Chapter 3: Perilla Dry Pot Bullfrog

Cold-blooded, hideous, writhing.

The scarlet snake tongue flickered slowly, as if it had already locked onto the prey before it. Su Su felt her scalp tingle, her body frozen in place, not daring to move a muscle. She was terrified that if she shifted, the black snake would lunge and strike. After all, Wu Zhi had just grabbed it... and given the vengeful nature of cold-blooded creatures, it might well have marked her as an "enemy" too.

The snake’s body, hanging from the tree branch, stretched longer and longer, inching closer to the human on the ground.

"Don't bite me..."

Without realizing it, tears of fear welled up in Su Su’s eyes, and she instinctively scooted backward.

"Hiss, hiss..."

Just as the danger drew nearer, a sudden exclamation rang out from behind her.

"She’s here!"

Noise and footsteps flooded into the woods. The black snake, sensing trouble, retracted instantly into the canopy and vanished from sight in the blink of an eye.

A flashlight beam cut through the darkness. The leader of the super-powered group was the first to discover Wu Zhi’s corpse—his eyes wide open, his forehead bruised and purple, a look of deathly indignation frozen on his face.

"This..."

"What’s wrong?" Lin Weiran pushed through the brush. A second later, her expression turned ghastly. "Wu Zhi is dead?"

She glanced reflexively at Su Su, who was huddled on the ground with reddened eyes, her tone turning involuntarily cold and harsh.

"What happened? Why is Wu Zhi dead?"

The interrogation she had expected finally arrived.

Su Su hugged her knees, her voice sounding unnervingly numb. "He was bitten by a poisonous snake."

"How could that be?" Lin Weiran frowned, clearly skeptical.

Si Zhe, standing beside her, crouched down. After scanning Wu Zhi’s body, his gaze locked precisely onto the leg where the pant cuff was rolled up. "There are indeed snakebite marks on his leg."

"What kind of snake has poison potent enough to kill Wu Zhi without him even making a sound?" Lin Weiran pursed her lips, feeling a flicker of unease.

There were seven super-powered individuals in their group, but only four were at the second rank: herself, Si Zhe, Wu Zhi, and Zhao Zhenyu. On their journey south, Wu Zhi’s strength-based ability had been invaluable; with a swing of his baseball bat, nine out of ten zombies would have their heads exploded, and the tenth would have its head sent flying. Her fire abilities and Si Zhe’s lightning abilities were useful, but they drained energy quickly and had limited offensive range early on... Thinking of this, Lin Weiran’s mood soured.

Zhao Zhenyu was even less able to contain his temper. He glared fiercely at Su Su. "What is wrong with you? When Wu Zhi was bitten, why didn't you call for help? We were right outside the woods; if you had just shouted once, we could have saved him!"

Su Su remained silent.

Now, Lin Weiran also grew dissatisfied, her gaze toward her cousin filled with intense disappointment and misplaced blame.

"Why didn't you call for help?"

It was the exact same interrogation as in her previous life. Su Su felt a sense of detachment. How had she answered back then? Back then, with a swollen face, she had clung to a sliver of desperate hope that these people would stand by her side.

—"He wanted to rape me."

"He wanted to rape me." Su Su said it anyway, though this time, her tone was calm. "He just hadn't succeeded yet when the snake bit him."

She even offered a faint smile.

"It was the same black snake he had just caught. It came back for revenge."

The two sentences left the scene in total silence.

"What rape? Does Wu Zhi even need to rape you!" Zhao Zhenyu sneered. "Do you think this is still before the apocalypse? Do you think every man is yours to choose from? He’s a second-rank super-powered user; he can have any woman he wants! Who knows if you were the one pestering him to bring you into the woods, trying to squeeze some benefits out of him, and now that he’s dead, you’re trying to shift the blame!"

His words resonated with the other super-powered individuals, and they all cast suspicious glares at Su Su. They were the super-powered ones; she was just a normal person, the most disposable kind. No defense would work.

Su Su turned into a mute, refusing to speak again.

Seeing this, Zhao Zhenyu’s anger flared even higher. "Weiran! Your cousin got Wu Zhi killed; there has to be an explanation. Otherwise, throw her out. A woman with such malicious intent in our group—I’m afraid she’ll get us all killed one day!"

From the moment Su Su said the word "rape," Lin Weiran had gone silent.

"...Forget it."

"Forget it? What do you mean?"

"She didn't do it on purpose. No one could have expected Wu Zhi to be killed by a snake." Lin Weiran pursed her lips. "Zhenyu, do me a favor and let it go."

Zhao Zhenyu huffed through his nose, stewing for several seconds before finally compromising. "Fine. For your sake, I won't hold it against her."

The farce ended, and the others left the woods one by one. Su Su struggled to stand and began to walk out. As she passed Lin Weiran, the latter called out to her, "Wait..."

Su Su acted as if she hadn't heard a thing, head bowed as she walked out of the woods and merged back into the group of ordinary people.

Lin Weiran’s lips thinned, and she instinctively looked at Si Zhe, who stood by her side.

"Did I do the wrong thing?"

"Maybe she didn't like Wu Zhi, and I was the one who let him approach her..."

