PSW – Chapter 18

How to put it? Yu Yinan looked at the chocolate bar, knowing full well she had no right or reason to be angry over something so trivial.

If she was angry, it was at Zheng Yi’s way of thinking and her principles. She was angry that Zheng Yi didn’t get upset even after being spoken to like that. If Zheng Yi had been alone, she might have actually stayed behind to help them. More than the insignificant chocolate, she was angry at Zheng Yi’s lack of wariness, her lack of a temper.

In many moments, many instances, Yu Yinan clearly understood that she disliked people like Zheng Yi. It was the apocalypse, after all…

But what Zheng Yi did shouldn’t have had anything to do with her. She wasn’t supposed to care whether Zheng Yi lived or died. Yet she found herself caring, perhaps because she’d grown a little fond of this pure, kind “younger sister.”

Perhaps she was just bad at handling relationships of any kind, no matter the emotion or the connection.

Just a naive little Saint…

Yu Yinan composed herself and said softly, “You keep it. I’m driving. I’m not angry.”

Zheng Yi tentatively took the chocolate back, stealing a few more glances at Yu Yinan. Only after Yu Yinan, with a hint of resignation, reassured her once more that she wasn’t angry did Zheng Yi finally sit still, ceasing her fidgeting.

But what was the reality?

‘Yu Yinan is so generous,’ Zheng Yi thought. She felt it was necessary to re-evaluate this “companion.” Yu Yinan’s high output of Saint Points-seven last time and eight this time-put her leagues above the average person. If they ever ran into a truly dire situation, perhaps she could afford to pay more attention to Yu Yinan.

[You deliberately gave them the chocolate from an angle where Yu Yinan could see!]

Even when her principles clashed with those of the people in the survivor camp, she was still willing to expend her special ability and mental energy to fill their water tanks before leaving. Even though she barely had any food left and couldn’t bear to eat the chocolate herself, she was willing to share it with strangers she’d just met.

How wonderful.

Zheng Yi smiled. After all, if she didn’t have to maintain her Saint persona in this chaotic wasteland, she wouldn’t bother pretending at all. Before those people could even spit out their disgusting words, she would have already smashed their heads in.

Ah, but how should I put it? Relying on pure force too often becomes so dull and uninteresting.

[By the way, Host, do you… hold grudges?]

‘My dear Zero One, what are you talking about? A Saint doesn’t hold grudges. How rude of you.’

How strange. Zero One couldn’t help but think this. It zoned out in the system space for a moment, unsure how to continue the conversation. Zheng Yi’s answer… probably meant she didn’t hold grudges, right?

It really wasn’t sure.

“Zheng Yi, are we really going to the military base…” Yu Yinan finally remembered what they were supposed to be doing. She wasn’t sure if Zheng Yi had been joking earlier or if she genuinely wanted to check out the area. But before she could finish her question, she glanced over and saw that Zheng Yi was already fast asleep in the passenger seat.

She seemed utterly exhausted.

Using a special ability was mentally draining. Neither she nor Zheng Yi had awakened their powers long ago, so their control wasn’t very refined. Zheng Yi had just given those people so much water… She must have overexerted herself.

Was it really necessary to go that far for those people? Had Zheng Yi been suffering from a headache just now, only hiding it because she thought I was angry? Did she only relax after I said I wasn’t mad, and then… just uncontrollably fell asleep?

Honestly… Yu Yinan felt a mix of anger and heartache. In the end, she simply rolled up the window, turned up the heat inside the car, and continued driving toward the military base.

If Zheng Yi was going to be asleep for a while, she would need to find a place to park. In the meantime, she could look at that map and maybe take a short nap herself to regain some energy.

It was at that moment that Zheng Yi received her third contribution of Saint Points from Yu Yinan: seven points.

The seemingly asleep Zheng Yi mulled over the cooldown for Saint Points. Would she have to wait a whole month to get more from Yu Yinan? But if she broke character in front of her, got a deduction, and then smoothed things over, she could farm her for three more rounds.

[?] Zero One couldn’t believe Zheng Yi was already trying to find loopholes again. [Think twice!] A companion as generous and gullible as Yu Yinan was hard to come by.

Zheng Yi spent fifty points to expand her backpack by another slot, then opened the system store and browsed through it, making a mental note of the various items.

Then, Zero One watched as Zheng Yi’s body gradually relaxed, and she truly fell into a deep sleep.

They had been together for some time now, but Zero One still couldn’t quite figure Zheng Yi out. It couldn’t determine what kind of being Zheng Yi had been before, nor could it tell if her current deep sleep was related to her recent overexertion.

After all, Zheng Yi had always appeared to handle everything with ease. Had she ever struggled or felt exhausted? She’d shown no particular emotional reaction when the apocalypse began, no surprise when her special ability awakened. Even when drawing her own blood to make mud balls to feed to zombies, Zheng Yi had been perfectly calm.

