Chapter 4 - Survival

Wu Ye's savior had been suffering from a high fever and did not wake up. The vaccine, however, seemed to work, as his wounds stopped bleeding black pus. Bloodstains covered his frame due to the many wounds all over his body. Wu Ye was worried his wounds would fester due to the hot weather. If he truly died, Wu Ye would likely puke blood out of anguish.

"I have to take care of his wounds first."

Wu Ye surveyed the house and found out there were six rooms in the two-storey farmhouse with several chambers on each wing. A kitchen, granary, and a pantry were located at the right wing while a pigsty and chicken coops were in the left wing. The pigsty and chicken coops were in a wreck with broken bones scattered on the ground. Whether they were human bones or animals bones, he did not know, and nor did he plan to find out.

The kitchen was in shambles and dried blood covered its floors and walls. Wu Ye covered his nose and looked around the kitchen several times. Most of the pots and bowls in the kitchen were still usable, although the oil, salt, rice, and vegetables were already gone. Upstairs, there were three bedrooms with some doors closed and some pushed open. One room had bones scattered on the floor while the other two had been looted clean, leaving only a bare wooden bed, an empty wardrobe, and a television smashed into pieces.

Wu Ye brushed away the cobwebs sticking from the bed board, raised his hoe, and smashed the rotten wood two or three times. He pulled down the moldy curtains from the window and used them to wrap the wood pieces and carry them downstairs to the kitchen. Wu Ye found a large iron basin and took it to the yard to fetch water from the water pump. After pumping hard for what felt like half a day, rusty yellow water came out of the outlet. He needed to pump for a long time before the water turned clear.

(E/N: I suspect a lot of people would react to this pumping scene but if you've used a manual water pump, you'll know that there's no other way to describe this scene. LOL)

He fetched several pots of water, then scrubbed the other pots and the stove with old curtains. Afterwards, he filled a cleaned pot with water, took out a box of matches he had found in the cabinet, and, after scratching the matchsticks for what felt like half a day, he was finally able to light one. He quickly threw in some dried leaves under the stove and a fire was ready to boil the water.

Thanks to his fun-seeking nature, he had often traveled and had learned some camping skills. Otherwise, there was nothing he could've done with this old stove.

The rotten wood fueled the fire well, and it didn't take long for the water in the pot to come to a boil. Once the water was done boiling, the first thing Wu Ye did was to take off Qin Wuhua's black shirt and combat trousers, both littered with holes – he noted at least seven or eight of them. He fished inside Qin Wuhua's trouser pockets and found only a small bag of salt and a lighter.

"What a poor man." Wu Ye sighed before he took the clothes to wash them by the well. When it was somewhat clean, he took the knife he had found and used it to dip the clothes in boiling water to sterilize them. Afterwards, Wu Ye put the clothes aside, then washed the pot to boil more water. While the pot sat on fire, he cut the shirt into long strips of cloth with the sterilized knife to use as makeshift bandage. He also cut the combat trousers and used half of it, hanging the other half on a wire outside.

Wu Ye waited until the boiling water had cooled down before he ladled a bowl and carried it to the room where he had placed his savior in. Wu Ye sighed as he accepted his fate and twisted a sterilized cloth strip before wiping the stain off the man's body.

"Motherf*cker, he looks handsome… only a little worse than me." What Wu Ye said was not a lie. If one ignored the envy on his tone, Wu Ye really had a lovely face with his peach blossom eyes, straight nose, and full, sexy lips. He practically embodied the five delicate and exquisite Asian features with white skin tone inherited from his mother. The only flaw he thought he had was that his face still carried baby fat. He wished to be praised as "cool" or "handsome". But despite having the five features, with his baby fat, his face could only be described as "beautiful" or "cute".

At first, Wu Ye wasn't able to appreciate his facial features as Qin Wuhua's face was covered with blood. But after cleaning up this man, he had to admit that he was indeed very handsome. His deep-set eyes, straight nose, thin lips, and triangular jaw exuded an indescribable air of dignity. With wheat-colored skin and slightly furrowed brows, which Wu Ye longed to have, this man was simply superior in looks.

If Qin Wuhua's face made Wu Ye uneasy, his figure simply drove Wu Ye mad with his hard rock chest, standard eight-pack abs, that sexy mermaid line. He couldn't find even a trace of fat on his waist. His eyes swept over Qin Wuhua's entire body from his wide shoulders, narrow waist, and long legs, but he skipped over the crotch area to save his male dignity.

Shit, this younger brother looked so fascinating, with him around how could Wu Ye himself ever be the eldest brother in the future. But regretting it now would be useless, having already given the man the vaccine. Aside from waiting for Qin Wuhua to wake up and become his younger brother and bodyguard, what else was there to do? He wouldn't believe stories from X-Dian anymore and wait for this man to wake up, even if he felt suffocated and exhausted.

Wu Ye felt downcast but he still dutifully disinfected Qin Wuhua's body with antiseptic alcohol and used cloth strips to wrap several gravely injured areas. When he was finished, Wu Ye felt hungry again.

However, there was no food in the house and he dared not go out alone to look for food. Wu Ye took out the nutrient tube packet and stared at it. He could still remember its stench lingering between his lips and teeth. Oh, forget it! He should drink water first.

In the evening, Qin Wuhua ran a high fever without showing any sign of waking up. Wu Ye hurriedly asked the system about his condition but the thing pretended to be dead and gave no response. This left Wu Ye with no choice but to continue keeping his watch.

It was the height of summer and the heat was intense. The sun scorched the earth and a warm breeze blew. The corpse of the woman he had killed was baked in the afternoon sun. It gave off a disgusting stench that was constantly blown in through the cracks of the door, making Wu Ye feel like throwing up.

