Many people along the way asked Yan Shi for help. In their eyes, anyone who dared to ride a tricycle alone on the street at this time must be a strong person.
Yan Shi didn't have a good impression of humans. Who knew if they would steal her car, or even worse, try to kill her for money? Besides, she could only save them temporarily, not forever. Even if she gave them a ride out of the safe zone, there was no guarantee they would survive to reach the next safe zone.
But conscience is a burden, and Yan Shi couldn't decide whether to save them or ignore them. As the sun began to set, Yan Shi hardened his heart, closed his eyes, and shouted, "Ten minutes. If you're not afraid of death, come down and follow me. I'll just clear the way. Don't expect me to take care of you."
After saying that, he took off his gloves and swallowed all the zombies that surrounded him. This scene scared away some of them, and the remaining brave ones huddled together and followed Yan Shi's car. By the time they left the neighborhood, there were already more than a dozen people behind the car.
Yan Shi stopped the car to contemplate life. Where to go next? District 9 and District 7 were about the same distance apart, so Bu Qing and the others suggested District 7. They said the leader of District 9 was a madman, and his subordinates were all madmen too, none of them easy to mess with. District 7, in comparison, was much more normal, with a lot of sorcerers gathered there, and they were relatively tolerant of people with abnormal forms.
Let's stick with District 7. I always feel like I'd be devoured alive if I went to District 9.
I took out my phone to plan my route, and out of the corner of my eye I saw that the group of people behind me had also sat down to rest. Most of them had left in a hurry and hadn't brought much with them.
Yan Shi shook his head. At this point, if he didn't take care of himself, who would come to his rescue? How ridiculous.
With so many people around, Yan Shi didn't dare take anything out to eat. She just sipped some water and calculated how long the food in the car would last her.
The roar of car engines came from afar, and everyone looked over. At a glance, they could see that many zombies were clinging to the cars. Judging from how the cars were being driven like they were doing a folk dance, it was clear that the zombies couldn't shake them off.
The car window seemed to be broken, and the zombies were reaching out and grabbing at it haphazardly. Unfortunately, it was the driver's side window, making it impossible for the driver to concentrate on driving.
The vehicle came crashing towards them, and Yan Shi quickly dodged, keeping his eyes fixed on it, afraid that his little tricycle would be turned into scrap metal.
Thankfully, it didn't run over the tricycle; it's still intact.
But I just caught a glimpse of a few familiar faces, like the little boy's teammates. That little boy must be on the bus too. I feel like the bus won't last much longer, so I'll follow it and see if I can lend a hand.
Yan Shi immediately hopped on his tricycle and chased after them, not noticing that the group of people behind him had all run away when the car came rushing towards them.
The pedicab couldn't keep up with the car. Fortunately, the driver was also affected and didn't dare to drive too fast, so she didn't fall too far behind. If her eyesight were better, she could have counted how many zombies were hanging on the car.
As they chased after it, they discovered something rolling out of the car, followed by zombies jumping off the vehicle.
Is there anything more attractive to zombies than human flesh and blood? Even human flesh couldn't possibly attract so many zombies to jump off the vehicle.
Yan Shi inexplicably recalled the fragrance he had smelled on the little boy before. He had heard the little boy say that the zombies were quite sensitive to his scent, sometimes chasing after him and sometimes ignoring him.
Did they throw the little boy out?
Upon seeing the shadows of the zombies, Yan Shi got out of the car and followed them. He spotted a figure in a tree surrounded by zombies. After quickly clearing away the zombies, Yan Shi called out to the person in the tree.
"Come down, the zombies are all gone."
The figure moved slightly, but didn't look up or make a sound.
Seeing that he had no intention of coming down from the tree, Yan Shi quickly climbed up the tree and first noticed the mottled bloodstains on his clothes. Judging from the size of the bloodstains, it should not be a fatal wound.
"Were you bitten?" she asked, counting the number of wounds.
"Yes, but I won't turn into a zombie."
"It really is you." Yan Shi's tone was light and cheerful. Seeing him made her feel inexplicably better, even though he was covered in injuries and looked pitiful.
"Did you come looking for me because you saw it was me?"
"Yes, I don't save just anyone. I was regretting leaving without saying goodbye, but I didn't expect to see you again so soon."
"I didn't expect that."
"By the way, could you tell me your name again?"
"I forgot."
"Sorry, I was too excited and forgot."
"No, it's alright. Zhuang Zhao, Zhuang in Zhuangzi, Zhao in Zhaoxue."
"Which 'Zhao' is 'Zhaoxue'?"
“The edge of the sun.” Zhuang Zhao gestured in the air with his finger, leaving Yan Shi completely bewildered. In fact, whether written on the hand or gestured with the finger, it was quite difficult to recognize.
"Get out of the car. I have medicine in my car. You don't have any serious injuries, do you? I can't handle serious injuries."
Zhuang Zhao shook his head, climbed down the tree, and followed behind Yan Shi, behaving as obediently as a dog that had done something wrong.
"Caw caw." It was a crow, perched on Yan Shi's tricycle. Seeing Yan Shi return, it flapped its wings and cawed twice.
"There's food over there, go eat." Yan Shi patted the crow's head and pointed in the direction she had just come from. The crow cawed twice and flew over, as if it could understand Yan Shi's words.
Zhuang Zhao was stunned.
"Can you communicate?"
"Of course not. I'm just used to talking to these little animals. It probably didn't understand me; it just flew over because it smelled the scent."
"But it lets you touch its head." For a moment, Yan Shi was trying to figure out whether this statement was out of surprise or envy.
"Maybe it's just the same crow I used to encounter. Back in Huaicheng, a crow discovered that it could get meat by following me, so it always stuck to me. It's not that crows are social animals with a strong sense of sociality, and that if one crow makes an enemy of a human, the human will suffer collective retaliation. It's also possible that my good reputation has spread among the crows."
While talking, she cleaned and disinfected Zhuang Zhao's wound. She had only honed this skill after the apocalypse, and she never thought she would be bandaging someone else's wound one day.
"That sounds amazing."
"I prefer small animals. Speaking of which, I seem to smell something sweet. I can always smell different scents on you, and they all smell quite nice." Yan Shi sniffed, feeling that the zombie smell on him had faded.
“They say I always have a strange smell because I’ve never been able to smell anything since I was little, and I don’t know what smells are.”
"Wow, that's amazing! You have a natural fragrance, that's incredible. So you can't smell zombies either?"
"I can't smell anything, whether it's pleasant or unpleasant. I can only smell a tiny bit occasionally. Maybe it's because I've never been able to smell anything before. When I do smell something, it smells good no matter what it is."
"If it were before the apocalypse, you could only be described as pitiful. Now, it's hard to say whether you're pitiful or lucky. In the early days after the apocalypse, I was vomiting every day. I was so worried that I was going to get esophageal cancer."
"And this hand of mine swallowed a zombie, so I smelled like a zombie all over, and I can't wash it off. It's awful." Yan Shi complained to him naturally. If it were someone else, she definitely wouldn't have said these things, but since he said he couldn't smell it, she could say it without caring.
Because he will never smell that scent that makes her feel inferior and ashamed.
Little did she know that Zhuang Zhao could smell her scent. Whether it was the stench of zombies, the smell of laundry detergent on her clothes, the lingering smell of cooking oil after she had just finished eating, or her hidden natural fragrance, he loved it all.
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