Lin Ying

Lin Ying stood by the window, looking up at the sky, only to find a dim, gray expanse overhead, with no trace of sunlight or hope in sight.

In the hot air, a strong stench of decay lingered, occasionally mixed with a sour odor in the gusts of hot wind. The combination of these two smells made Lin Ying's stomach churn.

He took out a cigarette, holding it under his mask to smell it. The faint scent of tobacco calmed his churning stomach a little.

After a moment, Lin Ying put away the cigarette, pulled down his mask, and let out a long sigh: "Sigh, this d*mn apocalypse, when is it going to end? I really miss the old days!"

Lin Ying was originally a senior student majoring in automotive engineering at Xichuan University, with just a few months left until graduation. With good grades, he had signed a contract with an automobile manufacturing company in his junior year, and since the start of his senior year, he had been interning there. Once he graduated, he would transition directly to the design department to learn about design, with a bright future ahead of him.

He had often fantasized about getting promoted and receiving a raise, becoming a general manager, serving as CEO, marrying a beautiful and wealthy woman, and reaching the pinnacle of life.

However, everything shattered just ten days ago when darkness suddenly descended upon the world.

Ten days ago, the entire world was plunged into darkness, and when the brief darkness passed, some people suddenly mutated into monsters known only for their slaughter — zombies.

These zombies had completely lost their self-awareness and were never tired; they wandered around, attacking and tearing apart any living person they encountered. Normal people who were caught or bitten would become infected and turn into zombies within half an hour.

In an instant, the world was filled with blood and slaughter, resembling a hell on earth.

Only a small number of people survived this sudden disaster, forced to scurry like rats, hiding in various corners of the city to survive.

During the outbreak, Lin Ying was fortunate enough not to become a zombie or get infected by others. In the chaos, he escaped from the assembly workshop filled with zombies and took refuge in a temporary warehouse. Miraculously, he survived after evading the initial chaos of the disaster.

Although Lin Ying survived, life was extremely difficult. The warehouse was filled with car parts and tools, with no food or water, making his survival a pressing issue.

To avoid starving, Lin Ying had no choice but to muster his courage and venture out of the warehouse in search of food.

However, finding food in a factory swarming with zombies was incredibly challenging.

At the time of the disaster, there were over three thousand employees working in the factory, so the number of mutated zombies was also very high. Moreover, when the disaster struck, everyone fled in all directions, leading to zombies everywhere in the factory area, creating a scene of a sea of corpses.

Although these zombies had lost their sight and moved stiffly and slowly, their strength was astonishing, and their other senses, like hearing, smell, and touch, were greatly enhanced. Just a moment of carelessness could lead to being discovered by them.

If a zombie spotted you, there were only two possible outcomes: life or death.

Death was simple — if a zombie grabbed or bit you, you were doomed.

Life, however, was exceptionally difficult; the only hope of survival lay in killing the zombies.

If you encountered a zombie and chose to run away instead of fighting, they would inevitably appear before you at an unexpected moment, giving you a nasty surprise.

These zombies seemed to have a specific tracking system, following your trail relentlessly.

Thus, the only way to deal with zombies was to kill them.

Despite being just a senior student, Lin Ying had grown up in a village where everyone practiced martial arts, and he had developed a certain level of combat ability when facing these monsters.

Additionally, having watched shows like "The Walking Dead" and the "Resident Evil" series, he quickly adapted to the idea of zombies and the apocalypse. After experiencing the initial fear and panic, Lin Ying decisively picked up his weapon and killed the zombies he encountered.

Hiding in the warehouse, Lin Ying was temporarily safe, but as time passed, the food he had found nearby dwindled, while encounters with zombies became more frequent and their numbers increased. Moreover, these zombies seemed to be gravitating toward the warehouse. If this continued, Lin Ying's fate was all too predictable: he would either starve to death or be surrounded and killed by zombies.

Every day, watching his food supply diminish, a sense of helplessness enveloped Lin Ying. He did not want to die.However, just as Lin Ying was at a loss, things suddenly took a turn for the worse.

　　On the seventh day after the outbreak of the disaster, a wave of invisible energy surged out of Lin Ying's limbs and bones without warning, and then gathered at the location of Lin Ying's belly, forming an energy vortex.

　　The sudden appearance of invisible energy surprised Lin Ying.

　　Lin Ying was not unfamiliar with this invisible energy, he had once seen it on his old dad's body, and the people of the walled village called this energy: yuan qi.

　　There had been a legend circulating in the walled village: the Lin family's ancestors were descendants of the Immortal Sect's Hidden Sect, and the people in the walled village were also descendants of the Immortal Sect, and the ancestors had once passed down a method of cultivating Yuan Qi, and there was also a sleeve of secret Immortal techniques, and as long as one learned them, one would be able to do anything in the sky and enter the earth.

