Chapter 7: Escape Route
At this moment, the blood on Xu Zhi’s body had already begun to clot. What made her particularly uncomfortable was the blood that had splashed onto her face and hair when she slit the girl’s throat. But the side effects of the Bloodlust trait had kicked in—right now, she couldn’t even lift a finger as she slumped in her wheelchair.
Xu Zhi stared at the clock, silently counting the minutes. Just as ten minutes passed, she could clearly feel her condition improving.
“Looks like the side effects last for ten minutes.”
Ten minutes—a significant amount of time. In a dangerous situation, ten minutes could be more than enough to get her killed several times over.
“I can only hope that improving my physical condition and upgrading Bloodlust will reduce the impact of the side effects.”
For now, the most important thing was to figure out her next move.
The biggest problem at the moment was that the world outside was shrouded in black fog. Walking out of the room would be like stepping directly into that fog. Although the room wasn’t airtight, the fog inside was noticeably lighter compared to the outside.
After killing that girl, a question began to gnaw at Xu Zhi.
Since the city was sealed, she hadn’t seen a single other human being. So she didn’t know how quickly the black fog could corrode a person’s mind. But based on the male student yesterday and the girl today, it seemed like any ordinary person staying in the city long enough would end up just like them.
But no matter how she thought about it, Xu Zhi didn’t feel like she had been affected that badly.
Even when she washed up and looked in the mirror each day, her eyes never seemed strange.
Xu Zhi suspected she might have some resistance to the black fog. And judging by her frail physical state, that resistance must have existed before the game console ever appeared.
Otherwise, she probably wouldn’t have survived long enough to receive the console.
Previously, she hadn’t noticed this because she had no point of reference. But now, it suddenly occurred to her—maybe she had some kind of innate talent.
Maybe the game console didn’t appear by chance. At the very least, there must be something about her that attracted it.
With that thought in mind, Xu Zhi decided to try something bold.
But before that, she picked up the console. The screen showed the snake’s updated status after leveling up.
[Familiar: Snake Lv11]
[Spirit: 140]
[Body: 560]
[Attribute: Blade]
[Traits: Poison Lv5, Sharp Lv3, Bloodlust Lv4, Cunning Lv2]
[Evolution Points: 700/1500]
Both spirit and body stats had increased. It was clear that each level gained after Lv10 gave a larger boost than before. Nothing else had changed for now.
Xu Zhi wasn’t disappointed. After clicking confirm, a line of text appeared in the center of the screen:
[The world is ever-changing. You realize that to survive, you must evolve.]
[You now understand what must be done. You no longer need additional guidance. From now on, you will issue commands to your familiars on your own.]
[Note: A familiar’s intelligence will continue to grow with each level. Most of the time, your orders need not be too detailed—they will adapt based on the situation, unless you have a specific task that must be carried out.]
As the text faded, a virtual keyboard appeared on the screen. Xu Zhi wasn’t very familiar with computers, so she slowly and clumsily used the console to type out a line of text, letter by letter.
[Go to the old residential buildings behind the Bell and Drum Tower to hunt and gather intel.]
After confirming the command, the little snake set off.
The progress bar still showed 7 hours—seems that leveling up once hadn’t shortened the idle time.
Next, Xu Zhi moved her wheelchair toward the window. Because of the heavy accumulation of fog in the city, she could no longer tell what the weather was like. Whether it was a bright sunny day or a clear blue sky, under the black mist everything looked bleak and gloomy. Through the window, she could see the black fog constantly swirling in the air.
Then Xu Zhi did something incredibly bold—she reached out and slowly pushed open the glass window.
Black fog instantly flowed through the opening into the room. Xu Zhi didn’t dodge or hide—she let the fog wash over her face and enter her lungs.
It was a reckless move, but she believed it was necessary. One way or another, a group of insane people had their eyes on her. She wasn’t strong enough to confront them head-on, so she had to leave this place.
And to leave, she had to face the black fog.
If she tested her tolerance now, she could still recover if anything went wrong.
The girl sat by the window for a long time, breathing in the dense fog, yet she felt no changes. She returned to the bathroom to check her reflection again—no blackness in her eyes.
“Just as I thought.”
She did have a certain resistance to the mental corruption caused by the fog. Otherwise, while others had completely lost their minds, she would not be just starting to experience psychological strain.
“That’s great.”
This meant she could now carry out her plan and leave home.
Xu Zhi first washed up and changed into clean clothes, then began packing her belongings, carefully selecting what to bring.
Her house wasn’t far from the old residential area behind the Bell and Drum Tower. Xu Zhi planned to wake up at 5 a.m. and head there.
First, because one of her familiars would be over there. Second, according to the game narration earlier, monsters outside would fall into slumber after midnight due to fear. Most wouldn’t wake up until after dawn. Around 5 a.m. would be a relatively safe time window.
Also, she had sent her snake to scout the area. If all went well, she’d have it return as a guard and accompany her on the journey. With both familiars at her side, her chances of survival would be much better.
Not long after killing someone, Xu Zhi had already laid out her escape route with methodical precision.
After drying her hair, she ignored the corpse still lying at the door and picked up the console again to upgrade her second familiar—the dog.
Her time was far too precious now.
By around 10:30 p.m., Xu Zhi had just leveled the dog up to Lv7.
[Familiar: Dog Lv7]
[Spirit: 20]
[Body: 360]
[Attribute: None]
[Traits: Strength Lv4, Smell Lv3, Alertness Lv1]
She frowned at the number of evolution points needed to reach Lv8. At this rate, it would take at least three or four more days to reach Lv10—far too slow.
And tomorrow morning, she needed the dog and Yi to serve as her bodyguard for the trip to the old residential area. Sending the dog out alone to search for black fruits would be a gamble—if luck was bad, she could end up wasting a whole morning.
In her current situation, where increasing her power was urgent, gambling on luck wasn’t a smart choice.
Xu Zhi decided that tomorrow morning, she’d have the dog hunt stronger prey still in their slumber to quickly earn evolution points.
Since the dog’s physical strength and power were already well developed, ambush attacks might yield some surprising results.
As for the black fruits—she would search for those after settling into a new safehouse.
After finalizing her plan, not long after, the 7-hour progress bar for Yi was full again. Xu Zhi lay back and tapped the snake’s avatar, ready to check the results of this round of idle hunting.
