“Pupils… equal and round, no sluggishness to light. Good, continue pressing—young lady, has the blood type come back?”
The doctor retracted the miniature flashlight, then gently closed Zhao Long’s eyelids.
They were in a security room, situated on the first floor of the office building adjacent to the parking lot.
Zhao Long, having sustained a gunshot wound to the abdomen, lay unconscious on the security guard’s sofa.
Keke directed her flashlight beam onto the blood type testing card, which lay secured on the table.
“Both the A and B cards have clotted.”
“That means AB blood. Go and ask who among them is…”
“I am,” Xia Lang interjected, emerging from the crowd that had gathered by the security room’s entrance.
As a friend from the band, Keke was already aware of Xia Lang’s blood type; he had undergone surgery for a congenital heart defect in the past, a conversation during which his blood type had come up.
Precisely because of this, he was not a viable candidate.
“Individuals with severe heart conditions are unsuitable for blood donation,” Keke announced, her voice cutting through the murmurs and quieting the crowd. “Is there anyone else?”
Yet, no one uttered a sound.
Jing Lan meticulously tended to Zhao Long’s abdominal wound, while the doctor offered precise instructions.
“Anyone who donates blood, please provide your name. Should a transfusion be needed in the future, you will receive priority.”
Her cousin’s method of incentivizing seemed to spark an idea in Keke.
“Furthermore, those who contribute will receive an additional share during the next supply distribution,” Keke proclaimed.
Evidently, there were those who believed they would never require a blood transfusion, making the promise of supplies a more dependable incentive.
A faint ripple of unrest began to spread through the crowd, only to be abruptly punctuated by a sharp cry: “By what authority do you dictate the distribution of supplies?”
“The firearms are in our possession.”
Without yielding an inch, Keke advanced, planting herself squarely before the provocative man, fists clenched and hands resting on her hips.
The young woman, a formidable one meter seventy-three, did not need to crane her neck to meet his gaze, yet the man’s demeanor was decidedly confrontational.
“Move aside. I have no patience for a jabbering shrew.”
With virtually no preamble, Keke’s right fist shot out in a “Heart-Piercing Hammer,” slamming into the man’s shoulder hollow.
Simultaneously, her leg swept out, kicking his ankle.
The instant he faltered, her left hand executed a Xingyi Quan “Eagle Catch,” gripping his right wrist and pressing down with such force that she pinned him completely to the ground.
“Perfect, because I, too, have no patience for a blathering idiot.”
A profound silence once more descended upon the assembled crowd.
“Keke, leave immediately.”
“Brother…”
“Who gave you permission to strike him?”
“He… he was intentionally provoking a confrontation.”
Observing his cousin’s indignant, puffed-out cheeks, Jing Lan suddenly grasped the reason behind her sudden outburst.
“He merely expressed a personal opinion. Such matters are open to discussion…”
“Do you imagine yourself to be Armin? Talk, talk, talk—are you the Titan of Discourse? Do you intend to negotiate matters of life and death as well?”
“Do not obfuscate the issue. While he was unreasonable and refused to donate blood, he did not instigate a disturbance, whereas you resorted to violence.
Help this man to his feet, then apologize.”
At that precise moment, the crowd parted, revealing Xiao Ye and a tall adolescent stepping into the room.
It was Cao Hongrui, the son of the painter Cao Renshuang.
Rumored to suffer from a mental illness, he currently appeared remarkably composed.
“I am AB type, Rh-positive.”
The doctor lifted his gaze, scrutinizing Cao Hongrui.
“Schizophrenia?”
“And obsessive-compulsive disorder,” Cao Hongrui declared, his eyes wide and unblinking, each word delivered with deliberate precision.
“Perhaps those with mental afflictions are granted an expedited journey to paradise… Prepare the alcohol, and little white-haired sister, please approach as well…”
As the room filled with activity, Keke seized the moment to offer her apologies to the man she had struck.
Surprisingly, he appeared somewhat abashed.
“You needn’t have been so impulsive,” he murmured, before turning and walking away without another word.
****
While engaged in his professional duties, Doctor Gu Wenqiang’s usual air of charlatanry would largely dissipate, leaving only an occasional exclamation or a few rambling, tangential pronouncements.
