GTAG Chapter 71 Trap
Hank, who had been looking to make trouble for Umbrella, instead gave them an opportunity—several of his scales fell into their hands.
But the problem was that what Umbrella gained was nowhere near worth the loss.
Even though Umbrella had bases scattered across many states, the apocalypse had struck them just as hard.
Supplies, once consumed, could no longer be replenished.
Helicopters and other vehicles—once destroyed, there was no way to replace them.
Losing over a dozen helicopters in one blow was devastating, and in exchange, all they recovered were a few scales.
No wonder Wesker was furious.
In the projection beside him, the Red Queen's avatar—a young girl—watched silently as he raged.
Only after Wesker vented did she finally speak.
"Based on data comparison, these mutated beings can almost certainly be ruled out as T-virus products. On the contrary, they show similarities to the two Scythes."
"Scythes" was Umbrella's codename for the creatures they had identified as Blades.
"You mean to say these things are connected to those two giant monsters?" Wesker asked coldly.
"It can't be ruled out. We'll know more once the scales are fully analyzed."
For Umbrella, nothing was more important than information related to the two suddenly-appearing monsters.
With that, the value of those scales skyrocketed.
But Hank himself had no idea of any of this.
He was troubled by a different problem—how to actually find an Umbrella base.
In a ruined world, such bases would never be built in the open.
They were most likely buried underground or hidden in desolate places.
Relying on his own strength alone, finding one was going to be difficult.
And more urgently, he had no transportation. Was he supposed to walk along the highways to the nearest city?
At that pace, he'd die of exhaustion before ever getting there.
For now, what he needed most was a vehicle.
That thought led him back to the base he had once stayed in.
When the zombie tide overran it, most valuables had already been evacuated, vehicles included.
Still, if he remembered correctly, he had once seen a bicycle left behind.
Not much—but better than nothing.
And if by chance he managed to reach the place where he had entered the mountains, he might even find the motorcycle he had ridden earlier still there.
But first, he had to get out of this endless forest.
After running for nearly a dozen hours, even Hank had no idea how far he had traveled or how deep into the woods he had gone.
Hours passed. The sun rose, but he still hadn't escaped the trees.
By his estimation, he should reach the edge before sunset.
But as twilight painted the sky with brilliant colors, Hank was still surrounded by forest.
He had miscalculated.
The trees were thinning, but he still wasn't free.
So he pressed on, through the night, under the rising moon.
Even with his monstrous stamina, fatigue crept in.
He had walked for an entire day and night, seeing nothing but endless trees. His patience was stretched to the breaking point.
He hadn't exploded yet only because there was nothing nearby to take his anger out on.
Then, just as his grip tightened on his axe, ready to cleave down something—anything—he caught a stench on the wind.
Rotting flesh.
The stench of zombies.
His dull eyes lit up, and drool ran from the corner of his mouth as his lips split into a grin.
Hank broke into a sprint, charging toward the scent.
Soon, he saw them—figures standing stiff among the trees, shambling in the moonlight.
At once, Hank hurled himself into the horde.
Zombies standing fell beneath his axe, and those still twitching on the ground had their skulls smashed open.
In minutes, over a hundred corpses littered the forest floor.
If not for the trees slowing his swings, he could have halved the time.
After the slaughter, his mood lifted.
But a thought nagged at him—why were zombies even here?
This deep, isolated forest shouldn't have any.
Had they wandered from somewhere else?
Hank began tracking their trail.
Half an hour later, he stumbled onto a highway.
Excitement flared. With a road, he could follow it to signs of human life.
Then, in the distance, he spotted faint light.
Rushing forward, his eyes locked on the scene ahead: the road was clogged with countless zombies.
In their midst were two buses and several cars, all surrounded. Among the wreckage lay several toppled motorcycles.
Hank recognized them immediately—they were the same vehicles from his old base.
It looked like the survivors had fled, only to be trapped here.
Something felt wrong.
If zombies had simply chased them down, climbed onto the vehicles, and overran them, that would have been expected.
But these vehicles had clearly been forced to stop by a wall of zombies ahead, then besieged when the horde surged from both sides of the forest.
Trapped, with no way forward or back, the survivors had all perished.
It wasn't chance—it was a trap.
First, unleash a zombie tide to drive people out of the base.
Then, ambush them on the road to ensure none escaped.
Other than Hank, every single survivor was wiped out.
And Hank's instincts screamed the truth—Umbrella was behind it all.
Even the zombie tide itself could have been engineered by them.
And the horde on the highway? Most likely deliberately released to finish the job.
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