Chapter 32 The Breeder
In movies and TV shows, when people are frightened, they usually scream and shout, showing extreme terror.
But Bai Chenzhu is different. He has never been very brave since he was a child, but he always appears calm when he is frightened.
...Actually, I was just so frightened that I couldn't react at all to what to do.
Bai Chenzhu stared at that face expressionlessly for a moment, then bent down, took two steps back, and slammed the door shut. He belatedly clutched his chest, gasping for breath, his hands and feet turning cold.
What did he just do? He almost got face-to-face with a zombie!
After the initial shock subsided, Bai Chenzhu gradually realized something was amiss.
He thought for a minute, then cautiously pushed open the door. Just as he remembered, the zombie was bound upside down from the ceiling by a mixture of chains, strips of cloth, ropes, and other contraptions.
Because each floor of this villa is about five meters high, even if the zombie is hoisted up, it is still about two meters above the ground.
So it's his height that's to blame, otherwise he wouldn't have gotten so close to the zombie. Bai Chenzhu gestured to confirm that the zombie was about half a meter away from him. Although it was quite close, it looked stable enough not to fall.
The sound of the observation elevator running came from behind. Bai Chenzhu quickly closed the door, looked left and right, and hid in the closet.
However, the zombie turned its head and stared at his location, making a hoarse sound.
No, it's too obvious. Bai Chenzhu's heart jumped into his throat. He saw a leather sofa in the corner; the cushions could be lifted up to reveal storage underneath. Knowing that what's under the nose is often the darkest place, he didn't hesitate to lie down inside. That way, even if the zombies howled at the ground, no one would immediately suspect anything.
The door opened, and two sets of footsteps entered, circling the room once.
The room was large, so Bai Chenzhu held his breath and listened as the footsteps walked away, circled around, and came back. The time in between was so long that he once thought of running away, but considering his leg injury, he suppressed the urge to escape for the sake of safety.
Someone plopped down on the sofa.
Bai Chenzhu covered her mouth.
After a long while, an unfamiliar voice said, "There's no one here."
Bai Chenzhu couldn't help but release his spiritual power to check the situation outside, but he felt an unprecedented resistance, as if the air had been swallowed up in an instant, making it difficult for a person who lives on oxygen to move.
The zombie sensed the mental energy, and its howls grew louder, as if it were trying to express something with great excitement, but its mind could only utter meaningless roars.
“Dad, are you hungry? Don’t worry, the villa is big. He has a leg injury, we’re not afraid he’ll run away.” Tang Jie’s voice rang out, still so weak, making it hard to believe he posed any threat. “But what can we do? Brother Jiang and the others are starting to suspect me.”
The man who resembled A Liang said, "If all else fails, lock them all up."
“It won’t work.” Tang Jie was getting impatient as he got up from the sofa. Bai Chenzhu heard footsteps pacing back and forth beside him. “I don’t want to make enemies with them. Besides, did you see that day? Brother Jiang could fight zombies with his bare hands, and that girl’s voice is also a kind of superpower.”
“Have you forgotten that we have that? As long as we give them the drink, they will become as weak as Uncle Duan, and then we can tie them up…” Ah Liang paused, “Besides that pretty boy, I think Uncle is also very interested in that girl. It’s not impossible to use the girl to feed Uncle.”
Tang Jie was still hesitant.
“You need to think this through. We’re not trying to kill them.” Ah Liang sighed. “If there hadn’t been a traitor, if Uncle Duan hadn’t escaped, we wouldn’t be in this situation. If anyone’s to blame, it’s Uncle Duan. If a few people suffer a little, we can save all of us. Tang Jie, think this through.”
The room was silent.
Just as Bai Chenzhu was anxiously wondering why the two hadn't left yet, and his body was half numb from lying down, Tang Jie suddenly said, "A Liang, bring the bowl over."
"Dad, lend me some more blood."
The two left.