Even as the system bound to her, Zero One couldn’t truly peer into Zheng Yi’s thoughts. Of course, it had begun trying to learn, to judge, to alter its own thought processes and logic to better align with Zheng Yi’s actions and intentions-but Zero One had no idea if the things it was learning and changing truly matched Zheng Yi’s real nature.

What kind of being had Zheng Yi been before? Or, was she even human?

…Whether she was or not, it didn’t really matter. As long as her actions were within the rules and deemed successful by the system, Zheng Yi’s performance-her disguise-was flawless. Her efficiency at acquiring Saint Points had long ago left previous contractors in the dust.

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When Zheng Yi woke up, the first thing she saw was the setting sun. She glanced down, noticed the small blanket covering her, and showed none of the usual grogginess of someone just waking. With a simple blink, she was fully alert.

“You’re awake?”

“Mmm… sleepy.” But upon hearing Yu Yinan’s voice, Zheng Yi immediately became drowsy again. Her voice grew thick and nasal as she rubbed her eyes, turning to Yu Yinan with a whine. “Jiejie, my head hurts.”

“Here, drink some water.” Yu Yinan twisted open a bottle of water and held it to Zheng Yi’s lips. She watched as Zheng Yi took it and drank in small sips. “Next time you help people, could you please think about yourself a little? You’re in so much pain from overusing your ability, but they’ll never know.” Some of them were probably even resentful that Zheng Yi had only left a little water instead of staying to help them indefinitely, cursing her for being a hypocrite.

“Why should they know? If they found out, they’d feel bad too, and that wouldn’t be good at all,” Zheng Yi said, her voice soft. She took a few more sips of water, her brow furrowing in discomfort. But when her eyes met Yu Yinan’s, she immediately broke into a radiant smile. “Jiejie, I’m okay, really. It doesn’t hurt at all!”

Zero One silently gave Zheng Yi a thumbs-up.

Yu Yinan reached out and ruffled Zheng Yi’s hair, dropping the subject. “Do you still want to go to the base? They probably weren’t lying. The situation there sounds dire.”

“Let’s just take a look,” Zheng Yi said.

After the chaos erupted, too many people had gone there seeking refuge. Logically, a place like that shouldn’t have taken in any civilians, be they elderly or children, but they clearly hadn’t been so heartless. They had done everything in their power to accept everyone who came to them for help.

After the torrential rain, more than half the people there had turned. Even though the soldiers had responded as best they could-by sending away the asymptomatic survivors as safely as possible and sealing off the area-it was now highly unlikely that anyone was left alive inside the base.

And surely, there would be people coveting the weapons left behind. In the current situation, firearms were an incredible deterrent.

Zheng Yi and Yu Yinan were clearly not the first to arrive after the base fell. Zheng Yi climbed onto the roof of the car and could clearly see the blasted-open main gate. Broken barricades and fences were scattered everywhere, a scene of utter chaos. Amid the wreckage, two or three zombies shambled near the entrance. Another was hunched over, gnawing on a long-decayed corpse, pulling out blackened, viscous clots of blood.

But deeper inside… it seemed to be well-quarantined. Most of the zombies hadn’t managed to escape and run rampant through the city.

“Should we go in and take a look?” Yu Yinan asked hesitantly. “It’s very dangerous. And we’d better not take the car.”

“No, let’s not,” Zheng Yi said softly. “I imagine that in their final moments, they did everything they could to seal this place off.”

From a higher vantage point, she could just make out a corner of the hastily constructed quarantine nets and walls inside.

There was no need to break that seal.

Besides, clearing out zombies didn’t award any Saint Points.

“But I don’t know where to go next,” Zheng Yi said, sitting on the roof of the car.

A light breeze rustled the bangs on her forehead, carrying a deeper chill. The twilight was fleeting, and night was falling earlier and earlier.

Yu Yinan, wearing her jacket, leaned against the car. “Pujie? It’s a big city. Maybe they’ve managed the chaos well.”

“Or we could head south, to the coastal city of Chuanyang, or to a more remote town in the countryside,” Yu Yinan continued, pulling out a Ling Country Road Atlas from under the driver’s seat. “The border isn’t out of the question, but things overseas probably aren’t much better. Fuel, not to mention the wear and tear on the car, would be a huge problem. And once we left Ling Country, I wouldn’t know the way.”

Yu Yinan seemed to be seriously laying out the options for Zheng Yi, genuinely considering the feasibility of each one. For instance, very remote places had small populations; if they hadn’t been caught in the rain, it was possible they were completely uninfected. A place like that would be a paradise.

As for the bustling economic centers, they would be packed with people, meaning a high infection rate. But they also had advanced technology, research institutes, and major hospitals. There would certainly be troops stationed there for protection. If nothing else, places like that offered a glimmer of hope.

Zheng Yi was curious. The original novel hadn’t involved any sensitive locations, so it had avoided writing about them entirely. How, then, would this world, which was based on that novel, evolve and justify itself?

It couldn’t be that the authorities immediately collected all the fallen ‘meteors,’ started researching them without proper protective measures, and then all got infected, could it? A little bit of logic would suggest that’s unlikely.

The original novel didn’t need logic.