The woman lifted her son’s hand, gently rolling up his sleeve, revealing several shocking scratch marks on his wrist, the flesh tinged with a bluish-black.
“…Dad is tired,” she finally said, “He just went to sleep… Let’s go back with mom.”
The little boy no longer resisted, holding his mother’s hand as they walked deeper into the garden.
“Mommy.”
“Hmm?”
“Why is dad sleeping in a wooden box?”
In the distance, stained glass was embedded in the church’s roof, the cross piercing the gloomy sky.
This time, the mother was silent for a very long time before stopping, bending down to kiss her son’s tender forehead: “One day, dad will leave the wooden box and return to us forever…” Her voice carried a hint of sadness, but remained soft, saying: “That day won’t be too far away.”
Sinan violently coughed up a mass of thick blood, trembling hands pushing himself up. For several seconds, he didn’t know where he was or what had happened, his mind briefly disoriented. But memories from the past few hours quickly flashed back, pain crawling through his nerves, his injured internal organs causing his trachea to spasm, making him vomit the last bit of water from his stomach. Had the zombie gorilla died? That guy Zhou Rong, who seemed like a casual soldier but was surprisingly reliable – was he saved? Sinan finally stopped retching, thinking of Zhou Rong, lying disheveled on the ground and gasping, slowly sitting up. At that moment, he suddenly heard a sound from ahead – thud. The sound was particularly clear in the silent space, and Sinan looked up. This was an underground circular glass laboratory, open at the top, with an elevator leading to the upper space. The circular metal walls emitted white light, illuminating the experimental site, about the size of a football field. Another, slightly louder – thud!
Sinan looked at the scene in the center of the experimental site, his pupils involuntarily contracting, finally understanding what had awakened him from his unconsciousness. It was a coffin. Black pine wood, slightly muddy, as if just excavated from a 19th-century British manor, looking utterly out of place in this modern biomedical laboratory surrounded by equipment. Even more striking was a massive silver cross slanted into the coffin lid, with leaf decorations on its edges, heavily oxidized and almost cutting the coffin in half. Thud! The coffin lid pushed upward.
Sinan stood up, staggering backward, his chest heaving with a terrifying premonition. Thud!!! Massive force cracked the coffin lid, the silver cross toppling to the ground with a heavy impact! Sinan turned and rushed to the elevator, pressing the keys frantically, but the control panel remained unresponsive! Bang—! The heavy lid split in two, accompanied by a cry that was part demon, part beast, as the dark figure in the coffin sat up! Sinan stared at it intently, an extremely terrifying speculation rising from the depths of his heart, chilling him to the bone.
☆、 Chapter 22
The tactical flashlight illuminated the cracked wall, Zhou Rong observing for a moment, gesturing to the right: “This way.” The three moved quickly along the wall’s edge.
“I can manage,” Zhang Yingjie said breathlessly, self-deprecatingly: “Soon I’ll… I won’t recognize you. Don’t let your teammates down, stay away from me.”
Chun Cao’s face was streaked with tears, silent. Zhou Rong at the front, his eye sockets red, didn’t look back, his voice remarkably steady: “Hang in there, Yingjie. We’ll get out within two hours. You still have a chance… at least to get back to the surface.”
They passed through the corridor, descending the stairs that had been nearly destroyed by zombie gorillas. Zhang Yingjie laughed, “Will we make it in time? I don’t really care. When a person dies, the light goes out, and it’s the same everywhere. I just really want to know if my wife and children are still alive. If I could just see them one more time…”
They moved through the long hallway connecting various laboratories. Suddenly, Chun Cao stopped and shone a light on the emergency exit sign overhead, saying in disbelief, “Look, area E.”
The three of them looked up simultaneously.
“North E Area” in green and white letters hung crookedly in the darkness. Had Si Nan, chased by the zombie King Kong, accidentally run into area E?
Zhou Rong tried to find humor in their situation: “Good, at least it saves us some travel time. This way.” Zhang Yingjie paused to catch his breath. Zhou Rong, disregarding his attempt to avoid help, reached out and supported him, whispering, “Area E has the latest antibody research materials.”
There might even be some original antibody samples left. Judging from when the base was destroyed, the antibodies might not have expired. If they’re still effective…”
Zhang Yingjie immediately responded, “I won’t take it, brother Rong. Don’t joke around. Exchanging the world’s hope for my survival would send me to the eighteenth level of hell after I die.”
“If there are two doses,” Zhou Rong said hoarsely, “If there are, I’ll definitely give you one.”
Zhang Yingjie was about to say something more, but Zhou Rong pulled him, “Let’s go.”
The flashlight illuminated the fork in the road ahead. On the six-meter-high ceiling, broken ventilation pipes hung like giant twisted snakes. Zhou Rong glanced at the tablet computer map in his hand.
To the left was an experimental site, with no specifics mentioned; to the right was a confidential biochemical data room, classified as red S-level.
Zhou Rong momentarily couldn’t decide which direction to take when Chuncao’s ears suddenly twitched: “I hear something.”
In the darkness, Zhang Yingjie’s heavy breathing momentarily stopped.
Sounds gradually came from upstairs, like a group of people approaching, intermittently punctuated by the familiar suppressed gunfire of special forces.
The three looked up. Within seconds, the noise had rolled right above their heads, causing countless small dust particles to shake on the ceiling.
“…” Zhou Rong suddenly realized something, his expression changing dramatically: “Damn! Don’t—!
But his angry shout was futile.
Gunfire erupted overhead, almost like a ground-level missile explosion. The concrete ceiling collapsed with a thunderous sound. Zhou Rong, Chuncao, and Zhang Yingjie scattered in all directions, and three special forces soldiers descended with debris!
Yan Hao rolled to his feet, screaming hoarsely, “Don’t let them come down! Open fire! Open fire!! Captain?!”
Zhou Rong fired while shouting, “What are you doing here?!”
Guo Weixiang: “Supporting you!”
Zhou Rong: “Get lost!”
Ding Shi: “…Being chased by zombies!”
Yan Hao, carrying a heavy assault rifle, threw a half-human-high ammunition bag, shouting during a break in the firefight: “No other way! We had to break through the floor!”
Zhou Rong hugged the ammunition bag, grabbed a grenade in the chaos, and threw it onto the ceiling, roaring, “Everyone get down—!”
A thunderous explosion collapsed half the corridor overhead.
The six who had just reunited were pushed in different directions by the blast wave before they could even catch up, followed by a rain of steel bars and bricks that completely blocked the intersection.
After several dozen seconds, the shaking stopped, and dust spread in the darkness.
“Cough cough cough…
Zhou Rong pushed away the debris crushing him and rose awkwardly: “Is anyone alive?”
After a long while, a groan came from nearby, Chuncao’s daughter: “Alive…”
Zhou Rong raised his voice: “Yingjie! Yan Hao! Xiang! Ding! Are you alive?!”
“Ugh…” Guo Weixiang from the right front: “My arm is dislocated…”
Ding Shi: “…Hiss hiss hiss…”
Zhou Rong: “Fix the dislocated arm yourself!” He then casually shot down several half-dead zombies and turned on his flashlight.
