Li Chengyu kept his head down as images flashed repeatedly in his mind: his younger cousin’s icy gaze as he severed the man’s wrist without hesitation, the spraying blood, and the venomous curse hurled just before the man plummeted into hell…
It all filled him with an unprecedented sense of alien detachment and chilling dread.
A tempest raged in his chest, but in the end, the thousands of words churning inside him boiled down to two dry syllables: “I’m fine.” He had a distinct feeling that his introverted, almost cowardly cousin had changed.
Was it because of this sudden apocalypse?
Or had he always…
hidden another side of himself?
Perhaps it was because he had witnessed him calmly abandon a fellow survivor.
From start to finish, there hadn’t been a ripple of emotion in those eyes—only pure, cold calculation.
Yet a voice of reason reminded him: if Chen Yexun hadn’t acted so decisively, the one dragged outside and ripped to pieces right now might have been himself.
Chen Yexun took in every detail of his cousin’s fleeting pallor and the subtle distance deep in his eyes.
Without making a scene, he withdrew his hand, which had hovered midair, while his other hand instinctively tightened around the bloodstained fruit knife.
His eyes flicked guardedly between the unfamiliar man and woman across from them, his tone casual: “Good to hear.” Just then, Li Chengyu looked up, his voice carrying a faint tremble that broke the silence.
“Zhang Yang and the others…
Duan Xuan…
did they really…?” Chen Yexun met his gaze and slowly nodded, his tone as detached as if recounting something completely unrelated to him.
“I saw it with my own eyes.
I don’t know if Duan Xuan got the madman’s blood in a wound or something else, but he went mad too.
I only looked back for a second, but I saw it clearly.
He…
was smiling as he strangled Zhang Yang with his own intestines.” Even though he had braced himself, hearing such a gruesome, horrific death suffered by his close friend made Li Chengyu’s face turn even paler, his stomach churning again.
Four years as classmates, gone just like that?
And…
he looked at Chen Yexun again, unable to shake an unsettling feeling.
How could his cousin remain so calm after something so monstrous?
Calm to the point of being…
terrifying.
As if reading his doubts, Chen Yexun turned his head and laid out his hypothesis, partly to shift the subject and partly to steady everyone’s nerves.
“Whatever is driving these people crazy seems to be some kind of virus, similar to zombie movie tropes.
It spreads through bodily fluids.
If blood or saliva from an infected person gets into a wound, you’ll likely mutate into one of them in short order.” “How can you be sure?
Do you have proof?” Li Chengyu asked instinctively, his voice still weak.
Chen Yexun then recounted in detail what he had witnessed—how the bitten security guard had rapidly succumbed to the infection and turned feral—for the three others in the cable car.
As he spoke, his gaze swept continuously between the weeping woman and the security guard, meticulously scrutinizing every subtle reaction.
The woman still kept her head buried deep between her knees, her shoulders quivering.
She seemed entirely consumed by her grief and terror, deaf to the outside world.
The guard listened intently, lingering fear and shock written across his face, but he didn’t display any overtly suspicious signs.
At least, there were no visible wounds on his exposed skin.
Still, Chen Yexun dared not relax.
He subconsciously tightened his grip on the knife.
Taking a deep breath as if to break the suffocating atmosphere, the guard took the initiative to speak.
“Um…
what should I call you guys?
I’m Wang Helin.
I’ve been working as a security guard here for two years.” He tried to demonstrate his usefulness.
“I know where the main breaker is around here, whether there’s stock left in the convenience store’s storage room, even a few side paths—it’s all up in my head.
If we need to make a plan later, having me around should help things go smoother.” Chen Yexun nodded, though he didn’t take much of it to heart.
His attention was mostly focused on Li Chengyu beside him, who was anxiously fiddling with his phone.
“What’s wrong?” Chen Yexun asked.
“No response on WeChat…
and the calls won’t go through!” Li Chengyu’s voice carried an irrepressible surge of anxiety and panic.
“I’m trying to reach my mom and dad!
Still nothing!” Hearing this, Wang Helin snapped to as well and hurriedly pulled out his phone.
His trembling fingers dialed, but the speaker returned only “The subscriber you have dialed is switched off” or endless busy tones.
After repeated attempts, his face turned ash-gray as he lowered his phone, panic flooding his eyes.
*Contacting family…* A cold ripple flickered in Chen Yexun’s chest.
Recalling his sickening, hypocritical household—soaked in bloodshed and lies—he even felt a vicious thought take hold: *If they die in this disaster, so much the better.
