August 3035… probably August. Xue Ling doesn’t really remember the date anymore.

But it doesn’t matter. Remembering the date is useless now.

This year’s weather is unusually hot. The sun has been blazing for more than half a month without a single drop of rain. Xue Ling lies beneath a patch of dense shade, and the old rocking chair beneath her—weathered by three years of wind and sun—creaks under her weight.

Xue Ling no longer needs to sleep. Lying here with her eyes closed is just a way to kill time.

She squints slightly, her gaze unfocused as she stares blankly at the swaying figures in the distance.

This used to be a park. If it were three years ago, there would probably have been many elderly people and children strolling and exercising here every day.

The idle chatter of the elderly and the shrill cries of children would have made the place noisy, but now it is extremely quiet.

Hunched old people shuffle forward, short children stop every step, and the few young people sway as they walk, their movements stiff and sluggish.

They are all zombies. When they do not sense the presence of living humans, they only engage in aimless wandering—like red-named NPCs in an online game that haven’t been triggered into combat.

Xue Ling stiffly turns over, seeming to hear the creak of her own bones, just like the old rocking chair beneath her.

There’s no helping it. After all, she is also a zombie now. Her body is rigid, and many movements are especially stiff, no different from the wandering companions not far away.

She turns onto her side and starts staring blankly at the bark of the old tree beside her. On the cracked camphor bark, there is an ant crawling. She watches as the ant climbs higher and higher, disappearing among the tall branches, never to be seen again.

Life as a zombie is just this monotonous and boring. Zoning out for a whole day at a time, Xue Ling has lived like this for a very long while now.

Who knows how much longer it will go on—maybe until she rots away?

That might be difficult. Zombies are getting drier by the day, their skin becoming tougher and tougher. Maybe someday they’ll turn into bronze skin and iron bones, and she’ll head straight toward living a hundred years.

Living for twenty-two years, dead for seventy-eight years—how is that not living to a hundred?

Today will probably be another peaceful day with nothing happening. Watching the orange-red sunset gradually spread across the horizon, Xue Ling sighs inwardly.

Some things really shouldn’t be spoken aloud. Just as she’s thinking this, a thunderous explosion suddenly sounds in the distance.

This is no small matter—it immediately draws the attention of all the wandering zombies.

Zombies gather toward the source of sound. Xue Ling watches as her kind, like students hearing the dinner bell, shed their former sluggishness and rush eagerly toward the direction of the noise.

The zombies in this small park soon run off howling, while Xue Ling remains lying motionless on her rocking chair.

Only humans would make such a commotion. As a strange zombie who still retains human rationality, Xue Ling has never been able to accept eating people. So she won’t join in this excitement.

Anxi City isn’t large, and there’s nothing particularly special about it. After the zombie tide broke out, there have been fewer and fewer living people here. Xue Ling arrived here about a year ago, and in that entire year, she has only seen living humans a handful of times in this area.

This time, the disturbance is so big that it doesn’t look like just one or two people. Who knows what kind of people they are, or what they’ve come for.

༚༅༚˳ .  . ˳༚༅༚

The sun sets completely, and a convoy drives into Anxi City.

The zombies here have all been drawn away to the other side by the thunder-explosion devices they set up. The convoy advances smoothly, shooting the few scattered zombies nearby and quickly reaching a place suitable for setting up camp.

In the abandoned automobile camp, the people in the convoy efficiently clear dangers and abandoned vehicles blocking the way, setting up some obstacles that can hold off zombies.

Several large lights are installed beside the vehicles. Someone sets up a boiler to heat water, and before long, the aroma of food spreads through the air.

Not long after, a battered modified vehicle drives over from the road. Seeing that it’s a familiar car, the people in the camp quickly pull open the large iron gate and the obstacles behind it, letting the vehicle drive in.

The car comes to a stop, and several people get out.

“Mi-ge (Brother Mi), was it smooth leading the zombies over at Southeast Plaza?”

“We’re all veterans. What could possibly go wrong.”

“Xiao Ying, first time going with Mi-ge to lure a zombie horde—did you piss your pants, hahahaha!”

“You’re the one who pissed your pants! I’m not that useless!”

“Alright, alright, the soup’s ready—time to eat, time to eat!”

There are more than twenty people in the camp, lively and bustling. Dai Ying hugs the golden retriever that came to greet him and affectionately rubs its head.

He squeezes into the crowd to scoop two bowls of thick soup, stuffs two cans into his pockets, then squeezes back out, taking his big dog with him as he looks for his cousin.

On the roof of a car posted at the outermost perimeter, someone is sitting there on lookout.

“Cousin, why are you sitting here alone again? Why not go over there and join everyone?”

“Too noisy.” Wen Jiuzhe, sitting on the car roof, replies lazily.

He’s a tall guy, broad-shouldered with a narrow waist. A simple black T-shirt turns tight on him, making the muscles in his chest stand out at a glance—clearly full of strength.

It’s just that his hair has grown too long, the messy ends brushing his shoulders, and he hasn’t really bothered to tidy it. Hunched over and slouching there, he looks a bit dispirited.

Nineteen-year-old Dai Ying, still a weakling teenager, feels envious every time he sees his cousin’s build. He wants to grow up like that too.

Today he went out with Mi-ge and his cousin to do the zombie-luring work and almost got grabbed by a zombie. His cousin hooked him back onto the car with one hand, then slashed through the zombie’s neck with a backhanded strike.

Zombies now aren’t like the ones at the very beginning. Their necks have gotten that hard, yet his cousin could still cut through with a single knife—simply amazing.

