Lin Buyu heard some commotion coming from downstairs, so she deliberately went down to see what was happening.
Xiao Jingcheng and Su Ya were fooling around when they heard footsteps coming from upstairs. The two of them turned toward the source at the same time.
A girl in a white dress came running downstairs. She was pretty, delicate, and radiant, with a remarkably clean and innocent appearance.
The two of them suddenly understood that Nie Fei’s description had not been exaggerated in the slightest.
This girl was simply too delicate.
To maintain such fair skin and such an appearance in the apocalypse, she had to have been someone who had lived a pampered life.
Could she be the precious daughter of the leader of some major base?
That was the only explanation they could think of.
But someone like her, if she had no abilities, could only become a dependent who relied on others to survive once she left the protection of a powerful group.
“You’re Lin Buyu, right?” Su Ya was the first to break the silence. Compared with Lin Buyu, she had to admit that she herself was ridiculously tough.
That delicate, soft appearance really made her likable.
Lin Buyu sized up the two people in front of her while quickly analyzing their identities.
If she wasn’t mistaken, these two should be teammates of the future great villain, back before he developed the mentality of destroying the world.
The woman should be Su Ya, famously known as the “Iron Barbie.” She had heavily muscled arms and possessed a strength-type ability.
The man wore black-rimmed glasses and had a rather refined appearance. He was Xiao Jingcheng, whose ability was somewhat similar to Medusa’s eyes.
When he activated his ability, he could turn a zombie or a human to stone the instant he made eye contact with them.
However, he couldn’t petrify someone completely, and the effect had a time limit.
Once the time limit ended, the target would return to normal.
Furthermore, the stronger the target’s ability, the shorter the petrification would last. Against sufficiently powerful opponents, he might not even be able to petrify them.
But in a life-or-death battle, immobilizing an opponent for just a few seconds was often enough to determine the outcome.
“I’m Lin Buyu. Nice to meet you both.” She smiled and greeted them.
Neither of them was on the list of the villain’s future henchmen, so there was no need to deal with them.
“Hello.” Xiao Jingcheng pressed his lips into a gentle smile, looking every bit like a harmless gentleman.
Su Ya was straightforward and didn’t bother with unnecessary pleasantries.
She asked bluntly, “You’re our team leader’s bedmate?”
Oh.
What an embarrassing yet strangely exciting identity.
Lin Buyu nodded. “Yes, I’m Jiang Ran’s bedmate.”
She was even more straightforward than Su Ya. After all, it wasn’t actually true.
Xiao Jingcheng looked at her in surprise and subconsciously adjusted his glasses.
In the apocalypse, even if someone became the bedmate of a highly powerful and influential man, they wouldn’t usually admit it so casually.
After all, a bedmate wasn’t a wife or girlfriend. They weren’t considered a partner, but rather a man’s tool for satisfying his desires.
She really was different.
Perhaps, just as Nie Fei had said, she wasn’t a delicate vine that needed something to cling to, but a beautiful yet dangerous Venus flytrap.
In the apocalypse, few people had the leisure to waste time chatting.
No one ever knew when danger would strike.
Xiao Jingcheng and Su Ya had just returned from a mission and were in a state of severe ability depletion. They needed to rest and allow the energy crystals within their bodies to replenish the energy they had expended.
Therefore, after briefly introducing themselves to Lin Buyu, the two returned to their rooms to rest.
Lin Buyu didn’t need to sleep.
After all, she was a zombie and didn’t feel tired.
Since she couldn’t fall asleep, she decided to go outside for a stroll.
The Yulan Base was situated in a mountain valley surrounded by mountains on all four sides. Being located in a mountainous region gave it a natural advantage and made it an excellent refuge in the apocalypse.
The largest concentrations of zombies were generally found in urban areas.
The entire perimeter of the base was surrounded by high walls, with electrified barbed-wire fences installed on top.
After all, it had already been a year since the apocalypse began. Everyone’s defensive capabilities were certainly far better than they had been at the beginning.
There were only three villas in the entire base, and the team led by Jiang Ran occupied one of them.
The rest of the residents lived in buildings that were more like ordinary apartment complexes.
