There's a ghost! There's a ghost!

The biggest difference between regular and irregular armed groups lies in discipline. I only came to this realization after someone had a gun to my head.

We prepared for a whole day. At 10 p.m. that night, the rescue team for Yu Zhongjian met at the designated location and boarded a vehicle. They were about to drive a few kilometers around the city through a sparsely guarded corner of the blockade when they were intercepted by a dozen soldiers who appeared out of nowhere. They were taken to the temporary commander on charges of sneaking around the camp and violating the rules for using the toilet.

I've heard of all sorts of rules, but I've never heard of rules for using the toilet! It was only after being explained by retired soldier Lai Yunfei that I learned soldiers must report before going to the toilet, and no more than three people can go at once. If the person in front doesn't return, the next person can't go either; even if you can't hold it in, you have to. There are also strict time limits: three to ten minutes. Going beyond that is also a violation of discipline.

The members of the Huaicheng Detachment, who were used to being free and undisciplined, ran off together with five men without reporting to the sentry outside the tent. This alerted the battalion and company commanders of the regular troops, who sent men to stop our vehicle.

What you fear most is what happens; the more you try to hide it, the faster it comes out. Zhou Yi grumbled, Lai Yunfei blamed himself for forgetting the rules after leaving the army, and Han Bo's face was dark, as if he was holding his breath. I didn't care; if I was exposed, so be it. Nobody could stop me from entering Zhangcheng. Those who wanted to help could help, and those who didn't could disband. We were just a disorganized group, not under the jurisdiction of any department.

Seven people were escorted to the command tent. The temporary commander, Gao Chen, stared at us silently for a long time before ordering the soldiers inside the tent to leave.

"Han Bo, Ai Feng, you mustn't act rashly."

Han Bo's tone was unfriendly: "It's been two days and one night, and Xiao Yu hasn't given us a single reply. Are you just going to wait here? You can wait, but we can't."

Gao Chen calmly said, "First of all, I trust Captain Yu. He's capable of protecting himself under any circumstances. Secondly, the ten soldiers he took with him are all elite members of the commando team, with extensive experience fighting terrorists and zombies. The first group lost contact after entering that building in Zhangcheng. Captain Yu was already on alert and made thorough preparations for possible traps and ambushes, but they still didn't return. The helicopter observed them twice and found nothing unusual, which means that building..."

Han Bo said, "We're not afraid of anything inside the building! What about the survivor? Has he shown up since?"

“No.” Gao Chen’s expression was grave. “He hasn’t appeared since the first batch of team members disappeared, which confirms that he is indeed the problem. But regardless of the situation inside the building, thirty-one people have already gone missing, including the commander. This is a devastating loss. Zhangcheng is currently a severely affected area, saturated with zombies. We cannot send any more people in before we find out the cause.”

“We’ll never find out the cause if we don’t go in.” I calmly spoke up from the side, rubbing my throbbing right arm, “You lead the troops to continue fighting the zombie horde, leave Xiao Yu’s matter to us.”

Gao Chen shook his head: "It's too dangerous. My suggestion is to clear out the zombies on the outside first, and then concentrate our forces to besiege that building."

"By the time we clear out the daylilies, it'll be too late," Han Bo said angrily. "It's been two days, and you haven't come up with any rescue plan. Are we going to wait any longer? Will you be satisfied when the army rushes in and rescues thirty-one corpses?"

Gao Chen clenched his fingers at his side, maintaining his calm tone: "The road that was blasted open earlier has been filled with zombies again. We must advance in a blockade formation to clear the area. At this point, people really can't get in. Even if they did... are you confident you can outperform Captain Yu?"

He paused for a moment, then continued, “Please have some faith in Captain Yu. He’s my senior, a recipient of the Special Forces Wolf King Medal, one of the top Gold Hunters at the Hunter School, and twice represented the country in international peacetime and wartime operations. He’s one of the few people in peacetime who has been tempered in the midst of gunfire. Although he later retired due to illness, he has always been a benchmark and legend in our special forces. His abilities are more than enough for him to handle all kinds of emergencies and survive in environments a hundred times more dangerous than this. He won’t die, believe me.”

Han Bo and I exchanged a glance. What? Yu Zhongjian is a top-notch special forces soldier? Does the country know that he committed a series of murders after retiring? Does it know that he hid from the police in a pigsty? Does it know that he sometimes acts like a man and sometimes a woman when he has an episode? Does it know that he was electrocuted in a mental hospital?

