Book 1 Chapter 3:Hunting Zombies
"Are we to keep hiding here?" Ye Zhu swept hergaze across the pristine room, due to the immaculate surroundings; there weren"tany insects like c.o.c.kroaches or mosquitoes to be found, it was perfectly safe inthis room.
If it were any other normal place, once theapocalypse struck, there would immediately be numerous bared fangs and flashingclaws from the numerous mutated rats, c.o.c.kroaches, mosquitoes, and other monstrosities….
Ye Chen shook his head; he glanced out the windowto see the sky covered in dark clouds, thunder rumbled in the distance and thewinds outside were howling like mad, it was as though the heavens were weepingfor the tragic fate that awaited humanity.
"Tomorrow, at the break of dawn, I"ll be zombiehunting!" Ye Chen"s eyes were gleaming, hiding away while slowly diminishingtheir food supply was simply a delayed death sentence. The virus culminating inthe bodies of the infected would only continue to multiply and evolve, by thetime their food supply was diminished and were forced to confront the alreadystrengthened zombies, it would be no different that throwing their lives away!
"What?" the absurd idea of Ye Chen heading outto hunt zombies left Ye Zhu utterly gob-smacked, "You can"t, it"s simply toodangerous!"
Ye Chen patted her head, with a smile he said:"Relax, I"ll be alright. Right, it"s getting late, so let"s get some rest!"Having said so, he headed to one of the large beds, grabbed a comforter anddumped it on top of the sofa. "I"ll be sleeping in the living room, if anythinghappens, I"ll be the first to know, you should sleep in the bedroom."
Ye Zhu stared at her brother in amazement, shequietly muttered: "Such a disaster occurred, yet you"re able to sleep sosoundly?"
Ye Chen chuckled while whispering: "This isonly just the beginning…."
The next day, at the break of dawn when thefirst rays of sunshine shone through the windows and landed on Ye Chen"s face,he slowly opened his eyes. Glancing at the bedroom door, he felt a surge of warmththroughout his heart, he had once experienced an everyday life of hiding atcertain locations, waiting for the break of dawn before heading out to huntmonsters. Day after day, repeating this way of life like a soulless machine, numbedhim to his very core.
But today, he was no longer fighting byhimself….
With a bright smile, he got up and brushed histeeth, got dressed in some thick clothes, armed with a watermelon knife as wellas a bottle of gasoline strapped in the pocket of his camo pants, it was hiscontingency for dealing with a large pack of zombies. Other than the gasoline,he brought along a box of matches, it was only sensible to bring matches if heplanned to ignite gasoline.
By the time he was done preparing, Ye Zhu hadalso awakened, wearing her white night gown, she lazily strolled out of thebedroom before stretching herself. This girl had clearly no sense of alertnessthat was required during an apocalypse, looking at the well-dressed Ye Chen,she exclaimed: "Big brother is so handsome!"
Ye Chen almost choked on his own saliva, he grudginglyeyed her saying: "Breakfast is in the kitchen, I"m off, and don"t you gowandering about."
Ye Zhu giggled and nodded.
Ye Chen could only smile bitterly. Peeringthrough the peephole; he observed that the coast was clear throughout thecorridor with no sight of zombies whatsoever, he confidently opened the doorand walked out.
"Brother!" Ye Zhu gently called from behind.
Startled, Ye Chen turned around to glance ather in puzzlement.
Ye Zhu was standing next to the sofa with afist raised, saying: "Be careful!"
Ye Chen felt a sense of warmth; he smilinglyclosed the door behind him.
She waited for Ye Chen to leave, before headingto the kitchen for breakfast, after she was done eating; she did not relax, butinstead started doing pushups in the middle of the living room!
"Big brother, Xiao Zhu will not be a hindranceto you!" Ye Zhu"s forehead started perspiring, after ten or so pushups, he fairand delicate arms began trembling from fatigue.
Still, she gritted her teeth and continued.
