After taking care of everything, Ling Qingyun returned to his space to sleep. Only he truly knew how exhausted he was after fighting zombies all day.
The environment here was already much better compared to the hospitals and such he had seen before, but there was still an unpleasant smell outside. Facing those terrifying zombies all day had made him mentally tense. In comparison, even though the space was small, it was like heaven.
Back inside the space, Ling Qingyun took several deep breaths and immediately felt refreshed all over. When he looked out and saw Zhuang Cheng quietly sitting on top of the car, he felt completely at peace.
“You’re planning to stay with this guy forever, huh?” Xiao Gong jumped and landed on Ling Qingyun’s stomach as he lay on the ground.
“Of course. I won’t leave him.” Thinking of how Zhuang Cheng had clearly wanted to eat him before but held back, and even helped him when zombies were attacking, Ling Qingyun felt a warmth in his heart. Zhuang Cheng treated him so well—how could he just abandon him?
From now on, they’d hunt zombies together! Once he accumulated enough merit points, he would resurrect Zhuang Cheng. Then they could live happily ever after, and if Zhuang Cheng agreed, they might even adopt a few orphans…
“Forget it, do whatever you want. Just don’t do bad things and focus on cultivating merit. But since you care so much about that zombie outside, I suggest you start practicing the things on the jade slip sooner—especially that cloning technique. It should be very useful for you.”
“Cloning technique?” Ling Qingyun frowned, and soon the method of cultivating the cloning technique appeared in his mind.
Those who cultivate merit must treat their bodies as golden vessels of merit that need protection—they cannot be injured or let their primordial yang or yin leak… But that would be too painful… so clone yourself!
“What does this mean? If I’m reading this right, it means I can’t… can’t lose my virginity?” Ling Qingyun suddenly jumped up, flinging Xiao Gong off his stomach onto the ground. What kind of nonsense was this? Did this mean he couldn’t have any deeper intimacy with Zhuang Cheng anymore?
“How could you only focus on that!” Xiao Gong angrily said, “He’s a zombie now. Even if you wanted to do something, you can’t. To save him, you need to cultivate your golden vessel of merit to the Great Perfection level—that’s a hundred million merit points—and then you can do whatever you want!”
“Is that so?” Ling Qingyun came back to his senses and smiled awkwardly.
He had only graduated middle school and was a small-time thug for three years. But because Zhuang Cheng kept educating him about AIDS and syphilis, even showing him many AIDS awareness videos, he never dared get close to women who approached him. Later, when Zhuang Cheng got into university and came to S City, he came along too. In S City, he did manual labor like a migrant worker. He had neither the money nor the time to look for a girlfriend. Although he had watched plenty of adult videos and even seen some live shows back in the day, he’d never actually experienced the real thing…
Back then, when Zhuang Cheng caught him searching for beauty pictures on his computer, he purposely showed him all sorts of sexually transmitted disease info, repeatedly emphasizing how terrifying AIDS was… Ling Qingyun’s heart ached, but a smile involuntarily appeared on his face. At that time, Zhuang Cheng must have been very conflicted, worried that some bad woman might take him away.
“I just want to tell you, you can totally follow the method on the jade slip and catch a zombie outside to make a clone!” Xiao Gong continued, clearly speaking with good intentions, but why did its owner’s thoughts always go in a completely different direction?
Make a clone out of a zombie? Wouldn’t that mean he could stay with Zhuang Cheng all day? Even if he had to leave for a while, the clone could stay by Zhuang Cheng’s side… And he could even touch Zhuang Cheng sometimes… Ling Qingyun quickly reviewed the cultivation method for cloning in his mind. Xiao Gong was right—he really could use a zombie as a clone!
Most people made clones by refining various precious materials into a body and then injecting their spiritual power. But he didn’t have any materials to refine a clone. Instead, he could use the method of “possession.”
However, he was cultivating merit and absolutely couldn’t commit such “bad deeds.” Compared to that, using zombies as clones posed no such problems. In fact, he might even earn some merit points by rescuing a trapped soul!
“Is that really okay?” Ling Qingyun asked. He could already foresee the happy life he would have with such a clone! Maybe he could even stroll hand-in-hand with Zhuang Cheng through this city now filled with zombies!
If survivors saw them… a couple of zombies in love—how amusing would that be?