Jiang Ran had left earlier that day and still hadn’t returned. Lin Buyu had no idea where he had gone.
There were also areas in the base where ordinary civilians lived.
The so-called civilians were people who had neither awakened an ability nor possessed any particularly outstanding skills or influential family members.
They had the lowest status and the least say in the base.
Lin Buyu happened to be wandering in front of the buildings where the civilians lived when she heard a burst of laughter, along with the frightened voice of a young woman.
She rounded the corner and immediately saw what was happening.
There was a man with an extremely unpleasant face, his expression carrying the smugness of a petty tyrant.
He had red hair and tattoos covering both arms.
In his left hand, he held an iron chain. A zombie was shackled to the other end.
With his right arm, he was forcibly holding a very young woman against him.
The girl looked terrified. She was clearly upset and wanted to resist, but she didn’t dare.
The zombie was crouched on the ground like a dog, making guttural “huff, huff” sounds at another man.
The man, whose entire body was covered in injuries, gritted his teeth and glared at Gao Changsheng.
“Gao Changsheng, deliberately bringing a zombie inside the base violates the rules. Aren’t you afraid the leader will punish you?”
“Hahaha! Punish me? What do you think? Do you really think the leader would punish an ability user like me because of a useless piece of trash like you?”
Gao Changsheng sneered.
“It’s been a whole year since the apocalypse began, and you’re still acting so proud, huh? You’re just a useless piece of trash without an ability.”
As he spoke, he planted his foot on Xu San’s hand and ground it against the ground.
“Ah!”
Xu San’s hand bones snapped beneath his foot, and his entire body convulsed from the pain.
Gao Changsheng hadn’t merely crushed his hand bones.
He was also using his wind-type ability to viciously slice through the bones inside Xu San’s body.
Yet even though sweat poured from his forehead and his body trembled violently from the pain, Xu San refused to beg for mercy.
The girl beside him tried to resist, but Gao Changsheng tightened his grip around her.
“I already told you. If you move again, I’ll have your brother bitten by the zombie right now. Do you want your brother to become a zombie too?”
“Gao Changsheng, let go of my sister!” Xu San roared through gritted teeth as he writhed on the ground in pain.
“Let her go? Keep dreaming.”
Gao Changsheng laughed viciously.
“I never expected that before the apocalypse, you two siblings would always have the upper hand over me. And now, after the apocalypse, you’ve actually been hiding out here, barely scraping by—and I just happened to run into you.”
“Do you really think I’ll let you off?”
“Huh?”
“Not only am I not going to let you go, I’m going to make you watch with your own eyes as I have my way with your beloved little sister.”
Gao Changsheng laughed with wild arrogance.
Lin Buyu was receiving information transmitted to her by the system.
Gao Changsheng was one of the future henchmen of the great villain, Jiang Ran, in the original story.
Over the following year, he would crazily devour the energy crystals of other ability users and become an extremely powerful high-level ability user.
He would eventually become one of the forces that helped the great villain destroy the world.
The current incident involving Gao Changsheng took place only a week after he first arrived at Yulan Base.
Because he was an ability user, he had been admitted into Yulan Base’s elite team.
At this point in the story, he had not yet encountered Jiang Ran.
This particular plot point was meant to reveal one of the characteristics that established him as a villain.
Before the apocalypse, Gao Changsheng had been nothing more than a worthless street thug.
The Xu siblings had trained in martial arts since childhood and were quite capable fighters.
Whenever Gao Changsheng bullied or harassed someone, they would step in and teach him a lesson.
But then the apocalypse came.
Some people awakened supernatural abilities, while others were destined to remain ordinary.
And the people who awakened abilities weren’t necessarily the capable ones from before the apocalypse.
Once these people awakened abilities, they could instantly rise to the top of society.
This time, after accidentally running into the Xu siblings, Gao Changsheng would have a zombie bite Xu San before sexually assaulting his sister.
He would then easily dispose of both the zombie he had brought into the base and Xu San after Xu San transformed into a zombie.
And he wouldn’t receive any punishment.
After receiving the complete information about Gao Changsheng’s storyline, Lin Buyu felt like her fists were already clenched.
