Chapter 21

Chapter 21

With only half a head remaining, the corpse slumped into a pool of blood. The toad mutant spat out the fragments of the skull in its mouth, seemingly savoring the moment as it extended its thick tongue to lick the brain matter flowing on the ground, sucking up the remaining viscera with a slurping noise.

The black-haired boy was completely petrified, despite not being a stranger to death. He couldn't help but gag, kneeling on the ground and vomiting uncontrollably.

Zhao Zhiyong's eyes bulged with anger as he rushed forward, grabbing Xiao Yang by the collar with both hands: "What are you doing!"

Overcome with emotion, his voice broke badly, and his hands trembled violently. Xiao Yang was shaken back and forth by his collar, looking as if he wanted to shake the water out of his brain: "Have you lost your damn mind!"

"Hahaha." Xiao Yang allowed himself to be yanked back and forth without resistance, his face filled with the satisfaction of vengeance. "He raped and killed my sister. Death for a death is only just. I should thank him, thank him for being so despicable and vile even after all this time!"

Palmer had covered up the murder of his sister so well that Xiao Yang could only deduce the cause of her death through various clues. She was the sister he had depended on since childhood, and he didn't even know where she had died.

Struggling with the lack of evidence and doubting whether he was overthinking, as well as Palmer being an associate professor researching the sources of calamity, Xiao Yang had his moments of hesitation and doubt.

Until today, when he saw the barely there smirk on Palmer's lips and his thoughtless reply of "I don't remember."

The fire of revenge was instantly ignited. The string that had been tense in his mind for over a year snapped with a dull sound, and with his rationality gone, he acted without hesitation.

Hearing Xiao Yang's reason for murder, Zhao Zhiyong's grip on his collar tightened. He instinctively wanted to argue: But you can't just kill someone so brazenly... Yet, the words died on his lips, swallowed back with difficulty.

Without understanding another's suffering, do not urge them towards goodness.

After two seconds, looking at Xiao Yang with his head bowed, making his expression indiscernible, he silently let go.

"Forget it," Zhao Zhiyong said, turning around with a weariness, "Let's go. We can talk about everything else if we survive... Who knows, we might end up joining Palmer soon."

The black-haired boy was retching so much that his stomach cramped, and his limbs were weak, but the will to survive still spurred him to act immediately. Yet, bizarrely, after running a few meters and looking back, they saw Xiao Yang still standing in the same spot, head lowered, seemingly devoid of any will to live.

Zhao Zhiyong's scalp tingled: "Don't you dare give up on life!"

In conversation, Xiao Yang's right fingertips at his side trembled slightly, followed by his forearm, shoulder. He lifted his neck, tentatively took a few small steps forward, then emotionlessly turned around at Zhao Zhiyong's shout, weakly propped his hands on the stone railing of the bridge, and staggered forward.

The emerald tips of lotus leaves peeked through the holes on both sides of the stone bridge, curiously touching the person struggling along the railing.

"Xiao Yang...?" Zhao Zhiyong frowned, "What's wrong with you?"

"I twisted my foot." The entity residing in Xiao Yang, feeling extremely irritable, coldly glanced at the human before him, "Carry me on your back."

...Twisted foot again? Are people nowadays so prone to twisting their feet?

And this commanding tone just because of a twisted foot? Why does it feel strangely familiar???

*

The windows of the convenience store were nailed shut with layers of wood and metal, and the mottled gray-white walls blatantly had big words written with a marker: The key is hidden under the plastic flowerpot at the bottom! There was even a small arrow pointing down, as if afraid someone passing by might not see it, clearly taking advantage of the fact that the polluters can't read.

Calling it a flowerpot, but inside it was only cracked soil and a shriveled plant that looked like a mummy.

The three quickly got the key, opened the door, and hid inside. After ensuring the safety of the interior, they dared not move anymore and all quietly sat against the wall in a corner.

This post-apocalyptic convenience store had been transformed into a small temporary rest area, probably for researchers studying the mutated lotus flowers. The food was long gone, and besides the makeshift beds made of chairs, there were also numerous neatly arranged scientific tools on the shelves, including measuring cups, test tubes, various test papers, and two bags of saline solution.

Within ten minutes of their entry, a mutated toad on the opposite side of the bridge had devoured a delicacy, shook its plump body, and plunged into the lake, swimming leisurely towards the other side.

The lotus "beauty" disdainfully moved all its roots onto the bridge piers, looking like a flowering ivy.

Zhao Zhi had just peeked through the cracks in the boarded-up windows, muttering incessantly, "Not good, not good, not good, it's coming this way."

"This place is so sturdy, it can't get in, right?" The black-haired boy sat cross-legged on the ground, peeling off dried mud from his skin.

"But the mutated ones easily attract the polluters..." Zhao Zhiyong squatted down again, "I'm afraid a bunch will surround us outside making noises soon."

"What about reinforcements, did the contact point say when they will arrive?"

"No word. Nearly all the external teams from the shelter are out, asking for help at this time..." Zhao Zhiyong shook his head, "It's too early."

Having said that, he turned his attention to the man who had been silent in the corner for a long time. The man's face was gloomily drooping, his eyes staring straight ahead, yet his gaze seemed to focus on nowhere, looking like he had lost his soul. Zhao Zhiyong couldn't help but advise him, "Yang Mo, if this is true, then Palmer, that scum, deserves to die. Chen and I are not unreasonable people..."

The black-haired boy, called Xiao Chen, immediately nodded vigorously, almost as if the words "we can cover for you" were written on his face.

Palmer dying wasn't a loss? That should happen only after his body had been fully utilized and his plans for tomorrow completed, not by suddenly destroying his host and ruining his plans. Wu Yin was so angry that his entire insides ached, not wanting to utter a single word.

His mood was like that of a person who, on a rare whim to do something good, excitedly goes to the supermarket to buy a sausage, only to have it snatched away by a stray dog.

Annoyed.

Furious!

Never doing good deeds again!

These detestable people, this accursed place, not a second longer could he stand it!!

Wu Yin irrationally took his anger out on everything around him, his eyes filled with rage as he searched the room for any useful materials, planning to take revenge on the whole world.

Just then, an oblivious mutant stuck its head through the window gap, staring with bulging frog eyes, salivating as it peered inside. Discovering three big treasures, the toad mutant excitedly flailed its limbs, pounding on the walls and door.

Its strength wasn't great, and even with prolonged effort, it was unlikely to cause substantial damage to the reinforced building. But as Zhao Zhiyong said, the scent of the mutant's hunting easily attracted other polluters, and soon, the toad had drawn a dozen nearby zombies, who crowded every transparent crack in the glass.

As the eldest, Zhao Zhiyong tried to calm the younger two: "They probably won't get in for a while. Just hold out until nightfall..."

Before he could finish, a burst of gunfire suddenly interrupted him, and in an instant, many of the gathered polluters outside fell.

"Is it the reinforcements?"

"Did the reinforcements arrive this fast?"

Zhao Zhiyong and Xiao Chen's faces lit up with joy, but Wu Yin just coldly scanned the tools on the shelf, quickly pocketing a bag of saline solution.

The battle outside ended exceptionally quickly.

Under absolute physical dominance, the polluters fell one after another, with the zombies' brains splattering on the window. The large, plump toad mutant's death was gruesome, its head and limbs severed by a long sword, its foul bodily fluids instantly smearing the entire wall.

Wu Yin heard the sound of metal swiftly contracting and transforming, then a familiar male voice from outside: "The danger is cleared, all the teachers inside can come out now."