In the vast Qingming Continent, the very first true zombie was about to be born. Yet, something was missing; the blood supply was insufficient to complete its transformation into a real zombie.
A fourth-level zombie lord, Yehan, flew to the sole surviving ghoul. Standing meekly before the superior zombie, the ghoul was irresistibly drawn to the bloody aura emanating from Yehan, yet also overwhelmed by a fear instilled by the aura of a fourth-level zombie.
"Haha, excellent, excellent," Yehan observed the soon-to-be first self-sustaining zombie of this alien world with growing excitement. Whether due to the blood or the constitution of this land's people, the ghoul, even without having fully transformed, possessed strength nearing that of a mid-stage fourth-level zombie, much to Yehan's envy.
The cost Yehan had paid to reach the mid-stage of a fourth-level zombie was immense, yet this being before him had achieved it merely by absorbing the blood of hundreds of thousands.
"Seeing that you are about to become a zombie, I shall help you," Yehan declared, condensing a drop of his essence blood from within his zombie core.
Under his control, the essence blood slowly drifted towards the ghoul. Sensing the blood, the ghoul rapidly lunged at it and swallowed it in an instant.
With a roar, the ghoul's previously lifeless eyes suddenly blazed with red light. Its wounds, visible to the bone, healed at a visibly rapid rate, all under Yehan's watchful eye.
While Yehan aided the ghoul's transformation, the largest beast riot in recent days erupted five miles from Miyat City, in the Hengduan Mountains.
Beasts, an unruly race by nature, often fought amongst themselves for territory and food. The air, tainted with corpse poison and carried by the wind towards the beasts, turned the injured ones into mindless ghouls. Their already aggressive nature, now fueled by the violent effects of the corpse poison, made them even more ferocious. With gleaming red eyes and two white fangs protruding from their massive mouths, they lunged at each other in a frenzy.
The first transformation triggered a chain reaction, affecting countless wounded beasts. Soon, the entire seventh-tier beast group was infected, and quickly, the infection spread to the eighth-tier beasts. Rank differences became meaningless in the face of such carnage, with only bloodshed prevailing. Tens of thousands of seventh and eighth-tier beasts tore at each other in a spectacular, yet horrifying sight.
Despite their intelligence comparable to humans, eighth-tier beasts, caught in such large-scale chaos, abandoned any strategy and fought wildly, either unleashing their most powerful innate abilities or biting like mad dogs.
Gradually, ninth-tier beasts also joined the fray, making the battle even more chaotic.
Finally, with Yehan's essence blood, the ghoul completed its transformation into a zombie. Black hair fluttering in the wind, the creature now bore some of Yehan's characteristics due to the transformation through his blood. Its body was covered in black scales, and smaller black wings flapped powerfully on its back. The significant difference from Yehan was the absence of flickering flames.
"Now that you have transformed into a zombie and reached the primary level of a fourth-level zombie, I will show you what it means to be a zombie," Yehan said, connecting his soul with that of the newly formed zombie and transferring information about zombies into it.
Unlike Yehan, whose soul was assimilated by the zombie core, this new zombie's body had died first, and its soul was enveloped by corpse poison. Thus, upon becoming a zombie, its soul was completely trapped inside the zombie core, disconnected from its body. This made Yehan a unique type of zombie.
"My King," the newly named zombie, now called Ming, respectfully addressed Yehan after quickly scanning the information imparted to him.
"From today, you shall be known as Ming," Yehan authoritatively named the zombie.
"Yes, My King," responded Ming. Being born from Yehan's blood, he was naturally subservient to Yehan, much like Yehan's zombie slaves. However, unlike zombie slaves, whose strength and thoughts are entirely dependent on their master, Ming, as a true zombie, could cultivate independently and possessed his own thoughts. If he advanced beyond Yehan's level, he could potentially overcome the influence of Yehan's essence blood and turn Yehan into his subject. This was the rule among zombies: rank dictates everything.
"Ming, what is your talent?" Yehan was curious about the abilities of this world's first self-sustaining zombie.
Upon Yehan's inquiry, Ming's body radiated a bright gray light. Yehan watched intently as the space around Ming momentarily froze – a manifestation of time, one of the two most powerful talents among zombies.
Yehan laughed heartily, his body glowing brightly as well. The space around him also froze, but it was different from what he observed around Ming. In Yehan's frozen space, time still flowed, but in Ming's, time had briefly halted. This was the fundamental difference between their powers.
Time, a slightly more potent talent than space, deeply impressed Yehan. Although he envied Ming's talent, as a fellow zombie, Yehan had no intention of harming him, at least not for now.
Roars of beasts echoed, interrupting their conversation. Yehan then remembered the airborne corpse poison spreading among the beasts. Following the direction of the roars, he realized that tens of thousands of beasts had been afflicted.
"Haha, let's go watch the show," Yehan said and flew towards the Hengduan Mountains, with Ming hastily following. The disparity in their levels and strength was immediately apparent as Yehan quickly became a speck in Ming's view, who frantically flapped his wings to catch up.
The seventh, eighth, and ninth-tier beasts, now infected, attacked the sacred-tier beasts. Despite the immense strength of sacred-tier beasts, the sheer number of zombie beasts eventually inflicted damage, proving that even the mightiest could fall once wounded.
An angry dragon roar indicated that the dragons were also affected. Yehan and Ming, now above the Hengduan Mountains, watched tens of thousands of zombie beasts battling a few sacred-tier beasts, including dragons. To Yehan, such carnage brought a sense of pleasure unique to zombies.
As Yehan laughed in the sky, three sacred-tier presences emerged not far ahead. He saw three enormous dragons, each over twenty meters long. But upon seeing one of the dragons, a red one, Yehan couldn't help but smile.