"Flower sand?" Fang Yong asked in surprise, "Have you looked carefully? This place is so big, she might have gone somewhere to play."
But the other three immediately understood the reason for Song Shuye's anxiety.
"She's gone?" Lin Bing's gaze shifted instantly. "Where's the barrier?"
"I can't open it," Song Shuye shook his head. "I tried, but there's a transparent wall blocking the exit. I can't get out."
"That's normal," Eve said. "She's the master of the barrier. If Huasha doesn't allow it, she can keep us trapped in the barrier forever."
"Anyway," Lin Bing stood up angrily, "without the flower sand, we can't open the barrier. Let's look for it again!"
The others also agreed and stood up, deciding to search again at the power station.
In order to speed up efficiency, they divided into two teams. Song Shuye, Lin Bing and Fang Yong went to the factory, while Eve and the other two stayed in the dormitory building.
"Whether we find the person or not, gather on the first floor of the dormitory building in half an hour." Song Shuye said.
Several people nodded and went their separate ways.
"Where are we going first?" Shoufeng asked Eve.
Eve didn't think twice: "Third floor."
The three of them climbed up to the third floor again. As soon as Eve entered the corridor, she immediately looked across, but the wall at the end of the corridor was still empty. Her gaze lingered on it for a moment until Shoufeng's voice came from behind: "There are signs that someone has lived here."
Eve turned around and saw Shoufeng standing in front of a half-open door, looking inside cautiously. She pulled half of her head back and said to Eve, "Come and take a look."
Eve walked to the door and gestured to Seven. Shadowtail jumped up from the ground and pushed open the half-closed door. The entire room appeared in front of the three of them.
It was still a double dormitory, but only the bedding on one bed had been moved. A corner of the quilt hung messily on the ground, and the pillow was wrinkled like ripples.
Shoufeng twitched his nose and said with certainty, "It smells like flower sand."
"She slept here last night," Eve walked to the bedside and casually ran her fingers over the sheets, smoothing out the wrinkles bit by bit, "but only last night."
Shoufeng looked at her in surprise.
"Except for this bed, there's no sign of anyone leaving any of the other furniture," Eve said. "And when I came here yesterday, the room was locked."
"She changed rooms temporarily? Why..." Shoufeng stopped talking halfway.
Eve chuckled.
"The little girl is quite alert. She even slept on the third floor... Doesn't she really want us to come up?"
Shoufeng: "So...were we discovered by her last night?"
Eve shrugged nonchalantly: "Who knows."
She glanced around the room one last time and said decisively, "Let's go."
"Where...where?"
"She's no longer on the third floor," Eve said. "Let's go downstairs and check."
The three of them went to the second floor again.
Shoufeng took a deep breath, disappointment in his eyes: "She's not here either."
But Eve said, "Wait, I want to see something."
Without waiting for Shoufeng to ask, she took a few steps forward and checked every room.
Shoufeng noticed that Eve's movements were very fast. She had just opened a room, scanned the room, and then quickly jumped to the next one. He couldn't help but feel a little confused: "What are you looking for?"
"Huasha's old room," Eve slammed the door of room 206. "Can you smell where she lives?"
Shoufeng closed his eyes, raised his head and remained silent for a few seconds, then opened his eyes: "...there."
She pointed to the 210 position.
"Thank you." Eve nodded at her and walked quickly to the innermost room on the right.
She tried pulling on the door, but the brass handle didn't budge.
Being enchanted, Eve wasn't surprised by this at all. With a flick of her finger, Qi docilely came over. His two shadow tails stood up like black snakes, curved into a powerful arc, and pounded hard against the door panel.
"Bang!"
Wood chips flew everywhere, splitting the door into two. Eve brushed away Qihu's arm in front of her eyes, tilted her head and smiled at Shoufeng: "Come on, let's go in and take a look."
Shoufeng was a little surprised: "How did you..." You opened the barrier so easily?
"This barrier is different from the other two," Eve said. "It just adds a restriction to the door handle. All you need to do is destroy the barrier itself."
