Chapter 32

After Zhang Su and the two were prepared and had taken protective measures, they each carried an empty large backpack and went up to the ninth floor.

Knock, knock, knock.

Zhang Su knocked on the door of 901 with a hand axe, then pressed his ear against it. After listening carefully for a while, he shook his head: "No movement. I never heard footsteps upstairs when I was at home either. It seems no one really lives there."

They continued upstairs. There was no information in the owners' group about the owner of the tenth floor in Unit 1, Building 3. Moreover, from the condition of the floor and the two entrance doors, it was clear there were no signs of habitation.

Continuing upward, just as Zhang Su pulled open the safety door on the eleventh floor, his hand gripping the axe handle tightened slightly.

Zheng Xin and Zhong Xiaoshan both swallowed hard.

The door to 1101 was tightly shut, but there was a pool of dark, congealed blood at the entrance. It was clear it had flowed out from the gap at the bottom of the door. The doormat, which read "Safe Coming and Going," was soaked in blood, giving off a strange color. A faint smell of blood drifted through the corridor, making one feel uneasy.

Zhang Su turned his head and made a shushing gesture to the two, ignoring the situation at 1101 and pointing toward 1102 instead.

According to the information gathered from the owners' group, there should be no one in 1101; 1102 was the one occupied. But now, 1101 clearly had a situation.

When Zhang Su carefully rounded the corner and saw 1102, his heart suddenly jumped!

At this moment, the entrance door to 1102 was wide open. A small electric scooter was parked in the entryway, and two pairs of shoes were placed on the ground. Everything looked very normal.

But this normality made Zhang Su feel a touch of unease!

Creak.

The sound of fingers gripping tightly rang out.

Zheng Xin and Zhong Xiaoshan, following behind Zhang Su, gripped their weapons tightly in unison.

"Same requirement as before: no matter what situation we encounter, no one is allowed to make a sound. Whoever screams, I'll knock them out directly!"

Zhang Su didn't take his eyes off 1102 as he turned his head to instruct the two women.

Both of them gave a soft "mm," gripping their weapons even tighter.

One step, two steps, the three walked toward 1102. Not a single sound could be heard in the quiet corridor; it was quiet enough to make one panic.

Finally, Zhang Su's foot stepped onto the doormat inside the door. He sniffed; there was a strange smell.

Past the entryway was the living room. Zhang Su moved slowly forward, his perspective shifting bit by bit. The first thing he saw was a pair of feet wearing socks; the shoes were nowhere to be seen.

His heart couldn't help but skip a beat. He made a "wait" gesture to those behind him, then used the axe to knock on the shoe cabinet.

Knock, knock.

The dull sound echoed in the room, striking their eardrums.

Still no movement, but this actually made the three of them feel a bit more at ease. If a zombie were lurking, it would definitely react to the sound!

The three walked inside, and when the entire living room came into view, they were stunned on the spot.

In the center of the living room lay a mangled corpse. The upper body of the corpse had been bitten beyond recognition, the skin and flesh of the abdominal cavity were peeled back, the internal organs were exposed, and the viscera were a mess of bloody mush. From the relatively intact head and blood-stained silver hair, one could tell it was an old woman.

The most bizarre thing was that there were no signs of a struggle in the entire living room, as if the old woman had been willingly bitten by the zombie while she was alive.

Zhong Xiaoshan was doing relatively well seeing the scene in the living room, only turning her head away in sorrow. Zheng Xin's reaction was somewhat intense; the urge to vomit surged in her heart, but fortunately, she suppressed it.

"Where did the zombie go?"

Zheng Xin swallowed the saliva constantly secreting in her mouth and asked cautiously, her eyes searching back and forth between the doors in the room. Logically, a zombie would be attracted out by the sound. She didn't dare rule out unexpected situations, worried that a big one might suddenly jump out from some corner!

Zhong Xiaoshan didn't speak, her hands gripping the large wrench tightly. The cold wrench had been warmed by her hands, and she was ready to attack at any moment.

Zhang Su could be certain the zombie wasn't in the room. Observing carefully, he quickly locked onto the wide-open bay window in the living room: "The zombie must have flipped out from there..."

"What?"

Hearing this shocking conclusion, Zheng Xin and Zhong Xiaoshan were very surprised.

"Remember the loudspeaker from yesterday? I guess that's when it happened. It seems zombies really have no intelligence, only the most primitive desires—chasing prey, regardless of everything!"

Zhang Su walked to the bay window and looked. The viscous blood stained on the window frame confirmed his guess. He leaned out and looked down; a twisted corpse lay by the flower bed at the bottom of the building. If nothing else, that should be the zombie that flipped out the window.

"Close the door and go check the other rooms."

Withdrawing his gaze, Zhang Su instructed the two women.

It was a three-bedroom, two-living-room apartment. Only one bedroom door was closed. They finished checking quickly; other than the corpse in the living room, there were no other dead bodies.

Swish!

Zhang Su pulled the curtains shut, then took a quilt from the bedroom to cover the corpse in the living room, then turned and said: "Hurry up and pack things. Xinyu, you go to the kitchen and the secondary bedroom. Zhong Xiaoshan, you go to the master bedroom and the small bedroom. Food, water, handy tools—take anything you think is useful."

"Okay."

"Got it!"

In less than ten minutes, the three gathered back in the living room.

"Brother Su, it seems only an old man and an old woman lived here. There's... there's not much stuff."

Zheng Xin patted her backpack helplessly. She had previously thought that a home with elderly people would have plenty of things in the kitchen, but when she went, she found that wasn't the case.

The clean kitchen was very tidy. An opened bag of millet had about two pounds left, half a bag of flour had four or five pounds, and there was a bag of dried noodles that hadn't been opened. The refrigerator contained oil, eggs, and a few jars of pickles. The most convenient thing was probably that bag of black sesame paste...

"Judging from the situation in the bedrooms, except for the master bedroom used by the old couple, the other two bedrooms hadn't been lived in for a long time."

Zhong Xiaoshan spread her hands. She only found a few daily tools like a screwdriver and scissors, as well as a few boxes of medication for chronic illnesses.

Zhang Su turned off the two elderly phones found in the living room and stuffed them into his bag. He shook the bankbook in his hand and said to the two: "The two old people's belongings are all here..."

Zheng Xin and Zhong Xiaoshan curiously took the bankbook. It was densely printed with rows of deposit records. The last entry was from the beginning of this month. They had deposited five thousand yuan every month without fail, and the balance had reached over three hundred thousand!

"This is the money the two old people saved for their grandson to get married..."

Zhang Su signaled for the two to flip the bankbook over. On the back, it was clearly written: "Grandpa and Grandma wish Haotian a happy marriage."

"The two old people must have wanted to give it to him as a wedding gift when their grandson got engaged. Poor... the hearts of elders."

Zhong Xiaoshan's eyes turned red, and she couldn't help but glance at the raised quilt on the floor.

"The old people lived frugally their whole lives, and just like that, everything is gone. What a shitty world..." Zheng Xin also pouted, looking pitifully at Zhang Su: "Brother Su, I miss my mom and dad, grandpa and grandma, grandma and grandpa."

"Your elders are quite complete, at least..." Zhang Su shook his head and comforted her: "Better think about how to survive yourself first!"

Thanks to reader Bai Ling Gongzi for the 100 tip!

(End of chapter)