Chapter 48.2: “…If I die, you die with me”
Ying Liuquan was in no condition to drive right now, and when it came to the matter of letting Xie Chongyi drive, for once, everyone found themselves standing on the same side.
In the end, the job of driving once again fell to Shen Ping’an.
“It’s impossible for me to drive all the time. When I need to rest, I guess the class monitor will have to take over,” he said.
“Alright,” Xie Chongyi was the only one who responded; everyone else’s expressions were downright grim.
Sitting in the passenger seat, Xue Shen changed the subject. “First, let’s find a gas station. We need to get a few barrels of fuel—gasoline, diesel, whatever. Either way, we have to make sure we have enough.”
Lin Mengzhi leaned against the window, watching the scenery outside for a while before saying, “I know where a gas station is. I passed by one when I was scavenging for supplies before.”
After speaking, Lin Mengzhi left his seat, grabbed the handrails, and moved toward the back of the driver’s seat, bending slightly to point the way for Shen Ping’an.
The road was either full of cracks or strewn with corpses. The tires bounced violently, and the bus rocked side to side, as if it might topple over at any moment. Occasionally, zombies appeared along the roadside. Du Yaoyuan and Dou Lu sat in the middle section of the bus, one on each side, dealing with any zombies that lunged at them—and while they were at it, they could even snatch the energy cores from the zombies’ brains from a distance.
Du Yaoyuan collected a whole pouch of energy cores, and out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of Wu Heng, slouched back in his seat, half-asleep.
He couldn’t help but let out a cold laugh. “Some people are clearly hiding their powers—just so they can slack off, huh?”
“Hm?” Dou Lu, sweating from killing zombies, turned her head. “Didn’t Shen She and Teacher Ying only find out they had powers after being tested? What do you mean, hiding their powers?”
“I wasn’t talking about them,” Du Yaoyuan said, though he didn’t particularly like Shen She or Ying Liuquan either.
Dou Lu closed the window, leaned over the seat, glanced at Wu Heng—already fast asleep—and then looked back at Du Yaoyuan in surprise. She lowered her voice, whispering, “You mean Wu Heng?”
Du Yaoyuan gave a cold snort—an admission in itself.
Dou Lu had almost forgotten about Wu Heng. In fact, not just her—aside from Du Yaoyuan, it seemed everyone else had forgotten him too. Because whether before or after the apocalypse, Wu Heng had always been like an invisible person in their class. He gave off no sense of presence, no hint of vitality—it was hard for anyone to even notice him.
When that female soldier had said he was a plant-type ability user, none of them had reacted with a “Wow!” but rather with a simple “Oh, I see.” Someone with Wu Heng’s kind of personality—even if he awakened a plant-type power—would probably just end up growing vegetables that tasted a little better than everyone else’s. That’s what they all thought at the time.
Du Yaoyuan saw Wu Heng slowly open his eyes, and his tone took on a deliberate edge.
“So now that some people know they’ve got abilities—can they actually do something useful?”
Wu Heng stared blankly at the seat in front of him. After a long moment, he lifted a hand to rub his nose.
Even if he wanted to use his ability right now, he couldn’t.
“…Sorry,” he said quietly. “I don’t even know what my ability is.”
“How could you not know? Didn’t the test say it was plant-type?” Dou Lu didn’t sound annoyed—she was more surprised and worried than anything.
“Lulu,” Ruan Silian turned her head toward them, “you and Du Yaoyuan are both metal-type, but within that, yours is magnetic and his is pure metal. Wu Heng only just got notified that he’s an ability user—it’s perfectly normal that he doesn’t yet understand the exact nature of his power.”
“And besides, Du Yaoyuan—why do you always have such hostility toward Wu Heng?” Ruan Silian’s gaze was calm and gentle, as if she could both embrace and dismiss all things.
Du Yaoyuan’s lips moved. “…No reason. I just don’t like him. He’s the kind of guy who acts all soft and delicate like a girl—I can’t stand that.”
Ruan Silian sighed helplessly. “Does that really matter right now? What we should be doing is helping Wu Heng, Shen She, and Teacher Ying figure out how to use their abilities. Especially Teacher Ying—his condition is really bad.”
