January 22nd.
15:40 PM.
On the rooftop of Rixin Building, National Middle School, Mengshan County, Mingshui Ethnic Autonomous Prefecture.
Gao Fei, a retired military pilot, had been assigned to operate a sightseeing seaplane at Bailu Reservoir as part of a veteran re-employment program.
While he had certainly trained with firearms, he had never imagined himself flying a plane with a gun pointed at him.
Once airborne, the direct threat had receded, yet the young man’s frigid voice still echoed in his ears, warning him, “Dare to land anywhere but where I tell you, and I’ll blow your brains out.”
Rumors circulated that this very individual had single-handedly fought his way through a granary recently seized by Burmese-Malaysian bandits.
Though these were mere whispers, Gao Fei could discern one undeniable fact: the young man’s grip on the pistol was impeccably standard, devoid of the common errors his own instructors had so often corrected.
“The rooftop isn’t nearly long enough for a landing!” Gao Fei exclaimed, his voice laced with bitter complaint, after confirming the landing spot designated by the young man seated behind him.
“Are you blind? Look over there—there’s an aerial walkway connecting to another teaching building, providing an extra hundred meters of buffer. Didn’t I tell you this already?”
Jing Lan harbored a deep dislike for those who failed to listen.
He had, after all, reiterated the landing procedure on the teaching building’s roof several times.
Nevertheless, he could understand the pilot’s apprehension.
‘What kind of pilot,’ he mused, ‘was ever trained to land a plane atop a school building?’
It felt akin to asking a master sculptor to carve intricate patterns into excrement; even if the technical difficulty wasn’t high, the sheer absurdity of the task would cause their hands to tremble with bewilderment.
Gao Fei’s hands were indeed trembling now.
He willed himself to steady them.
With a resounding thud, the plane’s front wheels touched down.
While a seaplane could theoretically land on solid ground, this particular aircraft had never done so.
Gao Fei wondered if the plane would “get angry” at such a rough inaugural landing.
The concrete surface of the teaching building’s roof was far from smooth, causing the taxiing aircraft to shake violently, as if in a fit of rage.
Gao Fei’s hands trembled in sync, forcing him to grit his teeth and maintain control over the direction, aiming for the skybridge connecting the two teaching buildings.
After traversing the thirty-meter skybridge, another teaching building stretched out for sixty meters.
The plane continued to slide for over fifty meters more before finally coming to a halt at the very edge of the rooftop.
Wiping a bead of cold sweat from his brow, Gao Fei gasped for breath and turned his head. “Damn it, you son of a b*tch, if I get a heart attack later, I’m coming to you for the medical bills.”
“Fine,” Jing Lan retorted. “As long as you can teach the zombies in the hospital how to scan and pay.”
Jing Lan tossed a large canvas bag out of the plane, then promptly leaped from the rear seat.
“Also, try to bear with them when they perform your heart surgery, and make sure they don’t eat your insides.”
He unzipped the canvas bag.
Inside lay an MP9 submachine gun, three P22 pistols, a box of thirty 9mm Parabellum rounds, two boxes of .22 rimfire ammunition, and three homemade decoy bombs.
These ingenious devices were essentially large blasting caps, originally intended for fishing, fitted with “crackling” fireworks—the kind Leng Yu’s team had planned to set off for Chinese New Year.
The fireworks would emit several seconds of noise to draw zombies before the blasting cap detonated with a thunderous boom, scattering the horde.
Evidently, this was the brainchild of a *Left 4 Dead* enthusiast.
Next, there was an AK, or more precisely, a Type 56 assault rifle.
This weapon, a trophy from the Burmese-Malaysian bandits, was significantly heavier than the pistols, yet Jing Lan stowed it in his bag nonetheless.
Two magazines containing sixty M43 rounds completed the arsenal.
In total, the equipment weighed over thirty kilograms.
Taking these supplies would likely enrage Leng Yu to no end.
Leng Yu had been unable to stop Jing Lan because he was pursuing deserters from his team—survivors from the granary who had agreed upon a rendezvous with Jing Lan, along with several dissidents from Leng Yu’s camp, had unloaded six tons of rice from a ten-ton transport truck before absconding.
This was the simplest ‘lure the tiger out of its mountain lair’ tactic.
