Eaten Ch.5

Chapter 5: Stock Up, Stop Digging

“Infected? What do you mean, infected?” Lin Mengzhi froze, unable to process the words. Deep down, he refused to accept the possibility that this could be happening to his friend.

But Wu Heng insisted, “I said, I think I’ve been infected.”

Seeing Lin Mengzhi standing there like a statue, Wu Heng went on, “I’ve got a bunch of bruises—just like the ones around my eye—all over my body. Some are darker, some are lighter.”

“That’s gotta be from when Wu Shiming hit you earlier,” Lin Mengzhi protested, refusing to believe it.

“Mengzhi,” Wu Heng said seriously, “we have to buy up all the supplies before I fully turn. Think about it—on the bus, there were only two people biting others at first. But after the crash, suddenly there were seven or eight. That means the infection is speeding up. I bet it’s going to break out completely in the next few days. The weather report said the rainy season ends next Monday, so I’m guessing—”

“Wu Heng!” Lin Mengzhi interrupted, staring at his childhood friend in disbelief. “Is that really what you’re focusing on right now?”

“Then what should I focus on?” Wu Heng looked genuinely confused.

“You’re infected! You’re fucking infected! You’re going to die!” Lin Mengzhi screamed, breaking down in a sob. His eyes brimmed with tears.

Wu Heng paused, his breath catching. He lowered his gaze and said quietly, “Dying doesn’t matter.”

“Let’s go to the hospital first,” Lin Mengzhi grabbed the motorcycle keys, ready to drag Wu Heng out the door. “Maybe it’s just some illness.”

Wu Heng shook him off and unzipped his backpack, dumping it in front of Lin Mengzhi. Inside was all the money Wu Heng had managed to scrape together.

“There’s no time. We need to stock up on supplies.”

Lin Mengzhi bit his lip, his whole body trembling uncontrollably.

After saying a quick goodbye to Grandma, Wu Heng threw on one of Lin Mengzhi’s thick sweaters. The two of them walked out of the courtyard together. The moment Lin Mengzhi swung his leg over the motorcycle, he started crying.

With the helmet on, all Wu Heng could hear was the roaring wind—and Lin Mengzhi’s loud, gut-wrenching sobs.

“A’Heng, this isn’t fair. This isn’t f*cking fair.”

“Why is it always you? You should’ve been an only child, but Zeng Like got pregnant by accident and couldn’t bring herself to abort. So she gave you a mentally challenged sister and made you work like a mule to support her.”

“And Wu Shiming, that bastard in human skin, turned you into his personal punching bag for over a decade.”

“I thought once you got into college, you could finally escape, finally leave those people behind. But why…? Why the hell does it have to be like this?”

While Lin Mengzhi cried and raged, Wu Heng calmly calculated how much the two of them could buy with the money they had.

The wholesale market was still open, the lights in every shop blazing. But since it was already late at night, the place was nearly empty of customers.

“What do we need to buy?” Lin Mengzhi sniffled, his eyes swollen from crying.

Wu Heng looked down at the checklist on his phone and said softly, “Stay away from me. I’m kinda getting the urge to bite someone.”

Lin Mengzhi instantly leapt back three meters.

Wu Heng looked up at the sound, gave a sheepish grin, and said, “Just kidding.”

“F*ck you!”

That one comment broke the heavy mood. Lin Mengzhi’s spirits lifted—just a little.

Maybe… maybe Wu Heng wasn’t infected after all.

“Together we’ve got just under two hundred thousand yuan. If we’re careful, it should be enough to get quite a lot.”

“Two hundred thousand is already a ton,” Lin Mengzhi replied. It had taken him years of part-time jobs—plus tricking, begging, and borrowing from his grandma—to save up just fifty thousand.

“It’s not that much,” Wu Heng said. “We’re buying in bulk—starting at a hundred jin (50 kg) minimum per item. Rice alone goes for about five yuan a jin. A thousand jin is already five thousand yuan—and that’s just rice. I…”

“A thousand jin? Are you serious?” Lin Mengzhi nearly choked. “Isn’t that a bit much? I mean, maybe it’ll only be a few days before the hospitals come up with a vaccine or something.”

Wu Heng ignored him completely.

