“You’re lucky, kid.” Only then did the tall man put his knife away. He didn’t spare them another glance, turning back to the supermarket to rummage through the few things left on the shelves. Besides the rifle, he had a black pack slung over his shoulder.
Huo Chi tugged his pant leg back down. His T-shirt was filthy, too, and he looked rather disheveled.
“How’d that happen?” Jiang Ziyao asked, pointing to the blood on his pant leg.
“When I was half awake, I felt something crawling on my leg. The moment I opened my eyes, I saw some damn thing grabbing at it! Good thing we were up high on a box. Otherwise, we’d have been eaten already!” Huo Chi got worked up as he spoke. “Brother Jiang, we transmigrated! We were still by the bridge last night. The fireworks weren’t even over yet, and I…”
He was furious. “What kind of shitty luck is this?”
“I figured. So, a sci-fi movie?” Jiang Ziyao clicked his tongue. The pads of his fingers rubbed against each other, but there was no cigarette in sight.
“It’s a horror movie,” Huo Chi corrected him.
It was much like the post-apocalyptic films they’d seen. Jiang Ziyao thought the walkers must all have been people once. They seemed sensitive to human scent, and even a little blood could draw them in. The infection probably spread through wounds. The tall man had been especially concerned about that.
When Huo Chi had been carrying Jiang Ziyao and got surrounded by walkers, the tall man had happened to fire a shot from the entrance of a nearby stairwell, saving them. Huo Chi had followed him here.
The tall man was searching through the ruined supermarket. He’d taken care not to make much noise while killing the walker outside, so now he could move around in peace.
He must have come here to look for supplies, Jiang Ziyao thought.
Walkers were still wandering outside, which was more than enough to show that the area they were in wasn’t safe. Jiang Ziyao didn’t understand the current situation, but if this was the apocalypse, food and water would be priceless. There were no lights, and he couldn’t see a single intact packet of food. The tall man had packed several bags of biscuits and a toothbrush. Almost anything useful had gone into his black pack.
Jiang Ziyao gave Huo Chi a look, and the two of them immediately began searching as well. Bloodstains marked the remaining shelves, as if there’d been a violent struggle. One set of shelves had collapsed, and several rotting corpses lay nearby. They were the source of the stench.
Jiang Ziyao finally understood that the dent in the corpse’s head was a bullet wound.
Huo Chi was still shaken. He kept worrying that one of the bodies on the floor would suddenly get up and bite them. Everything that had happened in the past few hours was enough to leave anyone frightened.
After enduring the stink for so long, at least they’d found something. Jiang Ziyao spotted a few pieces of chocolate scattered beside a corpse. He’d just bent to pick them up when Huo Chi suddenly grabbed his arm.
“Brother Jiang! Don’t go any farther!” Huo Chi warned. “Careful!”
Jiang Ziyao hadn’t noticed, but the half-corpse beside him was moving. Its desiccated, jerky-like hand had lifted. It had no body below the waist, its entrails spilled from its torn-open belly, and yet it could still move.
The sight was deeply disturbing.
The moment Jiang Ziyao’s gaze fell on the heap of black organs, he gagged. His stomach was empty, though, and nothing came up.
Huo Chi gripped Jiang Ziyao’s arm tightly to steady him. They both froze for a moment.
The walker was limited by its own body. It had probably caught their scent and could only crane its head toward them, straining to get closer. Its face was all bone, but it still pressed on.
“I’ve got this!” Huo Chi didn’t stand there frozen any longer. He looked around, steeled himself, and snatched up a piece of wood from the ground, swinging it at the walker’s head. Maybe he was nervous, because he missed by a little. The full force of the blow landed on the edge of the shelf.
With a crack, the shelf tilted, almost collapsing. The piece of wood in Huo Chi’s hand broke in half. He stared at the half-corpse, sweat beading on his forehead.
The tall man heard the noise and came over. He took one look, snatched the broken piece of wood from Huo Chi’s hand, and drove its splintered end into the walker’s head right in front of them. Black brain matter splattered out.
“Only destroying the brain will kill them.” The tall man looked openly skeptical. “Do I have to teach you that, too? How have you managed to survive this long?”
Huo Chi grimaced. “I panicked. I won’t do it next time.”
The tall man gave a cold snort and left them to it. He slung his pack over his shoulder and turned to watch the situation outside, apparently ready to leave.
[—Text: He came out looking for supplies. He has a Type 65 semiautomatic rifle. I’m guessing he belongs to a camp, but he doesn’t want to tell us anything more. In the world we live in now, anyone who’s survived has plenty of reasons to be wary.]
“Once you’ve found your supplies, could you take us with you?” Jiang Ziyao asked despite what he’d read. His expression was grave. He and Huo Chi had arrived in this unfamiliar place and urgently needed someone experienced like the tall man. Their first priority was survival.
“No. I don’t have time to babysit rookies.” The tall man scoffed, his disdain plain. He looked at the two young men, inexperienced and green, and didn’t think they had much chance of surviving.
The text had been confirmed, so Jiang Ziyao had gained something, at least. He smiled faintly. “Then we’ll say goodbye here. I hope you and your family are reunited safely.”
At the mention of family, the tall man’s expression changed. His hand was already moving toward his gun. “What are you trying to do?”