“Among the divine miracles wrought by Jesus were also acts of healing,” the doctor intoned, his gaze fixed on the blood collection bag as he drew from Cao Hongrui, as if admiring a masterpiece.
“Each time I attend to a patient, I sense my divine patron benevolently overseeing my work from nearby.”
“Do you… truly perceive the divine?” Cao Hongrui inquired.
“Proselytizing is not permitted within these premises,” Jing Lan stated flatly.
“Anyone can perceive them,” the doctor responded, gently withdrawing the phlebotomy needle.
“Three hundred milliliters. This should suffice for now; the divine does not favor excess, and furthermore—”
The doctor then turned his attention back to Jing Lan. “There is no need for proselytizing.
In the end, everyone will embark on their own quest to discover their personal deity.”
****
Following the rudimentary hemostasis and blood transfusion, the doctor unveiled his most treasured possession: a white medicinal powder.
During his tenure at the hospital, he had never once employed this substance to treat casualties; it was, in essence, a folk remedy, one no reputable physician would dare to utilize.
Legend claimed it had revived countless soldiers during the tumultuous era of warlord conflicts.
“His life has been secured for the moment. However, he must be transported to a hospital once daylight breaks. How many weapons do you still possess?”
“Our ammunition is nearly depleted, though we still possess bows, arrows, and knives.
Provided there are no Night Demons during daylight hours, re-establishing contact with the hospital should prove feasible,” Jing Lan explained.
“The critical question remains: how many more lives are you prepared to sacrifice?” The doctor’s gaze sharpened perceptibly.
“To preserve this single individual, you have already lost one able-bodied young person and inadvertently caused the death of a bystander.
Naturally, you may have accrued some advantages beyond the cost of human lives; I can only hope the divine sanctions such gains.”
****
Perhaps “benefits beyond the cost of human lives” did indeed exist, for wherever they went, those who naturally gravitated to the heart of the crowd invariably found themselves the focal point of all attention.
“I’m surprisingly finding this quite agreeable,” Cao Renshuang quipped to Keke. “I honestly believed I’d never again have the opportunity to engage in interpersonal management.”
The small group was diligently clearing the bloodstains from the parking lot.
Keke, however, shot the painter, Cao Renshuang, an irritable glance.
“Are you not concerned about becoming estranged from the populace?”
The painter appeared somewhat bewildered. “Well… I never asserted that I wished to be superior, so why do I sense such indignation from you, Little Dragon Sister?”
Keke, recognizing her own pique, chose to say no more.
After a brief word to Old Cao about needing rest, she departed by herself.
****
The brother and sister, accompanied by Xiao Ye, sat opposite one another within the confines of the convenience store where they had previously rested.
‘Indeed, it’s just as it always was,’ Xiao Ye observed, casting a surreptitious glance at her two companions. ‘While Keke is undeniably a strong-willed young woman, she becomes remarkably compliant in Jing Lan’s presence.’
“Did you resort to violence just now because of the insults that man hurled at you?” Jing Lan was the first to inquire.
Xiao Ye, having once been a boy, had long been privy to Keke’s family history: her father, intensely patriarchal, had yearned for a son but ultimately could not have one, thus he resolved to raise his daughter as if she were male.
Legend had it that upon his wife giving birth to a daughter, her husband had merely stared blankly, exclaiming, “Acceptable! Despite all my efforts, how did a female tadpole still emerge?”
Keke, recalling the anecdote, had even quipped, “It’s a small mercy my father didn’t commit a physiological error, at least knowing that the s*x-determining chromosome resides within his own ‘little tadpoles.’”
Her father, displeased with having a daughter at the time, simply adopted “Kě Hái Xíng” (It’s acceptable) from his offhand remark as her formal name, “Cun Kexing.”
Her mother, finding the name utterly peculiar yet unable to sway her husband, could only bestow upon her the nickname Keke.
Throughout her upbringing, her father consistently wished for Keke to embody masculine traits: courageous, robust, and entirely free of any “finicky” feminine air.
“Did that single insult of ‘sānbā’ truly break your composure? It’s such a base form of abuse, isn’t it?
A term associated with a women’s holiday, which should be a privilege, yet twisted into a slur.
Is that not utterly absurd?”
