The loud crash at the doorway prompted Song Yu to immediately raise her hands and train her gun dead on the door, coming within a hair’s breadth of pulling the trigger.
Fortunately, Song Yu retained a shred of sanity, knowing full well that the group of players outside couldn’t possibly have breached the building this quickly.
Nor could the players inside have subdued the clinic’s staff with such speed—after all, had they succeeded, molotov cocktails wouldn’t still be raining down outside.
The person who entered was Huang Yong, the clinic’s [surgeon] and the staff member Song Yu had interacted with most frequently outside of Doctor Zhong.
A 1.9-meter-tall tattooed brute with a ferocious appearance and equally ferocious behavior.
Yet his attitude toward Song Yu happened to be quite decent.
“Come with me!”
Ignoring the handgun in Song Yu’s grip, Huang Yong yanked her by the arm and hauled her toward the exit.
The very next second after Song Yu and Xiao Hei followed Huang Yong out of the room, a massive boulder smashed through the glass window, immediately followed by a barrage of incoming molotov cocktails!
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Glass bottles wreathed in raging flames shattered against the floor, and the fire spread rapidly.
One had to admit these players were truly vicious; given that the clinic was already suffering from an acute water shortage, facing a fire meant they stood zero chance of extinguishing it.
Aside from abandoning this territory, they literally possessed no other choice.
Naturally, that was only how things appeared on the surface.
The moment Huang Yong led Song Yu down into the clinic’s basement, she knew those players were completely finished.
Rows upon rows of neatly aligned fire extinguishers, alongside various weaponry housed inside glass cabinets, seemed to mock their sheer stupidity.
Song Yu found a dozen fire extinguishers shoved directly into her arms, saddling her with a heavy responsibility.
While she couldn’t get her hands on the weapons, acquiring a stash of fire extinguishers for backup proved exceptionally handy.
Thinking on her feet, Song Yu took Xiao Hei in tow and immediately plunged into the diligent, hard-working task of putting out fires.
The moment she stepped back out of the basement, Song Yu found herself handed a flare gun by Huang Linlin—the young woman belonging to the Qilin organization.
On the ground floor of the clinic, all the players who had managed to stay behind inside the facility had been tightly trussed up and bound hand and foot.
Even their mouths were gagged.
Upon spotting Song Yu’s appearance, they immediately cast desperate, pleading gazes toward her.
Song Yu simply acted as though she hadn’t seen them. Are you kidding me? If she didn’t walk over and carve a few extra holes into them right now, it would already count as a testament to her profound benevolence.
“Xiaoyu, I’m counting on you.”
Without clarifying her instructions further, Huang Linlin hurried off in a rush, though her intent remained transparently clear: she wanted Song Yu to find an opening and fire the flare signal.
It looked like the clinic NPCs commanded plenty of reinforcements after all.
Come to think of it, since this clinic offered free medical care, they must maintain amicable relations with the NPCs across the entire city, right?
While other NPCs possessed medical supplies as well, none of them were professional-grade doctors.
Clutching a fire extinguisher, Song Yu fought fires all the way as she sprinted like mad toward the rooftop.
As for that pack of players outside, Song Yu suspected at least a few among them possessed the Arsonist talent; otherwise, how else could every single molotov cocktail thrown land with such pin-point accuracy?
Either striking dead center on wooden fixtures or landing squarely on fabrics.
It was truly mind-boggling.
While extinguishing flames, Song Yu simultaneously had to keep watch to ensure no stray molotov cocktail flew in from outside to land on her person.
Fortunately, Xiao Hei flanked her side; at the slightest hint of danger, it would instantly tackle Song Yu to the ground, dodging those airborne projectiles.
Charging all the way up to the rooftop terrace on the clinic’s third floor, Song Yu left Xiao Hei behind instead of dragging it up with her, threw up a hand to shield her face, and fired the flare straight up into the sky.
A brilliant explosion of multicolored light bloomed across the heavens, and before Song Yu even stepped down from the roof terrace, the roar of motor engines reached her ears.
Oh, ho.
Song Yu arched an eyebrow; this pack of players was about to die a much uglier death.
“Charge, brothers!!”
A piercing, heart-rending battle cry erupted from the floor below.
Clearly, the players manning the defensive barricades had caught the sound of the approaching vehicles as well.
Song Yu peered cautiously outward, catching sight of several fools actually rushing forward in the open.
