When he saw me at the construction site, he smiled and waved to me from far away.”
“But I couldn’t pick him up as promised.”
“…Brother Rong,” Ding Shi choked: “This isn’t anyone’s fault, this…”
“He wanted to go with me. I shouldn’t have reached for the gun; he was so scared that I scared him away.”
Zhou Rong closed his eyes. Besides the helicopter’s roar, the cabin was frighteningly quiet.
A moment later, he removed a shiny object tied to a rope from his neck, which Ding Shi recognized as the chip containing all virus research data downloaded from the B Military Area.
Zhou Rong held the chip, then suddenly pointed below: “What’s on that rooftop? Let’s get closer and look.”
Ding Shi maneuvered the helicopter to lower altitude, the searchlight scanning the building’s roof: “Nothing, target area about two hundred square meters… Brother Rong?!”
Zhou Rong threw the chip onto the cockpit, unbuckled his seatbelt, pulled open the cabin door, and with a cold, biting wind, turned back and laughed:
“Wait for us in the South China Sea.”
That laugh was incredibly bold and unrestrained. Ding Shi frantically reached out, but Zhou Rong had already leaped, jumping down in a startled cry!
Swooping down from □□ meters high, Zhou Rong landed steadily, drawing the assault □□ from his back.
Amidst everyone’s frenzied shouting, he resolutely departed, disappearing into the city’s perilous black night.
Zhou Rong closed his eyes, allowing himself to wallow in regret and sorrow for just a brief moment. A few seconds later, he opened his eyes, forcing himself back into combat mode, firing a grappling gun from the top of a utility pole and swiftly moving to the next street block.
Meanwhile, one kilometer away, a figure, wrapped in chilling wind, staggered into a certain residential house, seemingly completely unaware of the deadly danger lurking in the corner.
As boots treaded on shattered glass, a shadow stirred in the room. From the darkness, a decaying gray-black face emerged, seemingly catching the scent of fresh human flesh, its murky eyeballs rolling.
The mostly rotted chest cavity leaked air, and the zombie unsteadily rose, its predatory desire rapidly surging. It lunged forward, viciously grabbing the newcomer and biting down!
The taste of flesh and blood instantly filled the rotting mouth, but before the zombie could take a second bite, a crisp crack sounded from its cervical vertebrae.
The zombie’s head tilted at a strange angle, then was lifted by one hand and slammed heavily against the wall, brain matter splattered across half the wall.
Si Nan let out a blurry groan.
He vaguely felt his wrist hurt but couldn’t see what had happened, so he reached out to touch it, feeling something wet and fleshy.
I was bitten by a zombie, flashed through his subconscious.
This was actually quite strange because he felt as if he were walking on clouds, with constantly shifting halos and spots before his eyes. His mental world switched back and forth between reality and illusion, unable to remember who he was or determine whether he was standing, sitting, or had already fallen.
But he just knew he had been bitten by a zombie.
With a loud crash, he collapsed to the ground, back against the damp and dirty wall, trembling as he stretched out his long legs, his chest heaving with a sound like tearing.
“You’ve been bitten again,” someone said with anger, enunciating each word.
It was a young blond, blue-eyed man in camouflage. But due to his good background, he already wore military rank, with an expression mixing arrogance, disgust, and anger.
“So, are you going to punish me?” His unkempt bangs couldn’t hide his bright, sarcastic eyes. “Come on,” he said indifferently.
Seemingly provoked by this attitude, the man grabbed his collar, shouting, “You think this is harming you? You’re already a monster!
Besides experiments and special training, what other path can you take! If your father had thrown you into an orphanage, you’d now be a lowly person working in a convenience store or delivering food!”
Si Nan raised an eyebrow. “Oh? In your eyes, the definition of a lowly person is someone delivering food? You’re truly a well-bred young master.”
As the man opened his mouth to curse, Si Nan curved his mouth with malicious intent:
“I thought that your father, who was grief-stricken after my mother’s death and drank himself senseless day after day, was the real lowly person…”
A crisp slap sound, and the man hit Si Nan so hard he turned his head, blood slowly seeping from the corner of his mouth.
“…” The youth breathed twice, then turned back with a smile:
“Or perhaps, someone who harbors resentment towards his father while desperately and futilely seeking his approval, might be worse than a lowly person…”
He thought he would receive another slap, but the man’s raised hand stopped midair. After five seconds of dead silence, he suddenly roared, “Electric shock!”
As soon as the words fell, blue light crackled, and Si Nan’s body convulsed backward, limbs spasming.
A few seconds later, the electric shock ended.
Si Nan did not wake up, remaining motionless in the chair’s embrace, silent for a long time, even his chest no longer rising.
The man waited over ten seconds, suspicion finally emerging in his eyes.
Cautiously approaching and pausing, he reached out to check the pulse on his neck, feeling an unusually weak pulse beneath the delicate skin. He tentatively placed a finger near the youth’s nose, the breath so faint it was almost imperceptible.
“Send a few people over,” he spoke into his shoulder communicator, briefly giving an order and unlocking the handcuffs on the youth’s wrists.
At that moment, Si Nan’s previously pale and lifeless long fingers clenched, with bulging veins on the back of his hand.
As the man realized something was wrong and quickly stepped back, a fierce wind struck like lightning. Si Nan grabbed the armrest, rising and kicking the man directly into the wall corner!
A loud crash shook the ground. The man cried out in surprise, then his body suddenly went limp. Jolting awake, he saw Si Nan looming over him, one knee pressing against his chest, viciously grabbing the collar of his camouflage uniform.
“Are you afraid of me?” he asked with a smile.
The man choked, overwhelmed by intense embarrassment and anger, along with another sudden, unspeakable emotion that rendered him speechless.
“You’re afraid of this monster, but you also want to possess the monster’s abilities—”
When Si Nan smiled, a small white tooth showed, which on his delicate boyish face was actually quite charming.
But if you looked into his eyes, you would only feel a bone-chilling terror, as if seeing a demon awakening with a shriek from the depths of hell.
“Stupid and unaware, greedy and unaware,” the youth whispered by his ear. “All of you will pay the price.
The laboratory door was slammed open, guards rushed in, pulling the young man away with multiple hands. Someone carefully helped the man up from the ground.
Si Nan heard nothing. He didn’t even look at the man’s indescribable gaze falling on him through the crowd. When he turned, he had already forgotten whether he had suffered a more severe punishment that day, only remembering the twisted pleasure deep in his heart.
You will all pay the price.
And I care about nothing.
Because fate will bring everything to the grave, leaving me with nothing, so I need not care about anything.
·
Six o’clock in the morning.
Zhou Rong held a gun in one hand, hiding behind a transformer box in the alley corner, licking the scrape on the back of his hand from falling from the second floor, exhaling a tired breath.
In the road not far away, zombies gradually emerged from the darkness, shuffling in groups and emitting growls.
