"This... this isn't real..."
Howard and Lovecraft, having just reached the FBI encampment at the town's perimeter, were completely horrified to witness the bizarre scene unfolding in the fog.
It was a horde of "humans." But these "humans" bore no trace of normal human form. They were more like humanoid monsters! They were menacing, their forms twisted and hideous. They resembled heavily irradiated, nuclear-contaminated fish with limbs.
Some of these "humans" had rotting, bloated bodies, yet dragged themselves forward step by step with relentless purpose. Some were enormous, at least three or four meters tall, wielding massive, rusted decapitation swords. Some had completely bizarre, asymmetrical shapes, with barbed bones protruding directly from their flesh and gaping maws filled with chillingly sharp, spiraling rows of teeth.
Accompanied by the faint, rhythmic sound of ocean waves crashing from within the town, they staggered and "crawled out of the abyss." With their blood-red, maliciously greedy eyes, they stared intently at the living people surrounding them.
They emerged from the gray mist in dense, surging numbers, like a throng of floating heads. The sheer density, almost impossible to count in the fog, was enough to send primal chills down any mortal's spine.
Without a doubt, they were monsters. Terrifying, deep-sea monsters.
But… Shuichi Akai, watching from the command vehicle, surprisingly felt his tension ease slightly.
'So this was the Black Organization's ultimate bioweapon backup plan…?' he thought. 'Perhaps those syndicate scientists are unaware of the absolute brutality of modern military weaponry. If it's just a horde of biological freaks, we can handle this...'
"Look!" a perimeter agent suddenly screamed, pointing a trembling finger. "They look like they're wearing our uniforms!"
What...!?'
His pupils shrinking to pinpoints, Akai's stiff head slowly turned, zooming in with his binoculars to notice the detail that was enough to make his scalp tingle with electricity.
That was right... those were indeed the shredded, bloodstained tactical uniforms of the federal agents and state police scouts who had been sent in earlier. It hadn't been long at all... and they had already been transformed into these monstrosities?
No. Perhaps it was worse. A few chilling words suddenly flashed through Akai's mind.
"Infection... highly contagious..." Andre murmured aloud beside him, taking a terrified step back.
Instantly, everyone around the command tent broke out in a cold sweat. Even Akai's eyes turned entirely bloodshot as the apocalyptic reality snapped him back to his senses.
'The Black Organization... I'm going to kill every last one of you bastards!!'
"All personnel! Open fire!! Heavy firepower, fire at will!!" Akai was nearly insane. He roared furiously, his voice cracking over the loudspeakers.
Damn it! Stop them! We must stop them here!!
Once these monstrous things broke through the perimeter defenses, given their rapid, terrifying infectivity, it would cause a biological catastrophe capable of destroying the country, or even the entire world! They had gone mad. Those damned lunatics in the Black Organization! How dare they… how dare they unleash such a plague!?
Rear Command: Washington D.C.
Similarly, back at headquarters, Director Joseph, after a brief moment of stunned silence watching the drone feed, turned red-faced and furious, shoving past his technicians in a fit of absolute rage.
"Fire! Tell them to fire everything they have!!" Joseph screamed at the comms officer.
They had all gone mad. Everyone had gone mad.
The Perimeter of Innsmouth
The soldiers on the scene, whether seasoned federal agents or local police officers, were almost losing their minds. After all, as Americans, no one understood the terrifying concept of infectious "zombies" better than them. Everyone had grown up watching apocalyptic movies.
Are terrorist organizations hateful? Yes. Are transnational criminal syndicates terrifying? Yes. But none of them are as existentially terrifying as a genuine zombie apocalypse!
Wiping away his cold sweat, even the usually composed Andre couldn't help but tremble slightly as he raised his assault rifle.
"God..." he whispered.
He had initially thought this was at most a domestic rebellion or a hostage situation—a carpet bombing at worst. But in the blink of an eye, he was standing on the front lines of a zombie apocalypse, a matter of human extinction...
Beside him, Mark swallowed hard, his throat extremely dry. He wanted to lighten the mood with a forced, trademark smile. But seeing how these deep-sea abominations were far more terrifying, fast, and grotesque than the slow "zombies" in the movies, he couldn't laugh.
"Fire!!"
Rat-a-tat-tat-tat...!!