While the number of players stationed outside the barricades was substantial, the vast majority were cowering and turtling behind their defenses, lacking the courage to expose their heads.
Suddenly, Song Yu’s gaze locked onto the distance, her pupils constricting violently as her previously relaxed mood evaporated into thin air. She immediately grabbed Xiao Hei and sprinted headlong downstairs!
“Doctor Zhong, it’s bad!!”
“They’ve lured a high-tier zombie straight here!!”
Song Yu yelled at the top of her lungs as she ran. Players weren’t terrifying—at least, they weren’t terrifying when you had clinic NPCs positioned in front to take the brunt of the heat.
However, once you factored in zombies—and high-tier zombies at that—things entered extremely perilous territory.
This bunch of players were truly malignant cancers.
Not a single high-tier zombie existed anywhere near the vicinity of the clinic, meaning they could only have dragged one over from somewhere else.
“What!“
Hearing Song Yu’s warning, everyone inside the clinic registered a jolt of shock, and shortly thereafter, they too sensed the oppressive aura radiating from the approaching high-tier zombie.
“Immediate evacuation!”
Doctor Zhong barked out the command decisively.
“Yes!”
With the high-tier zombie practically breathing down their necks, the clinic personnel lacked the luxury of time to salvage all their supplies.
“Take whatever you can carry, and save your own skin once we’re out.”
Huang Yong cast a parting glance at Song Yu, speaking in a solemn, heavy tone.
Without waiting for his prompt, Song Yu and Xiao Hei had already initiated packing up operations.
The disaster whipped up by that pack of players outside had ultimately managed to implicate Song Yu as well.
She caught the cascading audio cues of clinic NPC favorability ratings plummeting in real time.
Ratings that previously hovered around 50 or 60 plummeted straight down to roughly 30.
Still, you couldn’t entirely blame these NPCs; after all, the clinic housed other temporary players and outsourced hands just like Song Yu.
Those individuals had unhesitatingly abandoned the NPCs to side with the player faction, even preparing to unlock the front doors for the raiders outside.
Only to be mercilessly suppressed by Huang Yong and his crew, trussed up, and dumped inside the main lobby.
Their actions had dragged Song Yu down with them.
Moreover, the fallout extended beyond the clinic’s staff: apart from Shuyuan, Song Yu received prompts indicating favorability drops across every single NPC she had interacted with thus far.
She had to hand it to herself—Song Yu’s luck was genuinely down in the absolute dumps.
Nursing a heavy surge of resentment, Song Yu frantically stuffed supplies into her backpack slots and Xiao Hei’s spatial storage.
Gauze—grab it!
Alcohol—take it along!
Oxygen tanks—can’t leave those behind either!
The pack slung across Song Yu’s back finally ceased serving as a mere decorative prop, stuffed to bursting with every miscellaneous item imaginable.
She even scooped up half a bag of flour straight from the kitchen.
As for Xiao Hei, it dragged, hauled, and wailed miserably while trying to hoist one of the clinic’s heavy medical instruments out of the room, failing to budge it an inch due to the sheer weight and coming close to tears out of pure frustration.
The silly hound had seen Song Yu and her grandmother visit small clinics back in the day and assumed everything it laid eyes on was useful.
Yet the spatial storage couldn’t accommodate it.
The heavy footfalls of the high-tier zombie echoed within striking distance, and players outside had already forced their way into the clinic. Song Yu decisively reined in Xiao Hei and wheeled around to plunge into the basement.
The clinic basement connected directly to the underground parking garage, making travel through this route far safer!
It also allowed her to bypass those players entirely.
The NPCs had cleared out all the weapons from the basement, leaving behind a single solitary AK assault rifle resting in the corner.
Song Yu’s eyes lit up as she hurried forward to snatch it up.
Not only did she net the rifle, but right beside it sat a half-filled magazine containing over a hundred rounds of live ammunition.
This didn’t look like something accidentally left behind; it looked explicitly like provisions intentionally cached and left behind for her.
Song Yu appropriated the lot without hesitation, along with the fire extinguishers and oxygen tanks stationed in the basement—she bypassed not a single piece of equipment.
The relentless echoes of cursing, wailing, and pillaging filtered downward into Song Yu’s ears, and she even caught the cracking snap of gunfire.
Roar——!!
The zombies had arrived!