Chapter 21: Mountain Village Zombie Incident

Three days after the conference ended, all attendees held a grand banquet at the Capital Grand Hotel.

On the final day, almost all Awakened wanted to speak with her and seek her advice; she was so exhausted from maintaining a smile that her face went stiff.

But she did not need to force herself to make small talk; she simply said she was tired, and then no one approached to disturb her again.

Only at that moment did she feel how convenient it was to stand at the peak of power in a world where strength is supreme.

Finally returning to her dormitory, she had not even sat on the sofa for a moment before receiving a call from Director Zhou, telling her to come to the conference room immediately.

Upon her arrival, Director Zhou, Deputy Director Zheng, and Zeng Ceng Guosheng, the director of the Abnormal Creature Prevention Institute, were already on a remote call with the Strategic Analysis Department of the United Nations Awakened Alliance.

Seeing Yang Yi walk through the door, the people on the large screen were clearly delighted; the opposite side appeared to be in a conference room, with five people seated along a long table.

Director Zhou introduced the two people closest to her: "This is Walter Ward, Director of the UN Strategic Analysis Department, and Deputy Director Sally Marvin; they need your help."

"The matter is urgent, so we will not engage in excessive small talk; this is intelligence regarding the Misty Town in Brazil." Walter Ward played the video directly on the large screen; accompanied by his explanation, Yang Yi understood the course of events.

This incident was named "Misty Town" by the United Nations; the cause was that half a month ago, a strange white mist descended upon Masala Town on the outskirts of the city of Bahia in Brazil. Initially, no one paid attention to this white mist. Moreover, the white mist only appeared at night at first, but gradually, it did not disperse even during the day.

Strange things happened one after another: first, pets in the town disappeared, and then people began to vanish one after another.

At that time, the International Awakened Alliance had not yet been announced as established; the local police classified this incident as a series of murders and had been investigating, but with no results.

Until ten days after the white mist appeared, the fog covered the entire town day and night; the residents inside never came out again, and those outside could not contact those inside. Brazil then felt something was wrong and directly dispatched over one hundred fully armed soldiers to enter.

But after these one hundred-plus people entered the town, they lost contact with the outside world, as if they had vanished within it.

Subsequently, the Brazilian military and police jointly used drones, robots, and well-trained police dogs to enter the town, but any machine entering the mist range suddenly lost its signal, and the police dogs that entered never returned.

Brazil felt the matter was thorny and directly imposed a military blockade on the town; news regarding Misty Town was repeatedly deleted.

On someone's suggestion, Brazil dispatched a team of officially recruited Awakened to enter, including one B-rank Earth-Control Awakened and three C-rank Awakened. But they too never returned.

At this time, the International Awakened Alliance announced its establishment, and the invasion of abnormal creatures became known to the public; with no choice, Brazil directly reported the Misty Town incident to the United Nations.

After receiving the news, the United Nations immediately dispatched an Awakened mobile squad for investigation and rescue, but like everyone else, they entered Misty Town and never came out again.

Moreover, the range of the white mist in Misty Town was expanding larger and larger, and the speed faster and faster; initially it only covered the town area, but now it has begun to extend to the outskirts of the city of Bahia. Bahia is the fifth-largest city in Brazil; if it falls within the mist range, the consequences would be unimaginable.

Until today, the number of people who have disappeared in the white mist of Misty Town has reached over four thousand.

With no choice, the UN Strategic Analysis Department turned to Yang Yi.

Given Yang Yi's current status, no one would treat her as an ordinary Awakened and directly issue a dispatch order; instead, they would consult through the Xia Country Awakened Administration Bureau.

After briefly explaining the situation, Director Zhou and Deputy Director Zheng directly said, "We in Xia Country need to hold a meeting to discuss this," and cut off the remote communication.

Director Zhou and Deputy Director Zheng had very serious expressions; facing this UN mission, they had too many doubts.

This incident was not like the Fire Demon incident, where Yang Yi's powerful strength alone could handle it; the so-called "one force conquers ten strategies" applies when facing opponents whose strength can be measured; against such opponents, Yang Yi's power is terrifying.

But encountering such an eerie incident—even to this day, no one knows what exactly happened within the white mist—for safety's sake, it would be better to refuse. Even if she acts, they must first clarify exactly what happened and have certain assurance before conducting a rescue.

"My attitude is as such; of course, I still want to hear your thoughts," Deputy Director Zheng said.

"This incident belongs to the extremely rare category of global eerie events with unexplained causes; usually, such events cannot be solved by strength alone. You are our nation's precious talent, even one of a kind; your value will show even greater effects in the future and must not be compromised in such matters," Director Zhou advised with deep sincerity.

Zeng Ceng Guosheng, the director of the Abnormal Creature Prevention Institute, stood nearby frowning without speaking.

Yang Yi picked up her thermos cup and took a sip of osmanthus tea; the osmanthus was picked from her secret base. Since moving to the seaside, she had collected osmanthus every year to brew tea.

