Chapter 143

Chapter 143

Yan Bubu walked along the edge of the second floor in the central city, accompanied by several children.

In this stretch, there was no sight of anyone else. Gunfire and zombie growls persisted, while the massive metal mesh beside them rattled loudly. Occasional bright lights seeped through from the lower level, illuminating the nearby zombies unusually vividly.

The section they traversed now was the most severely collapsed area. Houses lay in ruins, becoming mere rubble. Many large metal panels had flipped, revealing cracks, posing a risk of falling if not cautious.

As Yan Bubu passed over a fissure and peered down, he witnessed intense fighting below. Apparently, there was a breach somewhere, with zombies continuously charging in.

"Be careful, let's move slowly, and watch out not to fall," Yan Bubu repeatedly cautioned, causing the two older boys to tread even more cautiously.

Once they got through this section, the situation ahead wasn't as dire. Yan Bubu reassured them, saying, "Look ahead, the remaining path is much smoother; we'll be there soon."

"Okay," both boys visibly breathed a sigh of relief.

The little girl carried by Yan Bubu asked softly, "When we get there, can both of us walk down?"

"It's okay. Didn't I tell you I have magic? You two are as light as feathers," Yan Bubu reassured.

"Hmm, okay," the little girl felt somewhat relieved.

Finally reaching the next section of the path, they found the situation here wasn't much better than before. This stretch of massive metal mesh was comparatively intact, leading to a reduction in the number of soldiers around. Zombies occasionally climbed up to the second floor. Binunu kept charging to eliminate them every so often before returning to lead the two boys.

Suddenly, footsteps came running from behind. Yan Bubu turned to see two figures rapidly approaching them. Although he couldn't discern their faces, Binunu dashed past his side, evidently tackling two zombies.

Binunu charged towards the two zombies, leaping onto the head of one. Knowing it wasn't a fair fight for that zombie, Yan Bubu turned to look at the two boys standing still.

"Come closer, there's a gap beside you. Be careful not to fall—"

Before Yan Bubu could finish speaking, his words were cut short.

Suddenly, two zombie heads emerged from the crack, gripping the edge, evidently climbing up from the lower levels along something.

Yan Bubu quickly set down the little boy he was carrying. With no time to put down the girl on his back, he allowed her to tightly cling to his neck. He only drew his dagger, rushing towards the two zombies.

The two zombies opened their grim mouths, one lunging for the leg of the boy in the yellow T-shirt nearest to them. While Yan Bubu pounced, his dagger descended, plunging into the head of one zombie, and he swiftly pulled the boy in the yellow T-shirt away.

The other zombie reached for the wheezing boy's foot. Yan Bubu withdrew the dagger from the zombie's head, swiftly thrusting it toward the thin, bluish hand, piercing the palm and pinning it to the ground.

"Move away!" Yan Bubu ordered as the wheezing boy stood rooted to the spot in shock.

Only then did the boy snap out of it, hurriedly joining the boy in the yellow T-shirt. But at that moment, the boy left on the ground suddenly let out a piercing scream.

Yan Bubu swiftly turned around and noticed a gap in the massive metal mesh beside them. A zombie, having climbed to the second floor, was wriggling through the gap.

He pulled out the dagger from the zombie's pierced hand and stabbed it into its forehead, then rose to rush toward the massive metal mesh as it fell downwards.

The young boy panicked, running towards Yan Bubu, but the zombie outside the mesh had already slipped through the gap, its sharp nails about to pierce the child's tender neck.

Yan Bubu dashed closer and delivered a forceful kick, hitting the zombie's chest. Although it caused little harm, the kick sent it stumbling back a few steps.

The zombie slammed against the teetering massive metal mesh and, leveraging the recoil, lunged back. Afraid of it hurting the children, Yan Bubu rushed forward and kicked it once more, sending it crashing back onto the metal mesh. Simultaneously, he raised his arm and plunged the dagger into its temple.

With the dagger piercing the zombie's head, a dull thud sounded, but Yan Bubu caught a glimpse of a dark figure emerging behind the nearby metal mesh.

A hand from that shadow reached into the gap, aiming for the little girl clinging to Yan Bubu's back.

Completely unaware of the zombie's sudden appearance, Yan Bubu hadn't noticed when it sneaked up beside him. Moreover, because the zombie's target was the little girl, it didn't trigger any reflexive images in his mind, allowing it to stealthily crawl closer.