“It’s not that I care about *that*! What I cannot tolerate is your consistent dissatisfaction whenever I attempt to assist you, Brother! It was the same when I helped you with your examinations…”
“Please, let us not speak of that matter.”
Xiao Ye was well aware of the incident they referenced.
Due to health complications, Jing Lan had failed to gain admission to his preferred university.
Consequently, Keke, out of heartfelt concern for her brother, dedicated herself to studying for an entire semester, emerging as the top scorer in the county’s college entrance examination.
She had claimed this was to help her brother realize his dream, and then—
The siblings had erupted into a furious argument.
Jing Lan later conceded, “I was entirely at fault, utterly without excuse.
At that moment, I was simply not thinking clearly.”
Keke persisted, her voice still laced with indignation. “Very well, let’s set aside past grievances.
Consider just now: you sought to establish an order where contributions would be met with commensurate rewards, and when someone chose to openly defy that, I advocated for you, I subdued the agitator.
So why, then, do you harbor such objections towards me?
Is your sole ambition to appear virtuous in the eyes of others?! Such an approach will undoubtedly lead to your demise!”
Xiao Ye found herself somewhat unnerved by such arguments, which invariably brought to mind the contentious quarrels of her own parents.
“You two… there’s no need for this.”
“Kong Cheng is dead! Didn’t you risk your life just now going to find the doctor? Was that risk taken merely to save that foolish man who got shot?
It was to make everyone believe you are capable, that power should be entrusted to you.
If anyone has an objection, you should send them out to kill Night Demons for you, to find doctors for you, instead of immediately spouting grand declarations like, ‘Oh, we must respect all opinions, we must defend the right to speak at all costs!’”
‘What a rare occasion to hear her voice so many opinions to her brother,’ Xiao Ye mused silently.
Keke suddenly leaned closer to Xiao Ye, perhaps a subconscious inclination towards another girl, as her gaze softened slightly. “Also, thank you for protecting my brother.
He didn’t bully you, did he?”
“Ah, of course not. He… he’s a very good person, even though we’re just ordinary companions.”
The moment the words left Xiao Ye’s lips, she regretted them. “Just ordinary friends”? What a blatant attempt to deny the obvious!
“So, Little White, what are your thoughts? You must be more aware than I of how dangerous that trip to the hospital was.
If such a perilous venture doesn’t earn us respect among the populace, then it’s simply not worth it, unless these people go out and do things themselves!”
Keke had casually bestowed the nickname “Little White” upon Xiao Ye, a name that coincidentally belonged to a stray cat at Ling Yechen’s school.
“But I don’t want everyone to fear us,” Jing Lan interjected before Xiao Ye could respond.
“I believe everyone should be equal.”
“Only we have trained in combat and marksmanship, and possess outdoor experience—do you, Little White? (‘Ah… well, a little.’) Therefore, this situation is already inherently unequal.
Didn’t Mencius say, ‘Things are not uniform; such is the nature of things’? Equality for all is merely an ideal, but now, to speak bluntly, if the situation outside deteriorates further, and more formidable monsters than ordinary zombies appear, then a team must undergo military-style reform.
Let’s consider our immediate plans. The doctor also asked just now: our weaponry is dwindling.
To deal with Night Demons, based on your descriptions, firearms are essentially mandatory, or your bow and arrows, but the margin for error with arrows is too low.
So our next step might need to be a trip to the county’s armed forces department, which serves as a militia training base and holds many second-line firearms and ammunition reserves.
And given our current weapon and equipment status, it would be difficult to go to such a place without casualties, I’m afraid.”
As Keke spoke, she slowly rose, likely facing the direction of the armed forces department, mentally estimating the distance.
“And you must clearly understand that remaining in a place like this offers us no future.
The food in nearby convenience stores will run out; we must find larger reserves, or locate those rice trucks that the people you know from the granary drove away.
You just described the appearance of the Night Demon’s nest, and we can roughly confirm that zombies likely possess sustainable means of physical recovery, perhaps by shrinking into those Cthulhu-like nests.
This implies that zombies probably cannot be starved to death. Moreover, mutated monsters like Night Demons are likely to become increasingly prevalent.
Before that happens, if we cannot find more weapons and ammunition, if we cannot locate a safer sanctuary, we will merely die like rats in a gutter.”