"Refusing directly? That doesn't seem right!" Yang Yi said. "Wouldn't that make us seem too unfeeling?"

"You don't need to worry about that; our country also has many abnormal creature invasion incidents; we are busy enough with our own affairs; what kind of situation is it to rush to save other countries?"

Director Zhou smiled and said, "Previously, because the abnormal creature invasions in our country were still within a controllable range, deploying you, a great Buddha, was a waste of talent, so each province's military and police jointly handled them through the Awakened Management Branches. But now it is a 'special period,' and they can investigate the cause first; this way, when you go to resolve it, you won't be completely clueless!"

"Yes, now if you go, you are completely diving headfirst into an unknown trap—who knows if this is some country or faction's conspiracy targeting you?!" Deputy Director Zheng considered all situations more comprehensively.

Yang Yi listened to the two directors' advice and fell into deep thought.

She recalled the white mist in the footage, which gave her a familiar feeling.

Her hands unconsciously gripped the thermos cup.

"What if the mist range in Misty Town continues to expand? What if our country encounters such a situation too?" Zeng Ceng Guosheng, who had not spoken until now, asked: "If some abnormal creature is breeding and expanding there, even lying in wait, then the earlier it is resolved, the better; if we let it grow, we will miss the opportunity. After all, our country has had such precedents."

As soon as he said this, Director Zhou and Deputy Director Zheng frowned simultaneously; they remembered the "Mountain Village Zombie" incident from half a year ago.

That was in a mountain village in South China; an elderly person living alone died in his own house. Because the old man's residence was already quite remote from the village, no one knew he had been dead for several days. Subsequently, strange things began to happen in the village: first, the livestock raised in the village disappeared one after another, and then the left-behind children in the village also disappeared one after another; the villagers were in a state of panic.

One month later, the entire village disappeared.

The young people working outside the village could not contact their families; they successively tried to contact other villagers, but no one could be reached. Someone called the police; the police entered the village and found the entire village filled with zombies.

These zombies fed on humans and animals, eating every living species in the entire village. They possessed immense strength and had developed a certain degree of intelligence; even though the two police officers who entered the village carried handguns, they were still killed by the monsters. Before dying, they made video calls to their colleagues, so their colleagues watched in shock as the two officers died under the claws and fangs of the zombies.

It was not until the fully armed army entered the mountain village that these zombies were completely killed.

This matter caused a huge uproar at the time; afterwards, the Abnormal Creature Prevention Institute discovered through research that these zombies were parasitized by a type of worm inside their bodies; these worms could parasitize the human brain and control human actions.

The mother body of the worms was inside that elderly person living alone; the other zombies were the offspring of the parasites on his body.

The mother body killed the prey and then parasitized its worm eggs onto the prey through biting and other methods. Then these worm eggs hatched inside the prey, controlling the prey's brain again, thereby reproducing infinitely.

This cycle repeated endlessly, forming a cruel life cycle.

Just as the lancet fluke parasitizes within snails, the lancet fluke's eggs hatch inside the snail's body and continuously grow using the snail's body nutrients. After the lancet fluke grows up, it controls the snail's actions, turning it into a zombie snail. The lancet fluke intentionally exposes the snail to foraging birds, causing the snail to be eaten by the birds. Then it reproduces inside the bird's internal organs, laying worm eggs; the eggs are excreted with the bird's feces, and the feces are eaten by the snails again, restarting the parasitism.

This type of worm, which had never appeared on Earth before, was named "Zombie Parasite" by the Abnormal Creature Prevention Institute, and it was unanimously considered an otherworldly species.

Afterwards, everyone who had entered the mountain village underwent strict physical examinations; the mountain village at that time was incinerated at high temperatures and remains a forbidden zone to this day.

The entire village's 112 people, mostly elderly and left-behind children, plus two police officers, all perished in this incident.

If they had discovered and prevented it earlier, the consequences would not have been so severe.

Extinguishing the spark before the incident occurs prevents a serious fire; this is a principle everyone understands.

What is feared is that this Misty Town incident is already a fire starting from a single spark and spreading across the prairie; by the time it causes a global disaster, it will be too late to resolve it.

Director Zhou and Deputy Director Zheng both fell silent; indeed, Brazil's incident this time bore some resemblance to the early stages of the "Mountain Village Zombie" incident.

"I will still go," Yang Yi finally said; her tone was gentle, but her expression was very determined.

Director Zhou and Deputy Director Zheng looked at each other and fell into deep thought.

After thinking for a while, Director Zhou made up his mind: "Although we are completely clueless about this incident, we must also prepare in advance to minimize the occurrence of certain accidents. Qingjiang, go contact the Intelligence Department to see if they made any small moves before the Misty Town incident occurred. Additionally, let us organize a study and observation group, bringing several top experts from the Strategic Analysis Group and the Abnormal Creature Prevention Institute along; on one hand, this prevents certain factions from making small moves, and on the other hand, it ensures logistical support for Comrade Yang Yi."