Bai Chenzhu didn't get up immediately. After a while, the door opened again, and the sound of two people's footsteps reappeared at the door.
A little while later, the door closed.
Bai Chenzhu closed his eyes and carefully surveyed his surroundings, confirming that there were no fluctuations in spiritual energy and that no one was nearby.
This time he must be really gone. He struggled to push aside the sofa cushions and get up.
The zombies roared louder as they saw food waving in front of them. Bai Chenzhu stopped moving, dusted himself off, and noticed that the empty bowl on the carpet in the middle of the room was gone.
He squatted where the empty bowl had been, picking up a shard and fiddling with the lingering, foul-smelling blood on the carpet. The zombies overhead were screaming in a hoarse, eerie tone. Bai Chenzhu felt a chill run down his spine at first, but after Jiang Ye held his neck and made him listen to it for a while, he became less afraid.
Jiang Ye. Bai Chenzhu lowered his eyes and casually tossed aside the broken tile. Tang Jie had just said that he had 'doubts'.
Oh, so this is what 'good friends who have gone through danger together' means. Bai Chenzhu stroked his chin, chuckled, and decided to figure out how to get out first.
He limped to his feet, pulled the dagger from his waist, and gripped it in his hand. As his superpower gradually came under control, his body was much better than before; at least his strength had recovered to about 70-80%, and he could run and jump again.
The zombie swung in the air like a ridiculous sandbag.
He had to eliminate this seemingly evolved creature to avoid future trouble. Bai Chenzhu took a deep breath, gestured the location, his eyes hardening, and aimed for the zombie's forehead.
The dagger pierced Bai Chenzhu's forehead. His eyes were closed, and he was splattered with foul-smelling blood. Unexpectedly, the dagger got stuck there, and the zombie continued to howl and struggle.
Threatened with death, even though the zombie felt no pain, it began to struggle frantically. With its movements, dust fell from the ceiling, which began to crack.
Bai Chenzhu's pupils contracted sharply. He looked at the two shattered walls in the room and suddenly understood how they had collapsed.
The center of the ceiling is recessed by a few centimeters.
The zombie shook violently with all its might, and Bai Chenzhu couldn't grab it to deliver a fatal blow.
When the building was about to collapse, he chose to turn and run.
The building was huge. He ran in the opposite direction, and along the way, cracks spread across the ceiling above his head, making it sway precariously and causing countless pieces of debris to fall. The floor-to-ceiling windows shattered with a crash, and a small waterfall cascaded down outside. If you stood close, you could feel the strong wind brought by the water flow.
If the zombies break free, he'll be the first one they want to eat.
The shaking of the ceiling grew more and more violent, and it was clear that someone was climbing the carved spiral staircase and rushing to investigate. Bai Chenzhu quickly moved in the opposite direction from the zombies, and the movement caused the wound on her leg to reopen and bleed.
I thought I had managed to avoid it, but I didn't expect to run into someone coming up from the other end of the stairwell.
Unexpectedly, there were people patrolling the stairs, and Bai Chenzhu turned and ran.
"Catch him! He's over there!" The voices rose and fell behind them.
Bai Chenzhu quickly grabbed onto the water pipe outside the building, and immediately slid down due to gravity until he stepped on a section of nail.
"Are you looking to die?!" the person at the window shouted. "Come up here, we won't kill you!"
Tang Jie and A Liang weren't there, so he had nothing to say to these people. Bai Chenzhu was too lazy to waste words, but when he looked down, he was mesmerized.
Although it's the fifth floor, due to its unique ceiling height, it's not much different from the tenth floor.
"We're all good people, brothers. Let's talk this out over here." These men were surprisingly friendly, trying to reason with him gently. "You don't want to end up as a meat pie, do you? Come on up!"
Bai Chenzhu regretted it a little, but he was already on the water pipe, so he silently slid down another section, equivalent to the distance of one floor.