The short-haired girl’s speaking rhythm was robust, as if she were delivering a powerful address.
“So, what are your thoughts?”
Turning around, she met her cousin’s gaze.
“Do you truly believe that ‘equality for all’ and ‘democracy’ are more important right now?”
Perhaps unaccustomed to Keke’s aggressive posture, Xiao Ye rose, compelled to interject.
“Um, you two… aren’t you both pushing each other’s viewpoints too far?
Especially you, Keke… I don’t think Senior Brother meant it that way.
‘Equality for all,’ ‘respecting the right to speak’—these shouldn’t be the core points Senior Brother intended to convey.”
Keke pouted, a hint of annoyance in her voice. “Do you think you understand my brother better than I do?”
‘That’s debatable!’ the white-haired girl retorted defiantly in her mind.
“What Senior Brother truly wishes to express, I suspect, is ‘unity.’
That is to say, it’s not about us—those with relatively higher combat capabilities who can accomplish more—degrading ourselves to become like ordinary survivors.
Rather, it’s about fostering unity through principles of equality, encouraging everyone to respect and assist each other as much as possible, thereby forming an overall powerful survivor group.
Or to put it another way, we can lead the charge for everyone, we can be heroes, even role models, guiding other less capable survivors to learn from us.
But we cannot become superiors, we cannot ride on the backs of others; we must stand with everyone.
Only then can everyone stand with us.”
The brother and sister fell silent.
“Uh, Senior Brother? Is my understanding correct? I haven’t known you long, so I don’t understand you very well.”
Keke’s soft chuckle echoed from the darkness.
“No need to ask; I know, Brother means exactly that.
You’re right… I was too emotional just now, so I only thought of vulgarizing Brother’s stance before refuting it, to brand him a ‘white left’ and then criticize him.
I truly am terrible.”
“Not at all,” Jing Lan denied, a little embarrassed.
“Just teasing you. I love seeing you soften up.”
The tension in the air finally dissipated.
“Speaking of which, Little White, you’re really impressive.
You look like a loli, but your mind seems frighteningly rational.”
“There’s no such thing.”
Keke sat back down. “But getting back to the main point, Brother, I still think your ideas are too idealistic.”
Jing Lan nodded softly. “Hmm, I’ve been thinking about what you just said, and you actually convinced me to a large extent.”
“So I can actually offer an idea,” Xiao Ye quickly interjected. “You two siblings may not need to have completely identical views, no need for one to necessarily convince the other.
Perhaps maintaining your differences is a good thing.
Think about it: no matter what your stance, there will always be people whose stance differs from yours, right?
But if you stand together on matters of principle, yet on non-principal issues, you each adhere to your own valid opinions.
In reality, you’re not divided; instead, you’re expanding your collective stance, making more people of different viewpoints feel that the holders of power have a representative among them.
Just like earlier, Keke resorted to violence, and I actually think some people in the crowd disliked the agitator; they would feel Keke handled it well.
And there are also people who are indeed wary of us holding a certain degree of authority, so Senior Brother, by stepping back and forbidding Keke from hitting him, you actually gain more approval from that segment.
The result is that as long as you two siblings don’t fall out, most people can be won over by you.”
Keke and Jing Lan gazed with a touch of surprise at the silhouette of the white-haired girl in the darkness.
To save power, they hadn’t turned on the flashlight, but the faint pre-dawn light still reflected as specks of brilliance on the white-haired girl’s hair and glasses.
“Little White, you’re not some second-generation official, are you?”
“Her family sells stewed offal,” Jing Lan said.
“Ah, right! Many Beijing natives traveling through here come to eat, and they talk grandly all day; I’ve been quite influenced!” Xiao Ye seized the opportunity to fabricate a story.
Keke burst into laughter. “Alright, I didn’t expect Brother to attract such a clever girl.
Then, in the future, we’ll generally have this division of labor.
Brother, you’ll be responsible for uniting everyone, resolving disputes, fostering communication, and handling cultural promotion.
I’ll be responsible for maintaining order, kicking the butts of the disobedient.
As for Old Cao and the others’ specific leanings, we’ll figure that out later.
So—” The short-haired girl turned to the white-haired girl. “What about you, Little White? Who do you want to be closer to?”