Chapter 9
Xing Nuo, dangling by the back of his neck, struggled weakly in mid-air.
He gasped for breath, his face pale, his lips completely devoid of color.
He turned his head to look at the “person” holding him, his voice as weak as a kitten’s.
“Not…little zombie!”
Xing Nuo’s speech was slurred, and he didn’t even understand what a zombie was.
The one holding Xing Nuo was a mid-level zombie in human form.
The zombie’s expression was stiff, its face pale, its eyes vacant and lifeless.
It stared fixedly at Xing Nuo for a long time.
Lifting the little cub, the zombie sniffed him, letting out a guttural sound.
“You are!”
This little zombie had a very faint human scent, masked by the strong smell of a high-level monster.
The zombie couldn’t identify the scent of the high-level monster, only instinctively sensing danger, even feeling the urge to drop the little zombie and run.
Fortunately, the zombie was already halfway to becoming a high-level zombie, and, with stiff arms, it didn’t reveal its fear too obviously.
They were all monsters; abandoning one of their own didn’t feel right.
The zombie’s eyes moved stiffly, and it praised the little zombie.
“Seems like you’ve learned well. When you meet other humans, don’t reveal your zombie identity. If you encounter them, just say you’re human.”
Xing Nuo was bewildered, not knowing how to respond.
He was human!
The zombie didn’t care, simply carrying Xing Nuo back.
“There was another little zombie who came here earlier. The two of you can keep each other company.”
The zombie was fast. Even carrying the little cub like a pendant didn’t affect its speed.
Soon, it arrived at a dilapidated building with Xing Nuo.
The building was dark, damp, and crumbling, like a shadowy lair, with an unknown liquid dripping plop, plop.
Inside were several zombies with stiff expressions, but whose appearances closely resembled humans.
Seeing the zombie return with a little zombie, a female zombie said with a deadpan expression:
“Why is there another little zombie here?”
The zombies were currently undergoing rigorous training in imitating humans. Young zombies were the focus of this education and were generally not allowed to wander outside.
Once their training was complete, they would disguise themselves as humans, infiltrate human settlements, gather intelligence, and relay information back to the zombie horde.
High-level zombies had gradually developed intelligence and were beginning to engage in psychological warfare with humans.
The zombie shook its head, its not-so-bright mind struggling to come up with an answer.
“Probably saw the new batch of humans in the city and couldn’t resist the urge to take a bite.”
The nature of a little zombie was hard to suppress. They craved blood and human flesh and would often sneak out to attack humans.
Although most didn’t return.
“Luckily, I found him. Otherwise, a little zombie like him would be killed instantly if discovered by humans.”
The female zombie glanced at Xing Nuo and shook her head.
“Not necessarily.”
This little zombie looked quite human.
His eyes were lively, his expressions vivid. If it weren’t for the strong monstrous scent, he would be practically indistinguishable from a human.
Perhaps he could even sneak in undetected.
None of their zombies had successfully infiltrated human society yet.
Xing Nuo’s feet finally touched the ground. Listening to their conversation, his mind buzzed.
He listened in a daze, blinking, and gradually understood.
He seemed to have been mistaken for one of these monsters.
Liang Yun, on a whim, decided to watch a television drama.
Halfway through, the television screen suddenly flashed a bloody image of a ruined city.
She felt dizzy for a moment. When she regained consciousness, she had been pulled into an infinite flow instance world.
She was lucky. She had landed near several veteran players who brought her, a newbie, to the human base.
In just half a day, Liang Yun was forced to accept the reality of being trapped in the infinite flow world.
Liang Yun learned some information about this world from the veteran players.
It was a world composed of countless horror instances. After being pulled in, humans needed to earn points and props in these instances to survive.
Some instances were easy, others difficult. The highest level was S+, which only the top-ranked players dared to challenge.
Ordinary people like Liang Yun, unlucky, could only choose easier instances to scrape by.
But even in these easier instances, many people died and never returned.
Liang Yun’s eyes were filled with the bewilderment typical of a newcomer.
