Sienna and Mitchell took the lead.

Walfred followed behind the two of them, walking toward the front line of the underground arcade.

Along the way, Sienna, who’d been walking in silence, murmured in a small voice.

"Honestly..."

"...?"

"Honestly, some small part of me is hoping you really are Hunter Walfred."

Says the person who refused to believe me this whole time?

Where did that come from? Walfred looked at Sienna with exactly that expression on his face. Sienna gave a bitter smile and murmured.

"Because at this rate, our shelter really is finished. Unless a miracle happens, like Hunter Walfred coming to save us."

Deep desperation and despair bled from Sienna’s eyes in equal measure. Seeing it drove home just how close to the edge this shelter truly was.

A question suddenly occurred to Walfred.

"Have you considered relocating to another shelter nearby? A city like Trenton should have a fair number of shelters besides this one."

"We have. We even made contact. But..."

"But?"

"We gave up on going. No, to be exact, it’d be more accurate to say we couldn’t go."

Sienna sighed.

"They said they could take Hunters and young adults, but not the children."

"...Ah."

Walfred nodded quietly.

It might sound coldhearted, but in a world frozen over and crawling with monsters, the reality was that young children were of no use to anyone.

Just dead weight that burned through food.

From the perspective of a shelter’s members, young children were nothing but a threat to survival.

’Whereas...’

The Trenton underground arcade chose a different path.

Even now, with their lives threatened by a broken gate, they’d given up on joining another shelter.

All to protect the children.

A type of community that had become nearly impossible to find after the world froze. Walfred looked at Sienna with markedly different eyes than before.

Just then.

"We’re here. Right over there."

They’d arrived at their destination.

The passage leading down to Basement Level 3. There, a makeshift defensive line had been built from a barricade of collapsed rubble and debris.

"Huh? Mitchell, sir?"

"And the Teacher’s here too..."

The Hunters standing guard near the barricade called out to them.

"What brings you both down here? It’s nowhere near time for shift change."

The moment the Hunters finished speaking.

Mitchell answered with a wry smile.

"Hunter Walfred has arrived."

"...Sir?"

The Hunters’ eyes went wide.

They looked Walfred up and down with expressions of half belief, half doubt. Meanwhile, Mitchell walked over to the barricade and picked up a pair of binoculars.

"The zombies? Still frozen in place?"

"Yes, sir. It looks certain that it used a curse at dawn. When it overloads itself from casting too many curses, it stays dormant for at least half a day."

"But who in the world did it curse? Right now the highest-leveled people on our side are you and the Teacher..."

The Hunters wore puzzled looks.

Having gleaned new information from their conversation, Walfred’s eyes quietly gleamed.

’When the Corpse Lord overloads itself casting curses, it can’t move for at least half a day?’

With those words, Walfred understood.

The reason this shelter hadn’t been wiped out, even days after the gate broke open.

Every time the Corpse Lord commanding the zombie legion overloaded itself into immobility, the advance naturally stalled along with it.

Just as that question resolved itself.

"Ah."

Something he’d forgotten suddenly came to mind.

Eyes going round for an instant, Walfred turned to Sienna and asked.

"By any chance, do you have any buff skills that can see through weaknesses or detect invisible targets?"

An Elite undead’s mana stone was transparent, invisible to the naked eye. It was something Walfred had learned firsthand during his fight with the Bone Drake.

’If Elsa were awake...’

[Shared Sight] would have solved this in a heartbeat.

But that wasn’t an option right now.

Starting a battle without knowing the mana stone’s location would be reckless. At Walfred’s question, Sienna shook her head.

"No, nothing like that..."

"I’ve got a perception skill."

Mitchell stepped forward.

He was a C-rank wind attribute Hunter.

As such, he said he had a support skill that read the flow of the wind to see through a target’s weak points.

"But my skill doesn’t last long. An hour at most. It’ll probably wear off before you even reach the Corpse Lord..."

"That’s fine. Do it."

Walfred said with a grin.

An hour was more than enough.

At that, Mitchell let out a low, dry chuckle, but extended his hand toward Walfred without further protest.

A moment later.

Whoosh!

A cool breeze brushed across Walfred’s eyes.

And then.

-----

[Support: Sharp Eye]

[Focus on a target for 5 seconds to perceive its weak points for the following 5 seconds.]

[Remaining duration: 59 minutes 59 seconds]

-----

With that, all preparations were complete.

’Time to get moving.’ 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

After loosening up his body.

Walfred vaulted over the barricade without a hint of hesitation. Then he strode forward into the darkened passage.

Watching this, the Hunters turned to Mitchell, faces full of alarm.

"Is, is it really okay to send him alone?"

"What if he provokes the zombies and they all come swarming at once..."

"Don’t worry. He wouldn’t walk in that confidently unless he had an ace up his sleeve."

Mitchell answered.

Then he raised his binoculars and tracked Walfred’s every movement. Just in case the worst came to pass.

Meanwhile, having entered the passage, Walfred noticed something unusual about the floor.

’This is...?’

Ice.

Water from a burst drainage pipe nearby had met the underground arcade’s frigid air, turning the entire area into one enormous sheet of ice.

A smile spread across Walfred’s lips.

’Even better.’

This meant [Snow Walker], which activated on snow or ice, would stay up the entire time.

And with the floor covered in ice, triggering the special effect of [Frost Nova] would be easy too.

This was, in every sense, home field for Walfred.

Just then.

"Grrr, graaah..."

Grotesque moans drifted out of the darkness.

What came into view next were zombies, packed wall to wall through the underground passage. Walfred grimaced.

’There’s a disgusting number of them.’

At a glance, well over several hundred.

If he’d had to carve through them one by one, his stamina and mana might have run dry before he even got close to the Corpse Lord.

’But there’s no need for that.’

Walfred glanced at his right hand.

The ash-gray ring on his index finger.

Brushing his fingers over the [Ring of the Decaying One], he gazed down the zombie-packed underground passage. Then, without an ounce of hesitation, he stepped forward.