Dou Lu’s attention followed Ruan Silian’s line of sight toward the corner of the bus, where Ying Liuquan was huddled up. “I think the teacher’s about to lose it,” she murmured.
“Crazy, fool, crippled, zombie—what a fine collection we’ve got on this bus…” Du Yaoyuan shook his head, clicking his tongue.
“Who are you calling fool?” Wu Zhi glared at him.
“You,” Du Yaoyuan shot back without hesitation.
“Did I ask you to take care of me?” Wu Zhi’s eyes turned red. “You think you’re so great? Your mouth stinks. Dr. Chen should’ve eaten you.”
“Du Yaoyuan, you’re really arguing with a little girl whose mental age is like five? Are you sure you’re not the one with brain damage?” Xue Qi leaned forward to look at him.
“What, she’s a person, isn’t she? Treating everyone equally is the right thing to do, isn’t it? What, you like it better when people treat you like a disabled—urk!”
Before he could finish, several white, threadlike strands shot out from Xue Qi’s hands, wrapping tightly around Du Yaoyuan’s neck and yanking him backward.
Du Yaoyuan tried to fight back, but to his shock, he couldn’t affect the energy source inside Xue Qi at all—impossible. This crippled man’s ability was actually stronger than his!
As the silk threads constricted, the lack of air—and the venom seeping from the spider silk—turned Du Yaoyuan’s face a dark, liverish red. His lips began to take on a purplish hue.
“Holy—holy crap, calm down!” Dou Lu jumped over her seat. Not knowing what was happening, she reached out to tear the silk away—but the moment her fingers brushed it, a sharp sting made her yank her hand back. Her fingertips were sliced open in several places, swelling rapidly with dark bruising.
“You son of a—urk!”
“One more time,” Xue Qi’s voice was chillingly even, “and I won’t mind sending you straight to the afterlife.”
While chaos broke out in the back, Wu Heng was quietly laughing.
Through the rearview mirror, Xie Chongyi caught sight of the scuffle behind him. For once, a clear flash of irritation crossed his eyes. He closed them again, as if to shut it all out.
“Aren’t you going to do something?” Lin Mengzhi tugged on Xue Shen’s sleeve—he was still absorbed in making plans and drawing maps.
“Oh,” Xue Shen adjusted his glasses, “grown-ups shouldn’t interfere in children’s quarrels. Let them sort it out themselves.”
“They’re about to kill each other!”
“Then when one of them dies,” he said mildly, “just toss the body out. Don’t let it rot in the bus.”
“…”
Lin Mengzhi realized then that Xue Shen wasn’t a decent person either—no wonder he and Xie Chongyi got along so well.
The bus finally stopped in front of a half-collapsed gas station, swaying precariously. Du Yaoyuan, foaming at the mouth from Xue Qi’s venom, clutched his aching neck and muttered hoarsely, “I—I won’t let you get away with this…”
Xue Qi sneered. “Anytime.”
—
X crouched atop a tilted lamppost beside the gas station, keeping watch over the surroundings.
The air was bleak; from time to time, the distant howls of zombies broke the silence, but there wasn’t a single sound of living humans. It felt as if the entire world had shrunk down to just their little group—lonely and desolate, as though they’d been dropped onto another planet that looked almost exactly like Earth.
The unknown bred endless fear. Even though this was once humanity’s most familiar and intimate home, that was all in the past.
The Earth was still the same Earth, the rules were still the same ones humanity had created and believed in—but that was the cruelest part: nothing had changed, yet everything had. That paradox stretched despair into infinity, an abyss with no visible bottom, where one misstep could plunge you into hopeless darkness.
Dou Lu muttered, “If I’d known, I’d have gone to Jingzhou with the others first.”
Xue Qi said, “Honestly, I’m not that concerned about my dad’s feelings.”
Du Yaoyuan rasped, “I remember I used to really hate Ruan Silian.”
Lin Mengzhi groaned, “Wait—did I seriously choose to suffer through all this with you guys? A’Heng! Something feels wrong here!”
Only Xue Shen remained as calm as ever. He sat on a pile of collapsed concrete blocks beside the gas station, not lifting a finger to help with the labor, merely directing the others.
