Chapter 96: Escape from Death
“Xiaoyi, Xiaoyi…” Getting closer, they could hear his low murmuring. Lin Yimu approached carrying him, seeing the pile of zombies below. “I need to save him, I need to save him…”
Zhuang Mingxu struggled on Lin Yimu’s back, trying to get down. The two were similar in height and weight. Zhuang Mingxu had lost a lot of weight after suffering for a period in the apocalypse, but at this moment, Lin Yimu couldn’t control him. It was Ning Yuan who stepped forward to help restrain him.
“Mingxu, calm down, I’ll go down and take a look,” Ning Yuan said with a solemn expression. He knew what Lu Weiyi meant to Zhuang Mingxu; calling him his life wasn’t an exaggeration.
“I’ll go too,” Antonio said.
“I…” Just as Xu Sa opened his mouth, Antonio interrupted him, “Just the two of us will go down. The rest of you take care of the wounded, watch the surroundings, and prevent zombies from approaching.”
After Antonio finished speaking, he looked at Ning Yuan. “We’ll climb down directly from the bridge pier.”
“Okay,” Ning Yuan said, flexing his wrist, and said to Zhuang Mingxu, who was staring intently below, “I will find him.” Alive or dead, he silently added in his heart.
The few people in front moved out of the way. Ning Yuan and Antonio stepped forward, just about to lean over and look down, when they saw an extremely thin small green branch reach up. Immediately after, Lu Weiyi’s clear and cold voice came from below, “Pull me up.”
Zhuang Mingxu’s eyes widened instantly. His trembling hand reached out to touch the almost imperceptible small green branch. The small green branch directly approached and circled his fingertip a few times. He called out in a hoarse voice, “Xiaoyi!”
Xu Sa, who was close to the bridge railing, leaned over to look and saw Lu Weiyi clinging to a bridge pier more than a person’s height above the bottom of the ravine. The small green branch had wrapped around him several times, tightly securing his entire body to prevent him from falling.
“Lu Xiaoyi!” Xu Sa shouted in surprise.
When Lu Weiyi realized he was falling, he directly entered his space. The total height was only a dozen meters, and he would reach the bottom in the blink of an eye. Even inside his space, he was only two or three meters above the bottom of the ravine. Going out again would still result in a fall, but with the buffer, he wouldn’t be smashed into pieces. However, there was a pile of zombies waiting below. Being bitten once or twice wouldn’t be a big deal, but being devoured would be terrifying.
But if he stayed in his space all the time, the people outside would definitely notice. Moreover, Zhuang Mingxu looked clearly frightened. Lu Weiyi only thought for a moment and directly exited his space. But in the instant of exiting, he had the small green branch, relying on its memory, bind him to the bridge pier.
Lu Weiyi also saw Xu Sa and said, “I don’t have the strength, I can’t get up.” Facing five ability users against a group of zombies, no matter how strong he was, he couldn’t avoid being grabbed and bitten once or twice. Plus, using his ability had accelerated the spread of zombie energy, and he could already feel the pain.
Lu Weiyi had always known it would hurt to be bitten by a zombie. The higher the level of the zombie, the more it would hurt. But he had never been bitten. In his previous life, Zhuang Mingxu had protected him perfectly. Every time they went out, if anything went wrong, Zhuang Mingxu would always shield him with his own body first.
He had seen Zhuang Mingxu grit his teeth and endure this pain countless times, his whole body tensed, sweat dripping from his forehead. He would bite his lip and force out a grimace of reassurance for Lu Weiyi who was watching over him.
So this is how much it hurts…
Luckily, it was me who got caught. If it were the current Zhuang Mingxu, he would definitely have turned into a zombie. Lu Weiyi gritted his teeth, enduring the pain that seemed to be drilling out from his bones, and also felt incredibly lucky.
As soon as Xu Sa’s voice fell, everyone immediately leaned over the bridge railing to look down. Ning Yuan shouted, “Weiyi, do you have a rope? We’ll come down and pull you up.”
Lu Weiyi manipulated the small green branches to take out two bundles of rope from his space and threw them up. The people above were quick. In a moment, Antonio came down with a rope tied around him. He had Lu Weiyi’s small green branch loosen slightly and directly used the other rope to tie Lu Weiyi in a tight knot, shouting upwards, “Pull!”
With the full strength of the people above, Lu Weiyi was pulled up in a few breaths. Antonio pulled himself up the rope as well.
Lu Weiyi was placed on the ground, and everyone hurriedly untied the ropes around him. Zhuang Mingxu dragged his leg over from the side and directly hugged the person on the ground in his arms. The force was so strong that Lu Weiyi felt like he could be strangled. He murmured in a low, heartbroken voice, “Xiaoyi.”
“I’m fine,” Lu Weiyi leaned against him and said in a low voice, “I went into my space.”
Zhuang Mingxu also remembered at this time that he had a space he could enter, but the feeling of thinking he had lost him forever just now couldn’t be relieved so quickly.
“I won’t be reckless and impetuous anymore,” Lu Weiyi endured the pain and said slowly through gritted teeth.
This time things had become so uncontrollable entirely because Lu Weiyi had been too high-profile, attracting the covetousness of others. Subconsciously, he had always felt that Zhuang Mingxu was still that omnipotent person, and no matter what he did, there would be a strong backing supporting him to get through safely.
But at this moment, Lu Weiyi looked at the blood Zhuang Mingxu had coughed up when he fell from the truck bed, the dust on his body as he crawled over, and the tear in his casual pants from the ground’s pebbles that had left a bloody mark on his skin. He finally realized that the current Zhuang Mingxu was not the strong person in his memory.