Upon leaving the room, the door locked behindhim with a "click", cutting off Ye Chen from his safe haven. With his smilewithdrawn and his demeanor grave, he gripped the watermelon knife close to hischest, that way, he could instantly slash at any zombie that he came upon. Thismethod of gripping the knife, was ingrained into him through his ten years ofliving in the apocalyptic world, any other amateur would just grip it close tothe side of their pants, delaying their reaction time towards zombies, oftenproving fatal….
While traversing the silent corridor, Ye Chentreaded carefully on the deep red carpet, making as little noise as possible,he didn"t go very far, only arriving at the left room opposite to his.
The door was ajar; a slight breeze blew gentlyfrom behind it.
Ye Chen held his breath, with his back againstthe wall, he used his foot to carefully prop open the door. Like the unfoldingof a prologue, the door slowly opened, the scene of the entire room graduallycame into view. Before Ye Chen could take everything in, he discovered a youthin dapper clothes wearing a white checkered hat standing right behind the door.
As the door swung completely open, the youthslowly raised his head, his face was deathly pale along with multiple pustules,the corners of his mouth had lines of blood slithering downwards….
Zombie!
Ye Chen was jolted, however he did not retreat,instead, he swiftly waved the watermelon knife towards the zombified youth, ifhe retreated now, it would only lead to attracting even more zombies.
The zombified youth"s milky green eyesinstantly flared with ruthless savagery as it let out roar, moving like a wildanimal, it pounced towards Ye Chen aggressively, with razor sharp nails, itencircled its arms around him, intending to flank him oh both sides.
Ye Chen was already quite familiar with such anattack pattern, any other person would have lost their cool in a panic, withonly a knife and one shot to split the zombie"s head open, if the strike wasnot lethal, what awaited was death by the zombie"s claws.
Ye Chen calmly executed a straight kick towardsthe zombie"s lower region; the sudden force of the kick caused the zombie"sbody to bend, instantly stopping its movement mid-pounce, almost at the sametime, he jabbed the watermelon knife from below into the zombie"s chin.
Squelch!
Blood came squirting out of the zombie"s mouth;it was probably the forced clenching of its maw that caused it to snap off itsown tongue.
Ye Chen could only sigh inwardly; a watermelonknife was not as useful as a proper blade, the tip of it had a flat edge,otherwise he could have easily pierced into the zombie"s brain. However, nowwas not the time for idle thoughts, immediately after his failed attempt at aone-shot, he kicked out once again to put some distance between them.
Ye Chen did not stop there, he once againshifted his grip on the knife, with its blade facing outwards, he aggressivelydashed towards the zombie, immediately after he neared, the zombie once againpounced.
Ye Chen"s gaze was frigid, with a straightkick, he struck the zombie in its left flank, the sensation was like hitting a speedingmotorbike, when it came to a contest of strength, the zombie was three timesstronger!
The kick was precise and swift; retracting hisleg in an instant, cutting off any chance for the zombie to grab his leg,though the recoil caused Ye Chen to tilt backwards slightly, the kicksuccessfully killed the zombie"s momentum, bringing it to a halt.
An opening!
Ye Chen"s eyes were gleaming, on retracting hisleg; he borrowed the momentum and spun his body in a circle, using thewatermelon knife in a reverse grip with its edge facing outwards, he swung avicious arc towards the zombie"s neck.
Sphhhlt!
The knife bit into the zombie"s neck, howeverit wasn"t sharp enough to go all the way, stopping in the middle of its throat.Ye Chen did not attempt to twist the blade, doing so would only damage it, hepulled it out with his left hand and crouched to deliver a low sweeping kickattempting to topple the zombie, the sensation felt like kicking two steelbars, his foot was throbbing in pain, however there was no room for secondthoughts. As the zombie lost its balance, it stumbled forward.
It was now of never!
Ye Chen seemed to have awakened his body"s fullpotential, with the watermelon knife in a reverse grip, his body in a crouchingstance and the zombie toppling towards him, he aimed the knife towards thezombie. With all the strength he could muster, he cut into the wound on thezombie"s neck, taking its head clean off.
Thud!
The head fell like a ball to the ground,blackish blood oozing from the gaping wound where it was severed, emitting arancid odour.
