Chapter 7
The Big Guy was startled by the sound of the door being banged on, muttering as he walked over, "What now over here?"
One apartment had screams, another had a door being pounded on. What was wrong with all his neighbors on this floor?
Jiang Cheng immediately yelled to stop him, "Don't go over there! Go back to your own place! Now!"
The Big Guy looked at her, "Huh?"
The mutated monster in this apartment got to the door handle even earlier than Jiang Cheng's neighbor had. The force and angle happened to be just right—unlike Jiang Cheng's neighbor, who fumbled a few times before pressing the handle down, this monster succeeded on the first try.
The door creaked open.
The Big Guy was standing right outside the door.
The monster stood inside.
A pair of normal eyes met a pair of pitch-black eyes.
Saliva dripped.
The Big Guy was speechless.
"Run—!" Jiang Cheng shouted.
The monster opened its mouth, letting out a hoarse roar from its throat, and lunged out with its hands outstretched.
The Big Guy let out a yelp, spun around, and bolted, "Help! There's a ghost!"
The Big Guy might have muscles bulging everywhere, with broad, thick shoulders and arms so developed they couldn't lie flat against his sides, looking like a hulking brute. But he had a timid heart.
He wasn't afraid of the living, but spirits scared him.
What kind of monster was this? He was about to pee his pants!
Mom!
The baseball bat was right by the door, and Jiang Cheng grabbed it as she sprinted out.
The Big Guy's position was quite far from her, near the other end of the hallway, close to the dead end. He didn't run many steps before hitting the wall.
Turning his head, he saw the monster with black eyes and drooling, slobbering—it was actually a neighbor he usually recognized. But now, the neighbor was radiating a kind of deathly aura.
The hands spread out like claws, coming at him.
The Big Guy's soul nearly fled his body as he dropped to a crouch instinctively, just like Jiang Cheng when she first encountered her neighbor monster. It was a reflex of evasion.
This neighbor monster also hit the wall. But since they were so close to the end of the hallway and hadn't built up much speed in those few steps, this neighbor didn't crash into the fire door with enough force to break an arm like Jiang Cheng's next-door neighbor had.
The monster's outstretched hand touched the wall, stopping its momentum, and it turned its head.
The Big Guy dodged that strike, scrambled on all fours for a few steps, got up, and also turned to look.
Their eyes met again.
The monster roared.
The Big Guy sprinted toward Jiang Cheng's direction, "Ahhh run! Why are you coming over here?!"
Jiang Cheng charged forward, yelling, "Move—!"
She gripped the bat tightly.
The Big Guy sidestepped nimbly, clearing the space, revealing the monster chasing him behind.
Jiang Cheng, using the momentum of her run, swung the bat in a full arc!
The Big Guy twisted to look behind him and saw it happen—
Teeth, slime, and blood burst forth.
The monster's body flew backward through the air.
The silhouette of the girl gripping the bat looked more powerful than any man pumping iron at the gym.
Everything seemed like a slow-motion scene in a movie, as if the world had frozen for an instant.
Then, with a thud, the monster crashed down, landing on its back.
In one fluid motion, Jiang Cheng stopped, turned around, and before the monster could get up, she viciously struck it again and again with the bat.
She could hear banging coming from Li Ziqing's door. She had to finish this quickly—if Li Ziqing also came out, she'd have to deal with two monsters at once.
The bat was thicker at the top and thinner and lighter near the bottom, making it great for swinging with force. It was way better than a mop handle.
Jiang Cheng's strength had indeed increased since she fainted. With a proper weapon in hand, she smashed the monster's head to pieces in a few blows.
The walls on either side of the hallway were splattered with red, white, and sticky stuff.
The Big Guy clenched his glutes, pressing himself flat against the hallway wall, staring in horror as a slender female neighbor beat a normally familiar neighbor to death with a string of strikes.
Jiang Cheng paused, resting the bat on the ground to catch her breath. She straightened up and nodded toward the Big Guy's apartment, "Go back inside and lock the door!"
The Big Guy stammered, "He! You! Me!"
The banging on Li Ziqing's door continued.
"Don't touch that door, go back. She's about to come out," Jiang Cheng strode past him. "There might be others turning into monsters too. Head back now and talk on the owners' forum!"
The Big Guy was glued to the wall like a gecko, watching Jiang Cheng as she dashed back toward her place, then looking at the neighbor's corpse lying horribly on the ground.
He glanced at Jiang Cheng again.
She was already jogging back to her own door, stepping inside, and slamming it shut behind her with a bang.
Meanwhile, the neighbor directly opposite from the Big Guy had just woken up. Still groggy, he heard shouts in the hallway.
A man screamed "ghost," a woman yelled "go back," then more shouting: "Help!" and "Move!"
Then came a bunch of messy noises.
This neighbor rubbed his temples, recovering his senses enough to get up and open the door to check. "What's all the racket? What's going on?"
He looked up and locked eyes with the Big Guy still plastered against the wall opposite.
The Big Guy glanced at this neighbor with normal eyes, then at the monster's corpse on the ground.
The neighbor followed his gaze and saw the body and the gruesome scene.
The two normal—or alive—people stared at each other in silence.
The Big Guy wanted to say, "It wasn't me," but he opened his mouth, unsure how to explain.
The neighbor stared at this muscular man for one second... then yanked his door shut with force, frantically locking it.
The Big Guy jolted, then sprinted and leaped over the corpse, shouting, "Check the owners' forum!"
After yelling, he scrambled into his own apartment and slammed the door shut too.
The banging from Li Ziqing's door continued to echo.
But fortunately, Li Ziqing wasn't lucky enough to hit the door handle and open it. She thumped and scratched inside, but after the Big Guy escaped into his place, the hallway fell silent, and Li Ziqing gradually quieted down, no longer making noise.