He had no ability now, and any bit of zombie energy could take his life. He was now a cripple, unable to take care of himself, especially since they were still so far from his home.
“If I die, definitely no one will take care of you.”
“Yes, I’m a cripple, a burden to everyone. No one will care about me. You must not have any trouble,” Zhuang Mingxu buried his head in his hair, breathing in his scent.
Running for their lives all the way, plus the hot weather, had made him sweat all over. The smell wasn’t actually pleasant, but it contained a faint, unique scent belonging to Lu Weiyi, which made him feel at ease, especially since the body under his hands was still warm.
After his leg was broken, this was the first time Zhuang Mingxu had taken initiative and said he was a burden.
Even knowing that Lu Weiyi still felt heartache, he struggled out of his embrace and looked at him seriously, “It will be alright, you know that.”
Zhuang Mingxu nodded and leaned in to gently kiss his forehead. The atmosphere was incredibly warm for a moment.
Everyone was immersed in the joy of surviving a disaster. Ning Yuan suddenly said, “Weiyi, were you… bitten?”
Lu Weiyi’s back clothes were torn, and several blackened scratches on his fair skin were clearly visible. Zhuang Mingxu’s heart, which had just settled, suddenly jumped up again. He looked at Lu Weiyi in horror and reached out to check.
Lu Weiyi stopped his hand. Only then did he realize that Lu Weiyi’s face was pale, cold sweat was beading on his forehead, and he was tightly clenching his teeth when he wasn’t speaking, making his masseter muscles bulge. He seemed to have no strength, and the hand that pushed him away was weak.
“Ability users won’t get infected,” Lu Weiyi knew what he wanted to ask and spoke first. He leaned back onto Zhuang Mingxu’s shoulder and began to use the ability in his body to resist the spreading zombie energy. Every piece of skin, every cell, felt as if it was being pulled by two opposing forces.
This feeling was like what they described the earliest ability users had to go through during that heavy snow. No wonder so many of the earliest ability users had died during that heavy snow.
This is something no one can bear.
Although Lu Weiyi hadn’t had a good life in the Ji family, it was mostly mental. No one had ever dared to lay a hand on him. He had only been injured a limited number of times, let alone experienced this kind of pain. For a moment, it was truly unbearable.
A short pain is better than a long one. He bit down on Zhuang Mingxu’s shoulder, exerting a little force. With a soft groan of pain, he suddenly poured out all his ability. Dirty blood spurted out from the wound, and he fell softly into Zhuang Mingxu’s arms.
“Xiaoyi, are you… alright?” Zhuang Mingxu held him, wanting to hold him tighter but afraid to.
Lu Weiyi shook his head slightly. Antonio said, “He should be fine. I see the blood is red now.” Zhuang Mingxu looked up at him, so Antonio had to add, “When Brother Li was bitten before, his blood turned red, and Lu said he was fine.”
Zhuang Mingxu turned his head to look at Li Zhuang sitting by the bridge, wanting a definite answer from him. Li Zhuang looked at Lu Weiyi with a half-smile and nodded.
“It’s alright, sleep for a while,” Zhuang Mingxu lowered his head and held Lu Weiyi close to his neck, coaxing him softly.
After all this commotion, Lu Weiyi was indeed tired. He blinked his eyes and was about to fall asleep when he heard Xu Sa squeeze in front of him. “Lu Xiaoyi, don’t sleep yet. Liu Rui was also caught. You quickly see how to save him.”
Everyone turned their heads to look at Liu Rui, who was leaning against the bridge railing. He was now lying on the ground, curled up in a ball, his body trembling slightly. His upper clothes had several holes burned in them, and on his arm were two very real rows of teeth marks.
“If you endure it, you’ll be fine,” Lu Weiyi said softly before falling asleep himself.
Between the gunfight and the car chase, plus several of their group bleeding and injured, even though the zombies behind them were cut off, the zombies in front could still be attracted at any time. Several of their main combatants were now out of commission. Staying here wasn’t safe, so they unanimously decided to move immediately and find a safe place for everyone to rest and recover.
In the truck, Zhuang Mingxu ignored his injured leg and held Lu Weiyi tightly in his arms, dazed. Equally dazed was Xu Sa, who was holding Liu Rui, whose whole body was trembling in pain. He lowered his head and buried his face in Liu Rui’s tattered clothes, his expression unclear, but Liu Rui could hear him whispering, “Endure it, just endure a little longer and it’ll be alright.”
Xu Sa’s initial attention was indeed on Lu Weiyi, but after seeing that Lu Weiyi was fine, he turned back to look at Liu Rui and found that the person who had been leaning against the bridge railing was now lying on the ground, curled up in a ball. His pained appearance was very similar to the scene he had witnessed when Liu Rui was beaten up by a group in prison. Xu Sa knew something was wrong. He stepped forward and saw the bite marks on Liu Rui’s arm. For a moment, Xu Sa felt his legs go weak.
He was a man over six feet tall, who had fought to the death with a group of murderers in prison, yet he felt his legs go weak. Xu Sa found it somewhat funny, but mostly he was scared.
“Brother Sa…” Liu Rui gritted his teeth and looked up at him, his eyes as bright as if they held the entire starry sky. He released his tense arm and instead hugged Xu Sa, his head gently rubbing against his chest.
Hmm, like a puppy, Xu Sa thought.
Loyal, protective, and fearless.
I hope that once his legs are healed he’ll also get super powers and they’ll be able to take care of each other