“So, we can never go back to the real world?”
Her cola, fried chicken, fries, burgers, spicy hot pot… were they all gone?!
And her small apartment, for which she had just made the down payment, what would happen to her mortgage?!
The veteran player gave a self-deprecating laugh and kindly explained:
“It’s not that you can’t go back, it’s just…difficult!”
Even the top players were still struggling to earn points and survive. For small fries like them, it might take forever.
Another kind-hearted veteran player offered some reassurance:
“But don’t worry too much. This zombie instance is quite simple. Surviving for three days is enough to clear it. It’s one of the friendlier instances.”
Liang Yun and the other two newcomers felt relieved.
Seeing the heavy atmosphere, a player tried to lighten the mood, scratching his head and saying:
“We’re quite lucky to have run into you guys. If we had landed in the zombie horde on the other side of the city, we would be dead already, hahaha!”
The veteran players exchanged glances, their expressions changing slightly.
While hiding earlier, they had actually seen a child being carried away by a zombie.
The chances of survival were slim.
Xing Nuo, having been carried back to the zombie lair, sat obediently on a small stool, looking dazed amongst the other zombies, participating in a class on imitating humans.
This was the zombies’ temporary classroom.
The zombies sat below, some not even needing stools, simply squatting.
Their expressions were uniformly stiff and blank, their dark eyes fixated on the blackboard, their mouths slightly open, occasionally letting out guttural groans.
The instructor was a high-level zombie teacher.
The zombie teacher looked lively and realistic. If it weren’t for its slightly pale complexion and somewhat stiff eye movements, it would be almost indistinguishable from a human.
“…The most difficult and complex aspect of humans is their facial expressions, which is the main reason for our failed disguises.”
The zombie teacher pushed up his glasses and called on someone to answer a question.
“The little zombie who just arrived, tell me, what should your reaction be if a human suddenly becomes suspicious of you?”
Xing Nuo, aware he was mistaken for a zombie, slowly stood up under the oppressive gazes of the other zombies.
After standing up, he noticed another little zombie about his age also standing.
The little zombie in front slowly turned around, its neck moving with a stiff, mechanical jerk.
The little zombie had jet-black hair and eyes, blinking with apparent effort, its skin an unnatural, lab-grown white.
He looked at Xing Nuo, tilted his head, and bared his small, sharp teeth in what was presumably a smile.
Xing Nuo froze, blinking a few times, unsure whether to be scared or to smile back.
The zombie teacher, seeing the friendly exchange between the two little ones, pushed up his glasses.
“Alright, the zombie in front, sit down. You’re too stiff. Even after ten or twenty years of training, and several more evolutions, you still might not be sent to the human side.”
The teacher looked at the black-haired little zombie and shook his head.
Clearly a low-level zombie, with only rudimentary intelligence.
He encountered hordes of these types of zombies in every class; they weren’t anything special.
“Curly-haired little zombie in the back, answer my question.”
The curly-haired little zombie, Xing Nuo, obediently hummed in response, thought for a moment, and shook his little head.
“I…don’t…know.”
He was a human who had infiltrated the zombie ranks; he didn’t know how to disguise himself as a human while pretending to be a zombie.
Ever since arriving here, Xing Nuo had looked bewildered.
His small curls, ruffled by the wind, framed his pale face, and his speech was halting and unclear, making him look somewhat like a little zombie.
The high-level zombie teacher seemed to notice something and walked over to Xing Nuo.
The zombie teacher’s lips were pressed into a thin line. He bent down, his face expressionless, and sniffed Xing Nuo intently.
After sniffing for a long time, he could only smell the strong scent of a monster, and a faint, almost dissipating human scent.
This was strange.
How could a little zombie have the scent of a boss-level monster?!
The only boss-level monster the zombie teacher had ever encountered was the Zombie King.
Unfortunately, he had been too far away and didn’t remember the Zombie King’s scent clearly, so he couldn’t determine what kind of monster scent was on the little zombie.
Could it be…
Was this little zombie related to the Zombie King?
