Wen Jiuzhe was moving forward with a clear purpose. He was very familiar with Anxi City; whenever he ran into roads that were so congested they couldn’t be cleared, or sections that had already collapsed and were impassable, he could always quickly find another route.

But there were also places where detours weren’t possible.

Several streets away, when he saw the words “Anxi Wenkang Hospital” on a distant building ahead, Wen Jiuzhe, who was driving, spoke up. “We’re almost there.”

Is he going to the hospital? Xue Ling thought.

But everyone knows that hospitals are the places with the most zombies.

In the early days of the zombie outbreak, most people who developed symptoms gathered at hospitals, which led to severe congestion inside the hospitals and even on the streets outside—packed tight, completely jammed.

Even now, three years into the apocalypse, there are still countless zombies inside the major hospitals.

The zombies outside might be drawn away by various noises and disturbances, but those trapped inside hospitals—those in each ward—are still innumerable.

Not to mention one person going in alone; even squads of hundreds aren’t necessarily able to enter safely and then leave safely.

Xue Ling had previously seen a team in another place break into a different hospital. The entire team was wiped out inside—no one escaped.

What was Wen Jiuzhe going to the hospital for?

Wen Jiuzhe parked the car at a street corner some distance from the hospital, took a large case out of the trunk, and began skillfully assembling something.

Xue Ling wandered over to take a look. It resembled a sniper rifle, but was even bulkier.

After assembling the big thing, Wen Jiuzhe loaded a special “round” about the size of a fist.

Then he hoisted it onto his shoulder, jumped onto the roof of the car, found a suitable angle, half-kneeled, and aimed at a shopping mall building near Anxi Wenkang Hospital.

With a whoosh, the corner of the mall building he had targeted collapsed, and an enormous noise rang out.

Xue Ling had heard this kind of sound before. The day before she met Wen Jiuzhe, she had heard it as well—so this was what caused it.

Wen Jiuzhe fired only a single round, then stood on the roof of the car and observed for a while through binoculars.

He jumped down, quickly disassembled the gun and put it away, and said to Xue Ling, who was wandering nearby, “Alright, let’s go.”

The zombies on the street to the left of the hospital were drawn by the loud noise and gradually squeezed toward another street. Wen Jiuzhe seized this opening and drove the car through that street.

Along the way, when they encountered a few stray zombies that hadn’t cleared out yet, he directly rammed them with the car, knocking them down and then running them over.

The wheels rolled over hard, uneven things, jolting violently. Xue Ling was tightly secured by two seat belts; otherwise, she would have been thrown up.

Wen Jiuzhe braced one hand against the roof of the car and held the steering wheel with the other, pinning himself to the driver’s seat as he sped through the street.

The car passed by Anxi Wenkang Hospital and drove farther away along a street lined with plane trees.

So he wasn’t going to the hospital after all. Then where exactly was he going? Xue Ling was curious.

After driving for a while longer, Xue Ling saw a stretch of pines and cypresses. Among the dark green trees stood rows of stone grave markers.

It was a cemetery.

Wen Jiuzhe parked nearby, took his gun, slung a bag over his back, and got out of the car.

There were very few zombies in the cemetery. Wen Jiuzhe dealt with the ones that had been drawn over before letting Xue Ling get out of the car.

“Come, follow me. Don’t run around.”

Wen Jiuzhe led her past the neat rows of gravestones. Contrary to what Xue Ling had imagined, he didn’t stop in front of any particular grave, but instead went to the corner of the cemetery.

There, a pine tree and a cypress grew together, their crowns touching. Pine needles and cypress cones carpeted the flat ground.

A squirrel under the tree heard their movement and darted up the trunk in a flash.

“This is it.” Wen Jiuzhe sat down cross-legged beneath the tree and raised a hand to brush the ground clear.

“I buried my mom here. Since we were passing by, I brought you to take a look.”

Xue Ling: “…………”

Good thing I’m a zombie right now—I don’t need to make any kind of reaction.

Otherwise, she truly wouldn’t know how to deal with a situation like this.

Wen Jiuzhe didn’t expect any comfort from Xue Ling after she had turned into a zombie.

And he looked very calm, as though he didn’t need any comfort at all.

He turned his head to look into the distance. From here, the inpatient building of Anxi Wenkang Hospital was still visible.

There were dozens of ward windows over there, facing directly toward this cemetery.

This hospital had been funded by the Wen family, and his mother had received treatment here, staying for eight full years.

When Wen Jiuzhe was young, he and his mother lived together in the neighboring city of Gulan, and life was extremely hard.

