11. War!
An explosion made Shi Dong unable to sleep. She felt inexplicably uneasy, so she set up a brazier in the living room, where a kettle on the iron rack was bubbling and brewing tea.
Fu Yunong couldn't sleep either, so she came out bundled up and sat with her around the fire.
The longer Shi Dong sat, the more uneasy she felt, as if there were other noises mixed in with the wind and snow.
"Did you hear anything?" she asked, frowning.
"Wh-what?" Fu Yunong subconsciously looked around and shrank her neck.
wrong!
Shi Dong suddenly stood up, grabbed his hooded jacket and put it on, hurriedly saying, "I'll go check on you, don't move." Before he finished speaking, he had already opened the door and rushed out.
Fu Yunong stood frozen in place, looking at the dark doorway and then at the small window, unconsciously hugging her knees.
Shi Dong braved the wind and snow to reach the rooftop. In the faint whiteness of the snow, the scene in the binoculars made her shudder—the ant-like figures below surged toward the firelight like a tide.
She was stunned, not even noticing when her hat had been blown off.
In the darkness, a bloated zombie suddenly looked up, a sinister smile appearing on its bluish-black face.
Shi Dong quickly returned, and the first thing she did upon entering the room was to have Fu Yunong extinguish the fire in the brazier, and then she scooped up a basin of fresh water and splashed it on her face.
Fu Yunong hurriedly did as instructed.
The cold water made Shi Dong shiver. She quickly moved closer to the fire, using the residual heat to dry her hair and clothes. Any slower, and her hair would freeze into ice crystals.
"What happened?" Fu Yunong's voice rang out in the darkness, sounding slightly flustered.
Shi Dong held the teacup and drank half of it before she could stop trembling. She said in a low voice, "There are zombies all over the place. We're surrounded."
Fu Yunong's lips trembled slightly, a chill creeping up her spine, but the next second, her eyes suddenly lit up, and she said urgently, "Let's go downstairs!"
Just in case, the two didn't even dare to turn on their flashlights and went downstairs in the dark. The closer they got to the lower floors, the clearer the footsteps and howls of the zombies became.
Fu Yunong kept an eye on the system, which showed that there were 120 Level 1 crystal cores within a radius of 100 meters, and...
She calmed her wildly beating heart, tugged at Shi Dong's sleeve, and whispered, "Let's quietly pack a little and leave."
Although Shi Dong didn't know what had happened, he still patted her hand to indicate that he understood.
Starting from the corner of the stairs on the first floor, Fu Yunong began rapidly clicking to exchange for crystal cores. Each operation yielded a reward, ranging from one or two cores to sometimes more than a dozen at once!
The system points are silently increasing.
Fu Yunong kept her word and stopped after only two minutes. She and Shi Dong were now retreating upstairs together.
But after taking only a few steps, they both stopped. The sound of zombie footsteps downstairs was getting closer and closer.
Amidst the howling wind and snow, the crunching sound of footsteps on the snow, mixed with the hoarse sounds from their throats, grew clearer and clearer to their ears.
"Bang!"
The next second, a piercing crash rang out. Countless zombies pounced on the building's main entrance like madmen, with more surging in after them. Worse still, at the back of the building, a group of zombies were climbing upwards like a human pyramid, some of their hands already touching the second-floor windowsill.
"What should I do!" Fu Yunong's voice trembled, her mind in turmoil. What she was experiencing now was far worse than even the most terrifying dream.
A flash of electricity crossed Shi Dong's eyes as he urged, "Go into the space!"
Fu Yunong almost subconsciously did as she was told, but she immediately refused, clenching her fist. "Since they've come to me like this, don't blame me for being impolite!"
Having said that, her fingers flew across the ground, and she began to reap the harvest without mercy. Seeing this, Shi Dong said nothing more, but simply gripped his dagger and stood beside her, his gaze sweeping across their surroundings.
Just as Fu Yunong was harvesting with great enthusiasm, the bloated zombie roared, and several monsters with twisted joints immediately sprang out from behind it. Their limbs were bent backward, and they quickly pounced on Building 20.
Once downstairs, they scattered, some attacking the main entrance, others going around to the back.
"Bang! Bang!"
Amidst the deafening crash of the zombies slamming against the door, Fu Yunong abruptly took a half-step back, then tapped the system with her fingertips—level one, no, level two!
The number of crystal nuclei on the panel remains unchanged!
Her heart sank. Could it be that her system level wasn't high enough to capture level two zombies?
Before she could even confirm, silver-blue lightning appeared in Shi Dong's palm. With a crackling sound, the lightning surged forth, striking several monsters in front of the door. The zombies froze in shock, but then rammed the door even more frantically. The door creaked under the immense force, and if it weren't for the heavy object supporting it, it would probably have been smashed through long ago.
Shi Dong's eyes sharpened, and the electric current surged even stronger. She pushed forward with both hands, sending two watermelon-sized balls of electricity hurtling towards them. This time, the zombies finally fell straight down in the snow, their bodies still twitching slightly.
Before she could even catch her breath, in the blink of an eye, a dark figure pounced down from the corner of the stairs!
Shi Dong instinctively dodged, unleashing a bolt of lightning with his left hand while simultaneously plunging his right dagger into the zombie's eye socket. But another zombie seized the opportunity to pounce on Fu Yunong below.
"Fu Yunong!"
