Luffy was incredibly depressed. He didn’t even need to look in a mirror to know what a ghastly state he was in. Before, he at least resembled a normal human to some extent, but now? Had it not been for everything he’d experienced since the apocalypse began, he felt he would have been scared to death by his own reflection. Since he wasn’t dead yet, he had to keep on living. With that thought in mind, he leaped out from behind the counter.
"Huh?" He noticed that his body was much more agile than before. After taking a few steps, his gait was no longer a shambling limp. Spotting the fire axe on the counter, he picked it up. When the apocalypse had just descended, he had tried using the fire axe. At that time, however, his power was weak. Although holding the axe looked intimidating, it was truly cumbersome to wield. He had to swing it with both hands, and just a few swings would drain a lot of his energy, making it far less practical than a small, handy screwdriver. But now, Luffy swung it single-handedly. It felt very light, and to his surprise, he wielded it with effortless ease.
"It seems my power is more than twice that of a normal human!
"Let’s test my speed next!"
With the axe in hand, Luffy started sprinting between the supermarket aisles!
"I’ve become about as fast as a normal person, maybe even a little faster!"
Luffy came to a halt and looked down to inspect his body once again. Aside from the color and the appearance of flayed human muscles, it was basically similar to before. Right—a human whose skin was peeled off would bleed, but he didn’t. His dermis was gone, leaving only a thin membrane of flesh covering the surface of his muscles. He reached out and poked it with his fingernail, but surprisingly, it didn’t pierce through. After all, a zombie’s muscles were very mushy—perhaps "rotten" was a better word. They would fall apart at the slightest grab, which was one of the reasons Luffy hadn’t dared to take risks before.
If a chunk of his flesh were chopped off, it wouldn’t regenerate. Up until he swallowed the Corpse Pouch earlier, the wound on his ankle had persisted without any signs of healing. But now, Luffy could see dark red granulations sprouting from the wound on his ankle. Compared to rotting muscle tissue, Luffy could see true vitality in his current muscles.
"Maybe this isn’t so bad after all!" Forced by circumstances, Luffy once again accepted his ghastly new form. "At least my power is greater and my speed is faster than before!"
Moreover, his fingernails were longer and sharper than before. He felt that his nails could absolutely slice open a person’s throat. At the same time, he became even more certain that zombies could evolve and grow stronger. At this thought, a surge of excitement washed over Luffy. He opened his mouth and actually let out a furious roar.
He could never have done this before. Since zombies didn’t breathe, they couldn’t make their vocal cords vibrate, which meant they were incapable of producing sound. Now, however, Luffy could slightly contort his lungs to squeeze out air, enabling him to roar. But that was the extent of it.
Next, Luffy sprang into action. First of all, he needed some clothes. On one hand, he needed to cover up his highly conspicuous body; on the other hand, he still possessed a human mindset—humans had to wear clothes, even in the apocalypse. There was a clothing section in the supermarket. Although it didn’t stock designer brands, it suited Luffy’s requirements perfectly. He didn’t let his slight increase in power go to his head, swaggering around the zombie-infested world in designer clothes and luxury watches like characters in TV shows. Despite getting somewhat stronger, he decided to keep an incredibly low profile. High-profile creatures were always the first to die. Tigers were high-profile, and they ended up becoming an endangered species. Pandas were chubby and adorable, flaunting their high profile so much that they ended up as captive national treasures.
From underwear to outerwear, Luffy chose very ordinary styles in grayish-white. His top had a hood, which was perfect for concealing his terrifying scalp, and its sleeves were long enough for him to pull his hands inside. For socks and shoes, he opted for athletic types that would aid in running and jumping. Next, he picked out a backpack to carry his supplies.
For instance, Luffy grabbed a pair of binoculars from a display counter, looked through them, and discovered that zombies could use binoculars too. It was quite understandable. Everyone thought zombies had no vision, but Luffy believed this was incorrect. They simply couldn’t process the visual information sent to their brains; it was just too complex for them. Perhaps as zombies evolved, their vision would eventually be restored. Therefore, the binoculars were somewhat useful to Luffy.
In the book section, he found a thick, latest-edition travel atlas. Flipping through it, Luffy noticed that aside from maps of Country Z’s major, medium, and small cities, as well as counties, it surprisingly included maps of famous foreign cities. Furthermore, it was the newest edition, published earlier that year in March. He decisively stuffed it into his backpack.
Luffy browsed quickly as he weaved through the supermarket aisles, packing away anything he deemed useful. He casually tossed a box of Durex into the backpack. It wasn’t that it was useful; it was merely out of habit. He only realized what he had done after it was already in the bag. In the past, Luffy had been a rich second-generation heir. This was something he almost always kept prepared and carried on his person. According to his unscrupulous father, women were only after his status and money, so he could never give them anything to use against him!
He returned to the raw meat counter and fished out a set of keys from the pocket of his discarded clothes. They were the keys to his house. Once he killed Li Yufeng and his gang, Luffy planned to head home. He also grabbed several fully charged smartphones. He was going to use these phones to make Li Yufeng and his people taste true despair. Finally, he opened the freezer blocking the counter entrance, ate some raw meat, and headed out of the supermarket.
He pushed up the mall’s rolling shutter door, stepped out, and pulled it back down again. He did this because he knew there were other survivors in this mall. Killing earlier had been a last resort. In a life-or-death situation, killing was simply what had to be done. Deep down in Luffy’s heart, however, he still didn’t want humanity to go extinct. For those who had no grudges or enmity with him, he would help them out if he could! The supermarket was now free of zombies, and the supplies there would be enough to sustain the survivors for a while. As for the future, that would depend on their own luck.
It was already afternoon. Under the baking heat of the sun, Luffy approached the hotel. He discovered that the main doors of the hotel had been shut tight. It seemed the music from that morning had helped Li Yufeng and his group lure away most of the roaming zombies inside, allowing them to seal the hotel.
"But with me around, all your hard work is in vain!"
Right on the street, Luffy found an SUV with slightly higher ground clearance, crawled underneath, and lay down. He pulled out the phones and set them with multiple overlapping alarms, staggering the times. Next came the waiting. He had to wait for nightfall, and then... "Hehe!"
Time ticked by, minute by minute, second by second. When the sky had turned completely dark, Luffy crawled out from under the car. Gazing at the hotel in front of him, he thought, "Now, enjoy the despair!"