Chapter 64: Typhoon Night p2
The obese zombie had controlled so many insects, and yet its intelligence remained at an infant’s level.
To reach human-level intelligence, she would need a seven-story-tall structure of densely packed holes, filled with insects, countless glowing green tentacles within, absorbing a mountain of brains…
Just imagining the scene made Lin Jiayao’s scalp crawl.
Could such a zombie truly exist? Or… did it already?
That would be beyond the realm of ordinary biology… Lin Jiayao wasn’t even sure if she could maintain her self-awareness against the mental assault from such a dense cluster of holes.
The nutrients needed to hatch these eggs were human or zombie brains and blood crystals, the tentacles on her left hand serving as the feeding channel.
And her current vision was that of an insect; she could share its perspective. Each insect was like an extra eye.
As for strength, defense, and other physical attributes, she didn’t feel much of a change.
But she could sense that her skin would eventually transform into that translucent, gelatinous material.
And it was highly likely that her body would bloat like the obese zombie.
The thought made her shudder.
She knew another type of Hive Zombie: the Wailer, which also had the honeycomb vocal structure.
But their evolutionary paths were completely different.
Now, she could only try and find another Hive Zombie; she didn’t want to continue down this path.
Using her insect vision, Lin Jiayao reached into her mouth and retrieved the remaining blood crystal.
It looked like any other blood crystal. She put it into the safehouse.
Then, she stood up.
The tentacles on her left arm coiled into a ball, like a glowing green hand.
Ready, Lin Jiayao looked towards the extraction point.
「Extraction Time 00:19:12」
【Extraction Point: 0.2km】
200 meters, nineteen minutes remaining.
More than enough time.
But Lin Jiayao hesitated.
She had achieved her initial goal, evolving into a Hive Zombie. Now she just needed to extract and choose an evolution.
But…
There were still so many blood crystals near those corpses!
And so many guns!
The thought was too tempting.
Just a little bit… I’ll just scavenge a little and be back in time.
Lin Jiayao ran towards the collapsed building.
Swarms of glowing green insects flew from her eye sockets, buzzing ahead, scouting the area.
The collapsed building wasn’t far.
To avoid encountering any reinforcements from that team, she sent the insects to scout first.
The American night was dark. Zombies from other districts, attracted by the noise, were already scavenging for blood crystals in the ruins.
She even saw a few that had stopped to evolve.
No reinforcements.
Confirming the area was safe, Lin Jiayao ran towards the glowing red spots.
Blood crystals! Blood crystals! Blood crystals!
She quickly gathered all the blood crystals, using the insects to carry the smaller ones.
She discarded the pistol from her safehouse and filled it with four blood crystals.
The full safehouse gave her a sense of immense satisfaction.
Then, her attention shifted.
The insects continued to collect blood crystals, while she went to the human corpses.
“Buzz—”
Emitting a loud noise to scare away the zombies feeding on the bodies, she started collecting their ammo vests and putting them on.
She also gathered their rifles, seven in total, lined up neatly.
She couldn’t carry them all, so she chose the ones with the most loaded magazines.
Guns were useless without bullets.
And she would mainly be storing them in the warehouse anyway, for use in China.
Finding 7.62x39mm AK rounds or 5.56x45mm NATO rounds in China wasn’t easy; Chinese rifles used different calibers.
She could only carry four at most. Unable to discern which were the best modifications, she chose the coolest-looking ones.
If they looked cool, their performance should be decent.
She quickly made her choices.
Two fully modified M4A1s with suppressors.
An HK416 decked out with beige attachments, like a Christmas tree.
A silver-gray AK74M with white handguards and a black and white stock, almost unrecognizable as an AK.
She chose them because the first three were NATO caliber, using the same ammunition.
As for why the 5.45x39mm AK…
Because it looked cool.
“Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat—”
Suddenly, one of her insects detected distinct muzzle flashes in the distance.
And through Bone Spike Lurker, she heard the controlled bursts of rifle fire.
Had their reinforcements finally arrived?
Glancing at the remaining eight minutes on the extraction timer, Lin Jiayao didn’t dare linger. She slung the backpacks and ammo vests over her shoulders, her left tentacles gripping the three NATO-caliber rifles, her right hand cradling the beloved AK, and ran towards the extraction point, fully loaded.
