Chapter 75

The raised section at the neck of the armor wrapped almost completely around the back of the neck, the back of the head, and the ears. It made people feel especially safe.

Li Jiangbing and the others who didn’t have armor couldn’t help touching the backs of their necks whenever they saw someone else wearing it.

Li Jiangbing took a towel and wrapped it around his neck.

Everyone, whether they had armor or not, also wrapped towels around their ankles.

Even the armor only protected the legs; it couldn’t cover the ankles. But there were definitely infant zombies in the hospital, since it had both an obstetrics department and a pediatrics department.

These were all lessons learned in blood.

When they reached the hospital, they didn’t head toward the outpatient area. The virus had broken out on Saturday night, when there should have been no one in the outpatient hall.

Everyone would have been crowded into the emergency department.

So they headed straight for the emergency department.

The hospital corridors weren’t very wide, which made close-quarters combat and killing difficult.

They used more or less the same strategy they had used when clearing out the garage: luring the zombies out.

This time, they used a loudspeaker. Someone had recorded the audio in advance, though nobody knew which tone-deaf person Gao Yuxuan had found to sing a horribly off-key rendition of a pop song.

The loudspeaker was set to play on a loop. Someone in armor cautiously approached, switched it on, left it on the steps, and turned to run.

The fighters outside formed a semicircle and waited.

Sure enough, the off-key singing immediately attracted the zombies inside the building.

The entrance was much like the one at Maiduo Supermarket: a set of double glass doors.

Before long, zombies came rushing out from inside.

Smack!

Although anti-collision strips had been pasted across the glass, the zombies didn’t know what they were for. The one leading the charge was naturally a second-generation zombie. Moving at high speed, it slammed straight into the glass.

Everyone winced and sucked air through their teeth.

“Ugh...”

The original zombies had all mutated during the first wave of the virus. Generally speaking, their bodies were still intact and clean.

Second-generation zombies, however, had mutated after being bitten or scratched by original zombies. Many of them had surely been attacked by more than one original zombie at the time, perhaps several at once, so they had multiple wounds all over their bodies.

When the first one slammed into the floor-to-ceiling glass, it smeared a huge, disgusting mess across the pane.

But the second-generation zombies didn’t look for another route because of it. Their paths were always straight lines.

If something blocked the way, they jumped over it. If they couldn’t jump over it, they simply attacked it head-on.

A mass of second-generation zombies hammered against the floor-to-ceiling glass. Everyone watched as broad networks of cracks spread across it, until at last the entire pane shattered with a roar.

That was only the inner layer. The outer layer suffered the same fate.

Finally, the zombies burst out.

Under the clear blue sky, in broad daylight, the humans raised their shields and weapons and charged forward with battle cries.

The battle to seize and hold Renxin Hospital had begun!

The armor was incredibly useful. It directly raised the humans’ fighting strength by a huge margin.

After a fierce battle, the fighters eliminated all the zombies that had been lured outside.

But the hospital corridors were long, twisting left and right. Although many zombies had been drawn out just now, there were still more lurking deep within the corridors.

Someone in armor boldly went inside and made a racket, drawing out another wave of zombies before sprinting back outside. The zombies were lured out and dealt with there.

They repeated the process again and again, making trip after trip. At last, they had eliminated nearly all the zombies visible in the emergency department corridors.

Once the humans had killed all the zombies that came rushing out and entered the hospital themselves, things actually became much more comfortable.

The air-conditioning was still running.

For a hospital of Renxin’s caliber, regulations required the air-conditioning to operate twenty-four hours a day, supported by a maintenance team on duty around the clock—at least four people during the day and no fewer than two at night. They were responsible for emergency repairs as well as regular maintenance and servicing.

Clearly, Renxin Hospital had always maintained its air-conditioning system very well. Left unattended, it had continued running for half a month without breaking down.

Everyone was drenched in sweat when they entered the hospital, but they immediately cooled down.

There were no zombies visible in the corridors anymore, but they still had to search every examination room one by one, especially those with the doors closed.

Sure enough, there were survivors among the dead.

Next came the emergency pharmacy, offices, and testing rooms. The toilets and stairwells couldn’t be overlooked either.

In fact, it wasn’t hard to guess where people would have been in the hospital on Saturday night.

Several hundred people couldn’t all crowd into one place; there wouldn’t have been enough room to maneuver.

After clearing the emergency department, they passed through the connecting corridor and arrived at the deserted outpatient hall. Everyone began splitting up.

Jiang Cheng gave them a special warning. “Be careful around the maternity ward. There may be babies.”

The people assigned to the maternity ward acknowledged her warning.

Jiang Cheng had only taken two steps after turning away when Mo Li suddenly leaped out of her shoulder bag.

