“There really aren’t any zombies…” Qi Zhaozhao said in disbelief.
It had already been nearly fifteen minutes since they entered the scenic area. The sightseeing cart had followed Rong Mountain Lake all the way into the tree-lined paths deep inside the park, yet during the entire trip they hadn’t seen a single zombie. Even the ground they passed over was spotless.
“There should be zombies here.”
Ye Ling’s guard hadn’t dropped despite the peacefulness of the past dozen minutes. “The outbreak started around ten in the morning. Even if this is the off-season for tourism, there’s no way there wouldn’t be a single zombie here unless…”
“They were all drawn somewhere else.”
The moment Jiang Qi heard that, she got a bad feeling. “Don’t tell me we’re going to run into another traffic jam like the one outside the university?”
This time they didn’t have an armored vehicle protecting them.
Ye Ling replied helplessly, “Hopefully not.”
Qi Zhaozhao silently prayed that nothing else would go wrong during their escape from Rong City.
Already unsettled by Ye Ling’s words, Jiang Qi quickly took out her phone to check the official tourist map of the scenic area.
“After Rong Mountain Lake is the forest walking area. Then comes the children’s amusement zone and the camping and picnic area. After that is the wildlife interaction zone where visitors can feed alpacas and monkeys.”
“Ye Ling, once we pass through the wildlife interaction zone, we’ll reach the south gate exit.”
Ye Ling glanced at the map on Jiang Qi’s phone and mentally memorized the route once more.
Ten minutes later, they left the forest walking area and entered the children’s amusement zone and camping picnic area.
There were three or five zombies nearby, but before any of them could get close, Ye Ling killed them one by one with his steel crossbow.
Finally, they arrived at the wildlife interaction zone.
“All the animals are dead…”
Qi Zhaozhao looked sadly at the alpacas, peacocks, and other animals inside the fenced enclosures. Some had been eaten down to nothing but skeletons, while others were horribly mutilated.
“Everyone, stay alert. There are definitely zombies here!”
Ye Ling tightened his grip on the steering wheel as he warned them.
Jiang Qi gripped her frying pan with both hands and took a deep breath, her eyes closed. “As long as there aren’t more than ten zombies, we should still be able to handle—”
Before she could finish speaking, more than a dozen monkeys suddenly appeared in the tall trees lining both sides of the road. They shook the branches wildly while screeching loudly.
The sudden change left all three of them momentarily confused.
But that confusion didn’t last long. The moment Ye Ling drove the sightseeing cart around a bend, they saw the horrifying scene ahead.
Six tourist buses were scattered haphazardly across the south gate exit of Rong Mountain Scenic Area, completely blocking the road. Cluster after cluster of middle-aged women and men wearing matching blue vests labeled “Sunset Red Tour Group” gathered there, along with group after group of gray-haired elderly women and men.
Screeeech—
The sightseeing cart came to a stop.
The elderly tour group, clearly numbering over two hundred people, turned their heads in perfect unison.
Revealing aged zombie faces with sickly bluish-gray skin that was obviously no longer human.
The distance between them was far too short. The sightseeing cart had no protective walls, and there wasn’t enough time to turn around and flee, so Ye Ling made a split-second decision and jumped out of the vehicle.
“RUN!!!”
Jiang Qi and Qi Zhaozhao followed behind him in terror, sprinting for their lives.
At the same time, deafening zombie roars and synchronized footsteps erupted behind them.
“ROAR—!!!”
Jiang Qi finally understood why there had been no zombies near the east gate.
Because Rong Mountain Scenic Area had only been hosting elderly tour groups today!
Humans could run faster than zombies under normal circumstances. Although the distance between them and the elderly zombie horde gradually widened, Qi Zhaozhao still didn’t dare look back.
“Brother Ye! Sister Jiang! Which way are we running?!”
Ye Ling answered, “Toward the west gate.”
Jiang Qi froze. “The west gate?”