His mother suffered from heart disease and couldn’t overexert herself. She couldn’t keep any job for long, often needed medication, and when it got severe, she would be bedridden, sometimes unable even to get up.

From a very young age, Wen Jiuzhe knew how to fetch medicine for his mother, boil water, and cook meals. Even though he was very young, he had always taken on the role of the protector.

After being brought back to the Wen family at the age of twelve, his name was changed, and his mother moved into this Wen family hospital to receive long-term treatment.

The hospital director was the maternal uncle of his cousin Wen Xuan.

So no matter how Wen Xuan provoked him or deliberately bullied him, he couldn’t fight back.

Wen Xuan smugly told him that if he didn’t behave, his mother would suffer.

The Wen family controlled his mother, and by extension, controlled him.

His mother always cried, saying that her illness had dragged him down, but whenever he brought up taking her away, she would desperately shake her head and refuse.

She felt that since he had been acknowledged and brought back into the Wen family, he should stay there to have a better future; otherwise, living outside with her alone, he would suffer even more.

She always urged him to endure it, to wait until he grew up, until he gained his grandfather’s approval.

It wasn’t that she didn’t notice the frequent injuries on his body, but back when the two of them lived outside, Wen Jiuzhe often fought with street hooligan kids as well, and he would come home injured then, too.

No matter what, the Wen family was wealthy and powerful. Being a child of the Wen family was still better than going back to live in a dilapidated building and being cursed as a wild child.

Sometimes Wen Jiuzhe would feel that his mother’s one-sided, stubborn persistence was a bit foolish—just like back then, when she was sweet-talked into pregnancy by that promiscuous, irresponsible bastard of a man from the Wen family, and still believed he truly loved her.

Insisting on giving birth to him, even at the cost of never finishing her studies, was likewise not a smart decision.

If it weren’t for the damage to her health from giving birth to him, if she were healthier and still beautiful, she would certainly have lived better than she did now.

But whenever this was brought up, his mother would say, “You are my child—how could I ever regret giving birth to you? I only regret that I couldn’t give you a better life. With this illness of mine, I don’t know how much longer I can live. As long as I can see you succeed in the future and live well, I can die in peace.”

During Wen Jiuzhe’s days in the Wen family, his life was like his mother’s illness—barely dragging on.

He went from anger and resentment to numbly enduring each day, like a seed dormant beneath frozen soil, waiting for rebirth, or else waiting for his mother’s death.

Beneath his indifference and calm lay a volcano that could erupt at any unknown moment.

“Wen Jiuzhe, if— I mean if— a few years from now we’re still together, would you want to marry me?”

—Xue Ling asked him one day, pretending not to care.

She didn’t know that when she asked this question, her eyes were sparkling with anticipation.

Wen Jiuzhe felt that he didn’t treat her well, yet she still wanted to place him into her future.

He was happy, and yet not happy.

“What would marriage bring you?” He smiled casually. “It would bring you a terrible man.”

Xue Ling, whose temper had grown worse and worse, raised her brows sharply, asked him if he was itching for trouble again, kicked him once, and stormed off.

Watching her retreating back, Wen Jiuzhe suddenly didn’t want to wait any longer. He didn’t want to continue following the Wen family’s arrangements.

He returned from Yu City to the Wen family in Anxi City. During that period, his grandfather, Old Master Wen, “suddenly died,” and the Wen family fell into chaos.

Everything had originally been going fine, but the appearance of the zombies disrupted his plans.

When the apocalypse suddenly arrived, he decisively abandoned the Wen family’s setup and prepared to take advantage of the chaos to transfer his mother first.

But the zombie outbreak spread too quickly, and the first place to fall was the hospital.

It was practically a purgatory—sealed off immediately, with no one daring to enter.

After exhausting every means to get into Anxi Wenkang Hospital, what he saw in his mother’s ward was her corpse.

Whether it was fortunate or unfortunate, she hadn’t been infected by the zombie virus, but had died of heart disease.

She had been frightened by the chaos in the hospital, her illness suddenly flaring up, but no doctor had the time to come provide emergency care, so she died quietly in the ward like that.

He took his mother’s body away, kept watch as it burned into ash blocks, and finally buried her here.

Because back when he used to visit her, she would smile and point to this cemetery and tell him that if she died in the future, she should be buried there—close to the hospital, and convenient as well.

At that time, everything was far too chaotic. He didn’t have time to grieve. After burying his mother, he rushed back to Yu City to look for Xue Ling.

Flights and high-speed rail had stopped running, so he drove back. The road was very dangerous, and he was delayed for a period of time.

By the time he returned to Yu City, he couldn’t find her.