　　For this legend, Lin Ying was initially not very believe, immortal door heir? Immortal secret arts? Yuan Qi? I've read too many metaphysical novels!

　　Although everyone in the village practiced martial arts, Lin Ying had never seen anyone use Yuan Qi or spells, and in their daily teaching, the elders had never taught the juniors the cultivation of Yuan Qi or the use of spells.

　　Some of the more curious juniors had asked the old people about Yuan Qi and secret spells, but the old people had all denied it, and over time, everyone had lost interest and stopped asking.

　　When he was young, Lin Ying had also asked his old man many times about Yuan Qi and secret arts, but every time, his old man had also denied it vigorously.

　　However, it wasn't until one day, when Lin Ying inadvertently bumped into Pops practicing boxing deep in the forest, that Lin Ying got the answer he wanted.

　　That time, the old dad told Lin Ying the truth: the walled village legend content although some exaggerated, but the yuan qi and the secret art is real, but in a few decades ago the walled village happened some big events, the old people will unanimously decided, the yuan qi and the secret art is no longer passed on to the next generation, from their generation into the yellow earth, and strictly forbidden to anyone to mention the matter of the yuan qi and the secret art.

　　Lin Ying pestered his father to teach him Yuan Qi and secret arts, but his father refused to agree no matter what. He told Lin Ying that the old people who possessed Yuan Qi had sworn together that they wouldn't pass on half of their Yuan Qi to the next generation, and that his revealing things related to Yuan Qi to Lin Ying was already the maximum he could do.

　　Lin Ying searched on the internet, in the world like this method of using Yuan Qi, does exist, only in the world, people call Yuan Qi as dark energy, call those who can use this kind of energy as aliens, or superhuman.

　　Old man did not want to teach Lin Ying, so when he was a child, Lin Ying tried to learn how to use Yuan Qi secretly, he once found the wooden box that old man hid when he went out, and Lin Ying found a lot of ancient books in the box, which recorded the cultivation of Yuan Qi and the secret arts of the immortals.

　　So, Lin Ying took the opportunity to secretly copy a portion of it, and secretly practiced on his own when no one was around.

　　But for some reason, Lin Ying practiced for a long time, but he didn't practice half a bit of Yuan Qi, and without Yuan Qi to support him, then he couldn't perform the other secret arts.

　　After a long time, Lin Ying had no choice but to give up helplessly.

　　However, just on the seventh day after the end times came, a Yuan Qi actually appeared in Lin Ying's body.

Yuan Qi, a mysterious power beyond common sense. Yuan Qi combined with secret arts could exert infinite power, instantly turning an ordinary person into a superman-like existence.

　　The appearance of Yuan Qi made Lin Ying, who was originally in a predicament, see hope: "Perhaps, I can use Yuan Qi and secret arts to leave this place and go to some place with plenty of food and fewer zombies. It might even be possible for me to return to the fortress."

　　Lin Ying started practicing the secret arts that he had stolen after his Yuan Qi appeared, but for some unknown reason, of the secret arts that Lin Ying had practiced, except for one called the Imperial Beast Decision, which had a reaction, the others had no movement at all.

　　The Imperial Beast Decree, this was a method of controlling wild beasts through talismanic seals.

　　Moreover, the Lin family had improved the Imperial Beast Talisman by combining the means of compiling talismans in proximity, without the need to draw talismans, they could control wild beasts by simply forming seals, and the ancient books had once said that as long as one's cultivation level was high, there was no beast that the Lin family couldn't control.

　　Thus, Lin Ying focused all his energy on the cultivation of the Imperial Beast Decree.

　　Lin Ying planned to control some wild beasts through the Imperial Beast Duel, and when he encountered zombies, he would let the wild beasts take the top, and even if he couldn't beat those zombies, he would still be able to interfere a bit and create some conditions for his own battles.

　　After practicing for a short while, Lin Ying then started looking for various animals around the warehouse, trying to take them in.

　　The warehouse Lin Ying was in was deep in the factory area, there were very few animals here, over the past few days, the smaller animals Lin Ying had come across were flies, ants, mosquitoes, cockroaches, and the slightly larger one he had come across was a sparrow.

　　However, Lin Ying's control of these animals all failed, except for the sparrow that was frightened and flew away, the others were all eventually slapped to death by Lin Ying.

　　Experiment after experiment, failure after failure, it was like a pot of cold water poured on Lin Ying, causing the fighting spirit he had just ignited to be extinguished in an instant.

　　Watching the food continue to dwindle and the control of the animals continue to fail, Lin Ying was a little disappointed again, looking at the low sky, Lin Ying felt a little breathless.