She had looked at the map of the scenic area before. The fastest route to the west gate was by climbing the mountain.
“Doesn’t that mean we have to climb a mountain?!”
Jiang Qi suddenly had a terrible premonition.
Ye Ling nodded. “That’s right. We climb to the summit, then take the cable car down to the west gate entrance. As long as we get onto the cable car, we can shake off the zombies.”
Jiang Qi opened her mouth, then slowly closed it again. “…”
Why do you think it’s called Rong Mountain Scenic Area? Obviously because Rong Mountain itself is the main attraction.
When Jiang Qi had looked up travel guides for Rong Mountain Scenic Area, she had even specifically checked the visitor reviews.
Beautiful scenery. Took four hours to climb to the summit. A great place for a short weekend trip.
Four hours…
Haha… four hours…
How was she supposed to compete with zombies in a mountain climb? Humans got tired. Zombies didn’t!
Jiang Qi seriously doubted whether she could even reach the summit before the zombies did, but in the end she swallowed the words back down.
“So what if we’re competing with zombies in mountain climbing? Twenty-two is the age to fight with everything you’ve got!”
She was going all in!
Ye Ling clearly exercised regularly, so he ran much faster than Jiang Qi. Qi Zhaozhao was only eighteen, the peak age of youthful energy and vitality, and she also ran faster than Jiang Qi. As a result, among the three-person temporary team, Jiang Qi, the freshly graduated intern, ended up lagging behind.
“Sister Jiang, do you want me to pull you along?” Qi Zhaozhao asked worriedly.
“No need, I can do it.”
How could she let an eighteen-year-old girl help her? Even if they didn’t attend the same school, she was still technically an older senior who had already graduated!
Jiang Qi stubbornly refused and forced herself to speed up enough to keep up with her teammates.
First they sprinted down a long, straight road before finally reaching the starting point of Rong Mountain’s climbing trail. The first thing they saw was an upward slope angled at sixty degrees.
None of the three slowed down as they stepped onto the incline, and Jiang Qi clenched her teeth and forced her legs forward.
After finally climbing the long sixty-degree slope, what awaited them next was an endless staircase stretching so far upward that they couldn’t even see the end.
Jiang Qi nearly blacked out on the spot.
“No, we can’t just compete with zombies in stamina without doing anything. We’ll lose…”
Think of something, think of something…
Jiang Qi’s eyes suddenly lit up. She pulled cooking oil out of her spatial ring and handed it to Ye Ling and Qi Zhaozhao.
“Quick, pour oil on the slope! Don’t let the zombies have a chance to chase us up here!”
Qi Zhaozhao was already panting heavily from the run, but the moment she heard Jiang Qi’s words, she immediately began pouring cooking oil across the slope behind them without hesitation. Once Ye Ling realized what Jiang Qi intended to do, he also started pouring oil over the ground.
Jiang Qi herself carried a large jug of cooking oil, pouring as she climbed. “Don’t stop moving. Pour while climbing the stairs.”
All this cooking oil had originally been collected from Kangkang Convenience Store as materials specifically intended for Ye Ling to make weapons with. Who would have thought it would end up being used here instead?
By the time the cooking oil was nearly exhausted, the elderly zombie horde had finally caught up.
Jiang Qi didn’t stop moving. She continued pulling out every spherical object she could find from her spatial ring and scattered them across the stairs.
Ping-pong balls, bouncy balls, and chocolate balls immediately went rolling everywhere.
Qi Zhaozhao watched as the elderly and middle-aged zombies at the very front either slipped on the oil-slicked ground or stepped on ping-pong balls and crashed to the ground.
The trail was already on a steep slope, and the stairs only made it worse. The zombies in front fell into the zombies behind them, and those zombies toppled into the ones farther back. In an instant, zombies were tumbling over one another in waves.
Admiration appeared in Qi Zhaozhao’s eyes. As expected of Sister Jiang, completely fearless even in a crisis!
