Under the evening sky, sunlight could not reach the depths of the narrow alley. It was cool, dim, and gloomy.
Two zombies with bluish-black faces, missing arms and legs, were chasing a petite young woman running ahead of them.
“Ahhh! So scary! Somebody save me!!”
Song Qing sprinted desperately toward the end of the alley. Her slender, fair legs ran so fast they practically smoked, and her heart was pounding at a hundred and eighty beats per minute.
“Host, you don’t need to run. Your body has been strengthened, and you also possess an earth-type ability. You can easily kill those two zombies.”
A slightly childish mechanical voice rang out in the young woman’s mind.
“You call that an earth-type ability? The little lump of dirt that dumped an entire headful of yellow soil on me?”
Song Qing complained inwardly without slowing down.
Her high ponytail bobbed as dirt kept falling from her head with a soft rustling sound. Some of it even landed in her mouth. She spat out the dry soil with a “ptooey” and continued running.
A patch of dusky sunlight entered from the right side up ahead.
Realizing that it was the exit of the alley, she excitedly quickened her pace.
The System felt a little guilty and muttered in a small voice, “That’s because your ability is only at the first tier. Besides, you don’t know how to use it yet.”
Song Qing had no time to respond.
Panting heavily, she ran out of the alley. Before she could feel happy, she saw a middle-aged male zombie several meters away.
Rotten flesh hung from every part of his body. The moment he saw her, he became excited and began walking toward her while making an enthusiastic “hrrk, hrrk” sound.
She slammed on the brakes, bent over, and braced her hands against her knees as she gasped for breath. Beads of sweat slid down her forehead and fell onto the dirty, messy ground.
The sounds of the two zombies behind her reached her ears.
She was surrounded from both front and back.
Her heart sank.
Song Qing had always been terrified of zombies. Her pupils contracted violently, and her entire body stiffened. She did not dare move even an inch.
With the System equally tense and silent, she said in despair, “System, I’m about to become a zombie’s meal. Go find someone else to complete the mission.”
The System panicked.
“Don’t! Don’t you want your parents and younger brother to come back to life?”
Those words struck a nerve in Song Qing.
Images of her parents and younger brother dying in a sea of flames flashed through her mind. Her heart began pounding violently.
That was right.
Her parents had not even had the chance to enjoy a good life, and her younger brother was still so young.
They should not have died like that.
She could not give up so easily either!
At the instant the zombie in front of her stretched out its rotten arm to grab her, Song Qing’s adrenaline surged.
She snatched up a wooden stick leaning against the wall and began smashing it violently against the zombie’s head.
After several blows, its skull cracked open. Brain matter splattered across her body, and the zombie collapsed to the ground with a heavy thud.
She did not even have time to feel disgusted.
She quickly turned around and dealt with the two zombies chasing her from behind using the same method.
Three corpses now lay on the ground.
Song Qing’s legs went weak, and she slid down to sit on the ground.
A cool breeze swept through the dark intersection of the alley.
As the only living person there, she shivered and tightly hugged her knees.
Although zombies could not exactly be considered human, they still looked exactly like people.
Song Qing had lived in a peaceful era. She could not accept this so easily.
The System spoke cheerfully in her mind.
“Host, you’re amazing! You killed three zombies in one go!”
Its praise and encouragement helped some warmth return to Song Qing’s blood.
She leaned against the brick wall behind her and rested while lowering her eyes to examine her dirty hands.
Her strength really had increased quite a lot.
She felt as if she could even carry a cow now.
For Song Qing, whose health had been poor since childhood, this was truly a pleasant surprise.
It would have been even better if she had not been in a place crawling with zombies.
“Host, it’s almost dark. We need to hurry into Hua’an Base and save the male lead. Otherwise, if he is rescued by his senior brother, he’ll fall into darkness even faster.”
Song Qing raised her head and looked at the sky gradually growing darker.
She became frightened again. Her lips trembled as she spoke.
“Zombies are everywhere outside. Although this place isn’t far from Hua’an Base, how am I supposed to get there alone? If I kill zombies all the way there, the male lead will have disappeared long ago even if I’m lucky enough not to die.”
She was an ordinary person in the modern world, timid as a mouse.
She would normally scream at the sight of a cockroach and be unable to sleep after listening to a ghost story.
Yet she had been selected to enter a world filled with zombies.
She really had no idea how the System chose its personnel.
The empty alley was constantly shrouded in fear.
On top of that, the burning pain in her stomach caused by hunger made her extremely uncomfortable.
She supported herself against the wall and stood up, planning to find something to eat before figuring out how to enter Hua’an Base.
She had not gone far when she was pleasantly surprised to encounter a five-person team that had gone out to search for supplies and was preparing to return.