Along the way, she tried injecting herself with one of the adrenaline syringes she’d found, but it didn’t seem to have any effect on the zombie body.
The extra weight slowed her down considerably. She had to discard the two heavy bulletproof vests and helmet to make it in time.
And behind her trailed a swarm of red lights, like fireflies, carrying blood crystals.
A bountiful harvest!
She had never been so wealthy during an extraction.
Reaching the designated building, entering the basement, Lin Jiayao arrived at the extraction point with just a minute to spare.
Down to the wire!
「Extracting in: 8.8」
Seeing the green extraction icon with the escape symbol light up, Lin Jiayao finally relaxed.
The thrill of that last-minute scavenging spree was greater than all her previous successful extractions combined.
Calming herself, she waited for the countdown to end.
Her consciousness entered the dark space.
She saw the illusory form of the evolved little girl zombie, standing before her.
The normally terrifying appearance was somewhat softened by its current attire.
It was covered in layers of ammo vests, two tactical helmets with night vision goggles on its head.
Its left tentacles held three rifles, its right hand another, and the swarm of glowing green insects buzzing around it each carried a blood crystal.
Lin Jiayao moved the four blood crystals from the safehouse to the warehouse and then started stacking the smaller crystals in the safehouse until it was full.
In the end, her safehouse contained ten blood crystals!
500g each; she now had 5kg of blood crystals – she was rich!
Then, she tried to move the vests, helmets, and rifles to the warehouse.
To her surprise, a fully modified rifle required a 5×2 space. The AK was even larger, 6×2.
She decided to leave the AK74M with the little girl zombie; it took up too much space.
The ammo vests also took up a lot of space, forcing her to dismantle them.
The vests were mostly AVS MBAVs with 3-BAND side straps, AVS M4 triple pouches, M4 quick-release pouches, LAP ballistic groin protectors, grenade pouches, and 9x7x3 GP utility pouches – quite bulky.
After removing the groin protectors, the vests, which had occupied 3×4 spaces, now only took up 3×3.
Lin Jiayao carefully organized her warehouse, even stuffing magazines and blood crystals into the various pouches to save space.
Finally, she managed to fit three rifles, four ammo vests, and one helmet into the warehouse.
And this was with the magazines, blood crystals, bullets, and grenades already inside the pouches; the warehouse was now more than half full.
If she didn’t have to leave a set of equipment for the zombie, she could probably fit even more.
It was like playing a game of Tetris.
After checking for anything she might have missed, Lin Jiayao, carrying half a warehouse of weapons and equipment, returned to her body.
“Boom—”
The moment she returned to reality, a clap of thunder startled her. She remembered the rainstorm in Yangzhou City.
Hadn’t this storm been going on for a bit too long?
Was it a typhoon?
Looking at the darkened sky outside, the excitement from her successful haul faded, replaced by worry.
Why hadn’t her sister returned yet?
As she pondered this, she felt a wave of dizziness.
She had been logged in for a full five hours, enduring two near-death experiences, a battle, and a zombie evolution.
This had taken a toll on her mental state.
Fighting the dizziness, she opened the system’s evolution interface.
「Please retain your evolution」
「1、【Hive Skin Lv.1 (Purple): Generates honeycomb-like holes on your skin for insect incubation, allowing you to cultivate an insect swarm】」
「2、【Neural Synapses Lv.1 (Purple): Your organs develop mutated tendrils, allowing you to feed on or control others】」
「3、【Vigor Lv.1 (Gray): Increases your mental and physical recovery speed】」
Seeing the third option, Lin Jiayao’s eyes lit up.
An ability called [Vigor]. Just like the [Robust] evolution she had encountered earlier, it was a simple name and a gray rarity.
But right now, this was exactly what she needed.
She immediately dismissed the first option, [Hive Skin]. The thought of those black holes made her skin crawl.
The second wasn’t very useful either; she already had the more potent and undetectable spores for mental control.
It was a pity she didn’t get the ability to control zombies through pheromones and sound; she might have considered that.
The third evolution was clearly the best choice.
She needed to improve her mental strength and recovery speed.
