Chapter 46
A deafening explosion erupted from the ground-level parking lot.
The fire spread at terrifying speed, and the surrounding zombie horde howled and shrieked as it was swallowed by roaring flames.
Even though Wei Cheng and the other two dropped flat in time, they were still hit by the blast. After barely shaking off some of the dizziness and ringing in their ears, they supported each other and ran desperately toward the ambulance at the main entrance.
Back in the safe house, Guanguan heard a noise even more terrifying than thunder.
He had been hugging the little dog and standing guard by the window the whole time, but big brother and the uncles never appeared.
Guanguan was so anxious, so anxious!
After who knew how long, big brother’s profile flashed through the narrow gap in the curtains.
Guanguan quickly put the little black dog down and fumbled to put on his helmet and boxing gloves. “Guard Little Apricot, stay home and be good!”
The little black dog wiggled its butt and barked twice.
The door opened from outside, and a thick, acrid burnt smell drifted into the ambulance.
Guanguan’s eyes went wide, and he clenched his little boxing gloves as he rushed over. “Big brother! Uncles!”
The three of them looked awful—there was black dust and blood everywhere on their faces and clothes.
“Guanguan! Quick, move aside!” Wei Cheng and Yi Qi quickly laid the unconscious Shen Zheng onto the stretcher bed.
Yi Qi rapidly looked over the equipment inside the ambulance. Wei Cheng immediately said, “Don’t worry, we have all the medicine you want, and there’s backup power in the ambulance too. Go drive.”
“Gasoline…”
Wei Cheng frowned. “As much as you need.”
Yi Qi looked deeply at Wei Cheng, then jumped into the driver’s seat while firing his gun to mow down the nearby zombies.
Just as Wei Cheng was about to shut the ambulance door, he saw more than ten zombies hurl themselves at them, waving their bluish-black claws as they tried to rip the flesh off the people inside.
He instantly took a samurai sword out of the safe house and slashed hard.
Zombie heads dropped in a neat line. At that moment, the ambulance started up and reversed, and the half-rotted corpses were immediately crushed flat under the tires.
Under Wei Cheng’s constant covering fire, the vehicle successfully made it to the hospital gate. But a swarm of relentless zombies was still chasing behind, and they were just about to flank the ambulance from the side.
Wei Cheng poured the last bottle of gasoline beneath the wrecked electric cart that had crashed into the security booth.
His face cold, he raised his gun and swiftly aimed at a zombie still burning all over yet stubbornly chasing them. A few sharp shots rang out. Several bullets struck its right shoulder, and it staggered sideways. In no time, the flames on its body merged with the gasoline under the electric cart.
Not long after the ambulance drove away from the hospital, a thunderous blast sounded behind them. The main entrance of Ren’ai Hospital turned into a vast sea of fire.
Guanguan crouched beside Shen Zheng’s bed, his voice as tiny as a mosquito. “Big brother…”
Wei Cheng set down the gun in his hand. “Guanguan, come here.”
Guanguan took off his helmet and boxing gloves, then quickly climbed into his brother’s arms, burying his little head deep in his shoulder and mumbling in a muffled voice, “Why is Uncle Shen keeping his eyes closed? Is he sleepy?”
Shen Zheng’s wound had been wrapped up tightly, and because the bleeding had been stopped in time, no blood had seeped out.
“Mm. Uncle Shen will wake up in a little while.”
Wei Cheng gently stroked Guanguan and forced a smile. “Don’t be scared. Uncle Shen will be okay.”
Then he glanced at Shen Zheng and whispered a few words in Guanguan’s ear.
Guanguan’s little brows furrowed solemnly, and he planted his chubby hands on his hips. “Leave it to Guanguan, Guanguan is the best at working!”
About thirty minutes later, the ambulance stopped in a mountain park that had been abandoned for many years.
As soon as Yi Qi parked the vehicle, he hurried up into the back—only to find that the once messy interior of the ambulance had become spotless. The air even smelled faintly of disinfectant.
The skeletal zombie corpse was gone, all the dust-covered medical instruments had been cleaned and arranged neatly, and most importantly, Shen Zheng now had a thick, warm quilt over him.
How had a quilt appeared here?
Yi Qi stared blankly at the brothers.
