tide of zombies—most of which were themselves armed with melee weapons. The intensity of the combat far exceeded anything they had ever faced.

For the sake of the students behind them and the survivors cowering in the ruins, the Tiger Squad pushed their specialized training to the absolute limit. Every member bore scars of varying depth and severity, and their blood had already stained the very earth upon which they fought.

Behind the Tiger Squad, the six students displayed faces that were at once youthful, desperate, and resolute. They had only just learned the basics of changing magazines, chambering rounds, and firing before being thrust into the fray, clutching rifles that did not belong in the hands of children their age. As they watched the wave of zombies surging toward them like a rising tide, fear gripped them, yet not a single one thought to retreat. The Tiger Squad’s spirit—a defiance of death itself—had set the blood of these young students boiling.

The zombie horde was not deterred by the mountain-like resolve of the twelve-man unit. The squad stood firm like ancient, immovable reefs against the sea; wave after wave of zombies crashed against them, each surge larger than the last, yet when the tide receded, the defenders remained standing.

But now, the Tiger Squad’s mission had reached its final hour. High-intensity combat had drained their strength, and the tremors vibrating through the ground cast a shadow of dread over every face.

Night had fallen completely. Lead-colored clouds smothered the earth, and the moon hid most of its face behind the veil. A sliver of silver moonlight fell upon two sand-worms that had just erupted from beneath the ground, bathing them in an eerie, metallic glow.

The "Intellect" seemed to be savoring this cat-and-mouse game. The sand-worms stood poised, not yet rushing to attack. Though they lacked eyes, Zhao Qiang felt as if he were being locked in a cold, unblinking gaze. The zombies had ceased their assault, forming a U-shaped perimeter fifty meters away. They stood with claws bared, staring at the twelve people inside the circle. The saliva secreted by the zombies due to the massive release of Z-type enzymes had pooled into small streams, flowing along the contours of the ground.

The Tiger Squad stood tall, like spears planted in the earth. The sand-worms did not move, and neither did they. Cai Jiashu’s sacrifice had shown the team a glimmer of victory. There were only two sand-worms; perhaps there was still a chance. High-explosive grenades were already clutched in the palms of every member. With their superior reflexes, they could potentially hurl the explosives directly into the worms' cavernous maws.

"Tiger Squad!" Zhao Qiang roared.

"Live and die together!" The squad’s response seemed to shatter the leaden sky.

"Live and die together!" Zhang Jun echoed in a low voice, gripping his rifle tightly.

The two sand-worms exerted a psychological pressure as overwhelming as their colossal, mountain-like forms. Before them, humans were as insignificant as ants. Since their first appearance in this world, they had encountered no natural predators; at the very least, humans—who once prided themselves as the masters of the Earth—were utterly defenseless against them. Of course, the previous one had been an exception.

The roar of the Tiger Squad served as a clarion call for battle. The two sand-worms finally coiled their bodies and lunged at the small unit. Fifty meters, forty meters... twenty meters. Zhao Qiang silently calculated the distance. The pins were already pulled from the grenades; he firmly believed that, at the perfect moment, these melon-sized weapons could deliver a fatal blow to the monstrosities.

Fifteen meters! "Throw!" Zhao Qiang and Jun Dao hurled their grenades directly into the gaping maws of the sand-worms. Without waiting to see the result, they turned and each snatched up a student, who had been frozen in terror, and bolted backward.

Zhang Jun had been paralyzed with fear as the sight of the sand-worms grew larger in his vision. He only snapped back to reality when he was hit by a gentle yet irresistible force; he was now slung over the shoulder of a Tiger Squad member, sprinting toward the rear. It was precisely because of this that he clearly saw the circular, razor-sharp teeth within the sand-worms' maws snap shut just before the grenades could enter. The hard shells of the grenades struck the teeth and were deflected away. The ensuing explosions failed to inflict the anticipated damage on the colossal monsters.

Zhao Qiang, carrying a student, barely managed to clear the path of the sand-worms before they crushed everything in their wake. When the dust settled, Zhao Qiang realized that only ten of their twelve-man team remained. One soldier and one student had failed to dodge in time, reduced to unrecognizable pulp before they could even scream.

Zhao Qiang’s face turned ghastly. Under the control of the Intellect, the seemingly simple-minded sand-worms had become far more difficult to handle. A single failed attack had cost two lives. The scene of Cai Jiashu’s death flashed through Zhao Qiang’s mind like lightning. Was it true that to defeat these worms, one must feed them with their own lives? If the worms refused to be baited and simply trampled their attackers, what purpose did a suicide mission serve?

In the distance, the sand-worms turned, splitting into two paths to launch another pincer attack. Several students closed their eyes in despair; they knew that they had only survived the first round by pure luck. This second wave would likely be their last.

Zhao Qiang steeled himself for this round. He would get the last of the grenades into the worms' mouths, no matter the cost—even if it meant sacrificing his own life.

The cold night wind suddenly intensified, and the background noise of the zombies' wailing grew chaotic, as if something had caught their attention. The exhausted squad members, fully focused on the pincer attack, failed to notice that the gale originated from directly above them.

Suddenly, two searchlights flared to life with a sharp click. Two dazzling beams of light locked onto the sand-worms, revealing the menacing silhouettes of two attack helicopters hovering overhead.

"WZ-10!" Jun Dao’s voice was nearly drowned out. The 30mm single-barrel autocannons mounted on the noses of the WZ-10s, hovering just above, erupted with a deafening roar. Thick, smoking shell casings rained down like a downpour. The high-explosive incendiary rounds, representing the pinnacle of Chinese aviation cannon technology, struck the advancing sand-worms with pinpoint precision.