As he moved away from the zombie-infested room, he felt his mental energy no longer suppressed, and he drifted away until he found someone nearby.
When the familiar scent crept onto his shoulder, Jiang Ye immediately sensed the prompting and quickly headed towards the garden villa.
Ignoring the shouts from the people above, Bai Chenzhu struggled to step onto a bend in the pipe and carefully moved down little by little. His hands and feet ached and went numb until he was about five or six meters above the ground.
Bai Chenzhu didn't want to die. He stretched out his hand to reach the nearest window, but the distance was beyond his limit. His fingertips barely touched the edge of the window railing.
Tang Jie's men arrived faster than Jiang Ye's, and they reached out to pull him away. Bai Chenzhu objected again, clinging to the water pipe and trying to get away.
The people above were making noises like monkeys, but Bai Chenzhu's attention was elsewhere. He took off one shoe, threw it down with one hand, and it landed near Jiang Ye from a great distance.
Upon hearing the noise, Jiang Ye instinctively looked up, his pupils suddenly contracting, his face filled with surprise, as if to say: How did you get up there, kid?
Jiang Ye finally arrived. At the same time, Bai Chenzhu estimated the height, let go, and fell like a swallow, landing perfectly between Jiang Ye's outstretched arms and catching him steadily in his embrace.
"Are you alright?" Jiang Ye asked anxiously, looking down at Bai Chenzhu.
Bai Chenzhu breathed a sigh of relief. After making sure she was on her feet, she smiled at him. Her phoenix eyes were full of affection, unrestrained and charming, and sparkling with stars.
Jiang Ye was stunned for a moment when he saw Bai Chenzhu smiling so brightly.
The next second, Bai Chenzhu punched him hard in the face.
The punch was delivered without restraint, forcing Jiang Ye to release his grip, take two steps back, turn his head to the side, and be completely dumbfounded.
"Xiao Bai!" Zhou Zhuohua and Bai Tao, who had followed, stared in disbelief, "What's wrong with you two?"
"You little brat, you've really been too kind to me these past few days. Did you think I had a good temper?" Bai Chenzhu gritted his teeth, and the angrier he got, the harder he laughed.
Jiang Ye asked in astonishment, "What are you talking about?"
"Still pretending? Tell me, besides wanting me to investigate the villa, what else did you use me to fish out? I want to see what kind of information is worth all this planning." Bai Chenzhu was furious, pushed away Jiang Ye's help, and hopped on one foot to put on her shoes.
Jiang Ye looked at him blankly, as if he didn't realize what he had done to make him so angry.
Bai Chenzhu sneered, not buying his act.
Even if he didn't say it, Bai Chenzhu could guess that it was nothing more than two things.
Firstly, they wanted to know what was inside the villa. After all, Bai Chenzhu's mental power was far more useful than Bai Tao's. Bai Tao's weakness was that he couldn't actively release his mental power, while Bai Chenzhu's fatal flaw was that he couldn't completely suppress his mental power. As long as they threw him into the villa, even if he didn't actively investigate, whether it was a human or a ghost, it would come looking for him. Moreover, even if he was bitten, a superhuman wouldn't be repeatedly infected.
Secondly, he wanted to find out the whereabouts of the second fragment. If Tang Jie wanted to stall him, he would have to use enough topics to divert Jiang Ye's attention and buy time. Tang Jie was not the kind of person who could keep things to himself, and one night would be enough for Jiang Ye to get to the bottom of things.
Bai Tao was a master at getting to the heart of someone. Her eyes darted around, and she guessed most of it. She pouted and pretended to complain, "Where did you go? How come you just disappeared? Tang Jie said you went for a walk to clear your head. Who goes for a walk and doesn't come back for dinner?"
"Half a day?" Bai Chenzhu knew she was deliberately bringing up the topic, and he was both annoyed and amused. "I was tied up all night, and I even cut my hand!"
