Just as Li Qiu thought she was about to be discovered, she suddenly heard someone shout, “Captain Zhou!”
Panting, Hu Zeyu pointed toward the street corner only a dozen meters away from them. At some point, a large group of zombies had poured over there. Judging by their numbers, there were at least seventy or eighty of them, if not a full hundred.
“I guess they were the ones who made that scream just now.” Hu Zeyu’s expression turned serious.
“Fire the signal. I’ll go first.” Zhou Jinshi calmly gave his instructions.
Hu Zeyu fired a signal flare into the sky. When he turned around, he saw Zhou Jinshi gripping Divine Art tightly and leaping forward.
Zhou Jinshi wore a black flight jacket. Divine Art danced up and down in his hand, wrapped in flowing waves of water, like a silver dragon fighting alongside him.
It was precisely because he held Divine Art that not a single zombie could get close to him. Instead, they collapsed one after another before him.
There were no flashy, showy movements, only an unrelenting pursuit of killing with a single strike.
Zhou Jinshi calmly sheathed his blade and pressed down on the veins protruding from the back of his hand from exertion. The surging killing intent within him also seemed to be suppressed by that motion.
Perhaps inheriting Divine Art came with some sort of side effect. Every time he used the blade, Zhou Jinshi felt that his emotions became somewhat difficult to control.
Huh? The scent of living humans was getting farther and farther away?
The commotion was also becoming more distant. Li Qiu, who was still trembling beneath the cashier’s counter, suddenly came back to her senses.
There was true affection in the zombie world after all. Thank you, zombie comrades, for your timely assistance. Li Qiu burst into tears in her heart.
Li Qiu had originally planned to seize this opportunity to run away and find a new place to hide before thinking about what to do next. However, the moment she crawled out from beneath the cashier’s counter, she started gasping for breath.
The world spun before her eyes, and her legs felt as if they had been cast in concrete. She had not even taken two steps before she became too exhausted to continue.
It must be because I haven’t eaten enough, so I can’t walk. Li Qiu thought to herself.
It’s definitely not because my physical condition is too poor.
As if to confirm this idea of hers, her stomach actually let out the rumbling sounds of hunger. One after another.
“Stop growling!” Li Qiu patted her stomach and muttered in her heart, “Aren’t I trying to think of a way?”
But after Li Qiu realized that she had once been human, she no longer had any way to eat zombie corpses as recklessly as before. In fact, the reason she had almost been caught earlier was because she had been startled by the sight of zombie corpses and screamed.
Yet it was obvious that this convenience store had already been thoroughly looted of anything humans could eat.
Then the question became, should she eat this zombie cashier’s corpse or not?
Curled up beneath the cashier’s counter, Li Qiu struggled with the decision and gradually fell asleep.
When she woke up, it was already night.
A full moon hung high in the sky, and moonlight streamed in through the convenience store’s open entrance, like a gentle veil caressing Li Qiu’s face.
The surroundings were so quiet that she could not hear a single sound.
Presumably, those human espers had already left.
Li Qiu crawled out from beneath the cashier’s counter once more. Although every step was difficult, she planned to search nearby and see whether she could find some food other than zombie corpses.
The streetlights had long since broken, and the illuminated signs of the shops along the street had long gone dark as well. If not for the moonlight, it would have been so dark that one could not even see their own hand in front of their face. But Li Qiu unexpectedly discovered that her night vision was quite good.
It was already autumn. The cold wind blew through the bushes by the roadside, and the shadows cast upon the grayish-white, bloodstained walls looked exactly like ghosts. The surroundings were completely empty, and aside from Li Qiu, there was not a trace of any living creature’s activity.
She was scared.
Li Qiu swallowed hard and remembered when she had gone with her mother to visit her grandmother, who lived deep in the mountains. Whenever she got up at night to use the bathroom, the howling wind, the swaying tree shadows, and her own vivid imagination would scare her half to death.
Li Qiu picked up a lightweight wooden board with thumbtacks sticking out of it and held it in her hand as a weapon for self-defense.
Her body felt incredibly weak. Even breathing seemed somewhat difficult. Li Qiu thought that at her current speed, she would probably starve to death before she even found any food.
Li Qiu’s attention had been fixed on the distant tree shadows. She had not even taken a few steps when she felt herself step on something hard and nearly stumble.
Then, no matter which direction she walked, she kept stepping on these stiff objects.
Li Qiu sat down heavily on the ground.
She saw clearly now. The ground was covered with the zombie corpses that had been exterminated by the espers during the day, lying in all directions.
Without exception, all of their brains had been pulverized, and the crystal cores that had formed inside had probably already been removed. Their bodies had been cut into pieces.
It was as though someone had sliced them up in advance and was simply waiting for Li Qiu to come eat them.
Fear was one thing, but another thought suddenly appeared in Li Qiu’s mind: they’re already cut up, so how about taking a bite?
Unable to keep going, Li Qiu resigned herself to her fate. She closed her eyes expressionlessly and reached out, touching a piece of meat from some unknown part of a body.
Chomp, chomp, chomp, chew, chew, chew.
I’m eating grilled lamb skewers, grilled squid, popcorn chicken…
The more she thought about it, the more she had to admit that imagining herself eating those things with her eyes closed actually made it taste pretty good, and it was very filling too.
Sitting beside the pile of zombie corpses, Li Qiu ate one bite after another, one zombie after another. A voice kept rising from the bottom of her heart, telling her, Eat. Eat. Filling your stomach comes first.