Wu Ye scratched his head, stood up, and said to the rotting body, "Forget it! I've helped you end your pain. I will help you once again and give you a proper burial."

He took the hoe he had used before and dug a small pit beside a dead tree in the middle of the yard. He pushed the half-a-corpse into the hole with the tool. But since he had smashed the woman's head, pieces of broken skull and brain matter were scattered all over the ground. Wu Ye took a broom and swept them all into the pit. While he was sweeping, the broom seemed to have brushed over a small round stone that then rolled half a meter away. When he checked, the "small stone" seemed to refract a warm red light under the setting sun, just like a crystal. It was gorgeous. [1]

Wu Ye picked up the stone and held it in the palm of his hand. The stone was only the size of a thumbnail, crystal clear and sparkling with charming brilliance. It was even more dazzling that the best crystal stones Wu Ye had ever seen.

"What is this?"

[Energy nuclei found from people with Level 1 D-virus malignant infection.]

"Damn, this thing doesn't really grow in the Zombie's heads, does it?"

[Yes.]

Wu Ye held the crystal nucleus, neither pocketing nor throwing it away. When he thought how it came from a zombie's head, he felt sick and just wanted to throw it away. However, this thing had the necessary energy to open the portal that could lead him back home, which was more important than any other concern he had. So Wu Ye took the nucleus crystal by the water pump, pushed some water out, and cleaned it with vigor. The washed crystal looked so much more sparkling than before that no one could've guessed such a dazzling rock could come out of a particularly disgusting and terrifying zombie's head.

Wu Ye sighed, put the crystal nucleus into his pocket, and continued to bury the rest of the corpse under the tree.

Once he was done, Wu Ye went back to the room and sat down beside Qin Wuhua. He thought of his family and pondered about his current predicament, not realizing that the sky had already turned dark.

Ultraviolet rays had a certain inhibiting effect on the D virus. Zombies were much more active at nighttime, when their speed was doubled, and their senses of smell and hearing were twice as sensitive.

When the apocalypse began, countless bases were ruined by tides of corpses at nighttime. Learning from this, the remaining bases would organize large numbers of experts to patrol and defend at night. However, there were still several instances when they were unable to defend their bases despite taking precautions.

Wu Ye did not know of this fact. He only felt that once nighttime came, a chilling silence had settled outside before he heard the zombies' voices ringing louder and closer. He sensed that the zombies were more active at night than during the day, and he feared that the zombies would smell the two of them and launch another attack.

In the afternoon, he found out that the iron gate outside the house wouldn't be able to stand another round of assault. Therefore, Wu Ye decisively used the lighter and crept upstairs into the room full of corpses. He wrapped the corpses in bloodstained sheets from the beds, took them downstairs, and sprayed them with expelling agents. Then, he hung the corpses on the windows as curtains and stuffed some of their meat in the cracks of doors to keep his and Qin Wuhua's scent hidden from the zombies' keen sense of smell.

The air in the room became extremely foul and putrid, making Wu Ye dizzy. However, the effect of the stench was obviously effective as the roaring sounds outside slowly faded away. Wu Ye exhaled a sigh of relief and laid down beside Qin Wuhua. As he stayed longer in the room he became more accustomed to the smell and thought that it wasn't as unbearable as before. He had experienced too many things since he had come here. He was so tired, scared, and hungry, that when exhaustion pulled him to sleep, he did not dream at all.

The temperature fell towards the middle of the night and it was cold to lie on the floor. Qin Wuhua woke up in a daze. He was confused as he felt something pressed hard on his body which made him unable to breathe. He wanted to push it away but discovered that he did not have any ounce of strength left in his body.

He took a deep breath and exerted more strength as he tried to move to get rid of the weight on his body. The result was tragic as his body was only pressed tighter. There was something slippery rubbing on his neck as warm breath sprayed on it, making the area ticklish. While Qin Wuhua's brain was burning into a paste trying to figure out what had happened, Wu Ye's terrified face flashed across his mind. His guard was honed by years of experience, but as the night turned into day, he unexpectedly relaxed and fell back to sleep while listening to the light breathing by his ears.

When he woke up the next day, Wu Ye discovered that he had slept on Qin Wuhua's body. He had taken him as a human cushion all night while he wrapped his hands and feet around the man like an octopus. As an "honest" man, it did not bother him. He was simply embarrassed that his bad habit of snuggling while sleeping still exist.

The guy was in a coma and knew nothing anyway. Even if he somehow woke up in the middle of the night, he was just sleeping on him and did nothing. Besides, he wasn't a woman. He wouldn't cry and demand him to take responsibility, would he? Er shao non-begrudgingly threw this bad memory into the deep recesses of his mind, never to see the light again.

In the next few days, Qin Wuhua's fever gradually subsided but he still did not wake up. Learning from the classic scenes in "Walking Dead", Wu Ye walked around the house a few more times while wearing the sheets sprayed with repellent. He dared not walk away too far but he still met two or three zombies along the way.

He also discovered that the repellent agent was not as powerful as he had imagined as some zombies were able to see through his camouflage. In fact, Wu Ye managed to escape twice and killed a frail old zombie, earning him a point. Then, he endured the nausea as he dig into the zombie's brain to get the crystal nucleus, but found none. He realized that not all zombies had a nucleus.

Wu Ye met another unfortunate situation. After several attempts at risking his life to explore around the house, he did not find anything to eat. Therefore, he was left with no choice but to eat the nutrient agent and wash it down with mineral water. The nutrient agent was indeed disgusting but it fed both him and Qin Wuhua, being at least a day's worth of food in a meal. He also felt that his physical health had improved after eating it for days. Compared to before, he obviously felt stronger as he had even managed to kill that old zombie.