Shoufeng noticed something was wrong: "Did Huasha change the barrier method?"
"It consumes too much energy," Eve said casually. "Her energy level is not high. Two barriers are already the limit. She may not have the energy left to cast more barriers."
After that, she walked into the room first.
Compared to the room on the third floor, this room was indeed more lively. There were scattered clothes on the floor, and a bucket of instant noodles with only soup left on the table. Eve went over curiously and sneezed several times at the pungent smell of chili peppers.
The next second, an arm suddenly came from the waist - Qi picked up Eve with a vigilant look on his face and stepped back several meters. A shadow tail suddenly whipped towards the instant noodles, and the paper bucket was torn into pieces in an instant. The remaining red soup inside exploded and spilled all over the ground.
Eve, who was doused in water, said: "..."
She took off a piece of instant noodles hanging on her head with an expressionless face and said to Qi: "Are you serious?"
Qi lowered his head, his wet eyes shining with innocence.
"Eve, come here quickly," Shoufeng said suddenly, "look at this."
She picked up a picture frame on the table and handed it to Eve.
The photo frame was undecorated and was one of those street stall items that cost five yuan a stack. But unlike other personal belongings that were randomly piled up in the sand, it was wiped very clean and there was not even a speck of dust on the plastic shell. In the photo frame, a woman was hugging a child and smiling at the camera.
The child was Huasha, with a rosy apple-like face and eyes that were not as hostile as they are now, but full of bright sunshine.
Eve looked at another thin woman. Huasha's face was 70% similar to hers. She put one hand on Huasha's shoulder and gave a gentle smile to the camera.
Eve raised an eyebrow: "Is this her mother? She's quite young."
Huasha is about seven or eight years old, and the woman in the photo looks no more than thirty years old.
But there was no man like Huasha's father appearing in the camera. Eve thought about it and realized that Huasha never seemed to have mentioned her father either - was she from a single-parent family?
On the other side, Shoufeng stared at the photo of mother and daughter for a long time without saying a word.
"Do you think Huasha's mother will come back?" she suddenly asked.
Eve: “?” Why do you ask this?
But Shoufeng didn't seem to need her answer, and continued, "She's so young. If she awakens her special abilities, she can survive the apocalypse alone."
Eve never cared about the affairs of others who had nothing to do with her, so she replied with a lack of interest, "Maybe."
She put the photo frame down, but Shoufeng's eyes were still on it.
She stared at Huasha's mother's face, and her light brown pupils seemed to be condensed into a mist.
"If Huasha's mother only lied to her about going out to find food, and actually wanted to abandon her..." she said slowly, "then Huasha will be trapped in the power station forever, with no chance of leaving?"
Eve replied as she searched, "Didn't she say her mother would be back?"
"That's all a lie!"
Shoufeng's voice suddenly rose. Eve paused in her rummaging and looked at her in surprise: "Shoufeng?"
"She's lying!" Shoufeng's face flushed with excitement. "Her mother is still so young. She would be welcomed by any organization she joins. But it's different with a child. She will only become a burden to her! It will hinder her survival!"
"Shoufeng," Eve stood up, her brow furrowed, "What are you talking about?"
"I'm not wrong!" But Shoufeng couldn't listen to her anymore. She seemed to be stuck in a vicious circle. "Why doesn't he believe it? She just despises us! She thinks we'll hold her back. We've all been deceived..."
"Guard the wind!"
Shoufeng paused, raised his head blankly, and met Eve's green eyes: "...what?"
Eve stared at her, her eyes seeming to penetrate through Shoufeng and into the depths of her soul.
He said word by word, "Who are you talking about?"
Eve's hand fell on Shoufeng's arm. She could feel Shoufeng trying to pull his hand away, but she held it tightly.
"You said before that you stole the gun from your father," she said slowly, "...Why did you do this?"
For a moment, Shoufeng's chest rose and fell, as if he wanted to pour out something, but his lips moved, and he only uttered a few words in a low voice: "It's none of your business."
Her face was pale, with an unnatural blue hue in the dim room. A few strands of bangs soaked with sweat stuck to the sides of her face, making her look like a down-and-out puppy drenched by heavy rain.