Jiang Ziyao pointed at his pack. “I mean no harm. I sincerely wish you well. I saw you pick up a few toys just now, too. I guessed you have a child.”
The tall man glared at him. “You’re observant.”
Jiang Ziyao continued, “How old is your child? It can’t be easy, raising a kid in a place like this.”
The tall man said nothing. He studied Jiang Ziyao and Huo Chi for a while longer, unwilling to take on unnecessary risks.
Although they were both tall and broad, their eyes were too guileless.
After a moment’s thought, the tall man asked, “Can you use a gun?”
Jiang Ziyao nodded. “I might be a little rusty, but we used Type 81 assault rifles during military training at university.”
“That’ll do.” The tall man took a handgun from his waist and pushed it toward Jiang Ziyao’s feet. He warned them, “There are five bullets left in this gun. You can keep it for protection. I suggest you find somewhere hidden before dark. Whether you live or die is up to you. But if you try to follow me, I’ll kill you.”
“I understand.” Jiang Ziyao spoke sincerely. “Thank you.”
“You were willing to save us from the start, and we’re grateful. Even more so now.”
[—Text: He refused to tell us about the camp, and we didn’t press him. He even gave me a gun. Ammunition is more precious than gold. In two years, I haven’t touched a gun. I’ve survived using sharp metal tools. Walkers are more fragile than ordinary people, but against mutants, a gun is the only thing that might give you a chance of winning. He’s about to leave. I think we might see each other again someday. There aren’t many survivors in this world, but as long as people are alive, there’s hope, even if the living are just as frightening as the mutants.]
Jiang Ziyao wasn’t going to sit around waiting. He turned to Huo Chi. “See if there’s anything else useful. We’ll pack it all up and take it with us.”
The place wasn’t safe. Once the tall man left, Jiang Ziyao didn’t want to stay long either.
“Sure,” Huo Chi replied. “I’ll find a bag.”
But before the tall man had gone far, Jiang Ziyao’s head began to ache again. A sharp, numbing pain spread through his nerves.
[—Text: This became one of my regrets later. While avoiding the walkers, we never realized we’d already been marked as prey. It clung to the wall in the blind spot by the entrance, watching everything we did. He became the mutant’s first target. In the blink of an eye, it pounced. It seemed to bite through his neck in an instant, spraying his blood everywhere. Its thin wings were as wide as a person’s shoulders. When I realized what was happening, I fired. Four shots went into the monster, and the last went into his head. Before I could watch him transform, I had to put an end to him. One more person was gone from this world. At the start of the apocalypse, people died in droves. I didn’t even have time to dispose of his body. By then, we’d grown used to it. We coldly and numbly took his weapons and supplies, all for the sake of finding a way to survive.]
Jiang Ziyao immediately turned toward the blind spot. Just as the text said, the tall man had reached the door and put a hand on the handle.
The blind spot must be up there!
Jiang Ziyao frowned. He didn’t know whether what came next would happen as the text described, and he couldn’t afford to take the chance. He raised the gun and flicked off the safety almost at once.
“Brother Jiang?” Huo Chi stared at him in shock.
Jiang Ziyao’s arm was already tensed. In an instant, he pulled the trigger. The bullet shot from the barrel.
The gunshot made their ears ring. One shot shattered the glass, the door exploding into fragments with a deafening crash. A black shadow dropped straight from the blind spot. Jiang Ziyao raised the gun and kept pulling the trigger. He fired all five bullets, four of them hitting the monster.
[—Text: The wood-boring moth, once a pest that could only harm white elms.]
[Low-tier mutant.]
The tall man reacted to the first gunshot, twisting away at once. The insect’s blood splattered across half his body, but he successfully dodged its attack.
Two of Jiang Ziyao’s shots hit its wings, throwing off its balance and sending it crashing to the ground. The monster was as large as a person. Its wings bore patterns like a cobra’s, and fine hairs covered its body. A large, dark brown patch covered its forewing, like a dead leaf.
It still tried to struggle. Its mouthparts spread wide, and beneath its labial palps lurked teeth sharp enough to grind a person to pieces.
Jiang Ziyao’s bullets had destroyed one pair of its wings and pierced its lower abdomen, but those shots didn’t seem fatal. The moth let out a furious screech. Jiang Ziyao sucked in a breath. The crushing tension somehow drove away some of his fear of the unknown.
A low-tier mutant. Even an ordinary moth, a creature that barely registered in people’s minds, had become a gigantic monster.
Apparently, walkers weren’t the only danger in this world. Other creatures had mutated, too.
The tall man reacted at once. Hunched over, he raised his rifle and aimed at the moth.
Bang!
The shot hit the moth in the head.
Even a mutated monster couldn’t survive a destroyed brain. The moth stopped moving and slumped by the entrance. The tall man quickly wiped the sticky blood from his cheek.
The two of them exchanged a look, still shaken.
“Can you take us with you now?” Jiang Ziyao asked.
His voice was steady, but the gunshots had left his head spinning. He pressed his thumb against the numb web of his hand and tucked it out of sight. He’d tried to hold it in, but his fingers were still trembling.
The tall man paused, then pressed down his hat. “The gunshots will bring every walker in the area. We can’t stay here.”
“Come on. Follow me.”