"Don't think so much." Si Zhe raised a hand and ruffled her hair. "Wu Zhi is dead now; none of that matters anymore."

"I suppose." Lin Weiran exhaled, sighing helplessly. "Actually, I haven't seen this cousin of mine for many years. Sometimes I really don't know what she's thinking. Wu Zhi... perhaps if someone had just shouted in time, he wouldn't have died."

"It’s just one less combatant. Do you not trust me?" Si Zhe gently squeezed her palm. "Even if it were just me, I could still get you safely to the Southern Base."

Lin Weiran blushed.

"Of course I trust you."

...

After everyone left, the woods returned to silence. Under the cover of night, no one saw a black snake coiled around a thick tree trunk. It poked its head from behind the tree, its vertical pupils shifting as it stared at the spot where the group had gathered.

After a while, the grass rustled violently, and something slithered past.

Within the group, someone’s backpack wasn't zipped tightly, revealing a large gap.

The dark, cold-blooded creature crawled slowly and stealthily into the bag.

...

The next day, the group set off again. Having gone without food for a day and a night, Su Su was hunched over from hunger.

When they finally reached the next service area, the sound of car engines attracted the zombies lingering there, and they swarmed toward the convoy.

"Zhao Zhenyu, take the others and handle the zombies outside! Si Zhe and I will take the ones inside! We’ll meet up at the convenience store later!"

"Got it!"

Four super-powered individuals stayed outside. With the second-rank Zhao Zhenyu leading, the dozens of low-level zombies were no match for them. Among the ordinary people’s convoy, some strong men and women also picked up weapons to fight off the stragglers. The zombies had crystals in their brains, which super-powered users could consume to increase their strength. Ordinary people could only trade them to the super-powered for supplies.

Su Su stayed with the "old, weak, sick, and disabled" group, not moving an inch.

She had once been one of the people working hard to kill zombies, fighting alongside other physically weak women; if they were lucky, they could kill a lone zombie.

"Su Su? Aren't you going to fight the zombies?" a companion tugged at her, confused. "About last night... they aren't holding it against you anymore anyway. Staying alive is what matters most."

Staying alive is what matters most?

She had worked so hard to survive for four years in the apocalypse, only to die anyway.

Soon, the zombies outside the service area were cleared. The super-powered individuals headed toward the convenience store in high spirits. The other ordinary people didn't move, waiting for them to finish taking supplies so they could search for leftovers—this was the unwritten rule of the team, and one of the reasons Lin Weiran allowed so many people to follow them.

"Right," Zhao Zhenyu suddenly turned back, his gaze locking precisely onto Su Su in the crowd, his words laden with implication. "For those who want something for nothing, I’d say you don't even deserve to enter the convenience store. If anyone is thick-skinned enough to sneak in and search for supplies, don't blame me if I beat you out."

No one made a sound. Everyone knew who he was talking about.

Zhao Zhenyu disappeared into the convenience store, while the others avoided it, opting to search elsewhere. Only the old, weak, and disabled remained near the vehicles.

Suddenly, Su Su, who had been like a ghost since last night, stood up, drawing many eyes toward her.

She didn't explain herself; in front of everyone, she walked into the service area.

Hunger caused her stomach to cramp in waves, and Su Su made a choice completely different from her previous life.

Why shouldn't she search?

She was going in.

If not the convenience store, she could go elsewhere.

Su Su blindly picked a room. The door wouldn't open, but looking through the window, she could see it was tidy—it looked like a staff office.

There were no zombies.

Feeling lightheaded, she climbed through the window.

After rummaging through cabinets for a while, she finally found two packs of instant noodles in the bottom drawer of an office cabinet. A glimmer of light flickered in Su Su’s numb eyes. She grabbed a pack, tore it open, and stuffed it into her mouth.

Crunch, crunch.

She chewed instinctively, the dry, hard noodles crushed and swallowed. With something finally in her stomach, her brain, dizzy from hunger, cleared a little.

As her reason returned, she finally had the energy to pay attention to her surroundings.

From this angle, she could see a half-eaten pack of noodles in a dim corner, covered in dust, the non-perishable noodles slightly discolored... it seemed to have been left there for a very long time.

And the door that wouldn't open—it was locked from the inside.

Su Su suddenly stopped chewing, realizing something was wrong. At that very moment, an intense sense of crisis pierced her back.

She instinctively dodged to the side.

Bang!

The attacking zombie slammed into the desk!

"Roar!"

It stood up quickly, its withered arms reaching for Su Su with speed and precision.

There was no way to dodge!

Su Su watched as the exceptionally fast zombie lunged at her, its pale, gaunt face hideous, its rotting fangs bared, clearly eager to devour the flesh and blood of a living person.

"Get away—"

Su Su shrieked, a surge of desperate survival instinct erupting. The white light she had only seen once before appeared again, stabbing into the zombie like a bolt of lightning.

As if in a frozen film, the zombie’s movements suddenly stalled.

Su Su only hesitated for a second before she strained to lift a nearby chair and smashed it into the frozen zombie—once, twice, three times... its head was smashed to pieces.

A transparent crystal fell out from the shattered skull.