What a truly despicable villain.
Jiang Ran would eventually associate with someone like this?
It was disgusting.
Because of this, she couldn’t help developing a trace of disgust toward Jiang Ran, the great villain, as well.
So she needed to eliminate Gao Changsheng before he had a chance to come into contact with Jiang Ran.
But how should she destroy him?
Lin Buyu frowned.
If she didn’t have to worry about possessing an ability, someone like Gao Changsheng could be killed by her in minutes.
But now, he had an ability while she didn’t.
More importantly, she couldn’t expose herself too much. If people discovered that she was actually a zombie, she would be finished.
Just as she was frowning and thinking, the zombie nearby let out another series of guttural “huff, huff” sounds.
That reminded Lin Buyu of something.
She was the Zombie King.
Although having her energy crystal stolen had caused her to lose her original abilities, her blood still had a special effect on ordinary zombies.
It could drive them berserk!
Lin Buyu turned sideways and pressed her back against the wall. She pricked her fingertip until it bled.
Then, while Gao Changsheng wasn’t paying attention, she flicked the bead of blood from her fingertip into the zombie’s mouth.
The zombie had originally been lazily making its guttural noises.
But the instant Lin Buyu’s blood entered its mouth, its white eyes suddenly began to mutate.
They changed from grayish-white to pure white.
Then, with a sudden flash, they turned into an eerie, dark green.
The moment the zombie’s eyes changed color, it immediately looked toward Lin Buyu.
Lin Buyu had already hidden herself in the shadows among the grass.
When their eyes met, she strangely sensed a certain ability.
An ability that caused the zombie to fear her.
Originally, Lin Buyu had only wanted to make the zombie go berserk and attract the attention of the other people in the base, exposing the fact that Gao Changsheng had brought a zombie inside.
But now, the zombie hadn’t gone berserk.
It had simply mutated—and it was afraid of her.
This seemed like an even better development.
Lin Buyu’s lips curled into a smile, her expression filled with wickedness.
She wasn’t a softhearted person.
Especially not when it came to a disgusting scumbag like this.
She tried sending an order to the zombie through her mind.
“Tear apart the man who chained you. Bite through his neck. Don’t give him a chance to turn into a zombie.”
After the command was issued, one second passed.
Then two.
Then three…
The zombie didn’t move.
Lin Buyu was puzzled.
Could it not understand her?
The moment that thought crossed her mind, the chained zombie suddenly leaped into the air.
It moved so quickly that it left afterimages behind.
A speed-type mutated zombie!
Gao Changsheng was still laughing.
The worthless zombie he had deemed incapable of harming anyone suddenly appeared behind him in the blink of an eye.
It let out a sharp, piercing “huff!” and sank its teeth into his neck.
It moved so quickly that he didn’t even have time to react.
His eyes widened in shock.
The sudden turn of events made Xu San’s sister scream in terror.
She reacted quickly, breaking free from Gao Changsheng’s grasp and rushing toward her brother.
“Brother, run! He was bitten by a zombie!”
An ordinary zombie bite would give the victim several minutes of incubation time before they transformed.
But after being bitten by a mutated zombie, the toxin would spread throughout the body within seconds.
After being bitten, Gao Changsheng didn’t even have time to fight back before his neck began to stiffen and spasm uncontrollably.
Lin Buyu curled her lips into a smile.
Wow.
He was turning into a zombie.
Unfortunately, he wouldn’t get the chance.
Before he could completely mutate, the newly evolved zombie swiftly bit through his neck.
Once his head was severed from his body, there was no chance for the mutation to continue.
Lin Buyu’s target had only been Gao Changsheng.
She had no intention of allowing the newly evolved zombie to threaten any other humans.
So, after Gao Changsheng’s body and head were separated, she casually picked up a small stone from beside her and flicked it toward the green-eyed zombie’s head.
A headshot was the fastest and most effective way to deal with a zombie.
“Team Leader Jiang, something doesn’t seem right over there.”
A voice came from a distance.
Accompanying it was a powerful energy pressure that Lin Buyu recognized as uniquely belonging to Jiang Ran.