What a dramatic and unpredictable life!

Since I was already mentally prepared, I wasn't too surprised to hear such an impressive resume. I just asked one question: "He's your senior. You're thirty years old. How old is he?"

Gao Chen paused for a moment: "Thirty-something, I guess... I'm not sure."

I was just asking; my age doesn't really matter to me. So I added, "It would be best if I didn't die. Get me some decent weapons; we need to leave now."

Gao Chen's face showed a hint of impatience: "Ai Feng, calm down. At most one or two days, the troops can clear that area."

I know he exposed Yu Zhongjian's past to give us confidence, implying that even someone as capable as him couldn't get out, so we shouldn't cause trouble. But...

“We can’t wait,” I said firmly and without room for argument. “When we were buried in the Howard Johnson Hotel, Yu Zhongjian left behind a bunch of zombies on the front line and immediately dispatched troops to rescue us without wasting a minute. He is now in danger, and we would have felt guilty if we hadn’t gone in to rescue him right away. We must go now, no matter what anyone says. I’m determined to repay this favor.”

"What if you get caught up in it too?"

I raised my head and smiled: "Then we'll wait for you to clear the zombies to that area and come rescue us! If we don't come out in two days, we might all die inside. Just order that building to be blasted into a pile of rubble, and none of the ghosts or monsters will be able to escape. We're all brothers, you wouldn't refuse to help us out, would you?"

Gao Chen tried to dissuade us from our irrational ideas, but when Han Bo proposed to leave the military and act as a private armed force, he finally fell silent, a vein bulging on his forehead.

After a long pause, he said, "At daybreak, we'll use helicopters to airdrop you! You have to listen to me on this, or you won't be able to go anywhere."

He raised his voice, and a series of clicks of gun bolts echoed outside the tent. We looked at each other in dismay. The commander was putting on airs; if he didn't agree, we really couldn't go.

At six o'clock in the morning, Gao Chen mobilized three heavy machine gun companies to open fire in the suburbs, while simultaneously launching mortar fire in other areas to increase firepower and eliminate zombies. Afterwards, he put the seven of us on a helicopter.

Seeing the exhaustion on the faces of many soldiers, I could understand Gao Chen's predicament. When he became the commander of a large force, it was his responsibility to minimize losses and protect the lives of as many people as possible. Just like Yu Zhongjian, when the first team went missing, he couldn't send anyone else in to risk their lives; he had to personally lead the rescue.

The regular battle commenced, with artillery fire mingling with the howls of zombies, creating a chaotic and chaotic scene on the battlefield. Just before boarding the plane, Gao Chen patted my right arm, bent over, and, bracing the propeller hurricane, shouted, "Has your injury healed?"

I pretended to lift my head slightly and mouthed, "All done."

He handed me a walkie-talkie, stared into my eyes for a while, and then suddenly whispered in my ear, "Be careful. When you come back, I have something to tell you."

I laughed and leaned over to say, "If it's not something nice, don't say it. I'm afraid it will upset me, and if I get angry, I might hit you."

He laughed and said, "Whether it's good or bad, you decide."

I wanted to say, "What if I can't get out? You might as well tell me now." But seeing his worried expression, I held back. If I said anything too blunt, neither of us would have any hope left; it would sound like a last will and testament, which would be unlucky.

Han Bo watched us crawling around and grabbed me, saying, "Let's go!"

It was our first time in a helicopter, and we were all a little nervous but also excited. After takeoff, our ears were ringing and we couldn't hear anything, so we gestured to each other to express our feelings. A few minutes later, we arrived at our destination. Looking out the window, we saw towering buildings and zombies surging like a landslide, blocking the roads. Every street and every corner was packed full, stretching endlessly to the limit of our vision, a boundless, dark mass of corpses.

Fireballs launched from the positions flew toward the center of the city, blasting gaps in the horde of zombies, but they couldn't hold for long. They filled the gaps very quickly, and in just a few breaths, the gaps disappeared.

The helicopter circled overhead, flying to the side and above the target building. The building was swarming with zombies on all sides, a chaotic mess, even the roads bombed a few days prior were obscured. The co-pilot pointed out the location where the survivor had appeared; a blood-stained SOS banner was indeed hanging in the window, but the window was closed and the curtains drawn. Something's fishy! What mischief are they up to in there?