Consider it divine retribution at long last.* “Yexun, aren’t you going to call home to check?” Li Chengyu suddenly raised his head, his eyes rimmed with red.
Chen Yexun’s expression remained impassive, his tone dismissive.
“We can barely save ourselves.
Who has time to worry about others?
Let’s focus on surviving first.” Li Chengyu hummed in agreement and didn’t press further, perhaps thinking his cousin made sense, or perhaps assuming Chen Yexun just didn’t want to hear bad news about his family.
He turned, looking as if he were about to ask the weeping woman why she wasn’t trying to contact her family.
Right then, Chen Yexun suddenly cut him off with a sharp “Hey.” Li Chengyu turned in confusion, only to see Chen Yexun give a barely perceptible shake of his head and gesture subtly toward the woman.
Understanding hit Li Chengyu instantly, sending a deeper chill down his spine.
She had been like this ever since she boarded.
Maybe her family…
had been killed in the chaos at the base of the mountain, right before her eyes…
He didn’t dare pursue the thought any further and quietly shut his mouth.
However, just as a heavy silence settled over the cabin once more, Chen Yexun suddenly stood up under everyone’s astonished gazes.
The fruit knife in his hand glinted coldly in the dim light.
His icy gaze swept over Wang Helin and the crying woman.
“Hey.
Get up,” he commanded, his voice devoid of emotion.
“Take off your shirts.
Let me see if you have any wounds.” Before either could react, he flicked the point of his blade toward the glass window at the rear wall of the car.
“Then find something heavy and smash this window.” “What?!” Li Chengyu froze.
Wang Helin was equally stunned, forcing a stiff smile.
“Man…
bro, what do you mean?
What kind of game is this?” “What do I mean?” Chen Yexun’s sharp gaze pierced them both.
“God knows if either of you got bitten or injured down there.
If you suddenly turn in here, we won’t even have time to react.” He weighed the knife in his hand, his tone chillingly uncompromising.
“So let’s lay all our cards on the table right now.
Take off your clothes and prove you’re clean.
Then smash the glass.” “On what authority?!” Wang Helin stood up in alarm, instinctively raising his hands as his pitch jumped an octave.
“What about you?!
How do you prove you haven’t been bitten?!” A near-cruel smirk curled Chen Yexun’s lips.
“I don’t have to prove anything.
Take a look at who’s holding the power here.” He bounced the steadily held blade in his hand once more.
“If you’re infected, you die.
If I’m infected…
and I mutate, you still die.
Is that logic clear enough?” “Yexun!
Have you lost your mind?!” Li Chengyu stepped forward to grab him, but Chen Yexun shoved him aside with a heavy arm.
Seeing how utterly unreasonable and resolute Chen Yexun was, Wang Helin’s face went through several shifts.
Looking at that knife that had already shed blood, he finally yielded.
Gritting his teeth, he silently removed his security jacket, then his T-shirt, revealing a lean, toned upper body with no visible wounds.
“There, happy now?!” he snapped angrily.
He pulled his clothes back on and scooped up the selfie stick from the floor.
“And what the hell is breaking the glass for?!” “To give us a slightly better chance of survival.” Chen Yexun kept his vigilant gaze on him, his tone chillingly calm.
“Do you really think it’s going to be safe when we reach the other side?” His words made both Li Chengyu and Wang Helin freeze.
“If total chaos has broken out at the bottom of the mountain, what about the top?” Chen Yexun’s voice dropped.
“What if what’s waiting for us on the opposite platform isn’t help, but another swarm of maniacs?” The cable car swayed gently as it approached the mist-shrouded far shore.
The hazy greenery now seemed fraught with unknown danger.
“So,” Chen Yexun pointed at the window they were about to break, “if things go sideways over there, this is our only way out.
We hang onto the cables outside and climb back.” “Climb back?!” Li Chengyu blurted in shock.
“The bottom of the mountain is full of infected too!
Plus, we’re so high up—what if we run out of strength and fall?” “I checked on our way up,” Chen Yexun replied, his tone as flat as ever.
“Below the departure platform, it’s only about two stories down, with dirt and bushes underneath.
If we’re lucky, the fall won’t kill us.
And even if we do fall to our deaths…” He paused, sweeping his eyes across the hellish scene outside the window.
“…it’s still far better than falling into the hands of those maniacs and being tortured to death while they laugh.” Dead silence fell over the cabin once more.
Only the cold gleam of the fruit knife remained, alongside the far shore drawing steadily closer outside the window.