◉◉◉◉◉
A sudden chill ran down Zombie Glaive's spine.
And then reality struck.
Nolan gripped the undead warrior's shredded cloak and spun, faster and faster, until the entire battlefield blurred into a cyclone. With no foothold, no way to anchor himself, Glaive was helpless, nothing more than a ragdoll caught in a god's hand.
Dozens of rotations later, Nolan released him.
The force was cataclysmic. The air itself compressed into a wall of steel before detonating with a thunderous crack, leaving a white shockwave in its wake.
Glaive's body launched like a missile, supersonic booms trailing as he skipped across the ruined streets like a stone on water.
Each impact carved craters, spraying stone and dirt like shrapnel. Entire blocks crumbled in his wake.
Finally, the bouncing slowed only for Nolan's shadow to fall across him.
THUD!
A single stomp crushed Glaive into the ground. Black ichor spewed from his mouth as the earth caved inward, the shockwave rattling the city like an earthquake.
Nolan looked down coldly. "You're not nearly as strong as you believe."
Scarlet chains of psionic energy burst from his hands, wrapping around Glaive's limbs, his torso, even his throat.
The zombie struggled, self-hypnosis screaming I am invincible, I am invincible! But the chains only constricted tighter, crushing his delusion.
The Sorcerer-Superman raised his palm. A mirror dimension unfolded, swallowing the battlefield in fractal glass.
One by one, the zombified superhumans Storm, Juggernaut, Emma Frost, and others were shackled in crimson coils. Even Juggernaut's endless brute force couldn't break free.
"This farce ends now," Nolan said with a faint smile. His gaze hardened as it locked onto Glaive. "You've ravaged this Earth. Your universe will pay the price."
A tidal wave of mental energy crashed into Glaive's hollow mind, ripping secrets from his memories. Images flooded Nolan's consciousness. He exhaled slowly. "So that's the truth. You'll serve me better back in my lab."
---
Osborn Tower – Restricted Labs
The zombified Rhino knelt trembling, his massive body quaking under Nolan's presence.
"Boss…" Aleksei stammered, fighting the gnawing hunger clawing at his insides.
"With your body and the tech we gave you, you should have resisted longer," Nolan said flatly. "But you disappointed me."
"I… I failed," Rhino whispered, forcing the hunger down, terrified to meet Nolan's eyes.
"You have two choices," Nolan continued. "One: I cure you with a serum once it's perfected, pay you out, and cut all ties. You'll leave Osborn with a golden handshake and never return."
Aleksei clenched his fists. "…What's the other?"
"Option two: become my test subject. I need to see how this virus interacts with enhanced physiology. I won't use regenerative serums on you. If you die, you die. If you survive, you'll help me create a cure for superhumans."
"…I'll take the second."
"Good." Nolan nodded. "Begin."
Connor and the research division activated surgical drones. The Osborn energy barrier kept the plague out; no airborne strain could breach it. Inside, order reigned. Outside chaos.
Zombified mutants and metas lay strapped to steel slabs. Mechanical arms dissected tissue with surgical precision.
"Zombie organs show hyper-accelerated metabolic activity," a scientist reported. "Mitochondrial output is extreme."
"The virus binds to the X-Gene," another noted. "Storm's genome has mutated beyond prior records. Entire chains of new alleles."
"Gut tissue functions like malignant cancer cells perfect absorption, endless replication."
Nolan observed quietly. No wonder even titans fell. This was more than a plague; it was a rewriting of biology itself. "So even Sentinels fell… and only machines proved immune. Infection capacity approaching skyfather-level pathogens."
Thousands of samples were distributed into containment chambers. AI systems triggered automated testing.
"Unit One reports: 372 samples neutralized under compound mix #47," came the update.
"Record everything. Adjust concentrations. Begin scaling trials," Nolan ordered.
The lab glowed with sterile light as experiment after experiment unfolded.
To Nolan, one truth was already clear:
These zombies weren't just a plague.
They were research materials.
◉◉◉◉◉
~Support with 200 PowerStones = 1 Bonus Chapter
◉◉◉◉◉
For early access to advanced chapters on P-atreon:
P-atreon/iamxeno
(Just remove the - hyphen to access Patreon normally)
Thank you so much for your support and for reading!