The little girl clung to Yan Bubu's neck like a koala. As the zombie's hand reached for her leg, Yan Bubu swiftly changed direction, facing the zombie himself, and swung the dagger toward it.

As the dagger struck, the zombie grabbed his leg and, at the instant the dagger pierced its temple, violently yanked him outward.

Yan Bubu was yanked, crashing against the massive metal mesh, emitting a grating screech. The section above the second floor flipped outward by ninety degrees.

He fell backward, half-lying on the mesh, fluctuating with the vibrations of the metal. Next to him lay the corpse of another just-killed zombie, its head punctured, resting lopsidedly on his shoulder.

"Brother! Don't fall!" Several kids screamed, running towards him, attempting to pull him back. Binunu, having killed the zombies behind, also swiftly rushed back.

Yan Bubu tried to get up, but the dead zombie gripping his leg persisted, dangling in midair. He attempted to shake off its hand, lifting his foot slightly, causing the juncture of the metal mesh to emit another chilling creak, sinking downward again.

"Ah…" The children arrived at the mesh, stretching their hands desperately, shouting in terror, "Brother, come back, come back!"

The little girl was still on Yan Bubu's back, her face pale with fear, unable to cry.

Yan Bubu glanced at Binunu, seeing it was about to reach him, wanting to instruct the children to stand back so he could use Binunu's magic.

Before he could speak, he felt a sudden weight drop beneath him, witnessing a few screws flying past. Then the massive metal mesh crashed, breaking off from the junction above the second floor, plummeting with him and two zombie bodies.

As Yan Bubu plummeted, Binunu lunged, but its claws missed, only a small piece of fabric slipping through its claws.

In the split second of descent, Yan Bubu managed one action: he reached back and grabbed the child on his back, tossing her upwards diagonally, simultaneously shouting, "Catch!"

He wasn't strong, and the toss wasn't high, but Binunu managed to hook its feet on the edge, leaning down to grab her from the back.

Yan Bubu continued falling rapidly with the massive metal mesh and two zombies.

Yan Bubu continued to plummet alongside the massive metal mesh and the two zombies.

Due to the collapse of the central city, the second floor was merely the usual height of four or five stories above the ground. However, during this short plummet, his mental domain lit up with a large display.

His mental tendrils rapidly flicked across those screens, executing corresponding actions and extending his left hand to the side.

Something entwined around his left wrist, abruptly halting his descent, leaving him suspended in mid-air. The zombie that had grabbed his foot finally let go, falling along with the broken massive metal mesh and another zombie.

Yan Bubu looked up and saw Binunu setting the little girl down and climbing down from the metal mesh. Wrapped around his left arm was a strip of fabric, hanging from an iron rod protruding from the metal mesh—likely torn clothing from the zombies as they climbed.

Roar!

Close by, there was a zombie's distant howl.

"Hurry up, brother, come up quickly." The three children were lying on the ground, desperately shouting, the little girl reaching out to him, crying uncontrollably.

The iron rod was somewhat long. Yan Bubu stretched out his hand to reach the giant metal net but failed. He looked up, squeezing out a smile, about to offer some comforting words, when he heard the tearing sound of the fabric wrapped around his wrist.

Then his grip loosened, and he uncontrollably continued to plummet downwards.

Amidst the desperate shouts of three children, Yan Bubu fell backward. In his field of vision, the figure of Nunu climbing on the net disappeared, replaced by a pitch-black sky.

In Yan Bubu's mental realm, a large screen lit up again, but each small screen showed him falling into a horde of zombies, then one by one, they extinguished.

They kept extinguishing.

Finally, his mental realm too succumbed to a silent, dark oblivion.

In that brief moment, Yan Bubu had no time for panic, nor to think further. The only image in his mind was of Feng Chen's face, as he softly called out 'Brother'.

Yan Bubu landed in a small clearing among the zombies. As he felt the pain of impact on his back, he also felt their cold fingers touching his body, grabbing his ankles and arms.

Before the pain of being torn and bitten arrived, his heart began to ache intensely. It spasmed into a knot, aching as if it had been ripped into shreds before the zombies could.

His heart ached for Feng Chen, pained by the knowledge of the agony Feng Chen would endure after his death.