Back inside her house, Jiang Cheng set the bat upright by the door, ready to grab on her way out.
Shen Wei and Mo Li were lying on the bed. Across from the foot of the bed, against the wall, was Jiang Cheng's dressing table that also served as a computer desk. Jiang Cheng pulled out the chair, sat down, opened her laptop, logged into the owners' forum, started a new thread, and typed rapidly:
[!!!! Attention! Those Who Just Woke Up! Some People Turn Into Monsters When They Wake Up!!!!]
She used several exclamation marks in the title to grab attention.
In the body, she wrote: [Attention everyone! Some people wake up with black eyes and blue-gray skin! Those who mutate into this state completely lose their reason and attack anyone or anything like wild animals, using their teeth to tear flesh! Everyone must stay alert and find a nearby weapon to defend yourself! The head is the weakness of the mutated ones—attack their heads until they lose their ability to move!]
What "lose their ability to move" really meant was to beat them until they were dead.
But Jiang Cheng couldn't write it that directly.
Back in the safety of her house, she realized she had already killed four people today.
Of course, these four people were twisted monsters—she was just defending herself. But what happens next is still unknown. They definitely wouldn’t write something as blatant as “kill” directly. Still, it doesn’t matter. When people attack in self-defense out of fear, they don’t stop so easily. Once you’re face-to-face with a monster, it’s kill or be killed.
All she had to do was tell everyone the monsters’ weaknesses.
[Variants have poor coordination in their limbs. You can outrun them by sprinting and making sharp turns. You can also attack their knees, ankles, or other lower body parts to make them fall, then go for the head.]
[Both the police hotline and property management phone lines are unanswered. The affected area might be huge. It’s not safe outside right now. Someone was passed out in the garden, and who knows if they’ll still be human when they wake up. I suggest everyone stay indoors and observe for now.]
After posting, Jiang Cheng refreshed the forum page and saw two new threads.
Thread One: [Are you there?! It’s me, it’s me! I’m 0320! Contact me!!! Please!]
Thread Two: [There’s a murder!! Someone’s been killed on the third floor of Building 2!!!]
0320 was the Big Guy. Jiang Cheng clicked on his thread.
Big Guy: [My phone number is xxxxxxxx. Call me! Please!]
Jiang Cheng picked up her phone and dialed the number. “Hello?”
Big Guy’s voice trembled. “Is that you? The one from 0306?”
“It’s me.” Jiang Cheng moved the mouse and opened the second thread. “Check out my latest post.”
“I’m reading it! Is this real?”
The big man sounded like he was about to cry. Jiang Cheng felt helpless. “Didn’t you see it with your own eyes just now?”
Big Guy muttered, “How did this happen?”
“How would I know?” Jiang Cheng told him. “My neighbor in 0308 turned into a mutated monster too. He bit his dog to death and chased me downstairs. The security guard downstairs was the same, and I ran into another mutant in the garden.”
“0308?!” Big Guy’s voice shot up. “Are you talking about Little White and Little White’s Dad?”
The dog next door was indeed covered in white fur. Jiang Cheng had heard other dog-owning neighbors call out to it: “Little White.”
She confirmed, “Yes.”
Big Guy asked, “What about Little White’s Dad?”
Jiang Cheng stayed silent and didn’t answer.
Hearing the silence on the phone, Big Guy understood.
He wanted to cry. “Am I dreaming? Maybe I should just go back to sleep.”
Jiang Cheng understood exactly how he felt. Since she woke up barely forty minutes ago, she’d had a strong sense of unreality too.
But she said softly, “This isn’t a dream. It’s real. Some people are turning into monsters, and plenty of others haven’t even woken up yet. We have no idea how many people are going to turn. That man from 0317 was probably bitten dead by his girlfriend. If that girl can get the door open, she’ll run out too.”
Heavy breathing came through the phone.
Fortunately, the man on the other end was an adult after all. Big Guy pulled himself together, sniffled, and asked, “So what about the security guard and the one in the garden? You...?”
Jiang Cheng hummed in acknowledgment.
“Badass! I never would’ve guessed it in normal times.” Big Guy admired her with genuine respect. He’d seen Jiang Cheng plenty of times before— she was quite pretty and seemed harmless. Who would’ve thought she’d go on the offensive in a crisis?
“My name is Li Jiangbing,” he said. “What’s yours?”
“Jiang Cheng.”
“Jiang Cheng, what do we do now?”
Why was he asking her? Jiang Cheng wasn’t responsible for him.
“Right now, a lot of people haven’t woken up or just have. I’m choosing to stay indoors and observe for now.”
“Alright, alright! I’ll stay inside too. Let’s wait until daylight tomorrow at least.”
“Yeah. Find yourself a weapon.”
“Got it. I’ve got a ton of stuff here. I have nunchucks, a tactical baton, a collapsible baton. Want me to give you one?”
“No need for now,” Jiang Cheng said. “I have a baseball bat. It works well.”
Big Guy said, “Okay, let’s leave it at that for now. Hang up first. Keep in touch.”
Jiang Cheng replied, “Got it. Keep an eye on the forum.”
After hanging up, Jiang Cheng heard screams from the hallway again: “Hey—someone come! There’s a dead body!”
She heard Li Jiangbing open his door and shout, “Get back inside! Lock your door! Check the owner’s forum!”
Though Li Jiangbing crumbled under pressure in a crisis, in normal times, that big frame of his was intimidating. Right after, two doors slammed in succession—he’d actually yelled that neighbor back inside.
But Jiang Cheng knew that more and more people were gradually waking up.
Some would open their eyes and still be human.
Others would open their eyes and no longer be human.