Chapter 18: Almost Becoming a Side Dish
At the very same moment, Chu Yang and Jiang Jue noticed the unusual commotion from their third-floor room.
A barrage of relentless thumping and low, guttural roars penetrated the walls and windowpanes, vibrating heavily against their chests.
“Brother Jiang, listen!” Chu Yang’s expression instantly turned serious. He shot up from the mattress, accidentally scattering a handful of sunflower seeds across the floorboards with a sharp rattle.
Jiang Jue was already at the window, moving without a sound. Looking down into the courtyard, his brows drew together in a tight frown.
“There are way too many of them!” Chu Yang crowded beside him at the glass. A single look outside was enough to make his breath catch in his throat.
The dense sea of rotting figures shuffling through the snow made his scalp prickle. “And look at how they’re moving… aren’t they way more agile than before?”
Indeed, the infected were no longer stumbling along with the rigid, clumsy gait from the first days of the outbreak. Though their movements were still somewhat stiff, their joints bent with noticeable fluidness, allowing them to coordinate their steps with chilling efficiency.
“They’ve evolved again,” Jiang Jue murmured, his deep voice laced with quiet gravity.
Chu Yang quickly tallied the numbers, anxiety creeping into his expression. “There are at least thirty of them down there. When I heard the noise earlier, I was actually excited, thinking our crystal cores were delivering themselves! But looking at this mess, if we charge down blindly…” He swallowed hard before finishing, “…we’ll just end up as a side dish.”
Throughout the residential complex, it wasn’t just their building that was on high alert. Shadows flickered behind the curtains of six or seven surrounding blocks as the remaining survivors watched the courtyard in terror. An invisible web of dread settled over the complex, keeping everyone frozen in place.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
The horde threw itself relentlessly against the ground-floor security door. The metal frame groaned under the strain, warping noticeably as the bolts began to give way. It clearly wouldn’t hold much longer.
Just then, the front entrance of Building 3, diagonally across the courtyard, burst open from the inside. Seven or eight men surged out in a tight pack.
They were clearly well-prepared. Armed with sharpened rebar, heavy iron pipes, rusted machetes, and even a couple of hefty fire axes, their faces were etched with raw, desperate fury.
The moment they cleared the doorway, they formed a crude defensive circle. Standing back-to-back, they braced themselves to hold off the zombies swarming toward the fresh noise.
“Brother Jiang, should we go down too?” Chu Yang watched the chaotic brawl below, a sudden idea taking shape. His voice grew urgent. “It’d be tough for just the two of us to take on that many, but if we team up with the guys from Building 3—plus any other survivors who might get the courage to join in—we might actually stand a chance at clearing them out!”
The more he thought about it, the more sensible it seemed. “We can’t stay cooped up here forever anyway, and we still need to collect those crystal cores.”
Jiang Jue considered the idea for a brief moment. Glancing down at Chu Yang—who was practically vibrating with excitement as he stared hungrily at the courtyard (almost as if he could already see the glowing crystals)—Jiang Jue let out an almost imperceptible sigh.
Reaching out, he curled his index finger and gave Chu Yang’s forehead a firm flick—not hard enough to cause real pain, but carrying a clear note of warning. “Stay close to me. Stay alert, don’t do anything reckless, and follow my lead at all times.”
“Got it! I promise to behave!” Chu Yang rubbed his forehead, ducking slightly, but there wasn’t a trace of annoyance on his face. His voice buzzed with pure eagerness.
With a thought, Chu Yang pulled his familiar Tang dao from his storage space. With a flick of his wrist, he gave the weapon a smooth spin, the polished steel carving a clean silver arc through the dim room. After checking the edge to make sure it was pristine, he gripped the hilt tightly.
Just as the two opened the door to leave, the apartment across the hall creaked open. Zhao Dayong, Li Wen, and Wang Rui cautiously poked their heads out, lingering fear plain on their pale faces. The fighting downstairs had clearly drawn them out to see what was happening.
