PSW – Chapter 13

The deeper they went into Genbin, the more zombies roamed the streets. Yu Yinan carefully avoided places with high foot traffic, like large supermarkets, hospitals, and even subway stations. If the number of zombies reached a certain point, it would be impossible to move even in the car, and a single misstep could get them trapped and killed.

“The temperature is dropping a little every day,” Zheng Yi said, sitting in the passenger seat with a mint in her mouth. After leaving the boss’s place, they had been driving around Genbin for two days. Now, at night, a thin blanket wasn’t enough to ward off the slight chill.

They had to find a way to get some jackets and bedding.

Zheng Yi had some in her large truck, but since she hadn’t revealed her abilities, she couldn’t just take them out. After all, a quilt was so big. Her hiking backpack was already stuffed; fitting a quilt inside would be a real stretch.

If the temperature kept dropping, they could turn on the heat in the car, but that would increase fuel consumption. They had passed two gas stations in the last two days, but there were almost no resources left inside. The supplies had been picked clean. Yu Yinan suspected there was a space ability user in Genbin.

“Once we find other survivors, we’ll figure something out.” They had plenty of food and water in the car and could trade some of it for warm supplies. Yu Yinan was actually fine. As a fire ability user, she could feel the temperature drop, but her resistance to cold was much stronger than that of other ability users.

“There’s no rush. If it gets too cold, we can find an abandoned building to spend the night in,” Zheng Yi comforted her softly. “Jiejie, you have a fire ability. We can start a fire to keep warm.”

Yu Yinan nodded. As she drove around a corner, she suddenly caught sight of two people running toward them frantically.

A man and a woman, both looking to be around twenty years old and in a terrible state. Behind them, a horde of zombies roared as it chased them relentlessly.

Yu Yinan immediately reversed and turned. She caught Zheng Yi’s expression out of the corner of her eye, and her heart sank. Sure enough, she heard a “Jiejie.”

“The back doors won’t open.” This was the first time Yu Yinan had encountered such a large zombie horde. Where on earth had these two run from? How did they manage to attract so many zombies!

“It’s okay, Jiejie. Just slow down; you don’t have to stop. If things look bad, you go on ahead. I’ll catch up with you later.” As Zheng Yi spoke, she opened the car door and leaped out before Yu Yinan could even react.

She steadied herself against the momentum, gripped her fire axe, and charged toward the two runners.

Yu Yinan, who had rarely sworn or gotten angry before meeting Zheng Yi, couldn’t stop a “Fuck” from escaping her lips in that instant. She almost slammed her fist on the steering wheel, but when it came to their only means of transportation, Yu Yinan managed to restrain herself.

The girl had already jumped out. What else could she do? Yu Yinan slowed down, her attention divided as she watched Zheng Yi’s situation in the rearview mirror.

“Run faster!” Zheng Yi shouted. “The car has slowed down! The back doors are stuck, so climb onto the roof and grab the hemp rope to steady yourselves. Once we get out of here and shake the horde, you’ll be fine!”

Without even the spare energy to thank her, the two pushed themselves to run even harder. The car did indeed slow down, but the girl who had come to help them didn’t immediately overtake them. Instead, she deliberately fell back a short distance…

Zheng Yi looked at the zombie at the very front, which had pulled ahead of the horde. So this is the enhanced type from after the rainstorm? she thought.

“Not only am I saving people, I’m even staying behind to cover their retreat.” Zheng Yi couldn’t help but praise herself. “Zero One, if you don’t give me Saint Points for this, it’s just not right.” As she said this, she raised her hand and shot a water ball straight at the zombie’s face. The moment the enhanced zombie was distracted, Zheng Yi burst forward with speed. The fire axe rose and fell, a brutally powerful force cleaving down and lopping off the zombie’s head.

Its bone density doesn’t seem to have changed much. How can it run faster and have sharper senses? Did the rainstorm improve its brain?

【Is it possible that its bone density was also enhanced, just not by much? Under the crushing force of your immense strength, it just seemed like there was no change?】

‘Indeed, for someone as outstanding as myself, that is a distinct possibility.’ Zheng Yi took the opportunity to clear out two more zombies, then shot a water ball downward. She used the opening to pick up speed and chase after the car.

With Yu Yinan slowing down, the two successfully climbed onto the roof. They gripped the hemp rope used to tie down the motorcycle, crouching as low as possible to secure themselves.

Yu Yinan was driving so slowly she was barely faster than a person running. She constantly watched Zheng Yi’s movements in the rearview mirror. When Zheng Yi got close, she opened the passenger door. Zheng Yi sprinted to the side of the car, grabbed the roof to lightly vault herself up, and landed directly in the passenger seat, smoothly shutting the door behind her.

The system quickly made its judgment. After assessing the danger Zheng Yi had faced to save the others, it generously awarded her four Saint Points.

Combined with the points she’d fleeced from the boss’s camp, and the boss’s constant promotion and memorization of the “five-character true words” under her pressure, Zheng Yi now had 37 Saint Points.

