Chapter 94: This. Is. Z-Day!

Xiu Ye thanked Wu Ling for letting him borrow her soul communicator. He punched down the number of Tang Wulin's soul number, dialed it, and he brought it to his ear.

He waited as the soul device rang for a brief moment before the call connected.

"Hello?" Xiu Ye let out a sigh of relief of hearing the familiar voice of Tang Wulin sounding out from the soul communicator.

"Wulin, its me."

"Ye? Oh my gods dude! You're alive!" Xiu Ye smiled as he heard Tang Wulin's loud relieved tone of voice resounding to his ear. He glanced to the side to see the mother and daughter duo leaving the room to give him space for a private conversation with his cousin.

Tang Wulin didn't wait for him to say anything and continued, "You got me and the others all worried bro. When we saw that sea of inferno bursting out of the window of the room where we staying at from the ground below, we all screamed out in panic. We all thought that something had gone wrong with your cultivation or something. We were about to head towards there to check on you but the heat caused by the fire was just too hot for us to pass through, and that was just when we were still at ground level. Holy sea gods Ye, what the heck were those flames? What is going on? And where are you?"

Xiu Ye frowned as he listened to his cousin's words. While it was great that they didn't rushed to their deaths due to the danger of his fire, it was still dangerous for them to be anywhere near the hotel with an angry evil soul master in it.

"Where are you and the others right now?" He asked, not answering his cousin's questions just yet because the latter and their friends' situation is more important than him right now.

"...At the Tang Sect branch of Skysea City." Tang Wulin's voice out of the device was like a whisper, low enough that he almost missed it, and it was filled with trepidation.

He was now confused and more worried now. "Wait, what? Is it only you?"

"No. All of us, even Gu Yue. In fact, almost everyone in the city are taking shelter in this place."

'What? Why?' Xiu Ye widened his eyes in surprise. What the heck's going on? Why were people, even those associated with the Spirit Pagoda, taking shelter in Tang Sect? Even for a skirmish between soul masters and evil soul masters that was just a little too much, ain't it?

Now normal people taking shelter from a fight between powerful soul masters is normal, except for the fact they were taking shelter in Tang Sect. That place wasn't something anyone except for its members can just go into, even for shelter.

"Wulin, what's going on?" Xiu Ye demanded, a grim expression on his face as he expected the worst case scenario. Did the cult launch consecutive bombs all around the city?

"...It sounds you're alright so Ye, listen up. You have to believe me when I say that the situation we're facing right now is straight out of a horror movie," Tang Wulin was silent for a moment before he started talking with a heavy tone. "I'm not joking here so please, take what I'm about to say seriously. I'm only telling you this because even when I heard it from teacher Wu and saw it personally: I still couldn't believe it. Oh gods..."

Xiu Ye heard him take a deep breath in through the device before he finally said what was going on in Skysea City, and it shocked him to his core.

"Right after you set the hotel room into a blaze of flames, "they" arrived–evil soul masters. They attacked everyone in the streets, killed them with no mercy. No matter if they were normal humans or soul masters, they slaughtered anyone in their path. We tried to defend the civilians from those evil soul masters, but they were too powerful for us to deal with. It was fortunate that teacher Wu and the teacher of the representatives from Shrek Academy were there to help us. But it didn't just end there," Tang Wulin choked for a moment, as if remembering an unpleasant moment, before he continued. "the bodies the evil soul masters killed suddenly rose up once more and attack anyone with a heartbeat. As if that wasn't enough, anyone they bit or scratched would also turned into them as well. Ye, they were turned into zombies!"

Tang Wulin was right, it was unbelievable. If this were an anime or cartoon, Xiu Ye's jaw would have literally dropped to the floor from utter disbelief.

Zombies? What the fuck? The evil soul masters turned anyone that they killed into zombies? This didn't happen in the original timeline! Although they did several atrocities in the original timeline but they didn't use something as creating a virus or secret technique to reanimate people into zombies.

