Chapter 145
Chapter 145
Chu Jingchu raced down the stairs. The moment she reached the first floor and burst out of the stairwell, she froze.
Several people lay scattered across the lobby.
Or rather, several mutilated corpses. Some were missing their heads, some their limbs, while others had been torn into pieces and strewn across the floor.
Chu Jingchu’s mind went blank for an instant.
Had that man done this?
Or had it been the girl?
She ran through the lobby, searching for the Director. But the Director was nowhere to be found.
Chu Jingchu turned around and found a deathly pale face inches from her own.
Her heart plummeted. It was the girl.
She stood less than half a meter away, close enough for Chu Jingchu to see her hollow eyes clearly.
They were bottomless black voids, empty as an abyss.
The girl was still holding a corpse by the ankle, dragging it facedown across the floor.
Staring into those eyes, Chu Jingchu felt her legs go weak.
Even someone as bold and carefree as her couldn’t stop herself from taking a step back. But after that single step, she stopped.
Wen Lianfeng was still upstairs.
Chu Jingchu drew a deep breath and spoke.
“Hey, kid.” Her voice trembled, but she tried her best to keep it steady. “I’m begging you.”
The girl didn’t move. Those black eyes simply stared at her as though she were nothing more than a rock.
“Please, go save Wen Lianfeng.” Chu Jingchu stepped forward, moving even closer to that deathly pale face. “A Madman got inside! You have to go kill it, or everyone will die, even the Director!”
At the mention of the Director, the girl’s eyes shifted. But she remained where she was, still clutching the corpse’s ankle.
Chu Jingchu’s throat tightened. She didn’t know what else to say. All she knew was that time was slipping away, and every extra second Wen Lianfeng spent up there brought her another second closer to death.
“The Director,” she said, her voice beginning to shake. “She’s your mother, right?”
“Don’t you want us to stay?” Chu Jingchu spoke faster and faster, the words spilling out before she could even think. “I’ll stay, okay? I’ll stay. I can eat, fight, and run. I can even feed the Madmen!”
“Director!” Chu Jingchu pointed at herself and shouted into the empty lobby. The roguish confidence that usually colored her face had been replaced by utter despair. “I can take on three people by myself. I can do anything. Just send her to save Wen Lianfeng, please! I’m begging you.”
Still no response. Chu Jingchu’s heart sank lower and lower. She had no time left to think. Gritting her teeth, she shot out a hand and grabbed the girl’s wrist.
Then a voice came from behind her.
“Don’t touch her.”
Chu Jingchu whipped around.
The Director emerged from a doorway. Somehow, Chu Jingchu hadn’t noticed the door before. Now it stood open, revealing nothing but pitch-black darkness within.
The Director held a handgun and was loading bullets into the magazine one by one. Dim light fell across her deeply lined, expressionless face.
She looked at Chu Jingchu, then at the hand still wrapped around the girl’s wrist. “You said it yourself.”
The Director slid the final bullet into the magazine and snapped it into the gun with a click.
Then she raised her head and looked at the girl. Her expression abruptly softened into something almost tender and maternal.
“Go on, sweetheart.”
For a moment, Chu Jingchu thought her eyes were playing tricks on her. A spark of light had actually appeared in those bottomless black eyes.
The girl released the corpse’s ankle, letting the body hit the floor with a thud. Then she took off without even needing Chu Jingchu to show her the way. Within a few breaths, her figure vanished into the darkness of the stairwell.
Chu Jingchu remained rooted to the spot, panting heavily. She had done it. She had really gotten the girl to go.
She turned toward the Director.
The Director had finished loading her gun. She tucked it behind her waist, raised her head, and met Chu Jingchu’s gaze. Her face had once again settled into that unreadable calm.
“What are you standing there for?” she said. “Let’s go.”
At the same time, inside a room on the fourth floor, Qingshui abruptly halted.
She had heard something. It was far away, yet unmistakably clear.
That was… Wen Lianfeng’s voice!
“Go!”
Wen Lianfeng might be in trouble!
…………
Gripping the railing with her remaining hand, Wen Lianfeng vaulted straight over it.
