Apocalypse: King of Zombies Chapter 1474: Kill, Loot, Disappear

While Ethan’s group was still being hosted in Azure Nereids territory, the Southern Region—quiet for nearly two months—got flipped on its head overnight.

Ethan had only killed a few dozen scouts.

But those "few dozen" represented dozens of races.

And among the dead were six agents from other Regions.

It didn’t take long for other Regions to send experts into the Southern Region. The moment they arrived, they issued a direct order: a full investigation.

Every race in the Southern Region was required to cooperate—no exceptions.

They weren’t making this kind of move because a few scouts had died.

They were moving because this involved humans.

Everyone had assumed humanity was extinct. Now humans had appeared again out of nowhere. For the higher races, that was an alarm bell loud enough to wake old nightmares.

This time, the other Regions sent real weight.

The Central Region alone dispatched three Stage SS experts.

With that kind of pressure, no one in the Southern Region dared disobey. The entire region mobilized—search teams, messengers, trackers, coordinated sweeps.

Azure Nereids received the order quickly, too.

Seraphine’s brows knitted as she looked at Nerissa. "What did you do... just now?"

Nerissa’s throat tightened. "There were a lot of other races watching the void passage. The moment we came through, they saw us. Ethan and the others... killed them. All of them."

They’d returned straight here and hadn’t even had time to report it yet.

Seraphine swayed slightly, then let out a slow, pained breath. Her gaze slid to Ethan.

"You... you were too impulsive," she said, voice strained. "Several of those were eyes from major races in other Regions."

"I know." Ethan didn’t look guilty in the slightest. "But if I didn’t kill them, your clan would be the one getting wiped out."

His tone stayed casual, like he was explaining why he’d chosen one road over another.

"They saw Nerissa come through with us. If they reported that, Azure Nereids would be next."

Seraphine’s face darkened.

She hated that he wasn’t wrong.

In that situation, "explaining" wasn’t a real option. Not when other Regions were involved.

Ethan waved a hand, cutting off the tension before it could turn into an argument.

"Anyway. You don’t need to handle this. Just act like you’ve never seen us."

Then he stood up.

"Tell me where there are Stage SS Outland Beasts. We’ll leave immediately."

Seraphine’s voice snapped sharp. "Leave ? The outside is crawling with search squads. If you walk out, you’re practically handing yourself over."

"Stay in Azure Nereids. Hide. As long as you don’t show yourselves, you can wait this out."

Ethan shook his head. "I don’t like hiding."

"You—"

Seraphine started to speak again, but Nerissa quickly stepped close and whispered a few words into her ear.

Seraphine’s eyes widened.

She stared at Ethan like she was seeing him for the first time.

A long moment passed.

Finally, Seraphine exhaled and nodded. "Fine. I’ll tell you."

"On Eldoria, nearly all Stage SS and higher Outland Beasts are concentrated in the Central Region. In the other Regions, Stage SS beasts are extremely rare."

She paused, choosing her words carefully.

"As far as I know, in the entire Southern Region... there should only be one."

"The Stoneplate Behemoth, deep within Greyspine Range. It has reached Stage SS."

Seraphine’s expression tightened. "But its defense is terrifying. Below Stage SS, no one can break it. If you go after it, you’re walking into death."

Then, as if forcing the words out one by one, she added, "I still advise you not to act recklessly. If you stay here, I’ll do everything I can to protect you."

Ethan’s gaze softened just a touch. "Appreciate it."

Then he immediately followed with, "Where’s Greyspine Range?"

"..."

Seraphine’s eyelid twitched.

She’d poured out warning after warning, and he’d grabbed exactly one useful coordinate and tossed the rest into the lake.

Nerissa answered before Seraphine could explode. "East. About twelve hundred miles from here. It’s the largest mountain range in the Southern Region."

"Perfect."

Ethan nodded once, satisfied.

"Then we’ll get going. Sorry for the trouble."

Before anyone could react, he lifted a hand.

In front of a hall full of stunned elders, a dimensional rift opened—right there in the meeting room, like the world’s rules had decided to take the day off.

Ethan and his people stepped through without hesitation.

The rift closed behind them, leaving the room exactly as it had been—silent, empty... as if none of it had happened.

The Azure Nereids’ upper ranks stared at each other, still processing.

Seraphine’s voice came out almost like a whisper.

"So this is a spatial-type ability..."

She swallowed.

