At first, Ling Qingyun was silent when facing Zhuang Cheng, because he knew very well that Zhuang Cheng couldn’t understand his words. But after discovering that Zhuang Cheng still had memories of him, he began to enjoy talking to him.
Being alone in this world, constantly killing zombies, was an unbearably lonely thing. But having someone beside you made everything feel completely different.
Ling Qingyun didn’t like leaving Zhuang Cheng outside every night, but he needed to sleep and practice some cultivation techniques. So after greeting Zhuang Cheng, he would nestle into his space, exploring everything brought by the jade pendant on his forehead while studying how to survive better in this apocalypse.
The next day, after researching the clone technique for a long time and getting a good night’s sleep, Ling Qingyun left the space and appeared inside the off-road vehicle. He greeted Zhuang Cheng, who was sitting on top: “Chengcheng, good morning!”
Zhuang Cheng glanced at him, made some sounds from his throat, and then bared his teeth.
“Chengcheng, let’s leave here!” Ling Qingyun said. Walking with his feet would be very slow, so he had to drive away, but for some reason, Zhuang Cheng had never gotten inside the off-road vehicle.
Of course, Zhuang Cheng didn’t answer. He just turned his neck and stared at Ling Qingyun, watching him check the vehicle and take gasoline from the trunk to refuel it.
This time Ling Qingyun didn’t eat breakfast. There was almost nothing left to eat by his side. The most important thing now was to go to the city and find enough food.
“Chengcheng, don’t stay on the roof. Come sit in the back, okay?” After tidying up, Ling Qingyun looked at Zhuang Cheng sitting on the roof and sighed helplessly.
The safe zone of S City had many helicopters, and countless people going out on missions… If others saw a zombie sitting on top of a vehicle, not only would it attract attention, but they would probably attack immediately.
Zhuang Cheng didn’t react at all. Ling Qingyun thought for a moment, then climbed into the vehicle, closed the sunroof, and shut the doors.
“Tap! Tap!” Zhuang Cheng pressed his face against the window looking inside. The scars on his face and his fierce expression made him look terrifying. His quick knocking on the window also showed his anger. Ling Qingyun smiled at him, then leaned over to open the rear door of the off-road vehicle.
Zhuang Cheng hesitated for a moment, then crawled inside, suddenly standing up and banging his head violently against the roof with a loud “bang.” He hit his head several times before finally sitting down in the back seat—but in a very awkward posture.
“Chengcheng, from now on, just sit in the back! That way no one can see you. From now on, we’ll kill zombies together and accumulate merits!” Ling Qingyun felt a pang in his heart as he spoke to the dirty, awkwardly seated Zhuang Cheng in the back, then started the vehicle.
The off-road vehicle headed toward the urban area of S City. Perhaps because it was still early, or maybe because there were no important resources in this area, they didn’t encounter any task forces from the safe zone or other survivors at all.
Speaking of survivors… Ling Qingyun had previously followed Zhang Yi around gathering supplies and rescuing survivors, so he naturally knew there were still many survivors in S City. But now, it seemed the higher-ups had reached their limits. Just a few days before he left, Zhang Yi had even mentioned that the special forces of the S City safe zone had mysteriously vanished…
The busier the road, the more likely it was blocked by broken-down vehicles. Since Ling Qingyun wasn’t trying to flee but instead looking for a place to stock up on food and kill zombies, he avoided the crowds and headed toward more remote areas instead.
The population density in S City was unimaginably high, so there were plenty of zombies wandering the streets. The corpses of zombies or humans that had been killed lay rotting and stinking on the roadsides, swarming with countless maggots. Fortunately, to Ling Qingyun’s relief, the flies feeding on zombie flesh hadn’t turned into “zombie flies.”
Ling Qingyun wasn’t a particularly skilled driver, so he didn’t dare run over the zombies walking in the road. He could only let them continue wandering or chase after him. But when he turned onto a side street, he realized he had found the right place.
Demolition was something some people treated like a plague, while others dreamed of it happening to them.
This was the outskirts of S City, formerly a rural area. If not for demolition, each household would still be farming and living in self-built houses on their land. But once demolition occurred, they could get multi-story buildings or even storefront properties on the main roads—enough to live off rent comfortably.
In S City, housing was never hard to rent out, so the buildings lining this road were surely packed with people before.
When Ling Qingyun first arrived in S City, he had rented a place with a group of others in the suburbs. A 100-square-meter apartment could house over a dozen people. So he wasn’t surprised by the number of zombies lining the entire road—it was likely full of people renting those homes. Group housing was never safe: all it took was one person turning into a zombie in a panic, and the whole group would be bitten. Nothing could be done about it.
More importantly for Ling Qingyun, several supermarkets lined this street—and he was starving!
The off-road vehicle suddenly accelerated and charged toward the northernmost supermarket on the street—there were fewer zombies here than on the southern side. With a sharp brake, the car screeched to a halt, scraping the wall but effectively blocking most of the supermarket entrance.
The entrance had been violently destroyed—clearly by human hands—suggesting survivors had once tried to get food here. But judging by the brownish bloodstains and the crowd of zombies inside, those survivors probably didn’t have good luck.