“We’ll buy the rice first. Get it delivered—late at night, if possible. If they can’t finish tonight, they can come back tomorrow night. Just not during the day.”

Lin Mengzhi agreed.

“Yeah, otherwise the neighbors will see and start asking a million questions. So annoying.”

But Wu Heng had a different concern.

“Mengzhi, if we all end up locked inside our homes, and they have nothing to eat—but they know we do—what do you think they’ll do?”

Lin Mengzhi went quiet for a long time.

“I… I don’t know.”

“You do,” Wu Heng said simply. He glanced at the nearby grain and oil shop.

“Let’s get started. You do the haggling.”

The teenager first glanced over the wholesale prices for the different types of rice. Then he pointed at a mid-range one and said to the shopkeeper, who was lazily cracking sunflower seeds behind the counter, “This rice here, the one that’s eight yuan per jin—I want two tons. Got any in stock?”

“How much? Two tons?” The shopkeeper had barely looked at them before, clearly dismissing them as just a couple of kids. But the moment he heard the quantity, he sat up straight.

Lin Mengzhi’s expression mirrored the shopkeeper’s shock.

He didn’t even get the chance to ask Wu Heng how “one thousand jin” suddenly turned into “two tons” before the shopkeeper rattled off a price that was supposedly already “heavily discounted.” That alone had Lin Mengzhi instinctively rolling up his sleeves, ready to haggle.

“Are you kidding me? Eight yuan a jin?” Lin Mengzhi leaned casually against the counter, face full of disdain. “Where I work, even a one-time order of a thousand jin only goes for six-something. We’re buying two tons, and you’re still charging eight? The most I can accept is two yuan per jin.”

He gave the look of someone generously putting up with nonsense—like even two yuan was pushing it.

Wu Heng glanced at him, then wandered off to browse the cooking oils.

“Two yuan? Oh my god, I’d be losing money!” the shopkeeper exclaimed. “No way I can sell it that cheap, two yuan is just impossible!”

Lin Mengzhi held up three fingers. “Three yuan. Final offer.”

“Three’s not doable either,” the shopkeeper grimaced. “Sure, two tons is a big deal, but I can’t do business at a loss. At least let me earn something.”

“Fine, I’ll add one more yuan,” Lin Mengzhi said lazily.

“How about four and a half? Just fifty cents more,” the shopkeeper offered.

“Deal!” Lin Mengzhi slapped the counter.

The moment he turned away, both he and the shopkeeper quietly let out a sigh of relief.

From a short distance away, Wu Heng had settled on a type of cooking oil.

“Fifty barrels,” he said, looking straight at the shopkeeper.

Lin Mengzhi struck his usual laid-back pose and added, “You name the price—make it good.”

In the end, both the rice and oil ended up costing less than Wu Heng had originally estimated. The difference in price per unit wasn’t huge—just a yuan here or a few jiao there—but with the quantities they were buying, the savings added up fast. Especially for two people who were far from wealthy.

After securing the large order, the shopkeeper loosened up, too. He sent two freight trucks, and with the extra space available, Wu Heng threw in several boxes of instant noodles, ramen, and compressed biscuits.

Lin Mengzhi checked the time and ran back and forth between the drivers and delivery crew, reminding them, “Deliver it late—set out around midnight. I’ll pay extra if I have to.”

Wu Heng led the way again, stepping into a store that specialized in canned food.

Fresh fruits, vegetables, and meats didn’t store well, but going without vitamins wasn’t an option either. In the apocalypse, taste didn’t matter anymore—just having something to eat was already a blessing.

As Lin Mengzhi caught up, Wu Heng glanced at him. Lin Mengzhi stepped forward, tugged Wu Heng aside, and opened with: “Make sure it’s cheap. If it’s too expensive, we’re not buying.”

They bought ten boxes of canned fruit, twenty boxes each of canned vegetables, meats, and fish. As they passed a butcher shop, Wu Heng stopped to place a special order for an entire pig. But he asked the butcher to cure the meat with salt before delivery, offering to pay one yuan extra per jin. The butcher found it strange, but since there was money involved, he readily agreed.

After all the bargaining, Lin Mengzhi was parched and exhausted.

He flopped onto a bench outside the shop, panting.