"...That’s disgusting."

Then her eyes sharpened, snapping back to the one person still standing there like she belonged.

"Nerissa," Seraphine said, voice low and controlled, "tell me everything you saw in that other world. Start from the beginning."

"Yes, Matriarch," Nerissa answered.

Greyspine Range...

The largest mountain range in the Southern Region.

Outland Beasts filled it by the countless.

On Eldoria, the boundary between the major races and the Outland Beasts was razor-clear: the intelligent races held the open lands beyond, while the mountains and forests belonged to the beasts.

Intelligent races could enter the wilds to hunt Outland Beasts for crystal cores. Outland Beasts could raid outward to hunt intelligent beings.

But both sides had one hard limit:

Stage S and below only.

Anyone above Stage S wasn’t allowed to cross the line. Break that rule, and you were violating the old agreement.

That agreement had been signed long ago—between the strongest of the major races... and the Beast Sovereign.

And because that agreement existed, both sides had been able to develop in relative stability instead of grinding each other into extinction.

A dimensional rift suddenly tore open in a patch of forest deep in the range.

Nearby Outland Beasts turned toward it at once, eyes wide, bodies tense, a ripple of instinctive alarm running through the pack.

Then figures stepped out of the rift.

Several of them.

And every single one of them carried Stage S pressure.

"???"

The beasts practically had question marks floating over their heads.

They didn’t even get time to figure out .

Ethan’s team moved.

The beasts didn’t have time to scream. Didn’t have time to warn anything else.

One moment they were staring, confused—

The next, their minds went dark.

With the immediate area cleared, Ethan didn’t waste a second. He led the group deeper into Greyspine Range, hunting for the real target: that Stage SS Outland Beast.

He’d Riftwalked them into what counted as the "deep" zone already, but Greyspine Range was massive. Finding one Stage SS beast in a mountain range this big wasn’t exactly easy.

Still—if it was anywhere in Greyspine, they’d smoke it out eventually.

And they weren’t only here for Stage SS.

They also needed a lot of high-Tier Stage S cores.

Right now, in the Fallen Star Squad, only Ethan had reached Tier 35. Everyone else was still Tier 34.

Their last sweep through Rivermark State had gotten them plenty of Stage S kills, but not many high-Tier ones. It had only been enough to push Skinny Pete and a few others from Tier 33 peak up to Tier 34.

Most of what they’d harvested after that were low-Tier Stage S cores—better used to feed the squad’s second-line members.

So this trip had two goals:

Find the Stage SS beast.

Farm high-Tier Stage S beasts along the way.

Greyspine Range had more Outland Beasts than they could count. Running out of targets wasn’t a concern.

Under Ethan’s True Sight, it didn’t take long.

He spotted a group of Outland Beasts with bizarre bodies and warped silhouettes—resting, clustered together.

At the front was a Tier 34 beast. Behind it were seven or eight more Stage S beasts.

Ethan’s voice cut clean through the air.

"Move."

No hesitation. No warm-up.

He led the team straight in.

The resting beasts jerked upright, still half-stunned, eyes narrowing in disbelief.

"How are there intelligent beings here—"

Ethan didn’t bother letting it finish.

He teleported.

In a blink, he was right in front of the Tier 34 leader.

His poleaxe came down like a guillotine.

The beast reacted fast—an earth-yellow barrier snapped up over its head.

For an instant it looked solid.

Then Ethan’s poleaxe flared with a faint, dark-black glow.

The moment the blade met the shield, the barrier shattered like brittle glass.

The remaining force didn’t slow.

The poleaxe split the beast’s skull straight down the middle.

Ethan lifted his hand.

An orange crystal core shot out and landed in his palm.

Around him, the others finished the rest—quick, practiced, brutal.

Ethan didn’t even look back.

"Go."

Kill, loot, disappear. No wasted motion.

Greyspine was packed with beasts. Any disturbance would draw a swarm fast, and there was no point burning time grinding trash when they had bigger prey to find.

So the group fully embraced hit-and-run tactics, weaving through Greyspine Range like ghosts.

Whenever Ethan’s True Sight picked up a high-Tier Outland Beast, they struck hard, killed it, took the core, and vanished before the surrounding beasts could even react.

Before long, furious roars echoed across the mountains.

Not just anger.

Not just pain.

There was something uglier in it—rage mixed with helplessness, like the entire range had realized it was being hunted by something it couldn’t catch.