After making her choice, Lin Jiayao felt a tingling sensation on her scalp, like a jolt of electricity, refreshing her mind.
The dizziness subsided, and she felt her mental strength returning faster than usual.
For now, she didn’t have to worry about her mental state.
But now, more than her own mental state, she was worried about her sister.
She’d been logged in for five hours, and her sister still hadn’t returned?
This wasn’t normal.
Looking at the torrential rain outside, Lin Jiayao was almost certain a typhoon was coming.
She sat up and moved to the edge of the bed.
Using the armrest of the wheelchair for support, she slowly moved into the chair.
She wheeled herself to the door and opened it.
She was no longer afraid of going out alone.
Stepping into the villa’s living room, she frowned.
The rain had flooded the living room, even soaking the wheels of her wheelchair. This was one of the things she hated most.
“Vroom—Vroom—”
Lin Jiayao, her hand on the wheelchair’s armrest, heard the sound of a car engine.
A car?
She wheeled herself to the villa entrance and saw a jeep speeding towards her through the rain, its headlights blinding.
Was it her sister?
“Vroom—”
“Screech—”
The jeep, with metal grilles on its windows and windshield, came to a sudden stop, splashing water everywhere.
“Thump—”
The door opened, and Lin Jiayao saw her sister running towards her through the rain.
“Sis—”
Before Lin Jiayao could greet her, her sister quickly touched her face and then rushed inside.
“Huh?”
Her sister’s urgency surprised Lin Jiayao.
She didn’t even have time to say a word?
Lin Xiwan quickly returned, carrying a large, black plastic bag, which she hurriedly put in the jeep’s trunk.
Soaked to the bone, she finally returned to the villa entrance, stood beside Lin Jiayao, leaning against the door, and catching her breath.
“What’s wrong, Sister?” Lin Jiayao wheeled herself closer and took her sister’s cold, wet hand. “You’re drenched.”
“Huff… huff… Yaoyao,” Lin Xiwan said, tying her wet hair back with a hair tie. “We have to leave.”
“Leave? So soon?” Lin Jiayao was surprised.
She had only figured out the zombie distribution in one city and hadn’t even surveyed the highway route yet.
Leaving now was too dangerous.
Unless… staying here was even more dangerous.
“We have to go,” Lin Xiwan said seriously, her voice low. “It’s been raining all day, and Yangzhou City is flooded. The Yangjiang River has overflowed, and the water level is still rising.”
“This…” Lin Jiayao’s eyes widened.
Without regular maintenance, the city’s sewers, clogged with zombie corpses and debris, often flooded when it rained.
But this typhoon seemed to be worse than she had imagined.
The river had already risen to ground level?
This meant the aquatic zombies’ range had expanded, and the land zombies, to avoid them, would be moving to higher ground.
And the resort villa was on high ground.
It would definitely be affected by the zombie migration.
And the rising water level meant even more terrifying amphibious zombies would be coming ashore, heading towards human settlements.
“We’ll take the highway. I checked; it’s not flooded. We’ll head north before the typhoon hits.”
“Okay.”
Lin Jiayao nodded, understanding the urgency.
“Ready?” Lin Xiwan asked, extending her hand.
“Wait.” Lin Jiayao quickly wheeled herself back into the room, grabbed the cloak her sister had given her from under the pillow, and put it on.
She had to take her sister’s gift with her.
As for everything else… she would leave it to time.
Lin Jiayao took one last look at the room she had lived in for four years and then, without looking back, wheeled herself towards her sister.
Lin Xiwan helped her put on the hood and then, carrying her through the rain, placed her in the passenger seat.
Then, she ran back, grabbed the wheelchair, folded it, and put it in the trunk.
Finally, soaked to the bone, Lin Xiwan got into the driver’s seat, checked the locks, and looked at her sister.
“Let’s go, Yao.”
“Okay, Sis.”
Leaving this place filled Lin Xiwan with a nervous excitement, her hands trembling, partly from the cold rain.
She brushed her wet hair away from her face, stroked her sister’s forehead, and kissed her.
Only then did she feel the warmth and strength returning to her body.
“Vroom—”
Gripping the steering wheel, Lin Xiwan pressed the accelerator and drove into the blinding rain, towards an uncertain future.
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