Chapter 133
Chapter 133
It was getting cold.
Truly cold. Overnight, the bare trees outside had become coated in frost.
Smiles appeared on the faces of most of the survivors. The colder it got, the better. Ideally, it would get cold enough to freeze those Madmen to death outside. No matter how crazed the Madmen were, they were still made of flesh and blood, and flesh and blood couldn’t withstand subzero temperatures.
“Winter came early this year,” someone muttered in the courtyard, unable to hide the anticipation in her voice. “Once it gets a little colder, those bastards will settle down.”
“Let them freeze to death.”
“The sooner they freeze, the better.”
The Director, however, wasn’t smiling. The cold could indeed freeze the Madmen to death, but it could kill people just as easily. Did they have enough food? Enough warm clothing? Enough bullets? Every one of those was a problem.
She continued to keep to herself. Every morning, she appeared in the main hall right on time, assigned the day’s duties, and then vanished. No one knew where she went or what she was doing, but no one questioned her.
In this Psychiatric Hospital, the Director’s word was law.
With one exception.
Meng Rui.
After the Director frightened her in the basement that day, she kept her head down for several days. But lying low didn’t mean she had given up. She couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. That basement, that generator room, and whatever lay behind that door had to be hiding something.
“What the hell could be down there?”
Meng Rui sat in her room, speaking in a low voice to the women beside her.
There were three other women in the room. The rest had gone out with Ye Que’s group.
A tiny, painfully thin woman leaned closer, her eyes gleaming with unusual intensity. Her name was Zhang Xiaoxiao. Before the apocalypse, she had been a thief, and her lockpicking skills were second to none.
“Why don’t I sneak down and take a look?” Zhang Xiaoxiao suggested.
Meng Rui frowned at her. “How are you going to get down there without a key?”
She grinned. “I’ll pick the lock.”
Meng Rui fell silent for a few seconds.
She remembered Xu Yun standing behind her in the basement that day, her bloodless face and those cold, emotionless eyes. Just thinking about it sent a chill racing up Meng Rui’s spine, along with a fear she couldn’t suppress.
It was a feeling she hadn’t experienced in a long time.
If something really was hidden down there, she needed to know.
“Be careful,” she said.
…
The basement door stood at the very end of the corridor.
Almost no one came here during the day. Zhang Xiaoxiao hugged the wall as she approached without making a sound.
Two women kept watch from the main hall nearby. They pretended to sharpen their knives, but their eyes discreetly swept their surroundings, alert for trouble.
Zhang Xiaoxiao crouched in front of the door and pulled a slender piece of wire from her sleeve. It was the tool of her trade. No lock lasted more than a minute in her hands.
She slipped the wire into the keyhole and gently turned it.
Click.
With a faint sound, the lock opened.
Zhang Xiaoxiao glanced back. After making sure nothing was amiss, she took a deep breath, pushed the door open, and slipped inside. The door closed softly behind her.
The generator was loud, its rumble carrying from somewhere deeper inside and making her eardrums tingle. Zhang Xiaoxiao frowned and edged forward along the wall.
She didn’t need a flashlight. Her eyes could see perfectly well in the dark.
She advanced one careful step at a time. The roar of the generator grew louder. Then, in a shadowy corner, she spotted something.
A huddled mass.
At first, she thought it was a corpse. Corpses were nothing unusual these days, but corpses didn’t move.
Something alive was curled up there, breathing.
Zhang Xiaoxiao stopped and held her breath, narrowing her eyes as she peered into the darkness.
It was a person.
A girl.
She wasn’t very old. Fifteen or sixteen, perhaps? Maybe even younger. She wore filthy clothes and sat curled up in the corner, utterly still.
Zhang Xiaoxiao’s brow furrowed. Why would the Director lock a girl down here…? Could this be what Boss Meng had sensed was wrong?
The girl suddenly moved. Slowly, she raised her head.
Zhang Xiaoxiao finally saw her face clearly.
It was deathly pale, almost translucent. But the most terrifying thing about her was her eyes.
Her pupils were black beyond belief. So black they no longer looked like pupils, but two bottomless holes. Set in that deathly pale face, those hollow, pitch-black eyes made Zhang Xiaoxiao’s scalp prickle.
“Ah… ah…”
The girl opened her mouth and made an incoherent sound. She showed no reaction to Zhang Xiaoxiao’s presence and simply continued moaning, as though she herself had no idea what she was doing.
