Big Brother stood at the door of the Bespectacled Man’s room, his towering figure blocking out almost all the light as he spoke in a low, threatening voice.
“Why didn’t you report Lin Ya’s escape immediately?”
The Bespectacled Man was gripped by unprecedented fear, and his body began trembling uncontrollably. He knew he had to explain himself, or he might suffer the same fate as the Innkeeper.
“Big Brother, I… I just saw her, and I was about to report it…”
His voice trembled as his glasses slipped down to the tip of his nose from nervousness.
Big Brother’s gaze grew even colder. He was clearly dissatisfied with the excuse. He took a single step into the room and looked down at the Bespectacled Man as though he were an insignificant insect.
“Is that so? Your ‘about to’ cost us a valuable ‘commodity.'”
His tone was filled with sarcasm, and there wasn’t the slightest trace of pity in his eyes. It wasn’t that he regretted Lin Ya’s escape. He was simply furious that someone had managed to escape right under his nose, making him feel as though his authority had been challenged.
The Bespectacled Man was overcome with despair. He knew he had to do something to calm the underworld boss’s anger. Stammering, he said, “Big Brother, I was wrong. I really was wrong. Please punish me, but give me a chance.”
The underworld boss sneered, a cruel glint flashing through his eyes.
“A chance? Fine. I’ll give you one.”
His words gave the Bespectacled Man a glimmer of hope. He raised his head, his eyes filled with pleading.
“Third Brother, he’s yours.”
The underworld boss called out toward the corridor.
A few seconds later, a burly man with a hideous scar across his face walked in. His gaze was greedy and sickening as he looked the Bespectacled Man up and down, as though inspecting a piece of merchandise.
“Thank you, Big Brother!” Third Brother’s voice was flippant yet filled with wicked excitement.
The Bespectacled Man felt a chill shoot from the soles of his feet straight to the top of his head. Strangely enough, however, a bizarre excitement began to rise within him.
He knew Third Brother’s reputation. He knew that Third Brother was interested in both men and women and that his methods were exceptionally cruel. He began struggling desperately, but Third Brother was far too strong and lifted him up as easily as one would pick up a chick.
“No, Big Brother, please! Don’t do this!” The Bespectacled Man’s voice became shrill, his eyes filled with terror and despair, yet his body inexplicably grew burning hot.
But Big Brother had already turned and walked out of the room, his back disappearing at the end of the corridor. His voice came from a distance.
“This is your punishment, and it’s also a warning to everyone else.”
Third Brother dragged the Bespectacled Man out of the room. His screams and pleas for mercy echoed through the corridor, but no one dared to come out and interfere. The small Inn once again fell into complete silence, broken only by the Bespectacled Man’s gradually fading cries for help.
The moment the Bespectacled Man was dragged away, everyone in the Inn realized what had happened. Fear filled their eyes, and their movements became cautious. None of them dared make another mistake because they knew that they could be next.
Meanwhile, on Ling Chuan’s side.
After waking up that day, Ling Chuan discovered a patch of blood on the bedsheet. He rubbed his brow, unable to understand why this life was different from his previous one. In his previous life, nothing had happened between him and that woman, yet in this life, they had actually slept together.
However, the apocalypse would begin the very next day, leaving him no time to dwell on it. He simply instructed someone to check the hotel’s surveillance footage and see whether that woman was still in the hotel. If she wasn’t, he could only deal with it later.
Afterward, he stayed busy using the hotel as their base and spent every day gathering supplies. However, the cruelty of the apocalypse did not come solely from the scarcity of resources, but also from the viciousness of human nature.
That afternoon, as they were about to return to the hotel, everyone heard a woman’s screams coming from the small Inn across the street. The sound was particularly piercing against the deathly silence of the apocalypse, making their hearts tighten.
For some reason, Ling Chuan thought of the woman who had fled from his bed the previous day. Although he didn’t know whether the drug he had been given the previous day had anything to do with her, he still needed to find her and ask her directly to know for sure.
He cautiously crossed the street, his gaze alert and his weapon held tightly in his hand. His teammates followed closely behind, their footsteps echoing through the empty street. However, the closer they got to the small Inn, the clearer the screams became.
Ling Chuan’s brows furrowed tightly. In his previous life, he had never received any news about that woman. The jade pendant she had left him had even turned into a tattoo on his chest.
When Ling Chuan and his teammates approached the dilapidated small Inn, the first thing they noticed was only a handful of zombies wandering aimlessly outside the entrance.
A dim yellow light spilled from inside the Inn’s lobby, but what shocked them even more was the sight of a man covered in purple bruises hanging against the large transparent glass window of the lobby.
His skin was covered in bruises and wounds, clearly showing that he had been subjected to brutal treatment. His body was twisted into a posture that could never have occurred naturally, while the zombies were separated from him by nothing more than a pane of glass.
Lin Yu followed closely behind Ling Chuan. When he saw the Bespectacled Man’s flushed face, his gaze involuntarily dropped toward the man’s lower body, and his stomach immediately churned.
“That’s fucking disgusting. There really are all kinds of weirdos in this world. He can even get a reaction from looking at zombies!”
As he spoke, he quickly turned his head and reminded Li Ningning, who was walking among them.
“Ningning, don’t look. Don’t let this kind of filth insult your eyes!”
Li Ningning glanced at him gently before obediently lowering her head. Lin Yu felt an inexplicable sense of satisfaction. His goddess really was both obedient and cool.
While the few people outside still had the leisure to chat, inside the small Inn, the situation had already descended into chaos.
The punishment Big Brother had given the Innkeeper moments earlier had left everyone terrified. They only wanted to return to their rooms as quickly as possible, so no one paid any more attention to the Innkeeper who had been thrown downstairs or the rope that was still hanging from Lin Ya’s room.
The smell of blood downstairs grew increasingly strong. Some people could no longer tolerate the abuse they were being subjected to, while Lin Ya’s successful escape had given them hope, so they secretly ran into Lin Ya’s room one after another, hoping to escape the way Lin Ya had.
But how could the zombies downstairs give them another chance?
As the smell of blood intensified, more and more zombies gathered around the Inn. The windows on the first floor were eventually crushed under the weight of the countless zombies.
A massive number of zombies climbed through the windows and poured into the Inn, throwing the entire place into chaos. Some zombies even piled on top of one another, using the air-conditioning units and Drainage Pipes as support to climb up to the second and third floors.
Inside the Inn, only the men brought by Big Brother fought desperately against the zombies. Meanwhile, the men and women who had originally been forced into submission now shouted that as long as they were rescued, they would do anything for Big Brother and his men in the future.
After Ling Chuan and the others dealt with the zombies at the entrance and opened the Inn’s doors, the people inside had also made their way down to the first floor.
Lin Yu instinctively pulled out his dagger and quickly cut the Bespectacled Man down from the glass. Don’t ask why he saved him. It was simply a matter of habit.
Among the scattered people who escaped, everyone eventually realized that apart from Big Brother, Second Brother, and Third Brother, everyone else had been left behind in the small Inn.
Oh, and the Bespectacled Man, who had been secretly looking at Lin Yu with his head lowered the entire time, had also followed closely behind Lin Yu and the others as they escaped.