Chapter 83: A Massive Karaoke Scene
This couldn’t go on. If it did, more espers were going to get injured, or worse, lose their lives.
Song Yuqing watched the battlefield with growing anxiety. She desperately needed a foolproof way for her allies to distinguish the disguised zombies from actual humans.
“Singing!” Huo Bin barked from beside her. Having spent time on the run and hiding out in the horde’s outskirts, he had picked up a few survival tricks. “Zombies don’t understand singing, and they definitely don’t know how to do it.”
He recalled a night during his travels when he had witnessed a family of three ordinary civilians huddled in a narrow drainage shaft. To soothe her terrified parents, the little girl had quietly sung a nursery rhyme. A patrol of zombies had walked right past the shaft, completely oblivious to their presence.
Song Yuqing looked at him with skepticism, but they were running out of time. Whether it was a flawless theory or not, they had to try. Besides, the sheer absurdity of the idea was worth a shot.
“Everyone, start singing!” she shouted across the chaos.
“Singing right now? Have you completely lost your mind?!” Zhang Yimiao cursed, swinging a heavy wooden club to crack a zombie across the jaw.
“Zombies can’t sing!” Song Yuqing yelled back, betting everything on her hunch. “Anyone who isn’t singing is a monster!”
Zhang Yimiao didn’t have time to process the logic. She slammed her club into another attacker, pinning it against the wall before unleashing a jet of fire to scorch it. Thanks to the heavy suppression field of the meteorite stones, her flames were severely dampened, barely generating enough heat to incinerate the flesh.
Spinning around to strike the next target in line, her club stopped a mere inch from a man’s forehead. The man frantically reached out, caught the edge of the wood, and rolled his eyes in sheer exasperation.
“Watch it! Are you blind?!” he snapped.
Zhang Yimiao blinked. Alright, maybe she’s onto something.
Hearing the exchange, another nearby esper decided to test the theory. He cleared his throat and loudly began humming an old childhood tune:
“Little Erlang, carrying his backpack to school… not afraid of the wind, the rain, or the rattle of the drums…”
As if on cue, other voices began to join in across the ruined lobby, echoing awkwardly over the sounds of combat.
“There’s a flock of ducks by the front gate, quack, quack, quack… come on and count them, two, four, six, seven, eight…”
“Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you…”
It was a completely discordant, tone-deaf chorus, but it worked beautifully. Amidst the singing, anyone standing perfectly silent stood out like a sore thumb.
Song Yuqing quietly pulled her phone from her pocket, turned on the camera, and began recording the bizarre, poignant spectacle unfolding before her. It had been an incredibly long time since she had heard anyone sing in this desolate world. When life and death hang by a thread every single day, nobody has the luxury to care about music. Yet, hearing it now, it brought an odd, soothing warmth to the grim environment.
She zoomed the camera in on an esper who was passionately belt-singing a nursery rhyme while bashing a mutant’s head in. The rhythm of his strikes perfectly matched the beat of the song, and his eyes were glistening with unshed tears.
“Die, you silent freak!” the man bellowed, swinging harder.
A few yards away, Zhang Yimiao cornered a suspicious-looking man. She narrowed her eyes and aggressively chanted a popular rap lyric: “Fast and furious, check out my nunchucks, hua-cha!”
The stranger chuckled nervously, waving his hands. “Hey, those aren’t nunchucks.”
Boom!
Zhang Yimiao immediately brought her club down on his skull anyway. “I told you to sing along, not have a conversation! Learn the lyrics, idiot!”
As the blow connected, the man’s faux-civilian face contorted with violent rage, his pupils flashing with a distinct golden hue.
“Standing tall like a cedar tree…” Zhang Yimiao sang off-key, completely making up words to a melody she barely remembered as she continued her assault.
Song Yuqing hadn’t forgotten about the mastermind. Now that the first floor was firmly under control, she tugged on Little Meat Bun’s massive fur-covered fingers. Looking up at the giant panda, she pointed toward the upper levels.
“We need to cut off the head of the snake! Go after Chen Ke!”
Little Meat Bun nodded obediently. He tossed the two zombies he was holding onto the floor like ragdolls, scooped Song Yuqing up onto his shoulder, and leapt back up the central stairwell.
Up on the landing, Chen Ke saw the giant beast coming for her. Unleashing a piercing, commanding screech, she turned and bolted deep into the ninth-floor apartment. Down below, the fighting horde heard the signal, immediately hissing in unison as they broke away from the espers and retreated into the building’s lower basements and rear exits.
“Faster, Little Meat Bun! Don’t let her get away!” Song Yuqing urged.
The panda bounded through the doorway of the penthouse, rapidly shrinking back down to his compact size to maneuver. Both of them scanned the luxury room, but Chen Ke was already gone. The only sign of her departure was a shattered window frame and a pile of glinting glass on the floor.