As for the zombie without a head, it continuesto struggle, flailing its limbs around madly, Ye Chen had antic.i.p.ated this anddid not relax the instant he decapitated the zombie, instead, he kicked hisfoot forward sending the headless zombie tumbling backwards, after a fewmoments of wild flailing, it finally slumped powerlessly to the ground.
This entire exchange may have been slow todescribe, however from start to finish, this encounter only lasted 30 seconds!Ye Chen no longer paid any attention to the dead zombie; instead he swept theroom with his gaze, the room was clearly in quite a mess, with bloodstainseverywhere. It was fortunate that there wasn"t a second zombie, if it were twoagainst one; he would have been forced to pay a heavy price.
It should be noted, that a zombie was quite thepowerhouse, having strength equivalent to three adult men combined, as well aspossessing three lethal weapons, its infectious maw and two sets of razor sharpclaws, the difficulty of confronting such a foe was immense, the average personwould require a considerable number of favourable conditions in order toovercome them, more often than not, only death awaited.
Phew! Ye Chen heaved a sigh, turned and closedthe door, looking at the zombie corpse, he calmly got to dissecting its torso,revealing its innards, they were still in pristine condition with no signs ofdecay whatsoever, only they were black, even the numerous bones throughout thebody had been turned pitch black, as though they had been coated in a layer ofblack paint, so dark that it glistened.
Ye Chen covered his hand with a plastic bag andbegan rummaging through the innards of the zombie, other than the various pitchblack organs, he didn"t discover any "mutagenic flesh", he couldn"t help butfeel a tinge of disappointment.
"Crunch-crack!"
Suddenly, from the corners of the room came alow chewing sound.
Ye Chen was startled, he reflexively grippedthe watermelon knife before turning to a.s.sume a standing position, it lookslike the noise came from somewhere behind the bed in the bedroom.
Ye Chen furrowed his brows, he slowly creptcloser. Circling around the bed, in the corner, he saw a little girl dressed ina white one-piece dress squatting in the corner facing the wall, she seemed tobe fiddling with something with her hands whilst her body trembled incessantly,her frail build made anyone who saw her feel a sense of pity.
"Little girl." Ye Chen called out.
The girl seemed to be terrified of strangers;she continued to hide in the corner facing the wall, hands fiddling with acertain something that was obscured by her dress, curious, Ye Chen approached closer.
"Little girl." Ye Chen called out once againand patted her on the shoulder.
The girl slowly turned around, she had a headof beautiful black hair, under her disheveled black hair, were a pair of milkygreen eyes, the corners of her lips were stained in blood, and in her hands,was a half-eaten human hand….
"Rrrargh!"
Thelittle girl ferociously tried to take a bite out of Ye Chen, alarmed, his handholding the knife by his chest seemed to lash out on its own, it sunk into thelittle girl"s left shoulder, yet that was as far as it went, Ye Chen wasinwardly frustrated, this was after all just a watermelon knife meant formelons, not a butcher"s knife for slaughtering people….
Ye Chen did not rely completely on thewatermelon knife, even with the knife lodged in the girl"s shoulder, it did notdampen her ferocity one whit as she came pouncing over, it was as though shewas incapable of feeling pain. Without another word, Ye Chen heavily kicked thegirl in the chest; the sound of her ribs shattering could be heard, slammingher right into the wall.
With a foot firmly pining her down, heruthlessly hacked at her skull, ka-shluk! The girl"s head was cracked open,blood slithered from the center of her forehead like worms, in her finalmoments; she glared at Ye Chen with eyes full of bloodl.u.s.t, greed and rancor!
Translator"s Notes:
Ye Zhu calls herself Xiao Zhu here, this seemsto be a nickname of hers as I have seen her brother call her similarly lateron, Xiao meaning little.
EinCisco: If you couldn"t tell, I have beenimprovising on the zombie roars and other various sound effects as I felttranslating them as "Roar!", or "Kaka!" and Puchi! (sound of puncturing flesh)seemed a tad bland, let me know what you think!