Once we were directly overhead, the plane began to descend. The pilot turned back and gestured to us, pressed a button, and the cabin door opened. A sudden gust of wind slapped me hard across the face, making me wince and squint.

The altitude decreased slowly until the cooling tower on the rooftop was clearly visible before it hovered steadily. The co-pilot lowered the ladder, and Lai Yunfei and Gan Mingde tightened their belts and climbed down without hesitation. Next came Zhou Yi and Li Tonggu, then Fatty Luo and Han Bo, and finally me, one after another jumping down the swaying ladder from the rooftop.

What I thought would be a difficult feat turned out to be much easier than I imagined once I actually tried it. Watching the ladder retract and the helicopter sway slightly as it ascended and took off, I pinched my right arm and said to Han Bo, "Remember when we were kids we dreamed of being action movie actors? We never dreamed we'd actually do a high-speed descent! If that scene could be made into a movie, we'd be famous! It was so realistic and thrilling!"

Han Bo tidied up the various equipment strapped to his waist and snorted, "That's you. My childhood dream was to be a policeman."

"Rescue a hostage, right?" I moved the submachine gun on my back to my chest and touched the dagger on my leg wrap. "Everyone, check your equipment. Keep your weapons handy. Let's try to rescue Yu Zhongjian as quickly as possible!"

Before coming here, Gao Chen had locked us up for several hours. We racked our brains, listing all the potential crises we might face. Considering that even thirty elite assault troops and the incredibly powerful Yu Zhongjian couldn't escape this building, our imaginations ran wild. We unanimously concluded that the building was either inhabited by zombies mutated into the Calabash Brothers, haunted by vengeful spirits causing paranormal events, or perhaps a cult sacrificing people? Or maybe a group of survivors, besieged for too long and harboring a vengeful mentality, had set a trap to kill the rescuers?

Zhou Yi finally concluded that there was a parallel space entrance in the building, and those who entered were transported to a backward world. Yu Zhongjian, as the commander, led his soldiers to overthrow the tyrant and seize the throne of the human king with advanced weapons and forward-thinking ideas.

We all encourage the views expressed in the Book of Changes. Since the zombie hasn't evolved a crystal core, his dream of becoming the human king is still far off. If his creative ideas aren't encouraged, life would be utterly meaningless.

Of course, aside from his gradually diminishing paranoia, his other skills are also worth encouraging, such as lock picking.

The stairwell leading to the lower level was locked. Zhou Yi fiddled with it for a few moments, and the door opened without making a sound. A pungent, putrid stench hit us, making us hesitate and almost turn back. Lai Yunfei and I quickly pulled out triangular scarves from our pockets to cover our mouths and noses.

In the early morning when the sun has just risen, a warm breeze is blowing, the rooftop is spacious, while the stairwell is dimly lit and the air is polluted; it's like two different worlds inside and outside the door.

I took two steps to the top of the stairs, held my breath, and peered down the stairs. I could barely see the steps on the next floor, but below that, everything was shrouded in darkness. I listened intently for a while, but there was no sound.

I shook my head: "That person is on the sixteenth floor, let's go down."

Han Bo put on his headlamp, pulled me behind him, and led the way downstairs. I wanted to follow, but Zhou Yi tugged at me again, and Li Tonggu also unceremoniously cut in front of me. Only Fatty Luo, Lai Yunfei, and Da Gan were too embarrassed to reach out and pull me, leaving me stuck in the middle of the line.

The further down I went, the stronger the stench became. The thin layer of cloth couldn't block the thick odor that kept hitting me. After smelling it for a while, I felt a bit dizzy. I saw that Zhou Yi in front of me was also using a triangular scarf, which he twisted into a strip and used to hold his nose and breathe through his mouth. I quickly followed suit, and it was indeed much more comfortable, although my throat was very dry.

On each of the five floors above the 30th floor, Han Bo walked out of the stairwell and into the corridor, carefully exploring each one. Before the apocalypse, it should have been an office building; some rooms had company signs hanging on their doors, indicating that no one had been up there for a long time. Thick dust had accumulated everywhere, and the place was empty inside and out.

