WMSR – QT Chapter 96

 

WMSR – QT Chapter 96

By

siofra

Chapter 96: The Zombie Apocalypse

Bai Yichen cast a quick glance at the mountain of supplies piled in the living room, possessing zero intention of conducting a detailed count, and promptly sent the delivery workers on their way after assuring them that everything was in order.

The moment the workers departed, Bai Yichen immediately dug out a nested stack of water buckets from the massive pile of goods he had purchased—yes, an entire stack. He rushed to every single faucet in the apartment, placing water containers beneath each tap, and turned them on full blast, letting the water rush out with a loud splash.

The chain reaction brought on by any disaster was always cascading. Although the world outside appeared perfectly peaceful and normal right now, Bai Yichen had no way of knowing whether municipal water sources would become contaminated or if the electrical grid and water supply would be severed once the zombie tide erupted. Thus, stockpiling an abundant supply of clean water in advance was the single proactive measure within his immediate power.

As he watched the buckets fill to the brim, Bai Yichen thought back to those supermarket employees who had just left. Unloading all the cargo had taken them a little over half an hour; heading back now, they would easily make it back to the supermarket in time. While at the supermarket earlier, he had casually surveyed the environment: because it was a weekday during standard working hours, foot traffic inside the store was exceedingly light. As long as those employees made it back inside the building and avoided turning into zombies themselves when the zombie tide exploded, their chances of survival were exceptionally high. After all, the two most critical pillars for survival were securing abundant survival supplies and avoiding being bitten by zombies.

Thinking of the supermarket, Bai Yichen's mind drifted to his teammates. He retrieved his phone, dialed their number, and the instant the call connected, a chaotic symphony of excited, overlapping voices came tumbling through the speaker: "How is it? How's it going? Any progress?"

The corner of Bai Yichen's mouth twitched subtly. Ignoring their teasing inquiry, he cut straight to the point: "Where are you guys?"

"At the supermarket! Didn't we follow your orders to take our sweet time going back?" At the mention of this, the voice on the other end carried a trace of melodramatic grievance.

Hearing this answer, Bai Yichen let out a quiet sigh of relief, though a flicker of lingering concern remained: "Mm. The supermarket isn't crowded right now, is it?"

Holding the phone, the teammate raised his head in utter confusion to scan the floor, completely baffled: "Yeah, pretty much empty—just a couple of cats wandering around."

Only then did Bai Yichen fully relax his guard, instinctively offering another firm reminder: "Make sure to buy plenty of supplies while you're there—especially food."

On the other end, the young men huddled over the receiver widened their eyes in absolute disbelief. Holy crap, bros before hoes, my foot!

Yet Bai Yichen on this end had zero interest in listening to their antics. He hesitated briefly, carefully measuring his words before suggesting: "How about we go watch a movie together tonight? What do you think about watching 'Attack of the Undead'?"

"Wait, what kind of movie is 'Attack of the Undead'?"

"It's a horror disaster film... where deceased people turn into walking corpses and zombies, tearing into ordinary humans on the street and that sort of thing..."

Picturing the plotline Bai Yichen described, the guys instantly shuddered, breaking out in goosebumps: "Wait a minute, when did your tastes get so hardcore? What's so good about those gory, blood-soaked movies?"

"My taste just suddenly shifted. Is it wrong to want to watch it?"

The guys were left speechless. Then, in a sudden flash of collective enlightenment, they felt as though they had decoded his hidden motive, eagerly chiming in to offer romantic counsel: "Is Qi Yuanyuan coming along tonight too? Let me tell you, this approach won't work! If you want to experience the thrill of a girl clinging to you in fear, you need to pick a supernatural horror film, not something so excessively bloody. Watching a movie with such hardcore gore—even with a face as handsome as yours, no girl is gonna handle that! Hey, wait—I'm not finished talking yet!"

Bai Yichen impassively cut the call off, deciding it was best to save their breath.

Having hung up, Bai Yichen didn't remain idle, continuing his efforts to establish contact with his biological parents in this world.

While Bai Yichen busied himself indoors, the world outside was quietly undergoing a terrifying metamorphosis as time ticked away second by second.

Unnoticed by the crowd, swaying silhouettes began to materialize across the once-bustling streets. Their skin exhibited an abnormal, sickly greenish-white hue, and their eyes were hollow, devoid of a single spark of life. As an elegantly dressed woman brushed past one of these staggering figures, her smartphone accidentally slipped from her hand onto the pavement. She leaned down to retrieve it with zero vigilance—yet in the very next instant, a shadow lunged violently onto her back, and a blood-curdling shriek instantly pierced the air.

Identical horrors were detonating across every corner of the globe, and the campus of S University was no exception. After departing from the shaded trees near the basketball court, Xiao Yi walked alone toward the artificial lake on campus, quietly pacing along its perimeter. Whenever turbulent emotions flared within his chest, he habitually resorted to this routine until complete inner tranquility was restored.

Today, after pacing for an unknown length of time, he had finally suppressed his restless thoughts when a sharp, agonizing scream suddenly pierced his ears. Turning his head, he spotted what appeared to be two individuals locked in a violent brawl in the distance. Xiao Yi knitted his brows; he generally refrained from meddling in other people's affairs, yet the shrieking sounded so utterly horrific that he ultimately stepped forward: "Classmate."

Xiao Yi rested a hand onto the person's shoulder, intending to intervene verbally first. However, his nostrils flared abruptly as an instant sense of wrongness gripped him—the stench of blood. Blood had been spilled! His eyes narrowed in sharp alert as he violently yanked back the figure pinning down the screaming student. Yet in the very next microsecond, the pulled student whipped around a face thoroughly drenched in fresh blood, lunging toward him with a ferocious, guttural roar.

At the critical juncture, Xiao Yi relied on his exceptionally agile reflexes to dodge the strike. Yet as his eyes locked onto the student's face, a surge of shock and suspicion surged within him. What in the world?

When he caught the scent of blood earlier, he had already braced himself for an attack, assuming the student was wielding a weapon and had stabbed the victim on the ground. But the fresh blood cascading down the attacker's face, coupled with teeth stained a horrific crimson, declared a terrifyingly different reality.

Yet the blood-soaked student afforded him zero time for rational deduction, lunging forward once more with a manic roar.

Leveraging his deep combat expertise and physical conditioning, Xiao Yi engaged the student in close-quarters combat. Yet the longer the struggle persisted, the more deeply abnormal everything felt. Due to his family background, he had grown up inside a martial arts dojo, accumulating immense experience in hand-to-hand combat. But this individual was profoundly wrong in every conceivable metric—whether it was the mindless, roaring state devoid of human rationality, the stiff, mechanical movements lacking tactical thought, or the icy, rigid body temperature he felt upon contact, which felt entirely non-human.