She plummeted through the air and slammed onto the floor below. The instant she landed, a dark figure lunged at her from the side.
A grinning Madman charged toward her with a machete in hand.
The distance between them vanished in the blink of an eye, and a deathly pale face filled Wen Lianfeng’s vision.
The entire world seemed to slow down.
The twisted face before her. The unhurried footsteps behind her. A dead end with nowhere to run.
It seemed… there really was nothing she could do.
Wen Lianfeng’s pupils contracted. Then an even faster shadow hurtled in from the side and sank its teeth into the Madman’s neck.
“Hhh…”
Wen Lianfeng sagged against the railing, gasping for breath.
The thing that had bitten the Madman to death raised its head. It was the girl. Cocking her head, she looked toward the top of the stairs.
A man stood there.
The girl stared at him, and he stared back.
Then the man spoke, his airy voice dripping with mockery. “You stinking idiot-”
As soon as the words left his mouth, he raised his right hand, lifting the pitch-black muzzle of his gun.
Bang!
The man pulled the trigger, but he wasn’t aiming at the girl. His gun was pointed at the Director, who had appeared at the turn of the stairs at some point and was raising her own weapon.
“Look out!”
Summoning the last of her strength, Wen Lianfeng threw herself forward and knocked the Director and Chu Jingchu hard to the floor. The bullet flew over their heads and struck the wall, spraying debris everywhere!
Wen Lianfeng lay sprawled on top of the Director. By the time she raised her head again, the girl had already pounced on the man.
She coiled around him like a snake, her body twisting as she bared her sharp teeth and tore into him as if he were a slab of raw meat. She ripped a chunk of flesh straight from his neck, and blood instantly gushed from the wound.
“Fucking bitch!”
The man swung the butt of his gun into the girl’s forehead with such force that part of her skull caved in. Then he grabbed her by the hair and ripped her off him, tearing away some of his own flesh with her.
Holding the girl aloft in one hand, he aimed his gun at her with the other.
No!
Trembling, Wen Lianfeng snatched the gun from the Director. With her one remaining hand, she exhausted every ounce of strength in her body to raise it and take aim at the man.
The blood loss had blurred her vision, but she gritted her teeth and pulled the trigger on instinct.
The bullet blew off his ear and mangled the flesh across half his face.
The man’s grin froze. He touched the exposed flesh, then stared at Wen Lianfeng, who was still fighting him even on the brink of death. His face contorted with rage. “Wen Lianfeng, you fucking bastard!”
With a violent heave, he hurled the girl into the wall. Her body struck it with a deep, heavy thud, and the impact knocked her unconscious.
“Ah… ah…”
The man’s face began to twitch, the raw flesh where his skin had been pulsing in a horrifying sight. Shaking his head, he raised the gun and aimed it at Wen Lianfeng.
Madness and hatred burned in his bloodshot eyes. “Join us…”
Since you hate us so much, I’ll make you into the same thing as me.
Wen Lianfeng’s pupils contracted slightly. As the man pulled the trigger, her body jerked violently.
She slowly lowered her head and saw a bloody hole in her shoulder.
Blood poured from the wound, and the light in her eyes abruptly dimmed.
At that moment, something surged into her through the wound. It was cold and frenzied, like countless hands tearing at her consciousness and dragging away her soul.
She did not mutate immediately.
But she could feel those things spreading through her body.
She raised her head, the corners of her mouth curling upward beyond her control. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to laugh without restraint. She wanted to tear every last bastard here to pieces and then throw back her head and howl with laughter.
“No… no…” Wen Lianfeng fought desperately against it. She tried to force down her smile, but she couldn’t. It seemed to have a life of its own, slowly blossoming across her face.
Desire and humanity waged war within her. Countless images flashed through her mind.
Her parents. Her teammates. Her friends…
She was their pride. She would never allow herself to become one of those disgusting things, to lose her dignity and principles as a human being and descend into a monster ruled by its desires.
“Ugh… Ugh!!!”
“Chen Qingshui… Chen Qingshui, you bastard! Stay away from me! Aaaaaaahahahahahaha-!!!!”
