WMSR — QT Chapter 141

WMSR – QT Chapter 141

By

siofra

Chapter 141

 For some reason, Lin Jiawen did not have Bai Yichen see him off at the base's exit gates like the families of other ability wielders typically did. Yet simultaneously as he departed the compound, inside the District A residential sector, Bai Yichen gazed at the clock hanging on the wall, calculating that they should have just commenced their journey.

"Mr. Ling, you needn't worry. Lord Lin will only be gone for two days and will return shortly," a steady voice sounded from nearby. It belonged to Gu Song, whom Lin Jiawen had explicitly assigned to safeguard Bai Yichen.

Bai Yichen turned his head and flashed a mild smile at Gu Song: "Mm, I know."

Perhaps driven by Lin Jiawen's exhaustive, repeated injunctions, Gu Song had arrived long before Lin Jiawen stepped outside the gates. At that very moment, the exterior of the villa was ringed by operatives from Gu Song's faction, establishing a defensive perimeter boasting zero blind spots. Naturally, the supreme defensive anchor remained Gu Song himself as an ability wielder, while the auxiliary guards consisted of physically robust ordinary humans.

Gu Song approached the mandate entrusted by Lin Jiawen with utmost gravity, maintaining an unyielding vigil directly beside Bai Yichen from start to finish. True to the promise he made prior to Lin Jiawen's departure, Bai Yichen harbored zero restless urges to venture outside and explore the wasteland over the next two days. Given that he owed his ongoing survival in this brutal world entirely to Lin Jiawen—and had grown deeply accustomed to their domestic routine—he held no desire to alter the status quo. Thus, enduring these potentially turbulent forty-eight hours by remaining safely indoors to read books and practice calligraphy felt like a thoroughly pleasant arrangement.

And so, the opening daylight hours of Lin Jiawen's absence slipped quietly away. Everything transpired in absolute, windless tranquility—as though nothing out of the ordinary were occurring, rendering the heavily fortified defensive ring around Bai Yichen's residence little more than a manifestation of acute paranoia.

Yet beneath that deceptive facade of absolute calm, deep in the dead of night, several figures converged in strict secrecy, nodding among themselves as one instructed: "Disseminate the rumor the moment day breaks tomorrow. Ensure every single resident in the base learns of it the instant they wake."

The others nodded in acknowledgment. Though the operation had been mapped out well in advance, one individual still voiced a flicker of anxiety: "Will broadcasting such fabricated intel trigger mass panic across the base?"

The initial speaker cast a sidelong glance at him: "This is the boss's explicit directive. Besides, rest assured—it is merely a false rumor engineered to inflict zero actual harm. The citizens inside this sanctuary have grown far too complacent in the apocalypse; consider this a simulated emergency drill."

Assuaged by the rationale, the hesitant operative dropped his objections. Indeed, circulating an artificial rumor would not spark catastrophic anarchy, and they possessed fully formulated containment protocols to manage any residual fallout.

Having executed a final alignment of their operational timeline, the conspirators dispersed into the shadows, heading toward designated sectors across the compound.

As the night slowly dissolved and the eastern horizon began to streak with pale morning light, early-risers across the sanctuary caught wind of an alarming intelligence that swept through every residential block with terrifying velocity: A colony of zombie rats had been discovered within the base.

Zombie animals represented an existential terror on par with standard zombies, proving in certain dimensions significantly more troublesome due to their diminutive physical frames and hyper-agile movement profiles. Among them, zombie rats reigned as the most agonizing vector imaginable. The terrifying prospect that such disease-carrying, hyper-aggressive predators might suddenly burst forth from any hidden crevice was sufficient to curdle the blood of every living soul.

What elevated the collective panic to a fever pitch was the grim reality that this crisis struck precisely during the compound's moment of maximum military vulnerability—barely twenty-four hours after the vast majority of the base's ability wielders had been dispatched on expedition. Erupting with such abysmal timing, the crisis prompted countless residents to curse their catastrophic luck.

Regardless of how intensely the panic gripped their nerves, immediate action was mandatory. The severely constrained roster of ability wielders remaining behind was mobilized instantly. While power-wielders stationed at vital command posts remained anchored to their posts, every other available ability wielder—regardless of their prior engagement—was conscripted into an emergency strike team tasked with a singular, high-priority objective: sweeping the compound for Tier-1 hazardous biological entities—zombie rats.

Naturally, the roster of mobilized operatives included Gu Song, who had been stationed beside Bai Yichen.

Zombie rats discovered within the base... What exceptionally convenient timing for such an emergency to materialize!

Gu Song could hardly be faulted for cynicism; the temporal alignment of the crisis was too unnatural. This marked the precise juncture when Mr. Lin and his vanguard should have completed their first day of transit, arriving at Z City—the maximum spatial distance separating them from the sanctuary. Should any crisis erupt internally, Mr. Lin remained stranded beyond immediate reinforcement range.

Given the exhaustive warnings Lin Jiawen had drilled into his ears prior to departure, Gu Song found it impossible to dismiss the event as a random coincidence. Was the reported incursion of zombie rats genuinely authentic?

Plagued by deep skepticism, Gu Song delayed his deployment to the designated sector in the northern slums, remaining rooted in place as turbulent thoughts churned through his mind.

Simultaneously, across the remaining sectors, all unassigned ability wielders arrived at their designated operational zones, executing a room-by-room, inch-by-inch purge of potential rodent vectors. Against that backdrop of total mobilization, the prolonged absence of the power-wielder assigned to the northern slums stood out with glaring prominence.

The administrative coordinator supervising the rodent sweep cast a cold, inscrutable gaze over the panic-stricken ordinary civilians populating the northern district and demanded: "Has the ability wielder assigned to the northern sector arrived yet?"

"Negative, sir. Still not on site."

"Move. We're going to investigate." The coordinator pivoted away with a dark, dissatisfied scowl. Had an independent observer been present, they would have recognized his vocal cadence as belonging to one of the conspirators who met in secret the previous midnight.

Simultaneously, within that very same northern slum district the coordinator had just turned away from, a lean, emaciated man sprinted through a labyrinth of narrow alleyways in blind panic. Rounding a sharp residential corner without watching his footing, the man slammed violently into a local woman carrying a basin of washing water. With a loud splash, freezing liquid soaked both individuals from head to toe as the plastic basin clattered against the stone paving.

Soaked from an unexpected impact and operating under an already fractured emotional state, the emaciated man snapped into a violent, volatile rage. Raising his hand without a second thought, he delivered a vicious, echoing backhand slap across the woman's cheek: "Blind bitch! Watch where you're walking!"

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