“Of course it’s okay. With a clone like that, you can have it stay with the zombies outside while you go rescue humans… I think I told you before, right? Saving more humans is good for you!” Xiao Gong glanced helplessly at the white, desolate surroundings. If all they did was kill zombies, when would this place ever be fully cleared? “Remember? You gave a human a few meal coupons that were meaningless to you, and you earned some merit points?”
“That happened?” Ling Qingyun frowned and thought it over. He seemed to have only given meal coupons to Zhuang Cheng’s junior. Did he really earn merit points then? He hadn’t noticed at all—his full attention was on Zhuang Cheng’s student ID at that time…
Xiao Gong gave Ling Qingyun a sidelong glance, then turned his back and crouched in a corner. His owner was really lucky—in a place where merit could be earned everywhere, if he didn’t become a saint soon… he’d be wasting himself!
Ling Qingyun rubbed his nose. He needed merit points desperately. In the short term, earning merit by killing zombies was feasible—but what about later? There was also this way of earning merit… If he organized a team to kill zombies, wouldn’t the merit earned by the team count toward him? If he helped survivors—fed them, settled them—how much merit would he earn?
Xiao Gong probably wouldn’t lie to him. According to it, earning merit from living humans should be much easier than from zombies…
Ling Qingyun hesitated, but decided to save some people without exposing Zhuang Cheng—if he wrapped Zhuang Cheng up completely, maybe others would think he was a warrior who just didn’t talk much. Of course, no matter what, Zhuang Cheng was the most important.
Ling Qingyun slept very well that night. When he woke up in the morning, he started his zombie-killing routine again, also sitting on a pile of stones with Zhuang Cheng to build their bond.
Many of the zombies at this construction site had been attracted here by him and by Zhang Yi and others before. Some had come recently from the city center. Although there were quite a few, it wasn’t overwhelming. After three days of killing, Ling Qingyun’s merit points surpassed two thousand, and all the zombies were wiped out.
Then, Ling Qingyun discovered a big problem—he was constipated!
Over the past three days, Ling Qingyun had already learned to stay calm about Zhuang Cheng witnessing him relieving himself. But the fact that, despite all his efforts, he still couldn’t go… was humiliating—even in front of a zombie.
Besides, anyone who’s ever been constipated would know—it’s a terrible feeling…
Since the apocalypse began, Ling Qingyun had basically stopped eating green vegetables. Back in the safe zone, at least he still had rice. But over the past few days, he had only been eating vacuum-packed ready-to-eat meals. It was practically impossible not to get constipated… And as if being constipated wasn’t bad enough—this was his first time trying to go in four days, and only then did he realize… he didn’t have any toilet paper!
No daily necessities around him, no food left, no spare clothes, and not even water…
Looks like he had to leave this place now.
Sitting in the SUV, Ling Qingyun sorted through his belongings, knowing that by tomorrow, he would need to move somewhere else. And… he pulled out a completely dead phone. Maybe he should also find a place to contact Gu Jiabao—he had prepared everything before leaving, yet somehow forgot to charge his phone!
He hadn’t been close with Gu Jiabao before, but now he wanted to get some intel from him. To be honest, it was kind of ridiculous—because he’d been out of the loop for so long, not only did he not know the current situation in the safe zones or the rest of the world, he didn’t even know much about zombies!
For example, he had no idea whether the zombie “virus” could infect animals. But judging by the birds still chirping cheerfully overhead from time to time, it seemed like only humans turned into zombies…
In just over a month, the corners of this cement construction site had already sprouted quite a bit of wild grass, growing freely, completely unaffected by the zombies.
Maybe… without humans, the world would be even more beautiful…
Zhuang Cheng was still sitting on the roof of the SUV. At first, Ling Qingyun had been worried that zombies might damage the car. But then he remembered—his storage space could actually hold the whole vehicle. Just as he was about to put it in, Xiao Gong told him that if he wanted to store it, he had to clean it first…
Fine. Zhuang Cheng really liked this car anyway. As long as he was careful, the car wouldn’t get damaged—might as well just leave it outside!
“Chengcheng, I’m going to sleep now. See you tomorrow!” Ling Qingyun called out to Zhuang Cheng, then turned and entered his storage space.
Zhuang Cheng, sitting on the roof, was already used to this routine.
He didn’t understand the sounds his food made, but he simply sat quietly on the roof of the SUV, not planning to move.
Even though he felt more at ease at night, he still preferred the daytime—because once the sun rose, his food would suddenly appear in front of him again, and that made him happy, as if his hunger wasn’t so unbearable anymore…