Agonized sounds tore from Wen Lianfeng’s throat. The veins stood out on the back of her hand, every blood vessel bulging beneath her skin. Mustering the last shred of clarity left in her body, she raised the gun with a trembling hand and aimed it at her own temple.
The man froze.
The Director’s eyes widened.
Tears streamed down Chu Jingchu’s face.
Wen Lianfeng looked at them, at those blurred faces, that damned smile still hanging from her lips.
She pulled the trigger.
Bang!
Almost the instant the gunshot rang out, the girl who had regained consciousness latched onto the man like a rabid beast. She plunged both hands into his eye sockets, her nails sinking deep into flesh, then opened her mouth as wide as it would go and sank her teeth savagely into his throat.
…………
“Chen Qingshui… Chen Qingshui, you bastard! Stay away from me! Aaaaaaahahahahahaha-!!!!”
The roar came through with perfect clarity, so clear that Qingshui froze mid-sprint on her way downstairs. Then came the bang of a gunshot, making all three of their hearts jolt.
That laughter… In that instant, they all understood what had happened.
Wen Lianfeng… had become a Madman.
Qingshui gasped for breath. Her heart hurt so badly she could barely stand it, and there were no words to describe what she felt in that moment.
None at all.
Under the gazes of the other two, she backed away slowly without a moment’s hesitation, spun around, and sprinted in the opposite direction from the sound.
“Follow me!”
Ye Que’s voice came from behind her. “This way! I know the route!”
Qingshui broke into a run.
The instant they burst out of the building, it was as though someone had muted the entire world. Not a sound could be heard.
Several fresh corpses lay in the courtyard.
Ye Que led the way. She ran quickly, weaving around the bodies and cutting between building after building before hugging the walls as she made for the rear courtyard.
Just as they were about to reach its entrance, three figures suddenly emerged from around the corner.
Qingshui stopped short, her gun already raised.
The three figures froze as well. They were holding binoculars. All three were women, their faces wary and faintly bewildered.
Qingshui aimed at the forehead of the woman in front.
The woman snapped her mouth shut.
Qingshui kept her eyes fixed on them until she rounded the final corner. Only after making sure they had not followed did she lower her gun and continue running.
The Psychiatric Hospital stood against the base of a massive mountain. They stopped in its shadow and stared at the towering wall before them.
It was over three meters high by their estimate, with shards of glass and sharpened steel rods embedded along the top. There was no way they could scale it unaided.
Ye Que crouched at an inconspicuous corner of the wall and brushed aside a patch of dead weeds, revealing a coil of hemp rope.
She began digging. As she scraped away the dirt, a pitch-black opening appeared beneath it.
“Help me!”
Wu Wujie immediately crouched down and started digging alongside her.
The two clawed frantically at the earth, sending dirt flying while Qingshui stood guard behind them, watching the direction they had come from.
The opening grew larger. It was a narrow hole beneath the wall, barely wide enough for one person to crawl through. Even Qingshui could not have squeezed through it, much less Wu Wujie, the Big Guy.
Ye Que practically burrowed into it with her whole body. Dirt showered down as she twisted desperately and forced herself forward. Then she was through.
A few seconds later, a rope dropped from the top of the wall.
Ye Que’s voice came from the other side. “Hurry!”
Wu Wujie grabbed the rope and gave it a hard tug. It was sturdy.
He took a deep breath and began climbing.
Wu Wujie hauled himself onto the top of the wall and sat astride it, pausing to catch his breath. Then he reached down toward Qingshui.
“Come on!”
Qingshui grabbed the rope.
She was much lighter than Wu Wujie and climbed far faster. In just a few steps, she reached the top, caught his outstretched hand, and swung herself over.
Beyond the wall lay a dense mountain forest.
The slope was steep and covered in dead grass and thorny brush. Ye Que stood below, caked in dirt and waving to them.
Qingshui did not hesitate. She jumped from the wall and landed on the slope, with Wu Wujie leaping down after her.
Neither of them looked back. Following Ye Que, they ran deep into the dense mountain forest.