She had leaped down to the adjacent rooftops to escape.
“Song Yuqing!” Zhang Yimiao’s voice bellowed from the courtyard below. “They’re all fleeing! The zombies are gone!”
“Well, that’s a relief,” Huo Bin’s voice echoed from the stairwell as he finally caught up. “If they’re gone, it means we’re finally out of danger.”
Song Yuqing walked over to the broken window and peered out. In the distance, Chen Ke’s silhouette was effortlessly leaping across the snow-covered rooftops, covering vast distances in a matter of seconds. Behind her, a massive trail of figures sprinted along the streets and upper ledges, keeping perfect pace. They were all part of her newly evolved horde.
Song Yuqing gripped the window frame tightly, debating whether they should pursue. But she knew it was pointless; the mutants were moving far too fast for humans to catch on foot.
What is Chen Ke’s ultimate goal? Are these zombies going to keep evolving until they are indistinguishable from us? But why?
Frustrated, she slammed her palm against the frame, a sharp shard of leftover glass slicing into her hand.
Little Meat Bun let out a worried squeak, immediately grabbing her wrist to inspect the cut.
“Don’t worry, I’m fine,” Song Yuqing said gently, ruffling his ears. “By the time we walk back, a minor scrape like this will already be healed.”
As they headed back downstairs, Little Meat Bun made a quick detour to the eighth-floor living room. He carefully rolled up the mystical, galaxy-patterned carpet and slung it over his shoulder, refusing to leave the treasure behind.
Downstairs, Zhang Yimiao and the rest of the exhausted combat squad were already collapsed on the floor, resting. It was Zhang Yimiao who had officially called off the pursuit.
“Why did we let them go?” one of the fighters muttered under his breath, though he didn’t make any move to stand up. “We should have pressed our advantage and wiped out the whole nest.”
“Because I’m completely spent,” Zhang Yimiao countered, leaning her head back. “If we kept pushing into unknown territory, they would have turned around and slaughtered us. Didn’t you notice? Their physical stamina is vastly superior to ours.”
Song Yuqing paused at the bottom of the stairs. She’s right. Why did Chen Ke command an immediate retreat when they still held the physical advantage?
Walking over to Zhang Yimiao, she voiced her concern. “Yimiao, what do you think their angle is?”
“Either they lack the tactical discipline for a prolonged siege, or they have a much bigger plan in motion.”
A bigger plan. The thought sent a chill through Song Yuqing’s chest. The immediate crisis had passed, but the true threat felt like a ticking clock, and no one knew when it would run out.
“Whoa, what is that?” Zhang Yimiao’s eyes suddenly locked onto the massive roll of fabric resting on Little Meat Bun’s shoulder.
“The carpet from upstairs,” Song Yuqing replied automatically. “Do you want it?”
“Yes, please.”
Song Yuqing stared at her blankly. I really shouldn’t have asked.
Zhang Yimiao dragged herself over to the wall, gesturing for Little Meat Bun to unfurl it. Surprisingly, all the embedded gemstones that had lined the fabric earlier had vanished, likely consumed or dislodged during the chaos. Only the deep, swirling patterns of the galaxy remained.
“Still looks pretty cool,” Zhang Yimiao remarked, tracing the patterns with her fingers.
Song Yuqing flagged down a few of the uninjured espers, instructing them to go outside with Little Meat Bun to scour the snowdrifts for any fallen meteorite shards. Once they left, she squatted down directly next to Zhang Yimiao.
“Base Zero has dedicated research facilities studying the mutations, right?”
“Yeah, the best in the country.”
“Those meteorite shards should help them unlock a lot of answers regarding this new strain,” Song Yuqing mused, already planning to use her store’s messaging system to coordinate a swift drop-off.
“Perfect. I’ll gear up and ride back to Base Zero first thing tomorrow morning to deliver them personally,” Zhang Yimiao said, nodding solemnly.
“No, that won’t be necessary. We have faster ways,” Song Yuqing replied.
She kept her eyes locked onto Zhang Yimiao’s face, staring intently. The main reason she had squatted down so close was to thoroughly inspect her features—she needed to be absolutely certain this wasn’t another one of Chen Ke’s disguised shapeshifters.
Feeling the intense, unblinking gaze, Zhang Yimiao shifted uncomfortably, a nervous sweat breaking out on her brow. “Uh… is there something on my face again?”
“No,” Song Yuqing said simply, standing up to stretch. “Let’s head back to God’s Supermarket.”
Before she could take a step, however, Zhang Yimiao reached up and firmly grabbed Song Yuqing’s arm, her brow furrowed in a deep, sudden frown.
