When Chen Yexun opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was Chu Yao’s face, caked in dried, dark red blood and mud, her eyes filled with panic and concern.
In an instant, memories flooded back like a surging tide—the wild boar, the chase, the crash, and that dying, warm current…
*Damn it!* How could he have made such an amateur mistake, losing consciousness in a situation like that?
In this hellscape, passing out usually meant death.
A fierce, throbbing pain radiated from above his right temple, but he didn’t have time to dwell on it.
Instead of answering Chu Yao immediately, he quickly darted his eyes around to scan their surroundings.
The light was dim, and the air was damp, smelling of earth and wet rock.
They seemed to be in a small natural cave—not very large, but more than enough to hold five or six people.
The sound of pouring rain echoed from the direction of the entrance.
The dense curtain of rain cut off the outside world, creating a natural barrier.
Sitting right by the entrance, leaning against the cavern wall, was a figure.
He was watching the rain outside with vigilant eyes while writing in a small notebook with a pen.
It was Li Chengyu.
He was actually awake and on guard.
Chen Yexun felt a slight wave of relief.
Only then did he turn his gaze back to Chu Yao’s face, right in front of him.
His voice was hoarse from just waking up: “I’m fine.
Just a bit sore where I got bumped.” He tried to sit up, but Chu Yao gently yet firmly pressed him back down.
“Could you stay still for a moment?” Chu Yao’s voice still trembled with lingering fear.
“The gauze on your head…
it’s dirty.
I want to change it for you.” She motioned toward a relatively clean roll of gauze in her hand.
Hearing this, Chen Yexun obediently lay back down.
He needed information.
“How long was I out?
When did it start raining?
How far are we from where we were before?” Chu Yao carefully unwrapped the old gauze soaked through with blood and grime.
She paused to think before answering truthfully, “You were out for about an hour and a half.
The rain…
started not long after you passed out.
It was coming down hard.” Her voice trembled slightly, clearly still terrified by the memory.
“I couldn’t drag both of you at all, so I squeezed every bit of strength I had to drag you behind the biggest bush nearby and covered you with branches and leaves.
I stood guard beside you with the axe, so scared my legs were shaking.
I kept telling myself if anything came near, I’d fight it with my life.” She paused and continued, “Luckily, after fifteen minutes or so, Mr.
Li woke up on his own.
The two of us carried you together and managed to find this cave.” Hearing this, Chen Yexun breathed a quiet sigh of relief.
The heavy rain had washed away their footprints and covered their scent.
It was undoubtedly cover granted by the heavens, significantly lowering the chances of those lunatics tracking them down.
*This companion really can be counted on in crucial moments,* he thought, raising his opinion of Chu Yao by several notches.
As he looked at her hands busy at work on his head, his gaze suddenly froze.
The gauze wrapped around her hands was utterly tattered, stained so heavily with dirt and grease that its original color was uninterpretable.
Through the tears in the cloth, her skin was visible—crisscrossed with cuts, the skin on several of her fingertips torn open in a gruesome sight.
He could imagine how this seemingly fragile woman had dragged two unconscious men through sheer terror and despair, using those hands to hack away at bushes, haul heavy weight, and ultimately find this sanctuary.
How grueling that journey must have been.
Noticing his gaze, Chu Yao quickly finished bandaging his forehead and instinctively tried to pull her hands back.
Chen Yexun snatched the remaining bit of gauze from her hand, then grabbed the unsealed bottle of rubbing alcohol she had set on the ground.
“You…” Chu Yao looked surprised.
Chen Yexun didn’t say a word.
He grabbed her wrist with rough efficiency, ripped away the rotten strips of cloth, and wiped the deep cuts directly with an alcohol-soaked cotton ball.
The sharp sting of alcohol on open wounds made Chu Yao gasp, but she bit her lip, neither resisting nor pulling her hand away.
In silence, Chen Yexun quickly re-bandaged both of her hands.
Ignoring her unvoiced gratitude, he stood up and instructed, “Keep an eye on those wounds.
Don’t handle combat directly until they’re fully healed.
If the blood of an infected gets into those cuts, not even God will be able to save you.” Chu Yao averted her gaze, keeping her head low as she whispered, “Thank you.” Just as Chen Yexun was about to step away, Chu Yao suddenly looked up, as if gathering all her courage.
Her lips twitched as if she wanted to say something, but hesitated.
“What is it?” Chen Yexun stopped.
“Did you…
have a nightmare just now?” Chu Yao asked softly, her tone tentative.
