“They… some of them should be students from Nancheng University,” Ji Cheng replied.
The once quiet and beautiful girl-next-door was now wielding a gleaming long knife with a calm expression, even sending the skulls of several zombies flying.
“Those students who escaped? What a coincidence,” Deng Jun said, surprised. No wonder they managed to escape from the school—they clearly had some skills.
Gu Yao tried using her water ability to kill zombies, but the streams of water she shot at their faces had no effect. She finally gave up on her “face-washing” attack method.
“Don’t be discouraged. My earth ability can control stones, soil, and sand. Your water ability should be capable of more too,” Zhang Tao said, noticing Gu Yao’s frustration.
“You’re right! Don’t worry, I won’t hold everyone back,” Gu Yao replied confidently.
“Uh…” Zhang Tao wasn’t sure how to explain to her that he didn’t mean she was holding anyone back. He wasn’t implying that at all.
The audience was thoroughly entertained.
[The girls in the main group all have such distinct personalities!]
[Hahaha, the two guys in the main group are more flustered than ever.]
[All beauties, I love it.]
[Huh? Why isn’t the male lead Ji Cheng killing any zombies?]
[The male lead is so weak! Wasting a lightning ability.]
[I want to summon Kakashi to teach him how to be a man.]
[…]
If Ji Cheng knew so many people were watching him, he’d probably put in more effort to show off, but he didn’t.
His level-0 lightning ability was only good for self-defense at the moment. For example, he could temporarily paralyze zombies to stop them in their tracks when they got close. He relied mostly on the two handguns issued by the rescue team.
“Hey, you survivors, are you looking to join our rescue team?” Deng Jun asked, slowly moving closer to Fu Ying and the others.
“???” Fu Ying looked at the stranger, confused. He didn’t seem to be part of Zhan Hao’s team.
“No misunderstanding—I just noticed you guys seem to be… practicing?” Deng Jun asked again.
“So what if we are? We’re not interfering with the rescue team’s mission,” Gao Yuan replied, stepping forward. Having navigated the corporate world for years, he sensed a hint of condescension in the man’s tone and wasn’t about to let anyone look down on his group.
Fu Ying, Li Yanqi, and the others were all so capable—he wouldn’t tolerate anyone belittling them.
“I didn’t mean it like that. If you’re interested in joining the rescue team, you could consider our Team One. We can equip each of you with one of these the day you join,” Deng Jun said, somewhat proudly waving his handgun.
Killing zombies didn’t have to be so complicated. To him, using knives for close combat was both dirty and dangerous.
“No thanks, we’re not interested in those,” Li Yanqi said, stepping forward.
Right now, the zombies were all ordinary ones. In a few days, as the game’s difficulty increased, some zombies would evolve to have abilities, eventually surpassing human ability users. By then, people would realize the limitations of firearms.
When your bullets couldn’t outpace a zombie’s ability, it’d be too late to regret.
This was the best time to train their stamina and abilities—they didn’t have much time left.
“Alright, suit yourselves. But just so you know, our Team One’s commander has connections higher up. If you change your mind, you can come find me—or Ji Cheng,” Deng Jun said before walking back toward Team One.
“What’s his deal? Where’d he get the idea we wanted to join the rescue team?” Gu Yao muttered.
“Probably because we’re killing zombies. Most survivors wouldn’t follow a rescue team to do that,” Fu Ying said with a cold laugh. She’d just realized there was competition between the rescue teams.
But someone like Zhan Hao, without a keen eye for talent, would probably struggle to stay undefeated in such competition.
After all… his focus was solely on killing zombies.
Li Yanqi glanced at Zhan Hao, who had jumped onto a high platform, then at the cautious Team One members trailing behind, shaking her head helplessly.
The zombies at Xinliang District’s train station were unusually numerous. Without the three to four hundred rescuers up front, it would’ve been tough for Li Yanqi’s group to collect crystal cores.
“Yanqi, what’s the point of collecting these… things?” Ji Cheng asked curiously, deliberately slowing to walk beside her.
“I’m just curious about their purpose, so we’re gathering them,” Li Yanqi replied while digging.
“I heard some people sent them for research recently, but there’s no word on the results yet,” Ji Cheng said.
Those results would come soon, and collecting crystal cores would get harder then, Li Yanqi thought.
“Yeah, it’s no big deal. Maybe we can use them as collectibles later,” she joked.
But Ji Cheng noticed her hand pause briefly while digging. Then, she ran toward Zhan Hao and his group, saying something to them.
“Upstairs? That should be the control room. Are you sure there are over a hundred people?” Zhang Jinhang asked. They’d reviewed the station’s layout before coming, and he remembered the control room was upstairs.
“I’m sure. There are 116 people,” Li Yanqi replied confidently.
“That many? Let’s hurry up then!” Chen Xiaochong said excitedly, thrilled to hear about so many survivors for the first time.
“They’re on the third floor, but the stairs and the second floor are crawling with zombies—probably around ten thousand,” Li Yanqi said.
“How do you know that?” Deng Jun, who had approached from behind, asked, his face full of disbelief.
How could she know what was happening upstairs?
They were still in the station’s plaza—there was no way to see the control room from here.
“My ability,” Li Yanqi answered simply.
“And you all just believe her?” Deng Jun asked, turning to Zhan Hao and his team. What kind of ability was that? It sounded like something a con artist would claim.
“We believe her. Every time…” Chen Xiaochong started to say, but Zhan Hao cut him off, looking at Deng Jun and saying firmly, “We believe her.”
“Deng Jun, come with me for a sec. We’ll talk on the way. Standing here is a waste of time and dangerous,” Zhang Jinhang said, signaling for the paused team to follow Zhan Hao. But Zhan Hao disagreed, saying to Zhang Jinhang, “No need to explain. Let’s move.”
“Zhan Hao, do you have a problem with our team or something?” Deng Jun, feeling humiliated, stepped forward and grabbed Zhan Hao to confront him.
“Deng Jun, he’s just like that. We’ll talk later,” Zhang Jinhang said helplessly.
“Zombies are gathering—right front, two o’clock direction, over 300,” Li Yanqi suddenly announced.
Deng Jun’s angry face turned to a frown as he looked at her.
Meanwhile, Team Two had already prepared to attack, hearing the zombie roars coming from the right-front corner. Deng Jun stared at the spot in disbelief.