Song Jingshuo let out an “Ah.” “Your cat!”

Everyone felt that a kitten was nothing but a burden at a time like this.

After all, whenever this happened in a movie, the heroine would panic and run after it, getting an entire group of companions killed in the process. In the end, she would be the one to survive, clutching the cat in her arms.

Fortunately, Jiang Cheng wasn’t a movie heroine. She seemed completely unsurprised and said casually, “Don’t worry about him. He’ll be fine.”

Everyone was astonished.

Jiang Cheng loved her cat so much that she took him everywhere, and everyone was used to it. Why wasn’t she concerned about his safety now that they were in such a dangerous place?

Of course, Jiang Cheng couldn’t tell them that her little cat could transform into a black panther and finish off a second-generation zombie with a single bite.

Besides, Mo Li had only jumped down because he had communicated with her through telepathy. He was going to patrol the various areas of the hospital.

Compared with humans, Mo Li ran faster, hit harder, and had evasion maxed out. There was no need to worry about him.

In a hospital, he even had more advantages than the humans did.

Go on.

Jiang Cheng: There’s any danger, notify me.

Mo Li: Meow!

Everyone assigned to the maternity ward felt especially unlucky.

Baby and infant zombies were the last things anyone wanted to encounter.

After killing enough zombies, people gradually became numb to it. Subconsciously, they no longer regarded these human-shaped things as “people.” But whenever infant zombies appeared, that numbness suddenly shattered.

Those tiny creatures crawling across the floor because their bones were not yet strong enough to support standing and walking had once been humanity’s adorable babies.

But even though everyone had prepared themselves mentally, the horror of the hospital’s maternity ward still exceeded anything they had imagined.

The babies there were not ordinary infants. They were newborns.

Normally, mothers were allowed to remain in the hospital for only three days after giving birth. That meant every baby there had been born less than three days earlier, forever frozen in that state.

They couldn’t even crawl.

Their way of moving toward fresh flesh was by thrashing their bodies.

Like fish stranded on the shore, they were tiny, one after another, their black eyes wide open as they flopped and jerked their way toward the living.

Their bodies smacked against the floor with a steady slap, slap, slap, slap.

The men who had killed so many zombies that they believed themselves fearless were all so horrified that they stumbled backward.

Someone vomited.

But there was no way to run from it. The “little fish” wriggled closer and closer. In the end, the people could only smash them one by one.

No one knew whether they were boys or girls.

No one knew whether they had been given names.

They had heard that if a person had a name, they could be reborn as a human in their next life.

Something else happened in the maternity ward—dangerous, but not exactly dangerous.

A full-term pregnant woman zombie was killed and fell to the floor. As the people stepped over her body, a fetal zombie wriggled out between her legs, thrashing its way into the world.

Another round of terror erupted.

Fortunately, it had no offensive power, and a single blow from a staff was enough to finish it off.

After checking the entire ward area and confirming that there were no more “living” zombies, everyone retreated as quickly as if demons were chasing them.

No one had the courage to take another look.

From early morning until afternoon, thanks to the new armor, no one had been injured.

If only they had gotten this armor sooner.

Jiang Cheng led the others in clearing out the orthopedic ward. Just as they were preparing to move on, she suddenly sensed something and turned around.

Sure enough, Mo Li had appeared.

Mo Li stood in the corridor and looked at them. “Meow.”

Jiang Cheng was slightly surprised. She walked over, crouched down, and stroked his head. 【Where is it?】

Mo Li replied, “Meow~”

He turned and walked a few steps, then looked back at them.

Jiang Cheng said to everyone, “Something seems to be going on. Let’s go take a look.”

Everyone stared at her in surprise.

Li Jiangbing said, “Wait, you understand cat language?”

“Small animals are naturally attuned to people,” Jiang Cheng replied. “If you spend enough time with them, you’ll understand them.”

Li Jiangbing thought of how he used to play with Little White downstairs. Little White’s Dad had seemed to say something similar before.

He had said that small animals were basically like children who couldn’t speak.

People who raised pets seemed to treat them as their own children.

Everyone followed, half convinced and half doubtful.

After Jiang Cheng communicated telepathically with him—【Lead the way】—Mo Li stopped looking back and headed straight in one direction, leading everyone along.

“Huh?” someone said. “This is the outpatient area.”

In theory, the outpatient area should have been empty on a Saturday night. Their main focus was clearing the emergency department and the wards. Only after those key areas had been cleared would they inspect the outpatient area.

Mo Li led them directly to the stairwell beside the escalators.

The escalators in the outpatient area naturally weren’t running on a Saturday night, so they had to walk down themselves. Everyone followed Mo Li to the level below, then continued in a particular direction.