Wei Cheng handed him a large medical kit. “There are sterile surgical gowns, a thermos of hot water, anesthetics, various instruments, IV drips, and antibiotics in here. If you need anything else, you can ask us.”
Holding the heavy kit in his arms, this big grown man suddenly had wet red eyes. Solemnly, he said, “Thank you. Thank you both.”
No one knew what Shen Zheng meant to him.
Wei Cheng took Guanguan and got out of the vehicle.
The mountain park had clearly been abandoned for a long time. There were no fitness machines left, only stone benches and a wooden seesaw. Precisely because almost no one came here, there were neither human nor zombie footprints around.
Wei Cheng and the others did not dare stray too far from the ambulance, so they played on the seesaw not far away.
Thankfully, the weather had turned warmer recently, the sun was shining brightly, and it was not cold outside at all.
“Big brother, sit here.” Guanguan pointed to one end of the seesaw, then thumped over to the other end. “Baby sits here!”
“Okay. Hold tight to the handles with your little hands.”
Wei Cheng sat down carefully, holding back his strength. Once Guanguan was seated too, he pressed down with his legs.
Little Guanguan was instantly lifted into the air. His eyes went wide. “Big brother! Guanguan is flying!”
Then Wei Cheng eased off his strength, and Guanguan dropped back down with a whoosh, his little feet touching the ground.
Guanguan let out a wow and proudly announced, “Astronaut Guanguan has successfully landed!”
Wei Cheng laughed softly. “Is it fun?”
“So fun, so fun!”
After a few rounds, Guanguan tightened his mittened hands on the wooden handles and suddenly had a burst of filial devotion. “Big brother, Guanguan will let you be an astronaut once!”
The child was too little to realize that every time he landed, his big brother had already been the “astronaut.”
Wei Cheng raised a brow. “Sure.”
But after a few energetic little hee-hee-ha-ha noises, Guanguan himself was still stuck suspended in the air and could not make it back down.
“Big brother, don’t rush, okay!”
Wei Cheng folded his arms and laughed. “I’m not rushing.”
“Little chicken wings, give Guanguan strength! Strawberry cake, give Guanguan strength! Potato-potatoes, give Guanguan strength!” Guanguan’s whole body was motionless—only his mouth was working hard.
Wei Cheng was trying very hard not to laugh out loud.
Guanguan scratched his little cheek. “Big brother, can you close your eyes?”
“Sure.” Wei Cheng closed his eyes.
Guanguan looked left and right, then pulled his little backpack around to his chest and sneakily released the little black dog from the safe house.
The moment it came out, the little black dog stuck out its tongue and barked excitedly at Guanguan.
Wei Cheng cracked one eye open just slightly. Seeing that Guanguan had both hands firmly gripping the handles, he gently lifted his legs and shifted his weight.
Guanguan stared in delight as his big brother rose into the air.
He held the little black dog up high. “Little Apricot, your dog food is so strong! You’re amazing!”
The little black dog wagged its tail furiously and held its head high, obviously deeply pleased by the praise.
After playing on the seesaw for a while, Wei Cheng took Guanguan and the little dog for a walk by the river.
Then, thinking of something, he asked, “Guanguan, can you see any numbers above the two uncles’ heads?”
Guanguan tilted his head. “I can!”
Wei Cheng brightened. “Then what do they look like?”
“Uncle Shen has two water-drop little gourds above his head!”
“Little gourds… 88%?”
Wei Cheng had not expected Shen Zheng’s number to already be above eighty percent.
“What about Uncle Yi?”
“Chengcheng, Guanguan!”
Yi Qi had opened the ambulance door and, not seeing the children, walked down a little before spotting them by the river.
Wait—when had that shiny black, beautiful little dog appeared?
Wei Cheng carried Guanguan up the slope quickly. “Uncle Yi, how is Uncle Shen?”
“Thank heaven, the bullet didn’t hit bone, and it didn’t get lodged in the bone seam. The depth is shallow too. In a case like this, taking it out right now would be even more dangerous than leaving it in. I’ll need to wait until Shen Zheng recovers a bit before doing surgery.”
Yi Qi sighed. “And this surgery will take a long time. Doing it out in the open is far too dangerous.”
Wei Cheng nodded. “We need to find a stable place to stay so Uncle Shen can recover properly.”
“I actually know a good place.”