“When you first woke up…
your expression…
was a bit scary.” Chen Yexun froze for a second, then forced a faint, ambiguous smile.
“Yeah.
I had a nightmare.” “Did you dream…
about those infected?” “No,” Chen Yexun shook his head, looking toward the misty curtain of rain outside the cave.
“An old acquaintance.
Though I probably won’t ever see them again.” That was what he said, but in his heart, he thought: *With that man’s ability and mindset, he’ll probably not only survive in a hell like this, but thrive like a fish in water, continuing to victimize survivors.* He only hoped that man and woman had already died in the initial chaos.
Chu Yao perceptively sensed that he didn’t want to elaborate on the subject, so she searched for a way to change the topic.
Chen Yexun spoke first, his tone softening slightly.
“It’s been hard on you along the way.
Take some time to rest.” He paused and added, “My head just hurts on the surface.
I’m fine.” With that, he turned and walked toward the cave entrance, sitting down beside Li Chengyu.
Up close, he noticed that Li Chengyu’s face looked abnormally pale against the backdrop of rain light outside, and the fingers holding the pen trembled almost imperceptibly.
The man was purely holding on through sheer force of will.
Chen Yexun frowned.
Li Chengyu stopped writing, turned to look at him, and asked with concern, “Are you alright?
Does your head still hurt terribly?” “Worry about yourself first,” Chen Yexun said in a harsh tone.
“My injury is nothing compared to yours.
Did Chu Yao tell you?
You have a concussion.” As he spoke, he carefully examined Li Chengyu’s expression.
Li Chengyu merely gave a indifferent smile—one filled with weariness, but also a sense of relief at having survived a close call.
“She told me.
But at least we’re all still alive, aren’t we?
This little injury…
won’t claim my life just yet.” “Go back inside and lie down.
I’ll take over,” Chen Yexun gestured toward the interior of the cave.
“No need,” Li Chengyu shook his head, his eyes fixing once more on the rain outside.
“Sitting right here counts as rest for me.” Chen Yexun looked at him for a few seconds before giving up.
“Suit yourself.” Silence fell between them, leaving only the patter of rain outside and the rustle of the pen scraping across paper.
Chen Yexun’s gaze drifted casually to the notebook in Li Chengyu’s hands.
He didn’t ask, just watched quietly.
On the paper, what was written was neither a diary nor a plan, but name after name: *Duan Xuan…
intestines…
laughing…* *Zhang Yang…
by Duan Xuan…* *Wang Helin…
vehicle roof…
mutated…
fell…* Behind every single name were a few brief words, yet enough to outline a scene from hell.
After the last name, Li Chengyu’s pen paused for a long time, hovering in midair and trembling slightly.
Just then, Chen Yexun’s calm voice broke the silence.
“There’s no point.
No one’s going to see it.” Li Chengyu’s hand froze.
He raised his head to look at Chen Yexun’s expressionless side profile, then looked back down at the names on the paper, shaking his head slowly and firmly.
“No, there is.” His voice was hoarse, but quiet and steady, as if stating a fact rather than arguing.
“I’m afraid I’ll forget…” he whispered, his eyes casting out into the rain again, as though he could look through the curtain of water and see those departed faces.
“I’m afraid that as we keep going, I’ll forget…
what they looked like…
what they went through…” He paused, his fingertips unconsciously tracing the names on the paper.
“Writing it down…
at least proves that they lived, that they struggled, that they existed.” His voice grew even lower, almost merging into the sound of the rain.
“If…
if we end up failing too, at least…
this notebook can let whoever finds it know that once upon a time, a few people fought desperately to live and struggle in a hell like this…” “I suppose it’s…
another way of leaving proof that we existed in this world.” Chen Yexun remained silent for a moment after listening, offering no reply.
What he thought in his mind was: *Let future generations know?
A meaningless illusion.
In this apocalypse, surviving is the only thing that matters.* Just then, someone gently tapped Chen Yexun’s shoulder.
He looked back—it was Chu Yao.
She handed over her phone, its lit screen displaying a map app interface.
“I thought…
you might need this,” she whispered.
“Thoughtful of you.” Chen Yexun took the phone and checked their location.
The map showed that they were currently deep inside a true virgin forest, a considerable, winding distance away from the nearest highway on the map.
He instinctively glanced at the signal bars.
There were only two faint bars left.
“Signal’s so weak,” he muttered, frowning.
“Looks like we really ran pretty far.” Chu Yao squatted beside him.
“What do we do next?” Chen Yexun stared at the tiny dot representing their location on the map, his mind rapidly analyzing every possibility.