Relying on her clumsy earth-type ability and her sweet words, Song Qing managed to get into their vehicle and return to Hua’an Base with them.
The rumbling of her stomach was especially obvious inside the enclosed vehicle.
Song Qing lowered her head, her face turning slightly red.
“Haha, you’re hungry, aren’t you? I have some dry food here. If you don’t mind, have some.”
The tall and capable-looking woman sitting beside her handed her a flatbread.
“Thank you.”
Song Qing knew that accepting food for free was not a good thing, but she was so hungry that she felt dizzy. She could not resist the temptation of the scallion-oil flatbread in the woman’s hand.
She took it, lowered her head, and wolfed down several bites.
As the food entered her starving stomach, she felt as if her entire body had come back to life.
The scallion-oil flatbread contained very little oil and was extremely dry and hard. It was slightly salty and did not taste particularly good.
To Song Qing at that moment, however, it was as delicious as sweet rain after a long drought.
After devouring the entire flatbread, Song Qing linked her arm through the woman’s beside her and turned to look at her.
Her eyes were sincere.
“Sis Zhang, thank you. I’ll pay you back with food in the future.”
None of the members of this team were dressed particularly well, and their vehicle was old and battered.
It was obvious that obtaining food was not easy for them.
Yet they had still given her a flatbread without asking for anything in return.
Song Qing was not an ungrateful person.
“What are you thanking me for? It’s only one flatbread.”
Zhang Wen laughed heartily and reached out to pinch Song Qing’s soft, tender cheek.
She had no idea how this young girl had survived the apocalypse.
Her body was covered in dust, and her little face was dirty, but none of that could conceal her fair, delicate skin.
Her face was small, round, and adorable.
She was very pleasing to look at.
Song Qing pressed her lips together and smiled.
She silently remembered their kindness.
After entering the base, she used the excuse of looking for relatives to part ways with them.
Before leaving, kind-hearted Sis Zhang even held her hand and repeatedly reminded her that a pretty girl like her had to be careful.
People’s hearts were chaotic in the apocalypse, and there were all kinds of rotten people around.
Song Qing nodded again and again.
After they left, the System began urging her inside her mind.
“Quick, quick, quick! Host, let’s go to the slums’ garbage dump to find the male lead. He has escaped from the laboratory. We can’t let the villain get to him first!”
The mechanical voice rose and fell dramatically, brimming with emotion.
It made Song Qing’s heart pound as well, and she became nervous.
She stopped a kind-looking older woman passing by and asked for directions to the slums in the base.
After finding out where it was, she hurried over.
It took only a few minutes to reach the slums.
The filth and disorder before her made her reluctant to even place her feet on the ground.
Just one street away, the area where ability users and their families lived was clean and tidy.
Although the people walking there could not compare with how refined people had been before the apocalypse, it was obvious that they did not lack food or drink. They kept themselves clean and presentable.
But this place was filthy and miserable.
Stains and garbage could be seen everywhere on the ground. Many men, women, elderly people, and children who were so hungry that their faces had turned sallow sat casually on the ground.
Cheap clothes hung densely from the closely packed buildings.
The smell of fermented rot filled the air.
The moment Song Qing stepped inside, countless unfriendly gazes shot toward her.
Greedy eyes stared at her exposed forearms and legs, as if they wanted to tear into her and devour her alive.
Goosebumps rose all over Song Qing’s arms.
She hurried past them and headed toward the garbage dump belonging to the entire base.
The farther inside she went, the more densely packed the buildings became, and the more people sat beneath them.
By now, the sky had grown completely dark.
Every so often, a dim yellow light bulb hung outside a building wall.
The bulbs were of poor quality and flickered from time to time.
Combined with the pairs of eyes below, gazing at her with the hungry, drooling look of wolves, the sight pushed Song Qing’s fear to its peak.
“Isn’t this the largest base in the south? Why are the people here starving like this?”
Song Qing asked in confusion inside her mind.
The System answered, “It is indeed the largest base. But in order to win over ability users and prevent them from leaving, the ruler of this base gives most of the benefits to them.”
“Ordinary people without any special skills can only exchange work such as sorting garbage and reinforcing the walls for enough food to keep themselves from starving to death. They also have to constantly worry about being killed when ability users vent their anger.”
“If you went to the Zhuguang Base in the north, things wouldn’t be like this. The people managing that base used to be soldiers. Although ordinary people there don’t live particularly well, they can still rely on their labor to obtain enough food and clothing.”
“The base is also managed more strictly. Ability users cannot attack ordinary people at will. If they do, they will be punished.”
Those words sent a chill through Song Qing.
Once again, she clearly realized that this was not the peaceful era she had known.
There were no police here to maintain order.
Instead, fists were what decided right and wrong.
