Tu Sanqi’s estimate had been correct—if it had been an ordinary sandstorm, the train carriages would have been able to shelter them.
But the problem lay precisely in this sandstorm.
The wind and sand had been raging for nearly ten minutes. Even the vehicle that Tu Sanqi had reinforced had already been blown dozens of meters eastward, and the wheels occasionally lifted off the ground—
The wind was far stronger than it should have been.
Zhao Abao frowned as he tried to contact Leng Xiangge and the others. Beside him, Tu Sanqi kept observing the outside.
Five minutes later, the wind clearly intensified. Both rear wheels of the car were lifted out of the sand pits by the force of the storm.
Amid the yellow sand, Tu Sanqi suddenly saw a pair of crimson-red eyes.
Her pupils shrank slightly, and she immediately informed Zhao Abao.
“There’s a high-level zombie!”
At that moment, Yan Shuang and the others—who had been swept away by the storm to a barren area—woke up from unconsciousness and turned their heads to see the train carriage that had fallen nearby as well.
Their wrist communicators vibrated continuously. Each of them received the messages Zhao Abao had sent in the squad channel.
The final message, however, had been sent three hours ago:
“A high-level zombie has appeared.”
Leng Xiangge and the others looked grim, and at the same time shocked.
They had never expected that a high-level zombie would appear so close to the Special Zone.
Now that they had been swept here by an abnormal sandstorm, Leng Xiangge spoke first.
“Miao Yu! Locate our position first and try contacting Abao and Sanqi.”
“Yan Shuang, Han Fei—you two check the train carriage.”
After saying that, she herself stood up and carried her weapon to inspect the surrounding area.
Half an hour later, the four regrouped.
Yan Shuang and Han Fei had rescued two people with bloodied heads from inside the carriage. At this point they looked like they were barely clinging to life.
But the only medicine they carried was meant for ability users and couldn’t be given to ordinary people, so the two survivors could only hold on by themselves for now.
Miao Yu soon obtained the location result.
They had been swept from the west side of the Special Zone to the south side, about fifty kilometers away from the Special Zone…
But Zhao Abao had lost contact with them.
There were no abnormalities detected in the surrounding area, but the sky was growing dark. Leng Xiangge decided not to bring her team back toward the Special Zone for now.
“We’ll rest here,” Leng Xiangge said. “Tonight the three of us will take turns standing guard. Miao Yu, keep paying attention to Abao’s side.”
The other three agreed.
Miao Yu stayed with the two rescued civilians while constantly sensing the surroundings.
Yan Shuang and Han Fei checked their equipment.
The accident had happened too suddenly. They had originally thought they would simply climb over the sand dune, check the train, and go back. So they had only brought a few weapons…
Now that they had to spend the night in the wilderness, they didn’t even have food.
After a moment of silence, the two searched the nearby area and discovered a river.
Han Fei controlled fire while Yan Shuang controlled water. The siblings managed to catch two zombie fish…
But without Zhao Abao, they didn’t dare eat them.
In the end, they didn’t waste more time and simply lay down beside the campfire to rest with their eyes closed.
Meanwhile, on the other side.
Tu Sanqi and Zhao Abao also couldn’t escape being swept away by the storm.
But compared to Leng Xiangge’s group, they were slightly luckier—they had been blown away inside the car.
Although they had no idea which wilderness they had been thrown into, at least the two of them didn’t lack supplies for the time being.
Tu Sanqi opened a can and handed it to Zhao Abao.
“How is it? Still no signal?”
Zhao Abao looked a bit dejected. He accepted the can with a thank-you and showed her the communicator.
There really was no signal—but it wasn’t the communicator’s fault.
Tu Sanqi glanced at it and formed a thought in her mind. After finishing the canned food, she curled up in the back seat and pulled out the pile of e-books Fei Yucheng had sent her earlier.
Zhao Abao was a healer, but the one injured right now was the car, so he couldn’t help much even if he wanted to.
Seeing Tu Sanqi sitting in the corner with a serious expression, he didn’t say anything. Instead, he tried to calm himself down and think rationally about what to do next.
However, when Tu Sanqi finally finished her crash-study and looked up, Zhao Abao had already slumped over the steering wheel, motionless.
She paused and went over to check him. After confirming that he had simply fallen asleep rather than died, she relaxed.
Then she grabbed a flashlight in her mouth, took a pile of tools from the trunk, and began tinkering with them according to what the book had described—treating a dead horse as if it were still alive.
By three in the morning, the helmet in her hands now had an antenna attached to it.
Tu Sanqi wiped the sweat from her forehead. After putting on the helmet, she excitedly turned on the communicator and walked around in several directions to test it.
Very quickly, messages from Miao Yu began flooding into the squad channel.
As expected of me!
But her happiness lasted less than a second.
A sudden sensation of being watched appeared behind her.
Tu Sanqi’s expression darkened as she turned around. The shout she was about to release was forcibly swallowed when she saw a fish with long legs.
She glanced back at Zhao Abao, who was still sleeping in the car. Then she crouched down and moved a little closer, whispering softly,
“Boss Fish?”
The mutated fish was clearly startled too.
“I already swam all the way downstream. How did I run into you again?” it said, its fish eyes wide.
Tu Sanqi actually felt a bit familiar with this fish. Hearing that, she quickly asked,
“Where is this place? Why is there no signal at all?”
The mutated fish walked a few steps closer and immediately noticed the communicator in her hand. It was shocked.
“You really became an ability user? Wait—that’s not right! You can still understand what I’m saying!”
“Shh!” Tu Sanqi grabbed it and sneakily moved forward. “Tell me where this place is first.”
After she placed the fish back into the river, it looked at her incredulously. After blowing two bubbles, it said,
“I don’t know either… I just followed the river downstream and arrived here a minute ago!”
It had thought it had escaped somewhere safe. But the moment it stopped moving its tail, it smelled the scent of an ability user.
So it quietly crawled onto land to observe the surroundings.
Who would’ve thought it was someone familiar!
However, that faint aura of an ability user wasn’t coming from Tu Sanqi.
Thinking of this, the mutated fish glanced at the car in the distance. When it looked back at Tu Sanqi again, its gaze was filled with admiration—
As a zombie, she actually dared to stay with ability users!
Tu Sanqi was recalling the direction of the river. When she snapped back to reality, she met the mutated fish’s heroic look of admiration.
Tu Sanqi: “……”
The corner of Tu Sanqi’s mouth twitched slightly. Since she hadn’t gotten any useful information, she waved goodbye to the mutated fish.
But just as she turned around, a pair of crimson eyes flashed past in front of her.
The mutated fish was startled and immediately fled.
Meanwhile, Tu Sanqi had already felt something touch her spine.
A cold sensation slowly crept up to the back of her neck.
Her pupils shrank.
In the next moment, a pale, expressionless face appeared before her.
Without warning, Tu Sanqi looked straight into the other party’s crimson eyes.
And the zombie was staring at her scarlet eyes as well.
“So… you’re one of our kind,” he said suddenly.