Exploring each floor would take too much time, so we stopped opening the stairwell doors and headed straight for the sixteenth floor via the fire escape. The mutated zombies or paranormal phenomena we'd imagined didn't appear; the journey was smooth. The stairs were only covered in dust; there were no zombies, no living people, not even a footprint, indicating that no one had ever been there.

The helicopter was taking the survivor to the rooftop for rescue, but he said he couldn't go up? He probably didn't want to go up!

No one spoke, only the swift footsteps of footsteps as we descended the stairs. The smoother the path, the more vigilant I became. At each corner, I would raise my knife, feeling as if a pair of eyes were watching us from where the headlamp couldn't reach, watching us step by step walk into the trap.

The accident happened on the eighteenth floor. Han Bo, who was leading the way down the stairs, suddenly stumbled and plummeted like he'd stepped on a banana peel. Zhou Yi cried out in alarm and reached out to grab Han Bo's belt, but instead of pulling him back, he was pulled down by Han Bo's weight. The two tumbled and rolled down seven or eight steps before crashing into the wall and coming to a stop. Their headlamps went out, plunging the stairwell into darkness.

"Oh my, Little Bo!"

Li Tonggu's burly body stood firmly in front of me, and I couldn't save him in time. After Lai Yunfei turned on his flashlight and saw the two people who had bumped into each other, I angrily pushed him aside and ran downstairs.

"What's wrong, Xiao Bo? Did you slip?"

Zhou Yi lay on top of Han Bo, clutching his head and crying out in pain, while Han Bo lay motionless on the ground. I snatched the flashlight and shone it on his face, finding that his eyes were closed, as if he had been knocked unconscious.

"Xiao Bo, wake up!" Zhou Yi got up and together with me patted Han Bo's face, pinched his philtrum, pinched the tiger's mouth, pinched every place on his body that we could pinch, but he didn't react at all.

Just as his heart was in his throat, he suddenly heard two thuds behind him. Turning around, he saw that Li Tonggu and Fatty Luo had also fallen on the stairs. Meanwhile, Lai Yunfei was desperately pulling on Da Gan, who was falling down, and whispered, "Doctor Qi, come and help me."

Seeing that all three of them had their eyes closed, like Han Bo, they appeared to be unconscious.

Zhou Yi tensed up, releasing Han Bo and looking around the small corridor: "What's going on? Is a ghost coming out to harm people?"

There were neither zombies nor bandits attacking. In just one minute, out of the seven people, only three were still standing conscious. Could this building really be haunted? My heart was pounding, and I was panting heavily, but the more I inhaled, the more difficult it became to breathe. It felt like a hand was choking me, and my breath was stuck in my throat, unable to reach my lungs.

I calmed myself down, held up my flashlight, and observed the group again. I noticed something: "None of them had their noses plugged."

"What?" Lai Yunfei didn't understand what I meant. He looked down at Da Gan's face, which was completely unprotected. "What's wrong with blocking his nose?"

"It's poisonous! The air here is poisonous!" I said with certainty. "It stank as soon as we came in, and the stench gets worse the further we go. What else could it be but poison? Look, the three of us are all blocking our noses and breathing through our mouths, but they aren't. They're poisoned!"

Zhou Yi remained silent, while Lai Yunfei hesitated before saying, "Dr. Qi, if the air is poisonous, we'll get poisoned just the same if we breathe through our mouths..."

"Really?" I was stunned for a moment, my senses working together, and it seemed to make sense. "Then... then what could it be?"

Lai Yunfei thought for a moment and guessed, "Could it be due to interference from some radioactive material?"

I disagreed: "What radioactive material could take down four big men in such a short time? How come the three of us weren't affected?"

"Could it be radio wave hypnosis? A brain attack targeting the people who seem to be the strongest in combat?"

"I think you look a bit stronger in combat than Fatty Luo."

"...Could it be a blow needle? The kind of blow needle soaked in anesthetic in martial arts novels, used to knock us out when we're not looking?"

Lai Yunfei's ideas kept coming up, and I kept rejecting them while quickly thinking of countermeasures. We had just come in and hadn't even seen the enemy yet, and four of them were already down. Could Yu Zhongjian and the others have fallen into the same trap?

"Thump."

Zhou Yi, who hadn't spoken for a while, suddenly collapsed to the ground, falling headfirst onto Han Bo without even struggling, completely unconscious.

Lai Yunfei and I were speechless. What a sharp "ghost"! He took down five people in the blink of an eye. Who will be next?