An ordinary person’s life was not considered a life.
She continued walking forward without saying a word.
After turning a corner, she arrived at the garbage-processing area.
The place was several times the size of a football field.
Large amounts of garbage were piled into mountains, and the pungent stench filled her nose.
Looking at the colorful garbage heaps that resembled mountains, Song Qing covered her nose in discomfort and asked hopefully, “System, can you detect exactly where the male lead is?”
The System replied, “No. The Host has to find him herself.”
“You’re completely useless! You can’t fight zombies, you can’t give directions, and you can’t even locate the male lead.”
After complaining, Song Qing picked up the handle of a discarded broom and began poking through the garbage to look for him.
The System said aggrievedly, “I can store things for the Host. I can also keep you company, chat with you, and praise you. Doesn’t that count as being useful?”
At those words, Song Qing’s eyes lit up.
“Is there a limit to the storage space you use to store things for me?”
The System replied, “No.”
That meant she not only had an earth-type ability and enhanced physical strength, but also a storage space capable of holding any amount of stuff.
Song Qing was overjoyed.
She immediately changed her attitude and began showering the System with praise.
“Sys-Sys, you’re so useful! You’re practically my right and left arms. Without you, I’d be the kind of person who couldn’t survive.”
The System became shy and began sizzling and smoking inside her mind.
Song Qing calmed herself down and focused on using the broom handle to move the garbage aside in search of the male lead.
He absolutely could not die.
Her entire family’s lives, including her own, depended on him.
The sky was pitch-black.
Apart from Song Qing, there was no living person in the garbage dump.
There was only the soft rustling of plastic bags as the wind blew past, along with the faint sounds of rats scurrying through the garbage heaps in search of food.
There were no lights in the garbage dump.
Fortunately, the area was open, and the bright moonlight shone down, allowing Song Qing to see instead of groping around blindly.
She patiently searched through one garbage mountain after another.
Time slowly passed.
Several hours went by, but she found nothing.
She did, however, uncover several corpses.
Most of them had been starved to death.
Their deaths were horrific. Their bodies were skin and bones, while their stomachs were swollen high.
Song Qing was already frightened enough as it was, yet she still had to force herself to check whether each corpse was the male lead.
The stench of the garbage made her head spin.
Her slender body trembled with fear, and the hand holding the broom handle gradually stiffened.
She constantly worried that the garbage beneath her hands would reveal another corpse.
Her entire condition was terrible.
According to the novel, the male lead escaped, was picked up by his senior brother, and was then betrayed once again.
Song Qing could not understand how the male lead’s senior brother—a senior researcher—could have run to the garbage mountains in the middle of the night.
Could he have some unknown hobby?
Perhaps he liked the smell of garbage dumps and came here every night to get his fill before returning?
She had finished reading that novel several years ago.
Apart from the general plot, she could not remember much else.
She asked the System about it in her mind.
The System’s voice sounded a little guilty as it replied, “There is a secret passage from the laboratory to the garbage dump. The male lead escaped to the garbage dump first and was unconscious for a while.”
“After waking up, he went out into the slums, where his senior brother—who had come to the slums late at night to select experimental subjects—pretended to save him.”
Song Qing: “…”
She had spent several hours being scared out of her wits in the garbage dump.
And this suffering had been completely unnecessary?
Seeing that she did not speak, the System hurriedly added, “I did this for your own good! If we encountered the male lead’s senior brother, we would have no chance of winning.”
“Besides, the winding paths in the slums are even harder to search through than the garbage dump.”
Song Qing looked at the mountains of foul-smelling garbage.
Then she glanced at the several roads leading into the slums.
She considered whether she should wait for the male lead to appear or continue searching for him.
After weighing her options, she lowered her head and continued digging through the garbage.
She had already been searching for several hours. A few more garbage mountains would not make much difference.
The System’s words were irritating, but it was true that she could not defeat the male lead’s senior brother.
The sooner she found the male lead, the safer they would be.
Twenty minutes later, she uncovered another person who looked like a blood-soaked gourd.
His body was thin, and his clothes had been dyed completely red with blood. It was impossible to tell what color they had originally been.
Song Qing’s hand trembled as she used the broom handle to poke the man around the waist.
When he showed no reaction at all, she assumed that he was dead.
She quickly turned her head and continued searching beneath him.
She did not dare look at him for another second.
But at the instant she turned away, the corner of her eye caught sight of the man’s eyes, partially concealed beneath his messy fringe.
His pupils reflected the moonlight, filled with an eerie and mysterious glint.
Song Qing’s feet froze in place.
The male lead she was looking for had escaped from the laboratory.
He had been used by the research institute as a blood slave and subjected to experiments.
The heavily wounded man in front of her—
Wasn’t he exactly the person described in the novel?