Wen Jiuzhe is eating as well, one hand holding a compressed biscuit used to replenish energy, the other idly playing with the short knife he uses to cut zombies.

“Cousin, don’t eat that anymore. Here, there’s soup, and canned food too!” Dai Ying climbs onto the car roof as well, fawningly offering up the hot soup and his own cans.

Wen Jiuzhe looks at his adoring little eyes with a smile, feeling that he’s about the same as the big golden retriever beside him—his tail practically about to wag.

“Cousin, are you still going with us next?” Dai Ying asks, holding the soup. “You said you wanted to go take a look at Qiuzhuang. We can accompany you there, then you can come back to the camp with us.”

Wen Jiuzhe doesn’t agree. “No need.”

Dai Ying still wants to try persuading him a bit more. After the apocalypse, being able to meet relatives again is rare.

At the very start of the apocalypse, things were too chaotic. The transportation network completely collapsed, and for a long time they couldn’t get in touch with this cousin at all. It was only two months ago that they ran into him by chance.

Because of him, his cousin temporarily followed their convoy.

But his cousin had also said that he wouldn’t stay with them forever. After going to see the Wen family’s old home in Qiuzhuang, they would part ways.

“Cousin, you don’t really have a destination anyway. Why not just come with me? It’s great when everyone’s together, and we can help each other…”

Wen Jiuzhe lets him talk, biting on the compressed biscuit and playing with the short knife, without the slightest extra reaction.

After talking for a long while to no avail, Dai Ying sighs and starts drinking his own soup.

This cousin of his looks very easygoing, like he doesn’t care about anything. Although he’s often smiling, he’s actually not easy to get close to at all.

He’s been with the convoy for two months. He’s good-looking and can fight, and quite a few people in the convoy like him, but no one can truly get close to him.

“Cousin, where do you want to go next?”

“I don’t know.”

“Cousin, you’ve been running around everywhere—are you traveling or something?”

“No.”

“Then why are you running around everywhere? It’s so dangerous outside now.”

“You talk too much. After you finish eating, go rest… lend me your dog to play with.”

“Oh. Puff, come up, play with Cousin!”

The big golden retriever obediently jumps onto the hood of the car, wagging its tail and resting its head on Wen Jiuzhe’s bent knee.

Dai Ying has been raising this dog since before the apocalypse. It’s been several years now.

Holding the two empty soup bowls, he sees his cousin scratching Puff’s chin, seeming to quite like it, and suddenly thinks of something.

“Cousin, do you still remember? About four years ago, when you were in Yu City going to college, there was a period when you often helped me walk the dog.”

Wen Jiuzhe’s hand pauses for a moment, then he smiles indifferently. “Yeah.”

The sky grows darker and darker, and the camp quiets down.

Slowly, a line of morning light appears on the horizon. A new day arrives.

“Today is August 26, 3035, Monday.”

The electronic calendar broadcasts.

The convoy sets off again, driving out of the camp where they rested for one night.

༚༅༚˳ .  . ˳༚༅༚

Xue Ling did not stay in the park today. The lounge chair she often lies on was finally crushed by her this morning.

She feels this is a bad omen and decides to go out and find another lounge chair to bring back.

Life as a zombie is just this dull and flavorless, plain and unadorned.

She can spend an entire day looking for a lounge chair she likes. If it’s far away, dragging the chair back might take another whole day.

Things just happen to line up this way. When she finds a suitable lounge chair inside a shop with its doors wide open on the street, the sound of vehicles comes from outside.

Several cars drive onto this street. They’re not going fast, because there are still some abandoned vehicles lying across the road, blocking the way. They can’t drive straight through and have to get out to move the cars.

The commotion draws the nearby wandering zombies over. Xue Ling sees several zombies run excitedly past the glass door, then more than a dozen more.

Amid the zombies’ hoarse roars outside, human voices can faintly be heard.

Someone says, “We still have to come back a few more times to move the equipment. Might as well clear out the zombies on this street.”

“Alright. You take people to lure the zombies. Brother Wen will stay in the vehicle to hold the line. Sound good?”

Xue Ling keeps one hand on the lounge chair she finally managed to find, glancing around the chaotic storefront.

There’s nowhere to hide. The door leading to the back rooms is locked. If it really goes like those people outside said, clearing out all the zombies on this street, staying here will probably get her killed.

Forget it. Leave first, come back in a few days to move the rocking chair.

She staggers out the door, preparing to retreat first.

Unlucky for her, a large wave of zombies surges in from the end of the street, blocking Xue Ling right there. The convoy’s advance is also much faster than she expected—she can already hear the commotion behind her.

Xue Ling usually pays close attention to keeping her distance from her own kind, but with the situation urgent, she grits her teeth and squeezes into the gaps in the zombie crowd.

“Bang.”

Xue Ling is startled by a zombie guy beside her suddenly dropping to the ground.

Seeing that the zombie brother with his skull blown open was shot in the head by a silenced gun, Xue Ling instinctively turns her head to look back.

It’s very strange. The slowly advancing convoy is still some distance away from her, and several people are killing zombies beside the vehicles, but her gaze is almost instantly drawn to a person sitting on the roof of a car.

It’s very strange. She only glances once—she hasn’t even seen him clearly yet—and that person’s name already surfaces in her mind.

Another bang sounds, and yet another zombie falls nearby.

The man on the car roof is holding a gun, firing in controlled bursts. One after another, zombies in the crowd collapse.

Xue Ling’s vision goes black, and she topples over along with the zombies beside her.