Wang Yanli fell stiffly to the ground.
The steel ball had pierced her temple, and red and white matter slowly spread across the floor.
Only then did I finally feel at ease.
Li Wenli, too, seemed utterly drained, her legs giving way as she sat on a nearby bench, covering her mouth.
She gasped for air, her eyes wide with shock as she scanned the dorm room, once filled with the lively presence of girls, now transformed into a slaughterhouse.
In just ten minutes, three bodies lay there.
Zhao Qian's neck was torn open, eyes wide in death, Zhang Yuman's head exploded like a smashed watermelon, and Wang Yanli lay at the table's edge, blood still oozing from her temple.
The air was thick with a suffocating stench of blood.
"Ugh..." Li Wenli dry-heaved, but nothing came out.
I forced myself not to look at the mosaic-like remains nearby.
"Zhou Peiyu..."
After a while, Li Wenli finally spoke.
"You just said, you suspect that what's turning them into zombies is that mutated syphilis, right?"
I nodded, finding a relatively clean chair to sit on, placing the compound bow on my lap, staying alert: "Yeah, besides this explanation, I can't think of anything else. Doctor Park also mentioned that the virus is extremely active, mutating at an absurd speed."
"I see... no wonder..." Li Wenli murmured to herself.
"What do you mean?" I asked, frowning.
Li Wenli didn't answer immediately. She took a deep breath, seemingly trying to calm herself.
Then, with trembling hands, she pulled out her phone from her pocket, her fingers swiftly sliding across the screen.
She handed the phone to me. On the screen was a slightly blurry educational image, the title in bold: "Transmission Routes and Clinical Manifestations of Syphilis."
I leaned in to look. It listed several main transmission methods:
Sexual transmission (over 95%).
Blood transmission (such as transfusions, shared needles).
Mother-to-child transmission.
Others: kissing, breastfeeding, or contact with clothing or utensils contaminated by the spirochete (low probability, but possible).
After reading, I didn't immediately notice anything amiss, looking at her with some confusion: "Isn't this all common knowledge? What's the matter?"
Li Wenli took back the phone, pointing at Wang Yanli's hands, which were starting to turn black and fester, and the dense red rashes on her neck.
"Wang Yanli wasn't bitten or scratched. She was just close by, or... came into contact with something."
Li Wenli paused, then continued: "Look at these zombies, their bodies covered in bleeding wounds and festering boils. And when Zhang Yuman's head exploded just now, bits of flesh and blood mist sprayed everywhere."
My heart skipped a beat.
"You mean..."
"I mean, the infection capability of this mutated syphilis is undoubtedly much stronger than ordinary syphilis. As long as these virus-laden bodily fluids or pus come into contact with human skin, it could cause instant infection, or... inhaling air with the virus-laden blood mist."
This theory made Fing Hell sense.
Wang Yanli had direct contact with Zhang Yuman just now.
Doesn't this Fing Hell mean that as long as you're in close contact with an infected person, even if you're not bitten or scratched, there's a high chance of getting infected?!
Moreover, what makes me feel utterly hopeless is the vitality of these zombies.
That Zhang Yuman, I had to blow her head three times. The first time, the steel ball pierced her forehead, she didn't die. The second time, a carbon arrow went through her eye socket and pinned her to the cabinet, still not dead. The last time, I directly shattered her cerebellum and brainstem, destroying her entire central nervous system, finally making her stop moving.
"This is too perverse..." I muttered, looking at the compound bow in my hand, "It can be transmitted through direct contact, and their vitality is so tenacious."
Li Wenli nodded, "These zombies can only be safely eliminated with long-range firearms. At the very least, it has to be a ranged weapon like your bow. If you engage in close combat with knives or clubs, even if you manage to smash their heads, the splattered blood would have already infected you."
Close combat means certain death, even if you win, it's mutual destruction.
Li Wenli irritably scratched her somewhat greasy long hair, her eyes darting over the three bodies on the floor, growing more agitated the longer she looked.
"This is troublesome. We're trapped here now, forced to share a room with these corpses. The walls are covered in blood, and a single careless move could lead to contact."
She pointed at the slowly blackening brain matter of Zhang Yuman: "Moreover, if this virus can indeed survive in the air for a while, or if the gases released from the decomposing bodies are toxic, staying in this enclosed room overnight is a death sentence."
Li Wenli was right; the living cannot stay with the dead, especially not these "explosive" dead.
They must be cleared out.
This task is practically a death sentence, having to move those bodies covered in boils and bleeding profusely. A slight touch could lead to the same fate as Wang Yanli.