Jing Lan subsequently located Gao Fei, the pilot Wen Hao had found at Bailu Reservoir Park, along with the seaplane.
Gao Fei, a diligent man throughout his life, would naturally never have agreed to such an outlandish plan, only to find himself with Jing Lan’s gun pointed squarely at him.
He had attempted to disarm Jing Lan once, but his move had been neutralized by an eerily strange technique.
Even now, a faint ache lingered in his groin.
****
Setting the MP9 to burst-fire mode, Jing Lan extended its stock.
He then casually tossed a P22 pistol to Gao Fei.
“Though it was unavoidable just now, I apologize,” Jing Lan stated. “From this point forward, we’re teammates. This transition might be a bit abrupt, so try to get used to it.”
Gao Fei accepted the gun with a wry smile. “You’re no ordinary kid. Were you in the military?”
Jing Lan offered no reply.
Approaching the iron door on the rooftop balcony that led to the fifth floor, he rapped on it.
There was no response.
He gently pulled it open.
With a creak, the iron door slid inward, and a body tumbled out.
It was a short-haired girl, dressed in a crisp, light-green long-sleeved shirt, black trousers, and canvas shoes.
Upon closer inspection, her features bore a striking resemblance to Jing Lan’s.
Despite appearing pale and weak from prolonged hunger and thirst, she possessed an air of nonchalant indifference, coupled with a subtle hint of contempt whose target remained elusive.
Her eyes were closed.
“Keke.”
As Jing Lan uttered the girl’s name, she suddenly opened her eyes, springing up with an almost instantaneous carp-flip motion.
A cold glint flashed from her hand, her newly opened eyes alight with both frigid determination and murderous intent.
“It’s me.”
The chilling gleam halted just before Jing Lan’s throat.
It was a SOG S37-K, a somber-colored, exceptionally sharp combat dagger favored by Navy SEALs, which should not have reflected such a cold light.
The short-haired girl’s eyes were bloodshot.
Jing Lan even momentarily wondered if she resembled a zombie.
“Lanlan… Brother?”
“Yes. I’m here to save you.”
Slowly, the girl lowered the knife in her hand, still regarding her cousin as if he were a stranger.
Then, unexpectedly, she embraced him tightly.
She began to sob uncontrollably.
The last time Jing Lan had seen her cry…
‘No,’ he thought. ‘He had never seen her cry before.’
Through her choked sobs, the girl mumbled indistinctly, “It’s too late.”
‘Too late?’ Jing Lan wondered. ‘At least you’re still alive.’
What could be too late?
A complaint? No. Were there others? Had they already perished?
From behind, Gao Fei stepped forward, activating the flashlight on his keychain and sweeping its beam down the stairwell.
“What is this?” he murmured, gently nudging a small bucket beside the stairs with his foot.
His strength was misjudged, and the bucket toppled over.
A viscous, crimson substance spread across the floor.
A dense, metallic scent of blood permeated the air.
“What is this?” Jing Lan echoed the question.
Logically, there was no need to ask; it was clearly blood.
Yet, it didn’t quite resemble blood.
It was excessively thick.
No, not just viscous—it had already clotted.
The true question, however, was why such a thing was present here.
Keke began to wail even louder.
Jing Lan had genuinely believed he would never in his life hear her cry so vehemently.
As her sobs gradually subsided, someone stumbled up from the stairs below, and both parties illuminated each other with their flashlights.
The newcomer from downstairs was a boy in a school uniform, appearing to be a student.
Upon seeing Jing Lan embracing Keke, he immediately relaxed, leaning against the wall, evidently utterly exhausted.
“Keke, your senior sister’s brother? Thank goodness. But if only you could have arrived three days earlier…” The boy’s voice trailed off.
Keke’s crying finally quieted, and she gently pushed away her embracing cousin.
With her eyes now somewhat clearer, she at last looked directly at the overturned bucket on the ground.
“These are blood clots. Xia Hua’s… blood.
“When left to stand, her blood separates…
“The upper layer is plasma, with a salt content less than one percent. It can… quench thirst…”
Keke’s eyes suddenly widened in horror, and she clapped both hands over her mouth, retching violently.
Ten days had passed since the zombie crisis erupted.
Without water, humans typically succumb within about seven days.
It seemed these survivors had been forced to consume something truly unpalatable.