But most importantly, how in the hell did this happen?! Its only been 30 minutes!

Was this his fault? Xiu Ye's gritted his teeth. Wulin had said that after the fire he created, the evil soul masters started to attack. Was this the consequence of pissing off Na Nali? After all, they did go into the city to recruit new members to their organization and not spread the T-Virus(AN: this is just a joke) across the city and starting a fucking zombie apocalypse.

Xiu Ye shook his head. No, it wasn't all of his fault. All he did was defend himself and escape. How could he know that Na Nali would be so pissed off that she would order her minions to start a massacre and reanimate the dead into zombies? Truthfully, this entire thing was all her fault.

'I have to fix this. This is partly my fault as well, I have to take responsibility.' He clenched his other hand that wasn't holding the soul communicator so tight that his nails dug through the skin and bleed. 'I have to go back.'

"Ye? Hello?" Tang Wulin snapped Xiu Ye out of his thoughts.

"Yeah. You have no reason to lie or joke around with me, I believe you Wulin." He could hear the sign of relief coming through his soul communicator and he chuckled at that.

"I really thought that you wouldn't believe me, you know? I even came up with a persuasive speech for you if you didn't"

Xiu Ye said, "Wulin, we both know that I can tell if you're lying or not. I've been your cousin, or more of a big brother than anything, to you for five years now."

"...Thanks man." Tang Wulin muttered.

"Aw, don't worry little bro. Besides we both know that you don't have the balls to lie to me." Xiu Ye laughed as he heard Tang Wulin stutter and yelled at him in anger.

His expression turned serious once more.

"Wulin, is teacher Wu there? I want to talk to him." He wanted a more in-depth knowledge of what was going on.

"Yeah he's here but his currently talking to some people from Tang Sect and judging who I saw before they and that Shrek Academy teacher entered a private room, they're talking to the higher ups." Xiu Ye clicked his tongue at the bad timing.

"Do you know when they'll be out?" He asked impatiently.

Tang Wulin hummed. "They've been in the room a few minutes now so I think they'll be out in an hour or so."

Xiu Ye narrowed his eyes. It's too long. He's seen enough horror movies, TV shows and animes to understand what would happen in that amount of time. The zombie horde would grow and so would the powers of the evil soul masters from the negativity of the surviving people.

There was also the possibility that Na Nali would use this opportunity to breakthrough to the Titled Douluo realm.

That can never happen.

Although Xiu Ye didn't want the spotlight or revealing most of his abilities that would risk his life, the rise of a new Heavenly King is much more important to deal with.

Not only would her breakthrough could help strengthen the Holy Spirit Cult but it would also be difficult to deal with her later on. With what Yu Fei had told Xiu Ye earlier, a Soul Douluo was leading a group of evil soul masters in Skysea City, and her prestigious status as a candidate for becoming a Heavenly King there was no doubt that she would have the information about the undead situation and have a solution for it as well.

Na Nali is the key to this entire thing.

"Wulin, gather as much information as you can about the zombie situation and tell our friends to find a secluded area, no wait, ask teacher Wu to get us an empty room without any recording devices."

"I understand the first half but you lost me at the rest, why find a secluded area?"

Cue a epic sfx sound as Xiu Ye's face hardened into grim determination. The danger of what he was going to do, and the repercussions following it, was going to be highly risky.

Even still, his body is of iron and flame. Never choosing the battlefield, never yielding and never amassing anything.

"Cause I'm coming there."

For his life has no meaning, except for others.

❄️

AN: This month is just fucking with me... or I pissed off a god in my previous life?

I got a cold, a storm hit my town for a couple of days(luckily no one was harmed) and the electricity keeps flickering off and on! Wtf?! Seriously I just might take the whole fucking month off if this continues.

But I can't. I just can't! I love writing! And I especially love writing this arc! Until I finish this arc, I won't be taking any breaks! So don't worry my readers! Just be patient with me and I'll continue supplying you with more of my story!

Btw, the next chapter marks the second arc of this story! Peace!