I glanced at Li Wenli. She was calm, but after all, she was a girl, and...
I gently placed the compound bow on the table, hesitated for a moment, and stood up.
"I'll do it."
I walked over to Wang Yanli's body, suppressing my physical discomfort, bent down, and grabbed her ankle still clad in sneakers.
She had just died, her body, aside from the head, was relatively intact and hadn't yet fully festered, making her the "cleanest" one.
"Hey! Zhou Peiyu! What are you doing?!"
Li Wenli saw this and jumped up from the bench in fright, hurriedly stepping back two steps, "Are you crazy?! Didn't I just say that contact leads to infection?! You don't even have gloves on!"
I didn't stop, continuing to drag Wang Yanli's heavy body towards the balcony, speaking without turning my head:
"I know. But I should be fine."
"How do you know you're fine?!" Li Wenli was anxious, "Stop showing off, will you? If you mutate, I can't fight you off!"
As I dragged the body past the desk, the hem of her clothes made a "rustling" sound against the floor.
"Li Wenli, there's something I haven't told you in detail."
I paused at the balcony door, turned to look at Li Wenli's terrified face, my tone a bit awkward, but I had to say it:
"Actually... I slept with Zhu Jiajia"
Li Wenli, who was still hopping mad, froze instantly upon hearing this, staring at me in disbelief.
Her voice rose by eight octaves, her eyes as if looking at an alien, or a madman telling a crude joke.
"Zhu Jiajia? The gold-digging campus belle who's the talk of the forums, with her nose in the air?" Li Wenli looked me up and down, her eyes full of doubt, "Dude, this is an apocalypse survival, not your wet dream. With your broke-ass condition, she'd notice you? Unless she's blind."
If it were any other time and she roasted me like this, I'd definitely roast her back, but in this situation, I couldn't be bothered.
"I'm not going to explain the details, it just happened." I waved my hand impatiently, "Don't mind the details, the main thing is... when I slept with her, she was already infected, and you saw how fast she mutated, but now, I'm still alive and kicking."
Li Wenli frowned, seemingly still digesting this massive amount of information, shaking her head, clearly still not believing: "Don't lie to me, the virus incubation period isn't certain, maybe it just hasn't manifested yet."
I sighed, continuing to drag the body towards the balcony edge, speaking as I went:
"Last Saturday, I went to the First People's Hospital of the City for a drug trial. The doctor gave me five thousand bucks and injected me with an experimental vaccine called 'Meiliting.' That doctor told me personally, it's a special antibody developed for the new mutated syphilis."
By this point, I'd dragged most of Wang Yanli's body over the balcony railing, below was a dark flowerbed, faint zombie growls could be heard.
"Later, in the infirmary, Doctor Park did a full check-up on me. She told me that I was indeed infected with the mutated syphilis, the viral load was once very high. But..."
I paused, lifting Wang Yanli's body, propping it on the railing.
"But Doctor Park said, once those viruses entered my body, they were slaughtered by an unknown antibody in my blood, all dead before they could replicate."
"So," I turned to Li Wenli, "I think, I shouldn't get infected, at least against this virus, I have antibodies."
Li Wenli listened, her mouth slightly open, completely dumbfounded.
"You're saying... you're an Immune One?" she murmured.
"Pretty much."
I finished speaking, took a deep breath, and pushed with both hands.
Wang Yanli's body flipped over the railing, falling under the pull of gravity.
A few seconds later.
"Bang!"
A dull thud echoed from below, followed by excited zombie growls from the few wandering below, rushing towards where the body landed.
I didn't dare look down, clapped my hands, and turned back into the dorm.
"Alright, stop spacing out." I looked at Li Wenli, still in shock, and pointed at the two even more gruesome bodies on the floor.
Especially Zhang Yuman, her head exploded, brain matter everywhere, a true heavy pollution source.
"I'll handle these bodies, you stay back."
I said, walking towards Zhang Yuman's body.
Li Wenli finally snapped out of it, her gaze on my back growing increasingly complex.
"Zhou Peiyu..." she called out from behind.
"What is it?" I didn't turn back, bending down to grab Zhang Yuman's sticky arm.
"You... be careful, even if you have antibodies, having that disgusting stuff on you is still gross." Her voice softened, no longer so sharp-tongued.
I chuckled bitterly, suppressing the churn in my stomach, grabbing Zhang Yuman's hand still clinging to bits of flesh.
"Got it, the smell is overwhelming."