Chapter 62 - 62: Upgrading
The second ring task had no time limit. Robert was a wandering type of BOSS in this city. If one deliberately sought him out, it would not only be time-consuming and strenuous, but there was also no guarantee of finding him.
More importantly, although this task was merely a suggestion, it was clear that reaching level ten was a necessary condition for completing it. if one were to happily rush to complete it before reaching level ten, then even if one encountered this patrol BOSS, they would have no chance of defeating it and would instead be throwing their life away;
Song Jian was currently only at level five and needed a considerable amount of experience points to reach level ten;
The experience points in this game increased on a tiered system. The initial levels were reasonable, but after level five, the amount of experience required to level up kept increasing. It would likely take Song Jian a while to level up to ten.
Leaving the junkyard, Song Jian didn’t summon his motorcycle. Instead, he found where he had hidden his pickup truck and drove it onto the freeway;
The freeway at night was filled with more mutant zombies. Song Jian put the pedal to the metal, causing the pickup to roar as it furiously barreled into the mutant zombies on the highway;
System: You killed a LV3 mutant zombie using the vehicle “pickup”, 96 experience points obtained;
System: You killed a LV3 mutant zombie using the vehicle “pickup”, 96 experience points obtained;
System: You killed a LV3 mutant zombie using the vehicle “pickup”, 96 experience points obtained;
Mutant zombies were physically stronger at night, but in front of a pickup speeding at 110 mph, they were as vulnerable as raccoons, either being flung aside or crushed;
Song Jian barely felt a bump as he rolled over one zombie body after another;
This way, his rate of leveling up was extremely fast, and it came with a sense of violent pleasure. The only regret was that he couldn’t stop to pick up the items dropped by the zombies. Once the pickup’s speed dropped, it would be exceedingly challenging to speed up again on a highway full of zombies, making it quite likely that he would be surrounded by zombies. With Song Jian’s current strength, no matter how thick-skinned he was, if he got surrounded by this many zombies, he was definitely doomed;
As the pickup truck sped along the highway, spewing thick smoke, Song Jian’s heart felt like it was being pulled out each time he saw the glimmering items on the ground;
System: Your experience points are full. Level up to six, obtain one skill point; simultaneously, your lost vitality points are fully recovered.
The leveling up was expected. Song Jian’s experience points were already more than halfway filled at level five. Now, with the dozens of mutant zombies that he’d run over on the road, it was about time he leveled up;
As it was night, and despite having the high beams on, he was only able to see about ten meters ahead; both sides were obscured. After driving for over ten kilometers, Song Jian finally slowed down and stopped;
It wasn’t that he didn’t want to keep driving and leveling up, but the highway up ahead was blocked.
Hundreds of cars, haphazardly collided in the middle of the road, spread out over hundreds of meters;
If Song Jian were a better driver, he could quickly turn the car around with a drift. But obviously, his skills weren’t there yet, so he had to slowly stop and turn around like a newbie who’d just gotten their driver’s license;
At this time, the zombies in the vicinity slowly started to surround him. The pickup was loud, and Song Jian had his high beams on, attracting even zombies that were outside the alert scope;
A large group of zombies was swaying and running over from hundreds of meters away. If Song Jian stayed too long, he would end up being surrounded by zombies;
Song Jian carefully turned the pickup and pulled out his gun, aiming at the zombies that were closing in on the vehicle and pulling the trigger;
Bang Bang Bang-
Each bullet hit the zombie’s head square. With his level four [Gunpowder Weapon (Pistol) (Basic)], Song Jian achieved incredible accuracy, comparable to that of a soldier who had trained for more than three years;
The zombies hit in the head would spurt out a thick liquid from behind their skulls, collapsing to the ground, and turning into black ash;
Song Jian stepped out of his vehicle to pick up several white-quality materials and zombie cores, before returning to his pickup truck, after he had picked off a dozen or so zombies attracted by the noise;
More zombies were already converging to surround him. Without so much as a glance, Song Jian slammed his foot down on the pedal, causing the pickup to violently shake and roar crazily. Within a few seconds, the vehicle’s speed rocketed, shooting forward like an arrow;
It’s not that Song Jian didn’t want to continue leveling up. It was just that a large wave of zombies was quickly moving to encircle him, leaving him with limited room to accelerate. If the pickup couldn’t speed up, Song Jian’s only choices would be to die a horrible death or an even more gruesome one.
“Woah~” Song Jian hollered, as he drove the pickup brutally into the swarm of zombies. The pickup began shaking violently, as though traversing a rugged mountain path at high speed, liable to roll over and tumble down a cliff at any moment;
Song Jian felt as though he were navigating a small sailing boat in a violent sea. The slightest mistake would send him capsizing, sinking to the ocean floor. This thrill of dancing on the edge of life and death caused an adrenaline rush that left him exceedingly excited. His hands gripped the steering wheel like iron, controlling the direction;
Thud Thud Thud-
With the added momentum, the pickup swayed drastically, looking as if it would flip over at any moment;
“Hahaha, this is awesome!” Song Jian yelled, bursting through the horde of zombies, leaving behind a dozen objects radiating white light and a heap of mutated zombies that he didn’t hit;
This violent collision caused the pickup’s durability to plummet by a quarter. The front bumper was deeply dented and the entire vehicle started emitting thin wisps of black smoke;
“It seems this method won’t last for long…” Song Jian thought regretfully. In just over ten minutes, his level six experience points had already risen up by a third. His leveling speed was incredibly fast.
Normally, upon encountering such a large group of zombies, Song Jian would immediately turn tail and run. If he wanted to gain as much experience as before by killing them one by one, he would have to hunt non-stop for over thirty hours;
After rushing through this wave of zombies, the road ahead suddenly became deserted. It seemed as though all the surrounding zombies had already been attracted over and had joined the large group of them.
After driving a little further ahead, Song Jian slowly halted, picked up any dropped zombie items that caught his eye, before turning around to charge back at the pursuing horde of zombies;
… After making three trips back and forth, the pickup’s durability had fallen to an extremely dangerous extent, thick black smoke was billowing even more, flames even began sporadically spewing out from the rear of the vehicle;
Somewhat regrettably, Song Jian jumped out of the vehicle and started walking away;
Glancing at his experience points, he noticed that he had just leveled up to six and his experience was already at 82%. He was about to level up to seven. All this only took just over half an hour;
“This vehicle can’t be used anymore, but this trip was totally worth it!” Song Jian closed the personal attribute panel, unsheathed his dagger, and slowly moved towards the scattered mutated zombies;
The prior collisions had already eliminated most of the zombies. Only a handful of mutated zombies remained scattered on the highway, and they no longer posed a threat to Song Jian. Now was the time for him to collect his spoils of war;
Just as Song Jian was marching towards the zombies, there was a “boom”. The pickup truck behind him suddenly exploded in a fiery display, sending shockwaves in all directions;
Just then, a system prompt appeared before his eyes;
System: You have driven a vehicle, a pickup truck, for longer than thirty minutes. You have mastered the skill: Vehicle Driving. Vehicle Driving: Passive, Level 1, you can skillfully drive any C-class small car, driving speed increases by 30%, vehicle stability increases by 10%;