The moment Song Jinhe opened her eyes, she knew she was in serious trouble.
Outside the window, a violent storm raged. Screams shattered the silence as an unprepared man was suddenly knocked to the ground by a “person” behind him, their mouth covered in blood, tearing a chunk of flesh from his cheek.
“Ah!!!”
Piercing cries erupted from the crowd. Blood splattered across the walls and ceiling as lightning illuminated a crimson world filled with grotesque faces.
The scene before her dealt a massive shock to Song Jinhe.
That figure wearing a hospital gown, with a chunk of flesh missing from its arm exposing bone, baring blackened teeth, was that… a zombie?!
A chilling cold crept up her spine. In all her 20 years, she had never encountered anything so terrifying and deadly.
As Song Jinhe tried to stand up from the ground, she realized a sharp, piercing pain shot through her right ankle.
“I’m sorry…”
The “companion” who had knocked her over had trembling lips. The guilt in his eyes vanished the moment he saw the zombie rushing toward them, replaced entirely by fear. The hand he had reached out to help her was quickly withdrawn.
Song Jinhe watched as they ran toward the stairs without stopping, while the zombie beside her lunged at her, its blood-dripping mouth wide open.
In her panic, Song Jinhe grabbed a stainless steel cup and, bracing herself, shoved it into the zombie’s mouth.
Then she quickly pulled back, forcing herself to stand despite the agonizing pain in her ankle.
She had no time to process what was happening!
Her field of vision was chaos, people being seized and torn apart by zombies, or trampled by others.
What kind of zombies were these? They could actually run this fast!
Song Jinhe pushed herself to the limit, limping through the chaotic crowd in search of a way to survive. Ahead, a zombie suddenly burst out and tackled one of the “companions” who had just crossed the corridor, tearing into them.
The floor trembled as growls and chewing sounds echoed through the entire building.
Looking at the structure now overrun by zombies, Song Jinhe realized that in her current condition, following the crowd would only get her killed.
The more noise there was, the more zombies it would attract, and at any moment, someone in the crowd could turn into a new zombie.
She turned around and hurried into a nearby office. Moving as fast as she could, she swept everything out of a filing cabinet and, just before the zombies rushed in, squeezed herself inside, trembling.
There were doors at both the front and back of the room, but she only had time to close one.
Listening to the zombies’ footsteps entering, Song Jinhe’s whole body went rigid in the pitch-black cabinet.
She recalled lying on a hospital bed at death’s door, when her perspective suddenly shifted upward, as if she were an outsider watching the flat line on the monitor.
Amid a buzzing sound, an electronic synthesized voice rang clearly in her ears—
“Congratulations, you have obtained a chance to ‘start over.’ It’s time for you to go back.”
Go back where?
Just as she was about to ask, she was suddenly transported to that corridor from earlier, nearly dying on the spot.
How chilling, truly chilling…
So this was what “starting over” meant. Being sent to a place like this, she couldn’t understand what there was to congratulate.
A zombie walked up to the filing cabinet. Through the gap in the door, she could see blood dripping from its pant leg.
Clutching the hem of her clothes, Song Jinhe didn’t dare even breathe too loudly, afraid of being discovered. The extra memories that had appeared in her mind quickly helped her understand the situation.
This was a parallel world filled with zombie mutations and natural disasters, stacked with every possible hazard. Ordinary zombies were only the first stage, after that would come all kinds of catastrophes: extreme cold, scorching heat, smog, acid rain… and biological mutations.
“She” and several companions had come to the hospital to visit a sick friend, but were unfortunately trapped by a massive storm, and then the zombie outbreak erupted in full.
They watched with their own eyes as the person who went to take the elevator down to get the car entered it, and never came out. All that remained were hysterical cries for help and the heavy stench of blood.
Under a sky shrouded in dark clouds, the city was filled with screams and desperate pleas. Cars had crashed into each other everywhere.
Thus, the apocalypse began.
The survivors in the hospital could only gather together and wait for rescue, but before long, more and more zombies appeared.
Then, one night, something went wrong, that was the moment she arrived in this parallel world.
A chilling “heh heh” sound grew louder in her ears.
Her nose was filled with the sticky, nauseating stench that humans instinctively reject, the smell emitted after the death of their own kind. It was even stronger than the odor of rotting animals, as if it could seep into her body through her pores.
The vividness of her senses made Song Jinhe realize that she could never return to the familiar, civilized world. She had no choice but to brace herself and adapt.
She wouldn’t get another chance to start over.
The storm raged on through the night, and screams rose one after another, some from the building across the way, some from upstairs and downstairs, and even… from the room next door.
Because of one urgent shout, what began as a single person being discovered by a zombie turned into everyone being exposed.
“No, help—!”
“Dad—!”
Listening to the screams not far away, Song Jinhe’s heart felt colder than the metal filing cabinet she was hiding in.
Outside, the entire floor was filled with zombies, and at night their speed and agility were far greater than during the day. She could become the next victim at any moment.
Don’t panic… don’t panic… panicking would only make things worse. She could only steady herself mentally, calm her breathing, and wait for the zombies to leave.
From night to dawn, then back to night again, for a full day—Song Jinhe stayed curled up inside the cabinet, her hands and feet numb, not daring to make even the slightest movement.
Until daylight came once more, and there were still two zombies left in the room, she didn’t even dare to think about how she had endured it.
Song Jinhe rubbed her ankle. It was bearable when she didn’t put pressure on it, but the moment she did, the pain was excruciating.
Fortunately, no bones were injured.
Otherwise, she wouldn’t be able to change anything.
In her memories, she had also been trapped on the third floor of the hospital, without water or food, so desperate that she had wanted to end her life.
A supply team that came to the hospital rescued her. At that time, her face was gaunt, and she looked almost like a zombie herself. Her greatest value was that, when necessary, she could be thrown out as expendable bait to attract zombies.
She had acted as an insider and wiped out that team, then joined a new one.
No one thought highly of her. They believed she lacked strength and was a traitor. Even though she had already done everything she could to survive in the apocalypse, her talent had awakened too late.
She ultimately died in the third year of the apocalypse. Her spatial bracelet fell and was taken by the new team.
Subconsciously, Song Jinhe reached for the faintly purple jade bracelet that used to sit cool against her wrist, but it was no longer there. In its place was a small storage space in her consciousness, roughly about fifteen square meters.
The storage space was still there.
She would not sit and wait for death, nor would she fall into those people’s hands again.
After observing for a long time, she saw that the two zombies were too close to each other. In this situation, unless she had a firearm, the moment she stepped out, she would become their next meal.
However, the filing cabinet was also close to the open back door. From there, she could just see a metal trolley parked in the corridor. Carefully, Song Jinhe pushed the cabinet door open just wide enough for her hand, gritted her teeth, and with a flick of her wrist, threw her phone.
Clang—
The trolley was struck, and a metal tray that was half hanging fell, the crisp noise echoing sharply through the silent floor.
Zombie growls rang out one after another. Following the sound, they staggered out. Seeing this, Song Jinhe immediately pushed the cabinet door.
But at the crucial moment, the door got stuck halfway and wouldn’t budge.