Ling Qingyun opened the car door and stepped out. Since Zhuang Cheng was still in the vehicle, he left the door open. Holding his spiked mace, he headed straight into the supermarket. The store was packed with zombies—thankfully, none seemed to be mutated ones. To these zombies, a living person like Ling Qingyun was a deadly temptation. All of them surged toward the entrance, their open mouths reeking of rot—perhaps from eating flesh. Their clothing and hands were stained with blood. Regardless of whether they had once been male or female, old or young, they were now all the same: monsters.
Having killed so many zombies, Ling Qingyun had long become skilled and unflinching. He paid no attention to the swarm. Only after the supermarket entrance was piled high with zombie corpses and no other sounds were heard did he step fully inside.
Suddenly, something tightened around his leg. Ling Qingyun reacted instantly, swinging his spiked mace down hard—smashing off a zombie’s arm with perfect precision.
It was a zombie that had already lost its lower body, with most of its upper body also chewed away, hiding behind the checkout counter! And somehow, it hadn’t made a single sound until now!
Ling Qingyun smashed the zombie to death with his spiked mace. Fortunately, he was wearing the military boots Zhang Yi had given him back then—very sturdy—otherwise…
He shivered at the thought. After calming himself, Ling Qingyun began to sweep through the entire supermarket. It was a small store selling mostly minor items, mostly food. He didn’t have time to inspect everything, so he just threw it all into his spatial storage. Thinking about how he didn’t have any toilet paper or toiletries with him, he also took some of those.
When he was done, he found that hundreds of zombies had already gathered outside the supermarket entrance, crowding around the off-road vehicle, waiting to eat him alive. A few zombies had even managed to squeeze into the supermarket.
Time to “get to work”! Ling Qingyun’s eyes lit up—these were all potential merit points! But after only killing a few, his hands couldn’t help but tremble.
At the construction site earlier, he was sure there were no survivors, so he had dared to slaughter zombies freely and show his strength. But here… what if there were survivors watching from the surrounding buildings? If their phones still had power, they might even take pictures and post what they saw…
He’d been careless! Ling Qingyun glanced at Zhuang Cheng, who was obediently sitting in the vehicle watching him. If Zhuang Cheng were exposed and ended up in danger, how could he live with himself?
Swinging his spiked mace, he took down several zombies crowding the front of the SUV, then quickly got back into the vehicle. Fortunately, he hadn’t taken too long, and the zombies near this supermarket were relatively few—otherwise, the vehicle might not have been able to get away!
Starting the engine, Ling Qingyun drove elsewhere. He didn’t drive too fast—there was so much potential merit here, and he didn’t want to waste it. But first, he needed to find a safe place to kill to his heart’s content.
The place Ling Qingyun ended up choosing was a free public park.
This park had a large open square. In the past, every morning and evening, groups of elderly people would gather here to dance. But now, only a few scattered zombies were shuffling around.
There were no tall buildings nearby, and trees provided some cover, making it an ideal place to wipe them all out. Ling Qingyun got out of the SUV and was just about to attack when one zombie suddenly lunged at him—followed by two more leaping toward him at the same time!
Mutated zombies! And three of them!
Mutated zombies have agility comparable to ordinary humans, and the speed-type mutated zombies are even faster than normal people. Their only weakness is the lack of intelligence!
But even without intelligence, three mutated zombies attacking simultaneously still caused trouble for Ling Qingyun!
He swung his spiked mace in a circle, then smashed it onto the head of the speed-type zombie—compared to other mutation types, speed zombies have very fragile bodies!
After dealing with one, he kicked another with his foot while smashing the third zombie’s arm with the mace—in situations where he couldn’t guarantee killing them immediately, he chose to disable half of their attacking ability first!
Ling Qingyun’s eyes reddened as he fended off the zombie with both arms severed while fiercely striking another zombie’s head with the mace, when suddenly he noticed the slow-moving zombies that had been following the vehicle seemed to be rushing towards them as if they were pumped with stimulants!
It was Zhuang Cheng! Zhuang Cheng had taken out a crystal core from the head of the speed-type mutated zombie that Ling Qingyun had just smashed!
A crystal core had such an attraction for zombies? Ling Qingyun was stunned. Suddenly, the two zombies that had been attacking him also lunged toward Zhuang Cheng. The zombie with severed arms stretched its neck and jumped, trying to bite the crystal core that Zhuang Cheng held high in one hand, but Zhuang Cheng slapped it away with the other hand… It was unwilling, kept jumping, and then Zhuang Cheng kicked it and another zombie away.
Damn! Ling Qingyun was amused in an instant by Zhuang Cheng’s teasing of the zombies, but the next second he immediately launched a surprise attack from behind—smashing the head of the armless zombie to death, then quickly striking another zombie’s head with his mace—hoping that before he could free his hand, Zhuang Cheng wouldn’t swallow those two disgusting crystal cores!
Yes, two of them! Zhuang Cheng had already deftly dug out another crystal core and was holding two cores, repeatedly trying to put them into his mouth and then pulling them away.
So hungry, so hungry, so fragrant, he really wanted to eat… but when it reached his mouth, he didn’t want to eat it anymore… Hesitating, he stared at the crystal cores in his hand, trying several times to toss them into his mouth, but… after a long hesitation, he grabbed his food firmly and made sounds to chase away the zombies surrounding them.
Ah! Another edible one! He pounced, dug out the crystal core, and then gave it to his food. Then he stared intently at the other, thinking: These are all mine, none can be lost! Especially the delicious big chunks of food!