He showed the three of them the cuts on his arm. "Tang Jie and the others are raising zombies, feeding them with the blood of superhumans. They even want to harm you! You didn't eat anything they gave you, did you?"
White Peach let out a burp.
Bai Chenzhu: ...
"She scared you." Zhou Zhuohua slapped Bai Tao on the back. "Don't be silly. We ate our own food. We only borrowed their water purifier."
Jiang Ye covered the swollen wound on his left cheek, his expression grave. "Stop talking. The food is fine. Let's go."
"Are you satisfied with the news I brought back?" Bai Chenzhu asked sarcastically.
Jiang Ye had already heard quite a commotion. "There are indeed zombies here, and they're not low-level. Let's go!"
Screams erupted from upstairs, and the next second, the top floor collapsed, scattering lime bricks all over the ground. The people quickly ran away.
In the distance, a humanoid figure could be seen sliding swiftly down the water pipe, landing on its back like a frog, and running towards the group.
The four who escaped all saw the zombie's ugly appearance clearly. It had a horrifying bloody hole on its forehead, bulging eyes and a crooked mouth. It was a bald zombie in its forties or fifties, wearing a tattered suit.
It was fast enough to catch up with Bai Chenzhu.
Just as it lunged forward like a frog, Jiang Ye suddenly appeared in front of Bai Chenzhu and smashed a baseball bat into the zombie's face, sending it flying two or three meters before it collapsed to the ground.
At the same time, the baseball bat that had been with Jiang Ye for a long time broke in two, and Jiang Ye's hands trembled as he stared intently at the zombie.
The zombie immediately got up.
"Dad!" Tang Jie caught up with him, looking anxious.
A-Liang, who was beside him, took advantage of the moment when the zombie's eyes were full of Bai Chenzhu, and quickly used a rusty iron chain to tightly bind the zombie, his face showing both fear and ruthlessness.
He used an iron chain to tie the zombie's neck and mouth, then pulled it back to bind it to his wrist, forcing it to be unable to lower its head and bite people.
"Don't kill it!" The others rushed over and surrounded the four of them.
Tang Jie examined the zombie from a meter away, his gaze falling on the bloody hole in its forehead, before he immediately turned and glared at Bai Chenzhu.
Bai Chenzhu pressed down on Jiang Ye's shoulder, stepped out from behind him, and said with a stern look, "You're raising a tiger that will eventually harm you."
"You don't understand, you don't understand anything!" Tang Jie exclaimed excitedly. "It protects us. If it weren't for it, the neighborhood would be overrun with zombies by now!"
"Why don't you think about why this is happening?" Jiang Ye scoffed. "It's because it has evolved and has its own 'domain.' You feed it with blood, and sooner or later it will evolve to a point where you can't control it. At that time, the zombie horde will also be caused by it."
"There's no point in saying more." Ah Liang handed the zombie to the others, stopped Tang Jie who was about to say something, and pointed the tip of his knife at Bai Chenzhu. "Leave him here."
"What if I say no?" Jiang Ye narrowed his eyes.
The crowd quickly gathered around, tools in hand, ready to fight at the slightest provocation. The four were surrounded, clearly outnumbered.
Bai Chenzhu looked around and belatedly realized that because they had arrived early, they had actually witnessed everything in the original storyline.
Did the original Tang Jie also raise the zombies that became his father in the same way? But in the end, he was the only one left, and he went blind.
If they had arrived any later, Tang Jie would have befriended them and given them control of the fragments and the villa area. But now, they are enemies because of their raising of zombies.
Everything has changed; he shouldn't rely on any more ridiculous plot twists. Bai Chenzhu, being fought over like an object, frowned as he watched the standoff unfold.
The next second, Tang Jie took two steps back, meaning he was handing over the decision to A Liang.
Ah Liang was at the front of the group. Unlike Tang Jie, who wanted both, he decisively said, "Go!"
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