Ye Ling quickly used his ability to make another Molotov cocktail. After Jiang Qi finally stopped, he asked, “Should I throw it?”
Still panting, Jiang Qi replied, “Not yet. Let’s climb first. Throw it later.”
As she spoke, she grabbed Qi Zhaozhao and started heading up the stairs.
Not long after, a thunderous explosion sounded from behind them, and Ye Ling quickly caught up.
Qi Zhaozhao turned back to look at the raging fire blazing at the foot of the mountain, then glanced at the lush forest all around them. Somewhat worried, she asked, “Sister Jiang… does this count as setting the mountain on fire?”
Jiang Qi: “…”
Ye Ling: “…”
The zombies were already covered in cooking oil from all the earlier falls, making them highly flammable. And if they kept running wildly around the mountain while chasing them, then, uh…
Jiang Qi coughed awkwardly. “We should probably climb faster.”
At the very least, they needed to reach the summit before the fire spread up the mountain.
***
Three hours later, Jiang Qi collapsed to her knees at the mountaintop, utterly drained. She wheezed like a broken bellows, sweat soaking her entire body, her lips pale. “Hah… hah…”
Qi Zhaozhao wasn’t in much better shape. She kept stuffing Snickers bars into her mouth, terrified she’d pass out from low blood sugar.
Out of the entire temporary team, only Ye Ling still had decent stamina left.
At the very least, he could still remain standing.
It had been the same during the climb. Jiang Qi and Qi Zhaozhao had been so exhausted they didn’t even have the energy to stay alert, while Ye Ling alone kept watch for zombies chasing after them.
Of course, the few scattered zombies that did catch up were all dealt with by him one by one.
“You two really need to work out more.”
Ye Ling wiped the sweat from his forehead as he spoke.
Jiang Qi also regretted never having developed the habit of exercising before, but who had time to work out when their job situation was unstable? She had only been focused on surviving.
“By the way… Ye Ling… what do you do in real life?”
His stamina was way too good for an ordinary office worker!
“A pilot.”
A trace of pride flashed across Ye Ling’s face when he mentioned his profession.
Qi Zhaozhao’s eyes lit up. “Air Force?”
Ye Ling shook his head. “Commercial aviation.”
“That’s still amazing…” Qi Zhaozhao said admiringly.
Jiang Qi pushed herself upright with her hands on her knees. “Let’s go take the cable car.”
She wanted to leave this nightmare-like place as soon as possible.
The nightmare being the mountain climbing.
When they reached the cable car station, the three of them were relieved to discover the cable cars were still operating, probably because when the zombie outbreak began yesterday morning, the staff never had time to shut the system down.
After boarding one by one, Jiang Qi slumped limply into her seat. She no longer had the strength to move, but Qi Zhaozhao’s gaze drifted toward the mountain below.
“Look! Rong Mountain is on fire!”
Jiang Qi and Ye Ling followed the direction Qi Zhaozhao was pointing.
They hadn’t noticed it while climbing, but now that they were looking down from inside the cable car, they realized Rong Mountain had already caught fire. The flames were spreading upward and outward, threatening to engulf the entire Rong Mountain Scenic Area.
Qi Zhaozhao murmured, “Sister Jiang… do you think… after us, there’ll still be players who try to leave Rong City through the Rong Mountain Scenic Area route?”
“I don’t know.”
Jiang Qi shook her head. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
“But whether there are or not has nothing to do with us.”
Ye Ling also calmly withdrew his gaze. “Get some rest. There might be zombies gathered at the west gate exit too. We need to conserve our energy in advance.”
“Mm.” Qi Zhaozhao nodded, looking a little sentimental.
She couldn’t help feeling that because of the fire they started, other players who might once have had a chance to escape Rong City had now lost that opportunity.
But Sister Jiang was right.
No matter what consequences this fire caused, it had nothing to do with them.
Because this was apocalyptic survival, not apocalyptic rescue.