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Everyone went mad. Completely disregarding ammunition conservation, they unleashed a deafening volley of bullets, single-mindedly focused on tearing these monstrous things to shreds.
However, while the humans fired in a frenzy, the monsters were equally, irrationally insane.
Stimulated by the heavy firepower tearing through their ranks, the Deep One zombies went completely berserk. Their speed increased exponentially, dropping to all fours to sprint like rabid animals.
Perhaps they couldn't break through the initial wall of lead—after all, modern military firepower was indeed a formidable meat grinder. But their sheer speed and madness clearly made the hearts of every soldier present race with panic.
Even more shockingly, one fish-man zombie suddenly flicked its long, barbed tongue through the barricade, piercing straight through the Kevlar vest of a screaming SWAT officer and dragging him violently into the horde.
In mere seconds, amidst sickening crunching sounds, the soldier transformed from a bleeding human corpse into a mutated fish-man zombie, rising back to its feet to attack its former comrades.
The extremely brief, horrific transformation left everyone present in a moment of deathly, paralyzed silence.
Then, an even more frenzied, desperate killing intent erupted from the human lines.
'Die! Die!! They all must die!!!'
If the monsters didn't die, humanity would!
Rear Command: Washington D.C.
At the same time, in the rear command center, Director Joseph and Sheriff Gray were desperately dispatching the National Guard to evacuate the civilian crowds in the neighboring counties.
Perhaps they had already dispersed the immediate towns. But it wasn't far enough! These monsters—as long as there were living people to supply them with fresh biomass—were inexhaustible. The only ones who could be permanently eradicated in a war of attrition were the humans…
And they still didn't know how these monsters infected the environment. Direct physical trauma could clearly infect them. So what else?
'The water... the air…' Sheriff Gray's face was extremely grim.
He had already requested federal military aid. But it wasn't enough. Their numbers were far from sufficient. The logistics required widespread CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear) air-isolation equipment for all frontline troops. And the Navy needed to immediately blockade that entire sea area to prevent aquatic spread.
They couldn't gamble on the limitations of the infectivity. Nor did they dare to gamble. If a single infected subject was missed, the zombie apocalypse wouldn't just be a movie plot...
Wait!
Out of the corner of his eye, Sheriff Gray saw something extremely horrifying on the live satellite feed. He rubbed his eyes, his heart trembling violently as he leaned closer to the monitor.
Under the relentless barrage of heavy fire, almost none of those monstrous things could withstand the physical destruction. Even the powerful, three-meter-tall monsters could only hold out for a short while before being torn to pieces by heavy machine guns.
The terrifying problem was...
"They're coming alive again..." Gray whispered in horror.
The Perimeter of Innsmouth
On the scene, Shuichi Akai, who was entirely focused on coordinating the battle, was nearly blinded by rage and despair.
He watched through his binoculars as, on the blood-soaked, muddy battlefield, the monsters' fragmented remains—which had long been blown to pieces by grenades and bullets—began to actively writhe and coalesce.
Those with relatively intact fragments directly resurrected, their wounds knitting together with sickening speed. Those without intact bodies were aggressively merging with other severed fragments to form entirely new, even more massive and grotesque amalgamations.
How could he tell these newly coalesced monsters were more powerful?
Because the storm of bullets could now only spark uselessly against their newly hardened, scaly flesh.
Clink! Ping!
Standard ammunition was bouncing off. Only heavy artillery and explosive firepower could tear them apart again…
'What does that mean?'
Back in D.C., Director Joseph gripped his hair tightly, wanting to shout an order, but could only manage a hoarse, empty gasp of despair.
Evolution…
These damned things were constantly adapting and evolving against their weapons in real-time! And the terrifying speed of this biological evolution was enough to send anyone's blood pressure soaring into cardiac arrest.
Slap!!
Sheriff Gray forcefully slapped his panicked friend across the face, grabbing the Director by the collar with desperate exasperation.
"Get your act together, Joseph! Report this to the Pentagon immediately! Authorize airstrikes!"
'There's still a chance…' Sheriff Gray's hands trembled, much like his rapidly beating heart. 'There's still a chance!!'
He grabbed his own secure phone, dialing his most trusted consultant.
"Yusaku... Kudo..." Gray muttered into the receiver, his voice cracking. "Hey, old friend... hurry up... please help us..."
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Give me powerstones.
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