“Come on! Let’s go down together and clear out the monsters!” Believing there was safety in numbers, Chu Yang called out in an encouraging tone.
Hearing that, Zhao Dayong’s head shook so violently he almost lost his balance, his face draining of all color as he scrambled backward over the threshold. “G-Go down there? The courtyard is crawling with them—going out is pure suicide! No way! I’m not going!” He retreated deeper into the room as he spoke.
Wang Rui’s eyes flickered. He looked at the sharp, gleaming blades in Chu Yang and Jiang Jue’s hands, then glanced toward the sounds of violence drifting up from below. The muscles in his jaw twitched, but in the end, he remained planted firmly on the spot, shaking his head without saying a word.
Li Wen was even more direct. Reaching out, he grabbed the trembling Zhao Dayong, hauled him inside, and slammed the door shut with a loud bang, sealing themselves off from the outside world.
“Tsk, what a bunch of cowards,” Chu Yang muttered, rolling his eyes in disgust. He couldn’t be bothered to waste his breath on them. Tightening his grip on his blade, he turned to Jiang Jue. “Brother Jiang, let’s ignore them. Let’s go.”
Behind the thin door, Zhao Dayong’s shaky, frantic mumbling could still be heard: “They’re insane… completely out of their minds… Charging into a horde like that is asking to die…”
Ignoring the mutters, Chu Yang and Jiang Jue moved in quick, silent tandem down the stairwell.
When they reached the ground-floor exit, they found that the majority of the infected at their doorstep had already been drawn toward the noisy skirmish by Building 3, leaving their backs exposed.
The two traded a swift, knowing look.
Chu Yang raised his hand, channeling his power. An invisible pulse of spatial energy shot forward with deadly accuracy. With a wet pop, the head of a nearby zombie caved in, spraying dark, foul matter across the snow.
“Watch your right!” Jiang Jue’s low warning rang out just as his body surged forward.
His blade cut through the freezing air with a sharp hiss. With two crisp snaps, he cleanly severed the legs of a flanking zombie. The creature collapsed helplessly into the snowbank, left with only its torso to claw pathetically at the air.
Perhaps inspired by the fierce fighting, several more survivors armed with crude weapons came pouring out from neighboring entryways to join the fray.
Among the newcomers, a short-haired young woman immediately caught everyone’s attention.
Her footwork was remarkably agile and her movements sharp. Facing two zombies charging at her side-by-side, she didn’t show the slightest hint of panic.
With a swift flick of her right wrist, several jagged ice spikes radiating bone-chilling frost condensed out of thin air above her palm!
With a sharp whoosh, the frozen projectiles shot forward, piercing cleanly through the monsters’ skulls.
The instant the ice drove into their brains, a burst of freezing energy spread through their bodies. The zombies stiffened at visible speed, their movements locking up before they crashed heavily into the snow.
The woman stepped in without missing a beat, raising a heavy iron rod with both hands. With two resounding thuds, she shattered the frozen skulls into pieces.
Incredible! An Ice-type Ability! Chu Yang couldn’t help but stare, thoroughly impressed.
She looked to be in her early twenties with sharp, delicate features, but carried a fierce, heroic presence that outshone most men on the field, making her impossible to miss.
As Chu Yang was busy marveling at how cool and capable she was, his focus drifted for a fraction of a second.
In that exact heartbeat, a seemingly dead zombie lying among the pile of corpses suddenly sprang to life. It lunged from Chu Yang’s blind spot with terrifying speed, its filthy, razor-sharp claws aimed straight for his exposed back!
“Watch out!”
Jiang Jue, who had been keeping a protective eye on Chu Yang the entire time, had already frowned the moment he saw the boy gawking at the stranger. Just as he sliced down an enemy in front of him, the corner of his eye caught the lethal ambush closing in behind Chu Yang!