Eve blinked and suddenly let go of her.
"You're right," she said straightforwardly, facing Shoufeng's surprised gaze, "it really has nothing to do with me."
"Seven, let's go," Eve called to Seven who was standing quietly by the side, "There's nothing here."
But just as Eve was about to reach the door, she turned around and gave Shoufeng a faint smile.
"There's just one thing you need to be careful of. If you see Huasha next time, don't provoke her with those words you just said."
The little girl was already hostile towards them, and after hearing what Shoufeng said, she was probably going to explode on the spot.
"You have to understand one thing," she stared at Shoufeng meaningfully, "you are you, and Huasha is Huasha."
“Don’t conflate your experience with hers.”
***
Half an hour later, everyone gathered on the first floor of the dormitory.
Eve looked at the depressed faces of several people and realized that they had not gained anything.
Lin Bing scratched his hair in annoyance: "Where did the brat go?!"
Fang Yong simply couldn't understand: "Why did she hide? Wasn't she eager for us to leave yesterday?"
Eve suddenly thought of something.
"Have you told Huasha about zombies?" she turned and asked Song Shuye.
Song Shuye was stunned and replied, "I said it."
Eve's eyes flashed, and she continued to ask, "What was her reaction?"
Song Shuye thought about it for a while and said uncertainly: "She...she just said she knew, and then said she had something to do and asked me not to bother her."
"Wait," Lin Bing said suspiciously, feeling something was wrong. "What zombies?"
So Song Shuye briefly explained the experiences of Eve and the other two.
"That's it?" Fang Yong couldn't believe it. "She knows there might be a zombie in the barrier, so she's not afraid?"
Lin Bing didn't believe what Eve and the others said: "You didn't see anything, but you think there are zombies just because you heard a few noises?"
Eve frowned slightly.
In any case, Huasha's reaction was indeed a bit abnormal.
Too bland.
It was as if...she had known about this for a long time.
Wouldn't the normal reaction be to ask a few questions like Fang Yong or Lin Bing?
Something suddenly flashed through Eve's mind, connecting those seemingly unconnected fragments. She raised her head and her eyes suddenly lit up: "I see."
Song Shuye: "What? Did you find anything?"
"Remember the room on the third floor I mentioned?" Eve said, "I've always thought that the reason that room disappeared for no apparent reason was probably due to the barrier Huasha set up."
Lin Bing disagreed, "Stop spouting those nonsense! How does this relate to our mission? The most urgent thing is to find the flower sand!"
"How is it not related?" Eve asked back, "Everything has a cause. Don't you want to know why Huasha disappeared?"
Judging from Lin Bing's sour face, he was probably not interested.
Eve simply ignored him and said to the other three, "I think Huasha is hiding on purpose."
Fang Yong thought for a moment and hesitated, "Because Song Shuye told her there were zombies at the power station, she was scared and hid herself?"
"That's not right," Shoufeng, who had been silent since the gathering, finally spoke up. "What's the point of her hiding? If she's afraid of being attacked by zombies, she should stay with us to be safe."
Eve shook her head. "You're wrong. This has nothing to do with zombies—she's trying to hide from us."
When these words were spoken, everyone was stunned.
Eve seemed to have anticipated everyone's astonishment and continued slowly, "Didn't I just say that the room on the third floor might have been hidden by Huasha's barrier?"
She posed a question: "Don't you think it's strange? Why did she cover up that room?"
"Didn't you say there was a zombie in there?" Lin Bing said without hesitation, "She used a barrier to isolate the room, so the zombie wouldn't come out."
"That raises two questions," Eve said. "First, if she's already isolated the room and the zombies are trapped, why is she still hiding?"
"Secondly, don't you think this approach is rather out of reach? Since we're here, she could definitely ask us to get rid of the zombie."
"So I think," she said slowly, "that she has known about the existence of that zombie for a long time and is still protecting it."
"What did you say?!" everyone was shocked.
"First of all, one thing is certain," Eve said, "there are indeed zombies on the third floor. Shoufeng and I have confirmed it."
