81: Chapter 81 Flying Kites?

"Huh?"

Fatty had his foot on the accelerator, but upon hearing Chen Ze's words, he turned his head in disbelief.

"Brother Ze, don't be impulsive! This Ant Swarm is different from those E-grade mutant zombies. There are just too many of these beasts; once we're surrounded, even an elephant would be picked clean!"

Duan Linhai didn't say anything, but from his worried expression, it was clear that he was also panicking.

"Do you really take me for a brute? Would I be stupid enough to rush in and fight them?"

Chen Ze looked at the worried expression on Fatty's face and let out a chuckle.

"Don't worry, I've got this!"

With that, Chen Ze opened his system's temporary storage and attempted to deploy two e-grade automatic crossbows onto the roof of the Mercedes-Benz G-Class.

To his surprise, it actually worked!

The roof of the G-Class was 1.9 meters wide, providing plenty of space. He fixed one at the front of the roof and placed another at the rear. They didn't interfere with each other, and the swivels were completely exposed, meaning nothing would hinder the crossbows from aiming left, right, up, or down. The coverage was absolute, with no blind spots.

Fatty's eyes lit up when he saw this, and he instantly understood Chen Ze's plan.

"Man, Brother Ze, your brain really works well. How did you think of such a devious method!"

Right, wasn't it just a moment ago that you were telling me not to be impulsive?

Chen Ze glanced at the Ant Swarm and noticed that quite a few Mutant Ants had emerged. Their pitch-black compound eyes were locked firmly onto the G-Class, ready to charge at any moment.

"Fatty, it's up to you now!"

As soon as he finished speaking, Chen Ze vaulted over, opened the passenger door, and slid inside.

"Hehe, I understand!"

Hearing this, Fatty perked up, his eyes filled with excitement. He lightly pressed the accelerator to steady the vehicle, his gaze fixed intently on the black tide closing in behind them in the rearview mirror.

"Don't worry, Brother Ze! With my driving skills, I guarantee I'll lead them around like dogs!"

The moment he finished speaking, the entire Ant Swarm behind them moved. Like a surging black tide, they swarmed across the ground, racing wildly toward the G-Class. The dense, layered mass of insect bodies almost covered the entire dirt road, and the sound of their rustling friction was deafening—just looking at it was enough to make one's scalp tingle.

Fatty gripped the steering wheel tightly, his palms slick with a thin layer of sweat. Faced with the intense pressure of thousands of mutant beasts, his arms couldn't stop trembling slightly. Yet, instead of fear, his face flushed with excitement.

He licked his parched lips and silently calculated the distance.

"70 meters!"

"60 meters!"

"50 meters!"

The Ant Swarm had fully entered the optimal range for the crossbows!

Chen Ze didn't hesitate to activate the e-grade automatic crossbows, and almost at the same time, Fatty slammed his right foot onto the accelerator.

"Vroom!"

The Mercedes-Benz G-Class roared like a steel beast, its powerful engine exploding into life. The wheels crushed the dirt road, kicking up a sky full of yellow dust. The speed surged instantly, locking the distance between them and the Ant Swarm at exactly fifty meters.

The two crossbows on the roof simultaneously glowed with a faint cyan light, turning in unison toward the Ant Swarm behind.

"Whoosh! Whoosh!"

The crossbow bolts whistled through the air, striking the two largest Mutant Ants with precision.

These two had shiny black shells and moved much faster than the average Mutant Ant. Just as they were about to reach the front ranks, the crossbow bolts, wrapped in a faint cyan light, struck them, giving them no chance to dodge.

The hard insect shells collided with the bolts, and with two dull cracking sounds, the shiny black armor was breached, and the arrows pierced through their bodies.

The two large ants jerked to a halt, crashed heavily onto the dirt road, kicked their legs a few times, and then stopped moving.

Such minor casualties were nothing to the Ant Swarm; they simply trampled over their companions' corpses and continued the pursuit.

But in the end, Mutant Ants were just ants. Their speed was fine for chasing survivors below E-grade, but trying to catch up to this high-powered Mercedes-Benz G-Class? It was pure fantasy!

Fatty controlled the accelerator with exquisite precision. The speed was neither too fast nor too slow, keeping them steadily ahead of the swarm while locking them firmly within the fifty-meter optimal range.

Furthermore, to avoid getting too far from the ant nest, Fatty deliberately led them in circles, never straying more than a kilometer from the nest.

No matter how frantically the Ant Swarm accelerated, sprinting with all their might, they remained separated by that insurmountable distance, left to chase in vain, unable to even touch the dust kicked up by the tail of the G-Class.

"Haha, awesome! Just watch how Fatty plays you all to death today!"

Fatty steered with one hand while slapping his thigh with the other, laughing heartily.

Duan Linhai's family in the back seat had never seen such a scene and were completely dumbstruck.

The little girl huddled tightly in Duan Linhai's arms, her small face buried in his clothes, not daring to look back even once.

Her older brother, Xiaolong, was also extremely nervous at first, his hands gripping the back of the seat tightly.

But after a while, he realized that those damn bugs couldn't catch the off-road vehicle at all and were being continuously shot down by Uncle Chen Ze's crossbows. His gaze toward Chen Ze changed instantly—it was no longer just respect, but sincere, unadulterated admiration!

"Dad, can I learn skills from Brother Chen Ze in the future?"

Xiaolong whispered.

Duan Linhai didn't speak. He looked at the calm young man in the front passenger seat and nodded gently.

Maybe, perhaps he could!

Just then, the two e-grade automatic crossbows on the roof emitted a series of crisp, clicking sounds as they fired blanks.

"Click! Click! Click!"

The two e-grade automatic crossbows only held thirty bolts each, and in just a few minutes, they had all been fired.

"Brother Ze! We're out of arrows, what do we do?"

Fatty asked.

Chen Ze had already anticipated this problem when formulating the plan. All they had to do now was increase their speed; once the Ant Swarm realized they couldn't catch up, they would surely return to their nest, allowing them to go back and collect the beast cores and crossbow bolts.

"Fatty, speed up and shake them off!"

As Chen Ze said this, he took out his old partner—the arisaka type 38 rifle!

He wanted to test whether human firearms could still penetrate the armor of E-grade Mutant Ants.

Hearing this, Fatty floored the accelerator. The G-Class engine roared, its power surging, and the vehicle's speed skyrocketed, kicking up thick clouds of yellow sand as it rapidly put distance between them and the Ant Swarm behind.

Chen Ze rolled down the window halfway, steadily braced the rifle, aimed at the large black ant in the lead, and pulled the trigger.

"Bang!"

The muzzle of the arisaka type 38 rifle spat out a blinding tongue of flame, and the brass bullet whistled through the air.

The bullet slammed hard into the Mutant Ant's dark, hard back armor. With a dull "thud," a small, fine crack exploded on the surface of the shell, but it failed to penetrate, merely embedding itself into the outer hard armor.

The giant ant that was hit felt the pain; its body jerked, and it spun around frantically on the spot, but it still didn't fall. Soon, it caught up with the main group and continued to race forward.

"As expected, it doesn't work. Looks like the arisaka type 38 rifle will only be useful for dealing with survivors from now on!"