Yi Qi looked toward the distant mountains. “Shen Zheng and I have a very good high school classmate. His parents run a guesthouse on Fenglin Mountain in Yu City. Before the virus outbreak, he told me his mother had just had surgery, and that their family wasn’t planning to open for business in the second half of the year. He even invited a few of us friends to go there and escape the heat. So that place probably won’t have many tourist-zombies. He’s a very loyal, warm-hearted guy. Shen Zheng and I have both received a lot of help from him. If we go, he’ll definitely take us in.”
Wei Cheng lowered his eyes and thought it over. Yi Qi was cautious, suspicious, and one could even say cunningly experienced. If he believed someone was trustworthy, he was probably not wrong.
Once night fell, it would get colder and colder in the mountains. He and Guanguan could enter the safe house, but Shen Zheng, injured as he was, might lose his life.
He said, “Then we’ll stay temporarily at that guesthouse.”
Yi Qi opened his mouth. He had a stomach full of questions, but did not know how to ask them.
“Uncle.”
Guanguan ran to Yi Qi’s leg. “Has Uncle Shen woken up? Does he miss me?”
“He’s awake.”
Yi Qi bent a finger and rubbed Guanguan’s nose, smiling. “Where’d this dirt come from on your nose? A perfectly good white steamed bun looks like it got moldy.”
Then he picked Guanguan up and said, “Not only does he miss you, this whole trip he’s been searching for good things to bring you.”
The two children followed Yi Qi back into the ambulance, where they saw Shen Zheng lying on the stretcher bed, his complexion having regained some color.
Guanguan launched himself forward. “Uncle Shen!”
“Guanguan.” The moment Shen Zheng really saw Guanguan, his heart finally settled back into place.
When he woke up, the first thing he had asked was where Guanguan was. Yi Qi had said he was out playing on the seesaw with his brother. At first Shen Zheng had not believed him at all and thought Yi Qi was just making things up to comfort him.
“Bag, where’s my bag…”
Yi Qi quickly handed over the backpack from beneath the stretcher. “Don’t move, don’t move. The bleeding just stopped. Your bag is right here.”
Guanguan stared curiously at the top of Uncle Yi’s head and then ran to his brother’s side, whispering, “The little water drops above Uncle Yi’s head keep changing!”
“Keep changing?”
Guanguan clenched his fists. “Mm!”
“Guanguan, come here. Look, what’s this?”
Yi Qi had opened Shen Zheng’s backpack and pulled out a few Kinder Eggs printed with Ultraman.
“It’s Ultraman eggs!”
Guanguan ran over in delight. “Uncle Shen, you’re amazing! You can find Ultraman eggs!”
So there weren’t just Ultraman eggs in his little Cloud Mall!
Shen Zheng smiled and coughed twice. “Last night, those people smashed a lot of the food display cabinets. They didn’t want this kind of snack toy for kids, so Uncle Yi and I took the chance to pick up quite a few. We could’ve even picked up a few bottles of juice too…”
Guanguan thought that sounded too dangerous and waved his hands. “Uncle, Guanguan doesn’t want juice. Guanguan wants you to be good-good!”
Yi Qi looked at Wei Cheng and smiled helplessly. “If I hadn’t stopped him just now, he really would’ve gone to grab some.”
Suddenly Guanguan’s eyes widened. “Changed! Changed again!”
Shen Zheng and Yi Qi looked puzzled. Changed what again?
Wei Cheng’s gaze moved between the two of them, and he seemed to realize something.
He pulled out the number cards from Guanguan’s backpack. “Guanguan, what numbers are above Uncle Yi’s head now?”
Guanguan held the familiar number cards and quickly read them out. “7, 0.”
70%.
Wei Cheng thought for a moment, then asked, “Guanguan, that day how did you say you missed Uncle Shen?”
Guanguan pressed both little hands together over his chest. “Guanguan missed him here!”
Shen Zheng’s eyes widened slightly.
Too cute!
Wei Cheng said calmly, “Guanguan, did the numbers above Uncle Yi’s head change?”
Guanguan nodded like a pecking chick. “Changed again!”
Yi Qi was practically being tortured to death by curiosity. “What exactly are these two kids talking about? First you pull out guns, then you pull out dogs. Tell me honestly—which one of you is Doraemon?”
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