Chapter 334: Mom, This Way You’ll Never Leave Me Again
Two hours later, their vehicle finally caught up with the main convoy.
Ma Dapao let out a sigh of relief and didn’t ask much about Xiao Yu and Grandma Yu’s situation. He simply arranged for the grandmother and grandson to ride in the same vehicle as Qian Lin and her daughter.
After being on edge for two days, Xiao Yu felt a wave of drowsiness the moment he got in the car. The sense of security around him lulled him into a deep sleep within three seconds, his soft snores filling the cabin.
Grandma Yu sighed softly, gently brushing his hair and patting his hand with affection.
Silly child, thinking that leaving with these people will keep him safe.
Hopefully, fools are blessed with good fortune.
She gazed out at the dark night through the car window, her vision seemingly piercing through the darkness to glimpse the future. Her expression grew resolute.
She would take this gamble. No matter how poor or weak the place she was heading to, she would press forward without hesitation now that she had made her decision.
The convoy continued toward Dongyang.
However, Dongyang was far from peaceful at that moment. Shi Zijin and his team stood vigil in the shadows, fully armed, their eyes locked on a brightly lit room across the way.
Inside the room, Liu Panpan sat at a table, absentmindedly stroking a photograph of Yanyan.
She glanced at the moon hanging high outside the window, and tears began to fall uncontrollably, blurring her vision.
Through the haze of her tears, a tall figure suddenly emerged, walking slowly toward her.
Liu Panpan froze, her tears seemingly crystallizing on her face.
She hastily wiped her eyes and, as her vision cleared, she recognized the face of the young man before her.
His features were sharper and more defined, but they were still the ones she remembered.
The day she had both longed for and dreaded had finally come.
Tears streamed down her face as she murmured, “Yanyan… Is that you, Yanyan?”
She stood up abruptly, but her legs, weakened by emotion, gave way, and she collapsed back to the floor.
Struggling to her feet, she staggered toward the young man. “Yanyan!”
The creature with bone wings didn’t let her touch him. He simply stared at her blankly, his head tilting mechanically as if in deep thought.
His human memories were hazy, but he still remembered her face. He remembered being forcibly taken away while she lay motionless, allowing him to be discarded like trash.
He remembered crying himself hoarse in a dark, filthy garage, curling up in a bug-infested corner while the pain wracked his small body.
He knew he was sick.
And because he was sick, this woman abandoned him.
Later, he had cried himself into exhaustion—or maybe he had passed out from the pain—he couldn’t remember. But when he woke up, he felt unbearably hungry, though the pain was gone.
He had bounced up, happy that he no longer hurt. But then he heard people screaming “zombie” and saw them trying to drive him away—or worse, kill him.
He was just sick. Why did this woman abandon him? Why did everyone else reject him too?
Driven by hunger, he had instinctively latched onto a man and begun to tear into him.
When he came back to his senses, he was surrounded by mangled bodies and pools of blood.
Amid the carnage, he felt an exhilarating power coursing through his now-pain-free body. From where his body had once hurt the most, sharp bone wings had sprouted—blades of death that carved a bloodstained path through the apocalypse.
Liu Panpan desperately wanted to touch him, her frail hand trembling as she reached out, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t reach him.
“Yanyan… Mommy was wrong. I didn’t mean to… I—”
Her plea was cut short by a razor-sharp bone spike piercing through her chest.
The creature gazed down at her impassively, then withdrew the spike without hesitation. Blood gushed from the wound, soaking the floor.
Liu Panpan’s mouth opened and closed as she fought to speak her final words:
“I always… loved… you… Run—”
The bone-winged creature paused for a moment, watching her take her last breath, before coldly remarking:
“Mom, this way you’ll never leave me again.”
At that moment, the surrounding area lit up as a barrage of bullets rained down, weaving an inescapable net of death.
The creature was about to take flight when someone tackled him to the ground.
Shi Zijin pinned him down, slicing off half of his bone wings in the blink of an eye. Blood-red feathers scattered through the air—a macabre offering to the apocalypse.
*
At five in the morning, Su Tao received a call from Dongyang. The voice on the other end belonged to Cen Tianjiao, who hesitated before speaking:
“Boss Su, I’ve got one good news and two bad news. Which one do you want first?”
Su Tao’s heart pounded, an overwhelming sense of dread washing over her. For the first time, she was afraid to hear the bad news.
“The good news,” she said.
“We captured the bone-winged creature. It’s under heavy guard now. But… we still can’t kill it—it’s too valuable for research. To prevent another escape, we might need your help, Boss Su.”
“What do you need?” she asked.
“Could you allocate a piece of land on the outskirts of Taoyang to contain it? We’d install a protective barrier—it’s the safest option we’ve come up with.”
“That’s fine. And the bad news…?”
There was a brief silence before Cen Tianjiao spoke again:
“I’m sorry. Miss Liu… didn’t make it.”
Su Tao closed her eyes. Though she had braced herself, the news still felt like a punch to the gut.
Liu Panpan’s only mistake had been treating Yang Yang as a replacement, which indirectly led to his death. But in the end, the real culprit was the cruel and chaotic apocalypse. She was just a broken mother lost in her grief.
Cen Tianjiao’s voice trembled with remorse:
“We’re truly sorry. We thought that, even as a zombie, he might still have some feelings for his mother. But the moment he entered the room, he killed her without hesitation. We were completely caught off guard—this was our failure.”
Su Tao took a deep breath. “I understand. But you should apologize to Mr. Mei—he considered her like a daughter. This is a parent burying their child…”
Cen Tianjiao promised, “We’ll deliver our apologies in person.”
Su Tao hesitated before asking, “The other bad news… is it about Major Shi?”
There was a long pause. “…Yes,” Cen Tianjiao admitted, struggling to find the words.
Su Tao’s voice grew distant. “If he were okay, he’d have called me himself. If you’re the one delivering the news, that means he’s either missing… gravely injured… or worse.”
Cen Tianjiao scrambled to reassure her:
“No, no, don’t jump to conclusions! Last night’s battle was brutal. The bone-winged creature’s power rivals that of a third-level ability user—it’s at the pinnacle of strength. Even with one wing severed, it still fought like a monster…”
“Moreover, at that time, all we could do was fall back and watch—we couldn’t intervene at all. Our boss fought against the bone-winged creature alone the entire time. In the end, although he nearly killed it, our boss… he also suffered severe, life-threatening injuries.”