After dealing with the monster in his hand, Shi Dong immediately leaped downwards, simultaneously unleashing lightning from his palm.
In the darkness, Fu Yunong felt a dark shadow looming over her, followed immediately by a blinding white light. The next second, the scene before her eyes changed abruptly, and she flashed into a spatial dimension.
The zombie missed its target, paused for a moment, and was then struck flat on its back by a thick bolt of lightning that had been chasing it.
"Shi Dong, crystal core!" Fu Yunong's figure appeared in a flash, reminding him urgently.
Shi Dong kicked out and plucked the pale green crystal core from the zombie's brain, then tossed it to her.
Fu Yunong immediately upgraded the system. Just then, several zombies that had climbed up the stairs roared and pounced. With a flick of her finger, the figures collapsed one after another.
The zombies outside kept pouring in; if this continued, the entire building would be doomed sooner or later.
Shi Dong made a quick decision, "Put on your hat and come out with me!" With that, she put her hat on her head and pulled up her sweater collar to cover half of her face.
Fu Yunong quickly did as instructed.
The next second, Shi Dong scooped her up in his arms and ran up the stairs. When they reached the elevator on the third floor, Shi Dong opened the window. "Put them away!"
Before she finished speaking, she leaped up with Fu Yunong in her arms, landing lightly on the thick snow.
The zombies immediately changed targets, roaring as they pounced, but they fell one after another as soon as they reached the two women. Soon, a wall of zombies half a person high had formed in front of them.
As Shi Dong stared at the surging, dark mass of corpses, her pupils flashed with undulating arcs of electricity, and crackling currents crawled across her hands. As the arcs in her eyes grew stronger, the howling night sky suddenly darkened, and even the wind and snow slowed down.
"boom……"
Dark, heavy clouds pressed down on the neighborhood, their edges swirling with silvery-blue bands of light. A muffled rumble of thunder rolled in from the horizon, and streaks of lightning appeared and disappeared within the clouds.
Under the terrifying pressure, the bloated zombie roared unwillingly, leaped into the horde of zombies, and disappeared in the blink of an eye.
"Fall!" Shi Dong roared.
In an instant, countless slits were torn open in the clouds, and the body of the thunder dragon stirred up the wind and snow, illuminating the night sky as if it were daytime. The next second, hundreds of lightning bolts struck down, silver, white, and purple lightning intertwined into a giant net, each bolt as thick as a lotus root arm, whistling as it cleaved the ground into scorched craters.
Lightning bolts, like whips and hammers, struck the densely packed zombie hordes, exploding within them and blasting swathes of zombies into charred fragments, even cracking the ground beneath their feet.
The thunder was deafening, drowning out the howling wind and snow, and the roars of the zombies.
Shi Dong's clothes were lifted by the electric current, and the frost on her hair melted in the electric light. Her eyes were as cold as frost, like a god who wielded the power of thunder.
The dark clouds only slowly dissipated after the last bolt of lightning struck the ground.
The horde of corpses had long since vanished, leaving only a charred mess, with a strong, acrid smell permeating the air.
"Time to collect the laundry."
Seeing that Fu Yunong was still in a daze, Shi Dong nudged her arm and said half-jokingly.
Fu Yunong nodded mechanically, still not fully recovered from the shock. Good heavens, she only had this much power at level two; wouldn't she be able to destroy the world at higher levels?!
Is this the lightning element?
Then, Shi Dong told her to get the motorcycle out; they needed to finish quickly. They had originally planned to keep a low profile, but now it seemed completely unnecessary.
The motorcycle roared, but the snow was too thick to pick up speed. The two circled the neighborhood, and Fu Yunong took the opportunity to store the scattered crystal cores into her spatial storage. Thankfully, Shi Dong had blasted the zombies to pieces; otherwise, it would have been far more difficult for her to pry them apart one by one.
At this moment, Fu Yunong felt no fear of the scattered limbs and broken bodies; all she felt was a desire for the crystal core.
We're rich! We're rich!
As the first rays of dawn appeared on the horizon, the two finally returned to their lodgings. After discarding their outer clothes and carefully washing away the bloodstains, they collapsed onto the bed to catch up on sleep.
She heard even breathing beside her and turned her head.
This was the first time she had ever seen Shi Dong sleeping. Usually, Shi Dong would go to bed later than her and wake up earlier.
Looking at Shi Dong's cool and aloof eyes, she couldn't help but smile slightly, then pulled the blanket tighter around herself and turned her head to fall into a deep sleep.
The wind gradually subsided, and snowflakes fell silently from the sky. In no time, the body parts were buried, leaving only a pristine white expanse as far as the eye could see.
Fu Yunong opened her eyes and found herself surrounded by darkness. She was momentarily disoriented and couldn't tell whether it was morning or evening. She struggled to sit up, her hat swaying precariously with the movement, and she quickly reached out to steady it.
Hearing the noise, Shi Dong leaned against the door frame with a cup in his hand, his voice slightly hoarse, "If you sleep any longer, it will get dark. Get up."
After saying that, she gently blew on the rim of the cup and took a small sip of the scalding hot tea.
Ice crystals formed on the windows, and even the freshwater ice inside the house grew thicker and thicker.
Fu Yunong brought her hands closer to the brazier to warm them, but she still felt enveloped in cold. She sniffed, thinking that the days were getting colder and colder.
As soon as her fingertips felt warm, she immediately opened the system to check her gains.
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