After that, he kept searching around Yu City. He never expected that after so long, when he had already given up hope, he would see the person he was looking for in Anxi City.

Why was she in Anxi City?

The current Xue Ling could no longer give him an answer, and Wen Jiuzhe didn’t want to think about it.

To think that perhaps she had come to look for the answer he owed her.

The last time they met hadn’t been pleasant. With what kind of feelings had she come to look for him?

Had she come during the most chaotic period? When she couldn’t find him, was she very afraid? And what had she gone through to end up becoming a zombie?

The two people he most wanted to protect, the two he cared about most—one was buried in the soil beneath him, one was right beside him—were both already dead.

Wen Jiuzhe suddenly wanted to laugh. He silently cursed, this damn life really knew how to toy with him.

He had originally been sitting under the tree, but gradually lay down, stretching out his legs, carelessly using the pine needles as a pillow, and closed his eyes.

Xue Ling pretended to wander around nearby. After seeing him quiet for quite a while, she quietly approached and discovered that he had actually fallen asleep.

Could he be pretending to sleep? Xue Ling leaned closer, opened her mouth wide toward his neck, waited for a bit—Wen Jiuzhe didn’t move at all.

His breathing was even; there was no expression on his sleeping face.

He really fell asleep.

Xue Ling was speechless. He was way too big-hearted, wasn’t he—just falling asleep like this, sleeping right here?

A zombie was right beside him, and he wasn’t afraid she’d chew on him.

And sleeping out in the open like this—there were other zombies around!

As Xue Ling thought this and turned her head, she saw a zombie following the scent and coming over.

Xue Ling shot a glare back at the sleeping Wen Jiuzhe, then walked toward that zombie.

She shed the stiff, sluggish manner she had in front of Wen Jiuzhe. Her walking speed quickened, her movements slightly smoother than the zombie in front of her. With one punch, she knocked the shambling zombie brother’s head aside, then fiercely kicked his knee.

Moments later, Xue Ling cursed inwardly as she dragged the fallen zombie companion behind a gravestone, so Wen Jiuzhe wouldn’t discover it.

When Wen Jiuzhe woke up, he squinted because of the light filtering down through the gaps in the pine branches, raised a hand to rest on his forehead, and thought—to think he hadn’t been bitten.

There wasn’t a sound around him. He sat up and saw Xue Ling still wandering aimlessly nearby.

Why didn’t she come bite him? Was it that she had no appetite for food that didn’t move?

After sleeping for a while, he instead felt hungry.

Wen Jiuzhe walked over and sat on the steps beside Xue Ling.

He opened his backpack and took out meat canned food, mandarin orange canned food, self-heating noodles, and a plainly packaged loaf of bread.

He had been to too many places. Those large and small bases all prioritized securing food first. Different bases would produce different kinds of convenience foods to use for exchanging supplies.

The best-preserved compressed biscuits were the most widely circulated and also cheaper; other better-tasting canned foods and breads were comparatively more expensive.

Wen Jiuzhe opened a can and held it up to Xue Ling. “Do you want to eat?”

Xue Ling unobtrusively took a couple of extra sniffs of the long-missed scent of food.

She hadn’t eaten human food for a long time. Her mind was drooling, but her body had no reaction to this kind of food.

Seeing no reaction from her, Wen Jiuzhe ate it himself.

He opened the self-heating noodles, poured in water, waited a bit, mixed it well, then held it up to Xue Ling again for her to smell.

“Smells good? Do you want to eat?”

Xue Ling: It smells good. Don’t want to eat.

Wen Jiuzhe withdrew his hand and ate that portion as well.

Noticing that Xue Ling’s pair of unfocused red eyes were fixed on the bread.

“Could it be that you want to eat bread?”

He forcefully stuffed the bread into Xue Ling’s hands and watched her reaction.

Xue Ling, holding the bread: She didn’t want to eat bread, but if she remembered correctly, this guy couldn’t eat bread, right? He’d get an allergic red rash.

It was already the apocalypse, food was precious—better not waste it.

She hesitated for a moment, then loosened her grip and let the bread fall back into Wen Jiuzhe’s arms.

“Alright, not eating bread either. I’ll eat it myself.” Wen Jiuzhe finished the bread in a few bites, rubbed the back of her head, and sighed.

“Why don’t you eat anything? Don’t you get hungry?”

Of course she got hungry—probably like the feeling of missing two meals, her stomach burning uncomfortably—but this level wasn’t enough to make her lose her rationality and eat people.

And after such a long time, being hungry over and over again, she’d gotten used to it.

Otherwise, why did she like lying still in one place so much? Because that way, she felt a little less hungry.