The strength of the old locust tree lay in the soul bodies it controlled. Its branches were of ordinary strength and could not obstruct the two women who had already regained consciousness.
However, all those powerful soul bodies had been killed by Qin Shilei, so Wang Yinghao could only watch as An Qian and Zhang Xiaoli escaped the range covered by its crown.
"You stop."
By the time Wang Yinghao recovered and noticed Qin Shilei, half of his trunk had already been cut off by Qin Shilei.
Qin Shilei's right hand, holding the sword, had become a blur, continuously hacking at the locust tree's trunk.
As rapid chopping sounds echoed, locust tree debris constantly fell to the ground.
Wang Yinghao was completely panicked and gathered all the movable branches to surround Qin Shilei: "Stop it quickly."
7.....8.....9
After Qin Shilei mentally counted to 9, he turned and fled into the distance.
"What a pity."
Just two or three seconds short of cutting down the entire locust tree, Qin Shilei could only choose to retreat temporarily.
Under the locust tree's full force of branches to kill him, he could not hold on for long.
Furthermore, with Qin Shilei having recovered his normal state, it would take him at least half an hour to chop down half a meter of the locust tree with the Seven Star Sword.
Following the sound of footsteps, Qin Shilei quickly found An Qian and the others.
"Did you chop that tree spirit to death?"
Zhang Xiaoli now had a blind adoration for Qin Shilei. The first thing she said was not to ask if Qin Shilei was injured, but instead, if he had killed the tree.
Qin Shilei shook his head: "Still a little bit short. Let's go back to our original place to sleep, and deal with it when it's dawn."
The two women nodded in agreement.
Then they clung to him, each tightly holding one of Qin Shilei's arms.
They were truly afraid of falling into an illusion again and being taken away by the locust tree.
While Qin Shilei and his companions were looking for a suitable place to rest, Zhang Qiang and his group encountered a life-and-death crisis.
They were forced out of a villa by a large group of zombies.
"Boss, what do we do? There are too many zombies."
"We didn't see a single zombie during the day, how come there are thousands at night?"
"These zombies are too strange, they don't even have a single crystal core."
"Don't fight, let's escape first."
Although Zhang Qiang knew that the most important thing now was to escape, with zombies all around, how could escaping be easy?
They advanced with Zhao Peng and Li Jingsheng as the vanguard, Zhong Ting and Xie Haimei in the middle for support, and Zhang Qiang covering the rear for a breakthrough.
The five dared to team up to kill zombies, each possessing unique skills.
Xie Haimei held a compound bow, and each arrow she shot killed a zombie that was about to bite a teammate.
Although Zhong Ting also wielded a mountain-cutting saber to help fill gaps, the ice cones she occasionally released indicated that her main role was to slow down mutated zombies.
Zhao Peng, though without special abilities, had a ruthless and precise saber technique.
Li Jingsheng's long saber occasionally flashed with a golden light, indicating that he was more than just a swordsman.
Zhang Qiang was even more extraordinary, holding a round shield in his left hand and a short gun less than a meter long in his right.
Alone, he blocked all the pursuing zombies behind their team.
One shield bash knocked down four or five zombies; one straight thrust with the short gun beheaded a zombie.
Although they all had their special moves, they couldn't withstand the tenacious encirclement of the countless zombies who feared no death.
"Out of arrows." Xie Haimei was the first to face a problem.
She had brought two hundred arrows on this trip. Before reaching Yangliu Village, she had only shot more than ten.
Tonight, she had shot 185 arrows, killing 185 zombies, but now she was out of arrows.
Without Xie Haimei's support.
Li Jingsheng made a mistake, allowing a zombie to embrace him tightly.
Then three or four zombies pinned him to the ground and lunged for his throat.
"Jingsheng!" Zhong Ting fired ice cones while wielding her saber to rescue her boyfriend.
The ice cones killed two zombies, but more zombies were already pressing in.
"Die!" Zhong Ting frantically swung her mountain-cutting saber.
"Zhong Ting, be careful." Xie Haimei warned.
Zhong Ting was only focused on chopping away the zombies pinning her boyfriend, failing to notice a zombie that had grabbed her from behind.
Soon, Zhong Ting was also submerged by zombies.
"Xie Haimei, I hope to meet you again in the next life."
After saying these words, Zhao Peng followed in the footsteps of Li Jingsheng and the others.
Without Zhao Peng's desperate obstruction, all the zombies in front swarmed towards Xie Haimei.
Seeing that she was about to be engulfed by zombies.
Zhang Qiang turned around, pushed the zombies in front of Xie Haimei back half a meter, and then turned to face the zombies behind him.
Xie Haimei had no choice but to draw a mountain-cutting saber from her ring to save herself.
By this time, Zhang Qiang was already exhausted and could not face the zombies from both sides.
After all, he was alone covering the rear, bearing a greater pressure from the four.
Suddenly, a commotion came from the front.
Some of the zombies in front of Xie Haimei were attracted and ran towards it.
Qin Shilei and his companions had intended to return to the villa to rest, but in the dense fog, they had inadvertently stumbled into the zombie horde after taking many turns.
Unknowingly, they had ended up here.
"Qin Shilei, there's fighting sounds over there. Should we go and meet up with them?" An Qian pointed to the front left.
"Let's get closer to take a look, but don't be too careless and get tricked," Qin Shilei warned.
When they approached within a few meters of Zhang Qiang and his group, Zhang Qiang once again repelled a wave of zombies for Xie Haimei, but a zombie from behind lunged at him.
"Whoosh!"
Qin Shilei's Seven Star Sword was quickly swapped for a short bow, an arrow was shot, and then it was swapped back to the Seven Star Sword.
Zhang Qiang gathered his last bit of strength to face the zombies behind him again.
The zombie swatted Xie Haimei's mountain-cutting saber away.
Then three or four zombies rushed forward, flailing their arms.
Xie Haimei, pale with fright, turned her head, intending to glance at her beloved man one last time.
But she didn't feel those zombies pounce on her.
She turned her head and found a man and two women standing in front of her.
"Go this way." Qin Shilei turned right, kicked open the door of a house, and rushed in.
Everyone followed them in.
"I'll guard the door with you," Qin Shilei said to Zhang Qiang.
He then took the opportunity to throw out several barrels of gasoline: "You three go to the second-floor balcony and pour gasoline down to burn these zombies."
Qin Shilei and Zhang Qiang stood like gatekeepers, firmly guarding the door, not allowing a single zombie to step into the house.
Seeing the fierce flames burning outside, Qin Shilei kicked a few zombies into the inferno, then quickly closed the door.
Zhang Qiang and his group had killed seven to eight hundred zombies, and Qin Shilei's group had killed nearly two hundred earlier. There were still two to three hundred left outside.
Soon, the zombies rushed into the sea of flames one after another and were burned to ashes.
As the house caught fire, Qin Shilei and his companions had already jumped out through the back window.
When Zhang Qiang returned to the original spot, intending to collect the bodies of his brothers, he could not find even a single remnant.
"Let's go, we'll find a place to spend the night first," Qin Shilei casually entered a house.