As they went, four or five zombie corpses appeared on the floor.

“Which team came through here?”

Someone even bent down to examine one of the corpses. “What did this? Its neck was snapped clean through.”

Jiang Cheng knew at a glance that Mo Li had bitten through their necks. Without changing her expression, she said, “Forget about that. Hurry up and see what’s ahead.”

The person quickly straightened up and followed the others.

Mo Li stopped outside the door of a room—a treatment room.

There were claw marks on the wooden door, and it was even cracked in places. It had clearly been attacked by zombies.

Everyone guessed that the zombies they had just seen might have been the ones responsible.

Perhaps some other team had passed by, made a noise that attracted the zombies, and cleared them out.

Jiang Cheng certainly wasn’t going to tell them that the “team” that had happened to pass by was actually Mo Li.

She raised her hand and knocked three times.

Everyone held their breath.

There was no sound from inside.

Jiang Cheng knocked three more times and called out, “Is anyone in there?”

The instant she spoke, a voice rang out from inside—urgent and excited.

“Yes! Someone’s here!”

“Are you police officers?”

“Is it safe outside? What happened to the monsters out there?”

It really was a survivor. Jiang Cheng’s cat was truly incredible. It had actually found a living person.

But how had this person survived?

Jiang Cheng said, “It’s safe outside. Open the door.”

Sounds of furniture being moved came from inside. After a while, the door opened cautiously by a crack.

Only after seeing that there really were no monsters outside did the person finally relax and open the door. He was trembling with excitement.

“Are you here to rescue me? What happened to those monsters? Are there still monsters outside? So many people turned into monsters—there were so many of them!”

He was wearing a white coat, so he was probably a doctor.

He moved excitedly toward Jiang Cheng, but he smelled terrible. Li Jiangbing discreetly raised his shield to block him.

“Is anyone else in there? Are you alone?”

Not only did the man stink—the entire room reeked as well.

It was unbearable, like feces mixed with rotting meat.

“Uh...” The man hesitated.

Jiang Cheng gave someone a meaningful look, and one of the others went inside to investigate.

It was a small treatment room. From the doorway, they could see almost everything at a glance. But there was another door inside, leading to a second room.

The person kicked the door open. The room beyond was also very small.

The first person went in. A few seconds later, he backed out.

The person beside him glanced at him in confusion, then went in to take a look as well. He came back out almost immediately and began retching against the table.

Li Jiangbing barked, “What are you doing? What’s going on?”

The first person who had gone inside kept his face taut and said nothing—or perhaps he simply couldn’t speak.

Someone else entered. A moment later, they let out a horrified cry of “Oh my God!” and staggered back out.

The person who had been dry-heaving couldn’t bring anything up. He wiped the saliva from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, stared at the doctor, and told everyone, “He ate people.”

That single sentence answered the question everyone had instinctively been asking: How had this man survived?

It had been two weeks.

There was a sink in the treatment room, so he could drink tap water. But no one could survive for two weeks on water alone. He had to eat.

Even if there had been snacks brought in by medical staff, a treatment room like this couldn’t have provided enough food to last two weeks.

So that was it.

He had eaten people.

Jiang Cheng and Li Jiangbing went in to take a look as well.

There was feces everywhere in the inner room. A naked corpse lay on the floor. Judging from the clothes beside it, the victim had been a hospital orderly.

All the flesh had been cut from his body, leaving only stark white bones. The portions that hadn’t been cut away had begun to rot, which explained the stench in the room.

The meat that had been cut off hadn’t all been eaten. Some of it was still in the refrigerator used to store chilled medication. But the refrigerator could only keep things cold, not freeze them, and after so long, the meat was no longer fresh.

“I had no choice. I was going to starve to death.” The doctor broke down sobbing. “There were monsters outside. Whenever we made a sound, they clawed at the door.”

“He died, and I was almost starving to death too. I really had no other option but to eat him.”

He pulled at his hair, putting on an expression of unbearable anguish, clearly hoping to arouse their sympathy.

But Jiang Cheng asked, “How did he die?”

He had prepared for this question long ago—from the moment the orderly died.

With his nose running and tears streaming down his face, he cried, “He was bitten by a monster. I tried to save him, but he’d lost too much blood. I couldn’t save him. I’m useless! I’m a doctor, but I couldn’t save someone!”

But he soon found himself unable to continue crying.

Everyone in the strange white plastic armor was staring at him expressionlessly.

They had tightened their grips on their weapons. Whether it was a steel pipe or a kitchen knife, the business end of every weapon was pointed straight at him, ready for anything.

The doctor’s sobbing abruptly stopped.

He couldn’t understand it. His performance had been flawless. Why had they seen through his lie?