Apocalypse Escape: Day One of Survival

The young man seemed to be one of Young Master Zhong’s underlings. After a zombie tore open his throat, his limbs were still flailing.

But blood poured back into his throat, choking him to death.

On the other side, Zhong Yaying was leaning against the doorframe, retching repeatedly. When a zombie suddenly leaped in front of her, she screamed in panic.

”Brother! Brother!”

Zhong Shichong’s face was pale and his legs were trembling with fear. How could he possibly worry about his sister? He turned and ran for the stairs.

Coming down to meet him was an obese woman drooling, her face covered in fine, bluish-black striped lines.

Zhong Shichong recognized the woman. She seemed to be a relative of the homeowner, Song Yufu. ’She seemed fine yesterday,’ he thought. ’Why does her face look so strange today?’

Before he could react, the woman’s entire body was pressing down on him.

Zhong Shichong’s mind went blank. He tried to turn and flee, but it was too late. The woman pinned him hard against the corner of the staircase.

”What are you doing? What are you doing?!” Zhong Shichong could only roar with a hoarse voice, but he was pressed firmly against the handrail, unable to move.

Seeing the woman press closer, her foul-smelling drool nearly dripping onto his face, Zhong Shichong felt a wave of nausea. In a moment of desperate inspiration, he frantically grabbed an underling who was standing beside him.

He completely ignored the underling’s screams and wails, shoving the man directly toward the woman’s mouth.

The CRUNCHING, CHEWING sounds were utterly horrifying.

A vicious ruthlessness born of desperation took hold of Zhong Shichong. He used the underling as a human shield against the woman’s tearing bites while struggling to free himself from underneath her. He then scrambled and crawled back down the stairs.

He looked up and saw his sister, Zhong Yaying, being protected by a man he didn’t recognize.

The man was tall and imposing, wielding an iron hammer. With a single swing, a zombie’s head was smashed to a pulp.

The pulpy brain matter was a shocking visual, making one’s stomach churn with the urge to vomit.

Seeing the chaos, Song You’ai quickly moved forward to help kill zombies.

Since awakening her superpower, she felt much more agile. Her arm strength and her own speed also seemed to have improved slightly.

When she used the Metal Knife her daughter had given her, she felt incredibly powerful, each slash silky smooth and effortless.

Xie Ning watched her mother for a while. Seeing Song You’ai fearlessly chopping off several zombie heads, she offered a bit of advice, telling her not to use so much force.

’Killing zombies requires technique, too.’

’If you can take one down with thirty percent of your strength, using a hundred percent is just a waste of energy.’

Song You’ai humbly accepted the advice and adjusted her fighting style, gradually becoming more and more proficient.

Seeing that her mom was on the right track, Xie Ning felt relieved and pulled her gaze away, scanning their surroundings.

Villa 59 was now in a state of utter chaos. Screams and shouts echoed from the bathrooms, the kitchen, and the guest bedrooms.

Two zombies were pressed against the kitchen’s glass door, striking it hard. The glass made a sharp CRACK-CRACK sound.

Xie Ning took out an obese zombie with one blow and rushed to the kitchen door, plunging her knife into the back of another zombie’s head.

The women hiding in the kitchen stared with wide, terrified eyes. Their shrill screams were audible even through the glass.

One of them, a girl with shoulder-length hair and a darker complexion, tearfully stood up and tried to rush out, only to be held back by an old woman and a middle-aged woman beside her.

Xie Ning flicked the tip of her Heavenly Blade, piercing straight into the head of the other zombie nearby.

After rummaging through its head and finding no Zombie Crystal Core, Xie Ning turned to leave.

The girl with shoulder-length hair in the kitchen suddenly threw off the hands of the two people holding her back. She rushed out of the door and shrieked at Xie Ning, ”You killed my grandpa and my dad!”

The old woman hurried out after her. ”Lu Qin, don’t talk nonsense! This is our eldest brother’s granddaughter. Your grandpa and dad had already turned. What else could be done but kill them?”

”Third Grandaunt, where are Xiao Long and Third Granduncle?”

”They should be upstairs.”

The girl named Lu Qin relentlessly advanced, still shouting, ”You killed my dad and my grandpa! You killed... Grandma!”

She clapped a hand over her mouth, her gaze fixed on an obese woman lunging down from the top of the stairs.

The woman’s face was smeared with blood; she had evidently just finished a meal.

Her milky-white eyes scanned the crowd, and despite a limp, she charged with surprising speed toward Zhong Yaying.

Zhong Yaying had collapsed to the floor, screaming with her hands over her mouth. Standing before her like a post-apocalyptic hero, Li Dawei slammed his hammer down, pinning the woman to the ground.

”Grandma!!” Lu Qin nearly fainted.

Her Third Grandaunt and her daughter-in-law quickly steadied her, a trace of pity in their eyes. ”Lu Qin, don’t be so heartbroken. The most important thing right now is to protect yourself.”

The joys and sorrows of others didn’t affect Xie Ning in the slightest. She lifted her foot and headed upstairs.

「About half an hour later, the situation was brought under control.」

Xie Ning came downstairs, supporting her Third Granduncle, whose legs were weak. Her cousin, Song Xiaolong, followed behind them, his face ashen.

She immediately spotted Li Xiang standing dazedly at the foot of the stairs, holding a hammer just like her brother’s. Dark red blood dripped from it.

A tight-fitting tube top and a miniskirt. ’She probably only owns this type of clothing for summer,’ Xie Ning mused.

At the moment, her head and body were spattered with filth, and her legs were covered in...

Xie Ning saw that she was trembling as she held the hammer. She glanced sideways at her. ”Uh...”

”You shut up! I don’t want to hear you talk right now!”

Xie Ning rubbed her nose, walked over to her, and used the Heavenly Blade to stir the contents of a zombie’s head, silently retrieving a Crystal Core.

She made a circuit of the house and collected three more Zombie Crystal Cores.

’It wasn’t that she didn’t want to tell them. It was that every time she tried to speak, the siblings Li Dawei and Li Xiang would glare at her with murderous eyes, as if Ningning were some kind of killer.’

The survivors had all collapsed onto the sofas and by the door, muttering incessantly like they had lost their minds.

Li Dawei and Li Xiang both stared at Xie Ning as if she were a freak.

’What kind of normal person would rummage around in a zombie’s head? She already killed it, but she still has to go digging around in there. She’s a total psycho!’

Xie Ning glanced at the Li siblings again. ”Actually, inside a zombie’s head...”

”Shut up!” the Li siblings roared at her.

Xie Ning turned and walked away in a huff. Song You’ai followed her daughter, comforting her, ”Don’t mind them. They’re just a pair of lunatics.”

’It’s not like they didn’t kill zombies themselves,’ she thought. ’Why are they so hostile to our Ningning?’

”Grandpa... Dad... Grandma...” Lu Qin’s heart-wrenching cries echoed through the villa.

But human joy and sorrow are not universal; most of the others were simply relieved to have survived.

”Third Granduncle, we need to check the other areas. All the zombies on the estate have to be cleared out.”

Song Yufu nodded shakily, then turned to the others in the villa. ”Who can go with Xiao Ning to help?”

Not a single person moved.

Li Dawei’s priority was protecting the beautiful Zhong Yaying. His legs seemed to be nailed to the floor beside her, unable to move.

Song Xiaolong stepped forward. ”Ningning, I’ll go out with you and take a look.”

Xie Ning nodded, not refusing his offer.

’In reality,’ she thought, ’for an ordinary person like Song Xiaolong, the only way to increase his chances of survival in the apocalypse is to kill more zombies and get more practice.’