Since they were connected by flesh and blood, he could empathize deeply, knowing the pain Feng Chen would suffer would be a thousand times more than what he was about to endure.

He didn't want to die; he wanted to live, but his limbs and shoulders were seized by the zombies and lifted.

In this brief time, it felt like he thought a lot, yet also as if he thought nothing at all. But the next second, he felt a buzzing in his brain, as if something forcefully intruded.

The world in front of him was spinning rapidly, twisting, stretching out bizarre lines of light. In his ears was a continuous, muffled noise, like many people whispering secretly, or like meaningless sounds, similar to the bubbles emerging from a boiling kettle.

Although the forehead lamp illuminated the path ahead, under its dim light, Yan Bubu's eyes staring at the sky lost their luster, turning an intense black that rapidly spread across his entire eyeball. His porcelain-white skin took on a cyan hue, with spider-web like capillaries rapidly protruding under the skin.

The zombie that had grabbed and lifted Yan Bubu hesitated to open its mouth, its expression becoming blank. After staring at Yan Bubu for a moment, it looked aimlessly into the distance, eventually losing interest and letting go.

Freed from the grip, Yan Bubu crashed to the ground with a thud. He felt no pain, only a sensation of electric currents surging into his brain, causing spasms in his limbs and convulsions in his body.

Yet, his mind remained clear. He could hear the hoarse sounds from his throat, reminiscent of those made by the dying. He was also aware that he was lying among a horde of zombies, being stepped on several times.

He lay there convulsing, eyes fixed on the sky. He didn't ponder why the zombies didn't bite him; all he knew was that he must stand up, right now, he couldn't just lie there.

As the convulsions gradually ceased, he struggled to rise, but his body was so stiff it seemed not his own. He first had to roll over from his back before pushing up with his hands.

Yan Bubu's gaze fell on the back of his hand, and he suddenly froze, hunched over.

Under the beam of the forehead lamp, he saw his skin turn an unnatural shade of dark blue, with similarly colored veins bulging on the surface, like lines on a tree trunk, and his fingernails had turned from pale pink to ink black.

Yan Bubu struggled to stand, lifting and slowly rotating his hands in front of his eyes. Throughout his life, he had seen such hands countless times – at the settlement, Haiyun Tower, the Beehive ship... and now, among the zombies crowding around him.

He stood there, staring at his hands, unmoved even as zombies bumped him. A single thought echoed in his mind: I've become a zombie, I must find Brother, I need to find him now...

At that moment, he sensed another consciousness within his mental realm.

To call it another consciousness wasn’t quite accurate, as it felt so familiar, so natural to him. He didn't need to ask; he knew it was part of his mental realm, inseparably linked to him.

"Bunu..." Yan Bubu called out in his mind.

Behind him, the horde of zombies roared madly. He turned to look and saw Bunu.

Bunu was leaping over the heads of zombies, occasionally stabbing its claws into the brains below. Under the light, its body was no longer cyan, and its eyes not purely black. It resembled the cartoon character from Yan Bubu's memory, with skin white tinged with pale pink, but its eyes were more vivid and agile, carrying a unique fierceness.

There was no need to ask; Yan Bubu gleaned everything from his mental connection with Binunu. He realized that to the zombies, he wasn't seen as a living person but had become one of them.

Yan Bubu gazed at Binunu, processing this information, when he heard the sound of engines from the direction of the central city.

An armored vehicle swiftly approached, stopping behind the mesh, and over a dozen heavily armed soldiers leaped off.

Seeing the arrival of the military, Yan Bubu felt relief flood over him. He instinctively considered running over for help. However, before he could take a step, the soldiers aimed their machine guns and began firing at the zombies crawling on the mesh.

Muzzles flashed; zombies fell from the massive metal mesh, and many bullets, amidst the dense firing, pierced through the mesh, leaving a series of craters near Yan Bubu.

The zombies around him seemed frenzied, roaring as they charged forward, then falling with each gunshot.

Another burst of bullets came his way; he quickly dodged backward, taking cover behind several zombies. But as he steadied himself, he heard a muffled thud from the head of the zombie in front, slowly tilting backward.

Sidestepping, the zombie crashed to the ground, sporting a deep black bullet hole squarely in its forehead.

Yan Bubu began to slowly retreat.

He finally realized an almost ludicrous fact: he was now also a zombie and would be targeted for elimination by the soldiers.