She didn’t have a great need for items in the system store, but at this rate, it wouldn’t be a problem to unlock another backpack slot in a little while.

Only when she had extra backpack space would Zheng Yi consider revealing that she had a spatial storage ability. Even though the backpack had nothing to do with such an ability, it could pass for one.

“Zheng Yi.” The moment Zheng Yi was settled in her seat, Yu Yinan accelerated, flooring it to try and shake the zombie horde behind them. This was obviously not an easy task. With a horde this large, it would probably take a long time to escape completely. “Don’t be so impulsive.” Yu Yinan didn’t even say “next time,” because she didn’t want there to be a next time at all.

“Jiejie, I’m sorry.” Zheng Yi looked guilty and wronged. “But if something like this happens again, I still won’t be able to just ignore it.”

“I’ll do my best not to put myself in danger. From now on, no matter what happens, Jiejie, you can prioritize your own safety. You don’t need to risk yourself with me.” Zheng Yi said with utmost seriousness, “If the horde is too dangerous, please don’t slow down for me, Jiejie. Just save yourself first. I’ll figure something out.”

“What could you possibly figure out?!” Yu Yinan was getting angry. She looked at Zheng Yi, but seeing her pitiful, on-the-verge-of-tears expression, she pressed her lips together and turned her focus back to the road.

After a few minutes, once Yu Yinan had calmed down, she spoke again. “Even though you’re an ability user and your body is enhanced, you’re still just one person. You can get hurt, you can bleed, and you can die. If a zombie scratches or bites you, you’ll turn too.”

“Zheng Yi, you taking risks like this makes me worry,” Yu Yinan said softly. “This is the apocalypse. If you keep being so indiscriminately kind, something bad is bound to happen sooner or later.”

“Jiejie…” Zheng Yi lowered her head, helplessly fidgeting with the hem of her clothes, not daring to meet her gaze. “But… even in the apocalypse, I want to hold on to this.”

“I’m not doing it for their gratitude. I just can’t stand by and watch them suffer like that. If I hadn’t gone, they never would have been able to outrun the horde at their pace.” And it went without saying what would happen to them once their stamina gave out.

Yu Yinan sighed. She looked at the road ahead, at the devastated streets, at the corpses and scattered trash on the roadside. What more could she say? Really…

She knew Zheng Yi’s thinking wasn’t wrong, nor were her actions. Fundamentally, it was she who was too selfish, too afraid of dying.

She could have just parted ways with Zheng Yi. Or, she could have been more ruthless, less concerned about Zheng Yi, and just left as Zheng Yi had suggested when she went off to take that risk, without a second thought.

They hadn’t even known each other for long. They were just companions who had met after the apocalypse and traveled together for a short time. Yu Yinan sighed again. But if it came down to abandoning a companion, she really couldn’t do it.

Just let it go, Yu Yinan thought. If Zheng Yi didn’t have this kind of personality, things would never have progressed beyond their first meeting in that building. If it had been someone else, and she had passed out in the hallway, she might have turned into a zombie by the next day.

No… it was more likely that someone else would have seen her approaching and immediately hidden back in their room, avoiding contact altogether.

“…I’m sorry for what I said just now,” Yu Yinan said in a low voice.

“No, it was my fault. I was taking advantage of your kindness, Jiejie, knowing you wouldn’t really abandon me. That’s why I acted so recklessly and jumped out of the car,” Zheng Yi said quickly.

What else could Yu Yinan say? Kind and soft-hearted? Maybe.

But… she also truly didn’t want to get involved with too many strangers. Perhaps it was due to her family background, or maybe her childhood had always been that way. In any kind of relationship, Yu Yinan was exceptionally passive.

At that moment, the two people clinging to the rope on the roof didn’t dare make a sound. Facing the headwind, they couldn’t even sit up to look back at the zombie situation. After being forced to listen to the “argument,” the two people who had been rescued felt quite embarrassed.

Seeing that it had gone quiet inside the car, the young man breathed a sigh of relief and whispered, “Sounds like they’ve stopped fighting. I thought… we were going to get thrown off…”

“You have the nerve to talk? If you hadn’t knocked over that shelf in the hospital, we wouldn’t have had to escape in such a mess. And after we finally got out, you just had to bump into that electric scooter and make its alarm go off!”

“How was I supposed to know a beat-up old scooter like that still had power and an alarm? The zombies were chasing us, I thought I could pick it up and throw it at them to slow them down…” The young man’s voice grew weaker and weaker until he finally gave up arguing.

“…At least we got the medicine.” The young woman didn’t press the issue, just adding thankfully, “And we ran into two kind people.”

“We’ll thank them later and see if they need any medicine. We can give them some.” At this, the young man seemed to remember something and added, “Take some of the medicine out separately. Don’t keep it all together.”

“Okay. Also, give me a few of the fever reducers and anti-inflammatories later. I’ll secretly give them to that grandma when we get back.” As she said this, a hint of anger showed on her face. “Otherwise, as soon as we get back, the medicine we risked our lives for won’t even go to the people who need it.”