She recalled Huasha's nervous expression at the time and continued, "When Huasha ran into me on the third floor that day, she acted very strangely, constantly asking me what I had seen and even trying to kick me out of the room."
Moreover, from the very beginning, Huasha asked them not to go to the third floor. This might not be her mother's warning at all, but she was just afraid that they would discover the zombies on the third floor.
She turned to Song Shuye again: "When you mentioned this to her today, she didn't seem to want to talk to you about it, right?"
Song Shuye hesitated for a moment and nodded slowly.
Eve said, "A normal person would panic if they saw a zombie. Some might even want to pull it out immediately. So why is Huasha taking such an evasive approach?"
Rather than being afraid, she seemed to want to stop Song Shuye from continuing the topic.
Eve continued, "And if we determine there are zombies on the third floor, we'll ask her to open the barrier."
"So she's hiding now..." Song Shuye murmured, "Is she also hiding to avoid contact with us and to protect that zombie?"
"Or even more extreme," Eve said, "She doesn't want us to go out, and she's trapped us in the power station so we don't tell anyone about her and that zombie."
"This... this doesn't make sense?!" Fang Yong couldn't believe his ears. "Why would she do this? That's a zombie that eats human flesh!"
Eve spread her hands, indicating that she couldn't answer the question.
"Why are you so hung up on this?" Lin Bing interrupted them. "Isn't the point that we're all trapped here and can't get out? Don't forget we still have to find Bai Shuichuan!"
After he said this, everyone's faces became serious again.
"It was Huasha who cast the barrier," Song Shuye said, "so we must find her."
"Isn't this too difficult?" Fang Yong looked troubled. "She's deliberately hiding from us. She definitely won't let us catch her again."
“It’s not difficult at all.”
Eve's words stopped everyone's discussion.
"There's no need for us to go look for her." She narrowed her eyes into a beautiful arc, raised her head, and looked meaningfully towards the third floor.
"—just force her out."
***
According to Eve, since Huasha protects the zombie so much, they can use it as a threat to force Huasha to reappear.
"If we're going to kill that zombie," she said, "she's going to have to come out."
"Didn't you say the room where it was locked up is gone?" Lin Bing frowned. "Then how do we find it?"
"It's right there, just hidden by the barrier," Eve said. "It's easier than going to find Huasha, right?"
Lin Bing turned to Song Shuye: "What do you think?"
Song Shuye pondered for a moment.
"Let's go to the third floor first." After all, he had never seen the rooms on the third floor, so he wanted to confirm it himself. "Then we can talk."
Everyone thought about it and decided to go up to the third floor together.
Eve walked at the end of the team, her eyes seemingly looking around casually, but this time, Huasha's short figure did not appear again.
They soon reached the end of the corridor on the third floor. The wall was still empty. Eve tapped the yellowed wall with her knuckles and said, "There used to be an iron door here."
"But now there is nothing." Lin Bing said, his suspicious eyes wandering around the wall.
Fang Yong asked, "Can the barrier also hide the entire room?"
"It's simple," Eve shrugged. "You just have to create an illusion on it."
Song Shuye suddenly squatted down and pressed his fingers on the wall: "What is this?"
Everyone looked over and saw three deep scratches near the floor, about ten centimeters long. The old floral wallpaper was lifted up, revealing the gray cement wall underneath.
"It's still very new." Lin Bing knocked off some cement debris and commented.
Eve also leaned over and looked at the scratch carefully.
"They're zombie claw marks," she said, comparing the distance between the scratches with her hand. "Each one is about two centimeters apart. The marks are long, but not very deep. This is an adult female zombie, about 1.6 meters tall, and no higher than level two."
Fang Yong was surprised and said, "You can see this?!"
Eve smiled and said nothing.
When she was practicing, she would come into contact with hundreds of zombies a day, and she was already familiar with their habits and characteristics. It was no problem for her to infer the zombies' physical characteristics from their claw marks.
"So..." Lin Bing's expression changed slightly, "There really are zombies?"