As Zhang Xiaoxiao stared into those eyes, an inexplicable panic rose within her, leaving her legs weak.
Still, she forced herself to calm down. The girl was just a patient. This was a Psychiatric Hospital, after all. There was nothing strange about finding a patient like her here.
She took a deep breath and prepared to go around her.
But the girl’s cries suddenly quickened, her pitch turning shrill. She opened her mouth, stretching it wider and wider with all her might-
Her black, hollow eyes remained fixed on Zhang Xiaoxiao.
“Aaaah! Aaaah!”
A chill swept through Zhang Xiaoxiao’s entire body. The girl’s teeth-every single tooth in her mouth-were covered in blood.
She looked exactly like a Madman.
At that moment, something exploded inside Zhang Xiaoxiao’s head.
Red, when dark enough… became black.
Those eyes were too black to be human. Zhang Xiaoxiao stumbled backward desperately. The girl in front of her was a Madman!!!
She spun around, only to slam straight into someone. A pair of narrow shoulders filled her vision.
Her body went rigid.
The Director.
The woman was standing right behind her. Her deeply wrinkled face was as warm and kindly as ever, but there was nothing at all in her eyes.
The next instant, the Director clamped one hand tightly over Zhang Xiaoxiao’s mouth. A cold gleam flashed from her other hand.
Shhk!
The icy blade plunged into the side of Zhang Xiaoxiao’s neck.
She couldn’t make a sound. Her body convulsed violently several times before going limp.
The Director released her, letting the corpse crumple to the floor. Then she turned toward the girl in the corner.
The girl had tilted her head and was staring unblinkingly at the body on the floor. Her mouth hung open, drool running from one corner, and her eyes brimmed with raw, primal hunger.
The Director looked at her.
“Go ahead. Eat.”
Her tone was gentle, as though she were coaxing a small animal.
The girl’s eyes lit up.
She crawled over and grabbed the corpse by the ankle. Her movements were practiced, as if she had done this countless times before. Opening her mouth to reveal rows of bloodstained teeth, she lowered her head to bite into the corpse’s ankle.
“Get out,” the Director suddenly said.
The girl froze.
She looked up at the Director, then released the ankle. Gripping the corpse again, she dragged it toward the generator.
A massive ventilation duct yawned open there, its interior pitch-black and impossible to see into. The girl crawled inside with practiced ease, dragging the corpse behind her until both vanished into the darkness.
The Director remained where she was, gazing at the vent with the same smile still curving her lips.
Then she slowly turned her head and looked in another direction. Someone was hiding in the shadows there.
Song Yunqing.
Her face was deathly pale, her gaze still locked on the vent behind the Director. The instant her eyes met the Director’s, she whirled around.
Run!!!
Her frantic footsteps pounded through the basement as she bolted for the stairs.
“Ah-mmph!”
Her cry abruptly cut off. A man had clamped a hand over her mouth and dragged her back.
Qi Zhi.
At some point, the silent man had positioned himself directly in her path.
Song Yunqing struggled desperately, kicking and thrashing, but it was useless. Without a word, Qi Zhi dragged her back one step at a time.
He brought her before the Director.
The Director gazed at her with eyes full of affection, as though looking at… a disobedient child.
“Good girl,” the Director said gently.
She reached out and softly stroked Song Yunqing’s face. Her touch was icy, so cold that Song Yunqing trembled from head to toe.
“I won’t hurt you,” the Director said.
For an instant, something that could truly be called tenderness flickered in those impossibly black eyes.
“She’s not a Madman,” she continued, as though trying to explain. “She’ll protect us. Don’t be afraid…”
Her hand slid away from Song Yunqing’s face, and she gently patted her on the head.
But all the blood in Song Yunqing’s body seemed to have frozen. Only her heart remained alive, pounding wildly in her chest.
Outside, the other two women realized that Zhang Xiaoxiao had failed to emerge within the allotted time, and their expressions darkened. They rose to leave.
Then they saw the Director walking toward them from the far end of the corridor, her gaze fixed squarely on them.
“What’s the hurry? Have you finished your work?”
The two women exchanged a glance. Each saw the same ominous realization in the other’s eyes. Zhang Xiaoxiao had definitely failed. They had to tell Sister Meng at once!
“No. My stomach’s acting up. I’m going to the bathroom.”
They tried to move around her, but the Director held them firmly in place. She leaned closer with a smile, though there was no trace of amusement in her voice.
“Work.”