“I need a drink and a break,” he grumbled. “I’m not moving. Go wander around on your own.”

Wu Heng nodded.

“Alright, I’ll go check out some vegetable seeds.”

Although Lin Mengzhi’s house was on the ground floor and had a spacious yard, Wu Heng knew growing vegetables outside wouldn’t be realistic during the apocalypse. Never mind whether other residents would covet what they saw—just being active out in the open would attract… unwanted attention.

So when it came to buying seeds, Wu Heng had his own logic: when the world collapses, chaos follows. Some things will be reborn, others will vanish. That’s the law of a world reset.

Things that were once abundant in peacetime might one day be priceless—or simply impossible to find.

The agricultural goods section was tucked away at the edge of the wholesale market. By now, most shops had closed, the corridor dimly lit by the last few streetlights.

That section had shuttered even earlier. Wu Heng saw only one store still lit.

He jogged over and scanned the shop—no sign of the owner. But near the back, there was a blue curtain acting as a door. From behind it, light glowed faintly, accompanied by the rustling sounds of movement.

Most shops were set up with a storefront for business and a back room used as a kitchen or living space—it made running the store more convenient. Wu Heng assumed the shop owner was in the back having a late-night snack, so he began browsing the shelves on his own.

He skimmed over packets of seeds—cabbage, cucumber, tomato, chili, eggplant, garlic, corn, pumpkin, celery…

He planned to buy a little of everything. There was no need to buy in bulk—seeds could be grown to yield more seeds. They only needed a bit of soil and time.

But suddenly, a harsh noise broke through the silence behind him.

Wu Heng froze, his fingers pausing on the shelf.

He held his breath.

A faint stench of rot drifted toward him—pungent and unmistakable.

It was the same smell he’d caught before… on Chen Shuang and Zhao Qiansun.

Lowering his gaze, Wu Heng’s fingers slid downward along the shelf.

In one smooth motion, he drew the fruit knife tucked behind his waist—just as it lunged at him with a guttural roar.

The teenager’s heart thundered, but his hands stayed steady.

He raised the knife and brought it down—straight into its skull.

The blade pierced deep.

That half-rotted face was right in front of him, its mouth wide open, spilling a fetid stench that nearly made him gag. The snarls from its throat grew weaker… until they faded out entirely.

Wu Heng yanked the knife free.

The thing collapsed to the floor, motionless.

He walked over and gave it a kick—no reaction.

Only then did Wu Heng take a good look.

It was the same as the others—just more advanced in its mutation.

Its gums were fully exposed, lips gone.

The skin was bloated and purple, folds of it sagging around the skull.

Parts of the scalp had peeled away, revealing wrinkled patches beneath.

Its eyes had turned cloudy and lifeless, like a dead fish.

It had the build of a man, dressed in men’s clothes.

Wu Heng figured this must’ve been the shop owner.

He stood there a moment, thinking.

Then, casting a glance at the empty street behind him, he crouched down again.

This time, he drove the knife back into the corpse’s skull.

He didn’t stop at once—stab after stab, five or six in a row, each accompanied by a sickening squelch.

Frowning, dissatisfied, Wu Heng shoved his hand into the eye socket, stirring and scraping, making sure nothing was left intact.

Wu Heng wasn’t sure if the mushy texture of the brain matter was due to the mutation, or if that’s just how it naturally was. Either way, the experience was… deeply unpleasant.

“What are you looking for?”

A voice came from above his head.

Wu Heng looked up to see Xie Chongyi standing over him, hands in the pockets of his long coat. The brim of his baseball cap cast a shadow over his face, but the faintly upturned corners of his eyes—a pair of peach blossom eyes—made Wu Heng’s nape prickle with unease.

The boy slowly pulled his hand out of the corpse’s skull.

“I just thought… he looked pitiful,” Wu Heng mumbled. “I wanted to save him.”

Xie Chongyi nearly burst out laughing.

He straightened up and replied lazily, “Stop digging. Zombies don’t have anything in their brains worth finding.”

Wu Heng blinked, surprised. “How do you know?”

“Accidentally scooped a couple on the way here,” Xie Chongyi said.

Despite the word “accidentally,” Wu Heng couldn’t help but detect a hint of regret in his tone.

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