And its traces were found near the third floor - perhaps what Eve said was not wrong.
"Okay," Song Shuye stood up. "Suppose here," he knocked on the wall, "there is indeed a room where zombies are imprisoned, but it has been enchanted. How do we break it?"
This time, everyone subconsciously turned their eyes to Eve.
Eve: “……?”
Lin Bing was very calm: "What can we do? We know nothing about the barrier."
Fang Yong: "1551, you are the best, little sister!"
Eve's expression was a little hard to describe.
She seldom teams up with others—or rather, few people dare to team up with her, so when she faced these enthusiastic teammates for the first time, she didn't know how to react.
She lowered her eyes, seemingly avoiding everyone's gaze, and said, "Attack."
Everyone: “?”
"Huasha has to maintain two barriers simultaneously, so her energy is divided," Eve explained. "The barrier won't be as strong as before. If we concentrate our attacks, we might be able to break it."
"Also, this barrier covers a small area and is relatively easy to break."
"You mean..." Lin Bing patted the wall, "Just hit the wall?"
Eve nodded.
Lin Bing muttered, "Why do I feel it's so unreliable?"
"We can only give it a try," Song Shuye encouraged, "It's better than doing nothing."
Fang Yong and Eve then hid aside, while the remaining four stepped forward, each drawing their weapons. Song Shuye took a deep breath and asked, "Are you all ready?"
Eve interrupted: "It's best if you don't disperse your attacks and concentrate on one point at the same time."
She took a piece of chalk and drew a big X on the wall: "Attack here."
"What a hassle," Song Shuye complained, condensing his ice spikes. "I'm ready."
Song Shuye looked at Qi and Shoufeng, and they nodded, then said: "Then I will count to one, two, three--"
"one."
"two."
"……three!"
As soon as he finished speaking, four colors of light burst out from the hands of the four people in the front row, and they all hit the fork in the center at the same time.
A magical scene occurred. The attack landed on the wall, but instead of being bounced back, it sank into the wall like a sponge absorbing water. Seeing this, Eve immediately said, "It's working! Keep attacking!"
Several people quickly prepared for the next attack. Various lights fell on the wall and were still sucked in. However, this time, the originally flat wall was slightly undulating like boiling water, and something was about to break out from the ground underneath.
But it still lacks a bit of energy.
Eve pondered for a moment and walked to Qi's side: "Seven."
As Qi turned around, a sweet fragrance lingered around his nose, and a drop of bright red blood fell from Eve's fingertips and dripped into his slightly open mouth.
Eve pressed a finger heavily on his lips and pinched him: "Don't be lazy, use all your strength."
That drop of blood left a rose-like mark on Qi's pale lips, softening his knife-like jaw for no reason, revealing a hint of the gorgeousness of a flower in full bloom.
Qi suddenly raised his head and looked deeply at Eve. Then, his shadow suddenly increased several times in size. His dark body even overwhelmed the light of the other three people and suddenly rushed towards the wall.
“Bang!”
After a loud explosion-like sound, a layer of ripple-like transparent substance rose from the wall, then instantly shattered, turning into a hazy mist and dissipating into the air.
"It's out...it's out!" Fang Yong's surprised voice rang out from behind the crowd, "It's the iron gate!"
Several people looked up hurriedly. Like a sunken object salvaged from the deep sea, a heavy iron door slowly emerged from the wall. The uneven surface still had a few dewdrop-like fragments of the barrier. Large pieces of deep red rust were splashed on the iron door, like some kind of mysterious symbol.
While the others were still in shock, Eve had already taken a few steps forward, put her hand on the door handle, and with a slight force, the door handle turned a little.
"Wait," Song Shuye said hurriedly, "Are we going in just like that?"
"roar--!"
Suddenly, a zombie roared from behind the iron gate!
"What?!" Everyone was shocked. Fang Yong stammered, "Really... there are really zombies?!"
Eve chuckled.
She gently hooked the door handle, tilted her head, narrowed her cat-like eyes into an upward arc, and said in a cheerful tone like a child about to open a treasure chest -
"Are you ready?"
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com