The bombardment continued for another hour.

Artillery thunder never stopped across southern Luzon. HIMARS rockets still screamed through the sky while B-1 Lancers continued cycling bombing runs against the advancing infected masses.

But eventually, the explosions began getting closer.

Inside the command center, one of the radar operators looked up sharply.

"Sir... lead elements entering outer visual range."

Adrian immediately stepped toward the main screen.

The drone feed switched.

At first, it looked like movement across dark terrain.

Then the camera zoomed in.

And the operators finally saw them clearly.

The swarm.

Even after hours of nonstop bombardment, the infected still stretched across entire roads and open fields. Smoke drifted around them while burning debris littered their path, but they kept charging northward without slowing.

The front ranks were no longer shambling.

They were sprinting.

Thousands upon thousands of bodies running together beneath the burning night sky.

"Distance?" Adrian asked.

"Approximately eight kilometers from the southern defensive line."

Another officer checked the artillery status board.

"Indirect fire effectiveness dropping. They’re too close now."

Adrian nodded once.

That meant one thing.

The ground battle was about to begin.

Outside Basa Air Base, soldiers along the southern perimeter finally saw movement emerging beyond the burning countryside.

At first it looked like shadows moving through smoke.

Then the shadows multiplied.

And multiplied again.

Until the entire horizon looked alive.

One infantryman lowered his binoculars slowly.

"...Holy shit."

The infected poured across roads, fields, and drainage canals like an endless black tide. Fires from earlier bombardments illuminated them in flashes, revealing twisted bodies sprinting over craters and burning wreckage.

Behind the defensive barriers, machine gunners tightened their grips on their weapons.

Abrams tank crews locked thermal sights onto the advancing masses.

Bradley IFVs rotated their turrets forward.

Everyone waited.

Inside one of the forward trenches, a young soldier swallowed hard while loading another belt into an M240 machine gun.

"There’s too many..."

His squad leader looked over the barricade.

"Then we kill as many as we can before they reach us."

Back inside the command center, the tactical display suddenly shifted red across the southern sectors.

"Lead elements approaching engagement line."

Adrian grabbed the command mic immediately.

"All ground units."

Across the base perimeter, every radio channel opened simultaneously.

"This is Command. Enemy contact imminent. All units hold fire until targets enter effective kill range."

Outside—

The infected kept coming.

Closer.

Closer.

The sound reached them next.

Not growling.

Not screaming.

Footsteps.

Thousands upon thousands of footsteps hitting the ground together.

Like a living earthquake approaching the base.

Several soldiers visibly tightened their shoulders hearing it.

The infected were now close enough to see individual figures sprinting through the smoke.

Some missing limbs.

Some burned from artillery fire.

Some still on fire while running forward.

And behind them—

More.

Endless more.

"Range?" an Abrams commander asked through comms.

"Eight hundred meters."

The tank commander stared through the thermal sight.

The display looked completely saturated with white-hot movement.

"Jesus Christ..."

The infected surged through the burning remains of destroyed highways directly toward the outer barricades.

Then Adrian gave the order.

"Engage."

The southern perimeter erupted instantly.

The first M1 Abrams fired.

The 120mm smoothbore cannon detonated with deafening force, the sabot round screaming directly into the advancing swarm before exploding through dozens of infected simultaneously.

The blast tore a massive hole across the front ranks.

Then every other tank opened fire.

Boom.

Boom.

Boom.

The entire defensive line lit up from tank muzzle flashes while shockwaves rolled across the trenches.

At the same time—

The M2 Bradley IFVs unleashed their 25mm Bushmaster cannons.

The automatic weapons roared continuously, streams of explosive rounds ripping across the advancing infected. Entire clusters were shredded apart beneath the sustained fire while TOW launchers occasionally fired into denser sections of the swarm.

Then the infantry joined.

M240 machine guns opened up first.

The deep chatter of 7.62 fire echoed across the base perimeter as overlapping kill lanes swept through the infected masses.

Tracer rounds cut across the darkness nonstop.

M2 Browning heavy machine guns followed moments later, their .50 caliber rounds tearing bodies apart with horrifying force.

The front ranks of the swarm collapsed instantly beneath the concentrated firepower.

Bodies piled everywhere.

But the infected behind them simply climbed over the dead.

"Keep firing!"

"Don’t let them stack on the barriers!"

Grenade launchers thumped repeatedly from the trenches while infantry rifles added constant streams of fire into the advancing horde.

The battlefield became pure chaos.

Explosions.

Gunfire.

Tracer rounds.

Burning bodies.

And still, the swarm charged forward.

One Bradley gunner stared through his optic in disbelief.

"They’re not slowing!"

Because they weren’t.

The infected continued sprinting directly into the gunfire, smashing into concertina wire and barricades while more climbed over them from behind.

"Sector Bravo pressure increasing!"

"Western trench taking contact!"

An Abrams fired canister rounds directly into a dense section of infected only fifty meters from the barricades.

The blast vaporized entire rows instantly.

Still not enough.

Inside the trenches, soldiers fired nonstop into the charging masses while empty shell casings piled around their boots.

One machine gun barrel glowed orange from sustained fire.

"Barrel swap!"

Another gunner immediately replaced it while the others continued shooting.

Then the first infected reached the outer wire.

"Contact on the barrier!"

The swarm slammed into the defensive perimeter like a tidal wave.

Bodies piled against razor wire while hundreds more climbed over them immediately. Some infected became tangled and shredded by the wire itself, but the ones behind kept pushing forward hard enough to force openings.

"Frag out!"

Grenades exploded directly along the barricades, blasting infected apart at close range.

But more replaced them instantly.

Back in the command center, the tactical display showed the southern perimeter fully engaged now.

Red markers pressed continuously against the defensive lines while artillery shifted deeper behind the swarm to prevent reinforcements from massing too tightly.

Adrian stared silently at the battle unfolding across the monitors.

The firepower was devastating.

The ground itself around Basa Air Base had become a killing field.

And still—

The infected kept coming.

Then one of the operators suddenly looked up sharply.

"Sir... Hunter signatures detected inside the swarm."

Adrian’s eyes narrowed immediately.

"How many?"

The analyst zoomed in on the thermal feed.

Then his face paled.

"...A lot."