“Put the gasoline inside the bus, not in the luggage compartment. Either way there’s a risk of explosion, but the odds are higher if it’s stored in the luggage area.”
“Grab anything even remotely useful—fill up the luggage compartment as much as possible.”
“I’ve also organized everyone’s ability types,” he continued evenly. “According to my calculations, the lowest-ranked ability users right now are Shen She, Teacher Ying…” He paused for a few seconds, then added, “…and Wu Heng.”
“The next tier up—Lin Mengzhi, Dou Lu, Du Yaoyuan, Xue Qi, Shen Ping’an, Dr. Chen, myself, and Old Xie.”
“Not included in the ranking: X.”
“Huh?!” Dou Lu, passing by with an armful of supplies, stopped short. “But the class monitor’s way stronger than us! How could he be in the same tier?”
“It’s just a range,” Xue Shen explained coolly. “Old Xie is simply at the upper limit of that range.”
Still slightly injured, Dou Lu didn’t argue further and went back to hauling materials onto the bus.
Xue Shen’s voice flowed on, steady and unhurried. “Based on our earlier research at the school—using the energy cores we’ve collected—the power ranking system goes like this: most zombies carry non-attribute E-grade energy cores and possess no abilities. Correspondingly, that puts Shen She, Teacher Ying, and Wu Heng at E-grade.”
“As for zombies like Dr. Chen—those showing signs of evolution—I’ve classified them as D-grade. That means: signs of evolution, a clear elemental direction, and a few basic abilities.”
Lowering his head, Xue Shen began writing rapidly in his notebook, pen scratching in sharp, steady strokes. “So, here are your targets:
—E-grade should advance to D-grade within two weeks.
—Low D-grade should reach high D-grade within two weeks.
—High D-grade should reach mid C-grade within two weeks.
If anyone has questions, raise your hand.”
“Class rep! Be a decent person, will you? None of us have a hand free to raise!”
“Yeah, and how exactly are we supposed to climb ranks, anyway?”
Xue Shen’s expression brightened slightly—finally, someone had asked a question. “We actually discussed this back at school. You weren’t there at the time, so I’ll explain again. Everyone listen carefully—those who don’t know yet, take notes.
Each of you should absorb and convert energy cores that match your own ability type. I don’t recommend cross-type absorption or taking in multiple cores at once. The safest method, according to the tests Old Xie and I ran, is small amounts, many times. But if a higher-level ability user absorbs lower-level cores, multiple cores at once aren’t an issue.”
“What happens if you absorb across types or take too many at once?” Du Yaoyuan asked, his face still pale, stopping in front of Xue Shen.
Xue Shen shrugged. “We haven’t tested that yet, so we don’t know. But I don’t think anyone’s dumb enough to try cross-type or multi-core absorption. You’re welcome to test it, though—I’d be quite curious to find out the result.”
Just then, Wu Heng—carrying a blanket he’d dug out from beneath the rubble—paused mid-step. His face didn’t betray a thing; no one noticed the momentary stillness.
Silently, he shoved the blanket into the luggage compartment, slamming the hatch shut.
Behind him stretched the ruins of the town. In the distance, the dark clouds seemed to be gathering again, pressing toward them. Lowering his head, Wu Heng kicked at a fist-sized stone by his foot.
Clang!
The rock struck a sheet of metal with a sharp echo.
The metal plate, already barely hanging on, swayed wildly with a few tangled electrical wires, creaked, and finally gave way—pulling down an entire section of whatever was hanging from it.
Boom—
Rumble—rumble—
From inside the gas station came shouts of alarm.
“Was that another earthquake?”
“Aftershock—it’s an aftershock!”
Wu Heng stood still where he was, waiting until the noise he’d caused completely faded before finally letting out a quiet breath and turning around.
But somehow, Xie Chongyi was already standing by the front of the bus, his gaze cold and sharp, full of scrutiny.
Wu Heng blinked. His body swayed slightly as he leaned against the side of the bus, pretending to faint—but his acting was terrible. He only managed to mumble a dry, unconvincing excuse: “My foot hurts.”
Xie Chongyi walked up to him, pulled him aside, and reopened the luggage compartment.
“Classmate,” he said evenly, “you’ve got quite a bit of strength, huh.”