To Li Qiu, appetite was the hardest desire in the world to overcome, without question.
However, Li Qiu’s stomach was like a cosmic black hole. No matter how much she stuffed into it, there was no sign of it ever being filled.
As she ate, Li Qiu could not help but cry.
It was as if she were venting the joy of surviving a disaster, grieving over the unwillingness of having become a zombie, and missing her family, who were separated from her by countless cities.
In the silent night, little zombie Li Qiu’s sobs were mixed with the sounds of chewing and swallowing.
When dawn finally broke, Li Qiu let out a satisfied burp.
One hundred and seventy-eight zombies. Li Qiu had counted them while eating. Every time she ate one, she said a quiet apology.
The overwhelming, surging hunger in her stomach finally disappeared for a short while. Even her legs had regained the strength to walk.
Li Qiu stood up and stretched lazily. Then she looked at the old street with a hint of embarrassment. The old street that had once been covered with zombie corpses now held only piles of empty clothing.
Every one of these zombies had been stronger than Li Qiu before they died.
They had possessed immortal bodies, powerful limbs, insane willpower, and an astonishing rate of infection. Those qualities were enough to bring devastating disaster upon humanity.
The hungry Li Qiu had not been a match for any one of them. Unfortunately, they had bad luck and were all killed by human espers. So their bones and flesh had entered Li Qiu’s stomach and become the nourishment that allowed her to survive.
And after these zombies’ flesh and blood had been digested, some memories that did not belong to Li Qiu appeared in her mind.
These memories largely filled in the blanks of her understanding of this unknown world.
Zombies are the products of failed human evolution. Like human ability users, they are divided into ranks and can evolve. Their ranks range from F to S, namely F, E, D, C, B, A, and S, with F being the lowest rank and S being the highest.
The lowest-level zombies are those that possess no thoughts whatsoever, know only how to feed, and move slowly. They are called Walking Corpses and are classified as F-rank.
Those with a slight degree of intelligence, comparable to that of a two- or three-year-old human child, and capable of moving rapidly on all fours are called Crawling Types, which are E-rank.
Starting from D-rank, zombies become formidable. They possess intelligence roughly equivalent to that of a five- or six-year-old human child, can call companions and form groups to carry out coordinated attacks against humans, and even understand how to launch ambushes. They are called Intelligent Types.
C-rank zombies are even more powerful. They have evolved long tongues, ranging from a minimum of one meter to as long as three or four meters, allowing them to attack and capture prey from great distances. These are known as Long-Tongue Types among zombies.
B-rank zombies are the watershed among zombie classifications. Not only do they possess even greater explosive strength, but they can also awaken all kinds of abilities, just like human ability users. This type is called the Fallen Type, meaning beings that are akin to fallen humans.
A-rank zombies possess intelligence, long tongues, and high-level abilities all at once. Their strength is extraordinary, and the appearance of even a single one can often wear down and kill more than a hundred human ability users. They are called Demon Types.
As for S-rank, it is the strongest category among zombies. They are known as Lords. Just like the leader of a beast pack that possesses absolute prestige and power, an S-rank Lord is often the ruler of all the zombies within an entire city and has the power to command an army of millions of zombies. Once one appears, it is absolutely the end of a human base.
Then what rank do I belong to?
Li Qiu thought about it.
She had thoughts now, so she definitely was not F-rank. She could not run quickly on all fours and did not have a flexible long tongue, so she was not E-rank or C-rank either.
Therefore! I should be a D-rank Intelligent Type, right?
That’s right, I’m a D-rank Intelligent Type.
The more Li Qiu thought about it, the more reasonable it seemed.
D-rank was actually quite good. Among the seven zombie ranks, it was right in the middle.
This fit Li Qiu’s usual attitude toward life perfectly. Whether she had been in classes full of excellent students or poor students, she had always been average. She could not become the very best or the most dazzling person, but neither would she become the worst or the lowest. That was enough!
This was her philosophy of life. Even after becoming a zombie, she still thought this way.
Then she would live on as a D-rank zombie.
There was nothing more important than surviving.
Even if it meant surviving as a zombie, that was fine.
As long as she still had her own consciousness, could still see this world, and could still walk, surviving meant she could go home.
Yes, home.
Li Qiu wanted to go home.
She was currently in Chilan City of Jiangning Province, while her home was in Bailin City of Fengjiang Province. In the past, Li Qiu had searched for the route from home to here on Gaode Maps.
The two places were seven hundred and sixty-eight kilometers apart. Taking the high-speed rail required three and a half hours, driving required eight hours, and walking required one hundred and sixty hours.
Of course, the high-speed rail had long since stopped operating. Walking would cost her half her life and might lead her into encounters with espers. So Li Qiu decided to drive!
Li Qiu had gotten her driver’s license the year she graduated from high school, four years ago. In those four years, she had never really driven a car, so her skills could easily be imagined. But with the beautiful vision of returning home waiting for her, Li Qiu was brimming with confidence. As long as she found a car, she would be home by tonight!
Before looking for a car, Li Qiu first searched through the pile of clothes on the ground.
Those espers wanted the crystal cores in zombie brains, but they definitely would not want the belongings carried by zombies. After all, who knew whether they carried the zombie virus.
Li Qiu did not have such concerns. Other than still looking somewhat human on the outside, her body was already filled with zombie blood.
In the tranquil and elegant morning light, little zombie Li Qiu searched carefully and earnestly. She needed to prepare some luggage for her long and arduous journey home.