Chapter 17
Melee
Rip wrapped his arms around the shadowy figure's waist and pushed forward with all his might.
The dark figure pressed down as well, trying to break free from Rip's bear hug, but its physical strength was far inferior to Rip's, and it could only keep retreating.
He tripped over a stone without noticing his footing.
The shadowy figure immediately lost its balance, and Rip used his body weight to throw it down.
The blow landed heavily on the shadowy figure. Fortunately, there were dry leaves underneath, otherwise, the blow might have caused multiple fractures.
The dark figure lay on the ground, hunched over, gritting its teeth as it lunged at its own crossbow.
Before he could even grab the crossbow, Rip kicked it away and looked down at the dark figure.
Everyone appeared together.
Caesar looked and, sure enough, it was Daryl. He raised his hand and beckoned Rip back.
Mohr quickly went over and helped Daryl up.
"Oh, it's Daryl."
"Daryl, why didn't you report that you were back?"
Seeing that it was Daryl, everyone breathed a sigh of relief, and Sean explained to Rick who Daryl was.
Moore grinned and crouched down. "Daryl, need your dear old brother to help you up?"
Daryl angrily shoved Mor's hand away, finally got his crossbow, and stood up abruptly, his face full of arrogance.
"You son of a bitch, how dare you ambush me!"
With that, Daryl raised his crossbow, aimed it at Rip, and was about to fire.
With quick reflexes, Moore pushed the crossbow upwards.
The crossbow bolt was fired and became firmly embedded in the tree trunk.
Daryl shoved Moore aside. "Moore, are you out of your mind? Instead of helping me take him down, why are you getting in my way?"
Enraged, Daryl drew his bowstring and prepared to shoot another arrow.
Those around Daryl, the hot-tempered young man, took a few steps back, afraid of getting into trouble.
Rip glanced at Caesar, and then heard Caesar say, "Go ahead, teach that hothead a lesson."
Rip nodded, flicked his wrist, and strode toward Daryl.
Daryl, with short hair and a youthful face, cocked the bow and fired.
This time, Moore did not stop him.
However, Rip had already grabbed Daryl's raised crossbow, and the bolt struck the tree trunk again.
Rip had no intention of holding back. He drew his crossbow, grabbed Daryl's shoulder, and delivered a powerful punch.
Rip was burly, much taller and stronger than Daryl.
A single heavy punch was enough to make Daryl clutch his stomach and cry out in pain. After several punches, Daryl was in so much pain that he became somewhat delirious.
Rip released his grip on Daryl's shoulder, and Daryl went limp, kneeling on the ground, clutching his stomach and vomiting.
"Kid, learn how to fight. You're too weak!"
With that, Rip clenched his fist, turned, and left.
Daryl barely managed to lift his head, his face flushed as he stared at Rip, then gave Moore a resentful look.
His eyes seemed to be saying, "Why didn't you try to persuade me?"
Reluctantly, Mor lifted Daryl up and carried him towards the camp.
The farce ended, and at Caesar's request, the deer carcass was carried back to the camp.
"You're saying this is edible?" Dale asked incredulously, hands on his hips, eyes wide, white beard bristling.
"Ugh—" Amy felt a physical aversion at the thought of that scene. It was like eating a zombie.
This drew a look of disgust from many of the women in the camp.
Even Rip and Jimmy looked at Caesar with confusion.
Caesar had no choice but to explain, "The virus on the zombies can't infect animals, everyone understands that, right?"
After thinking about it, everyone realized they had never seen an animal walking corpse before.
"That means the virus cannot be transmitted through animals. So, it's okay for us to eat animals."
"Furthermore, when the zombies were biting the deer, the deer was already dead, so the blood wouldn't be circulating. Plus, cooking it at high temperatures wouldn't cause any problems."
Caesar explained patiently that he didn't want to see such good meat go to waste.
In the future, we may have fewer and fewer opportunities to eat deer.
Caesar's reasoning convinced some people, but some women still refused.
After cutting off the deer's head, the zombies mainly gnawed at the deer's neck. For safety, they cut off an extra portion of meat below and discarded it.
After bleeding the deer, the women began to process the carcass.
The camp was bustling with activity again.
Caesar didn't want to stay put and do nothing, so he took Rip and Jimmy to the woods to look for walkers.
Tite stayed in the truck, guarding the supplies.
Once inside the woods, Jimmy started talking nonstop.
"The zombie I saw that day was the ugliest I've ever seen, it was outrageous, it had no mouth and its head was sunken in."
"There's no lower body, and the upper body is almost completely rotten."
At the same time, a look of disgust appeared on Jimmy's face, as if he was constantly recalling the walker in his mind.
"Jimmy, shut up." Caesar held up one finger and looked at Jimmy sternly.
"Okay."
Jimmy nodded blankly.
"Jimmy, we're not out here for fun, we're out looking for walkers. You need to be absolutely vigilant about your surroundings."
"You never know, a zombie might jump out from around you and grab you the next second. You'll have to learn to retaliate reflexively."
Caesar explained to Jimmy earnestly.
Jimmy understood his problem, nodded repeatedly, picked up his machete, and looked at the surrounding trees.
After they stopped talking, it seemed as if there were only the three of them in the quiet woods, with not many of the sparse sounds that usually linger in the forest.
This made Jimmy extremely nervous.
The three men, Caesar, Rip, and Jimmy, walked forward in an inverted triangular formation, with Caesar and Rip in front and Jimmy behind.
As Caesar walked past a large tree, he glanced at it suspiciously.
The next second, a zombie leaped out of the tree and lunged at Caesar.
Caesar was prepared. He swung his axe, which cleaved open the zombie's skull and embedded itself in the tree trunk amidst flying sawdust.
Black blood flowed down the tree trunk.
Rip, standing to the side, rushed toward the several zombies that appeared beside him, holding a small knife.
He gripped the walker's neck with one hand and plunged the other into the walker's jaw, reaching all the way to the brainstem.
He dealt with the walking corpse with effortless grace.
Meanwhile, Jimmy's situation was not optimistic. He was also entangled by a zombie, which grabbed his machete, and the two began to struggle.
Walking corpses have no limitations on muscle strength and can exert the maximum power of their muscles.
It gradually overtook Jimmy, pinning him against the tree trunk with his mouth wide open, emitting a foul stench.
Jimmy watched this scene with a look of horror and fear on his face.
A whooshing sound came from the air, followed by a crack.
The axe cleaved open the zombie's head, embedded it in the tree trunk, and pinned the zombie down with it.
The walker went limp and released Jimmy.
Jimmy felt something slippery on his head. The zombie stopped moving, so he shoved it away.
As the axe ripped through the zombie, much of its brain tissue scattered on the ground, resembling overturned pig brains.
Jimmy frantically took off his cowboy hat, which was stained with a lot of black blood.
Caesar walked over, took the axe, and patted the now-calm Jimmy on the shoulder: "You'll get used to it eventually."