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So aliens do look like us – two eyes and a nose.
—Mo Ke

“That was our bad, I apologise.” Another exosuit activated its visor, revealing a red, long-haired girl underneath, her age seemingly the same as the blue-haired youth, and just as good looking.

“Yeah… I knew zombies couldn’t open that door.” The third exosuit turned on her visor as well. The pilot was a young girl closer to our age, blue head of hair that was neat and short, and vaguely resembling that handsome youth.

“Live people! Finally more survivors!” Jiaojiao was beside herself with excitement as she yelled.

Ever since we left the shelter, we hadn’t encountered any other survivors. Honestly, with Southern Plains in the state it was in, nowhere was safe, and calling the situation complicated was an understatement.

However, the streets were undoubtedly the areas with the highest death rates. The virus outbreak happened in the day, a time when the streets would be the most packed. That was why most of the zombies were concentrated there.

Zombies had no intelligence to speak of, thus they wouldn’t normally enter buildings. As long as one was bold enough to clean the zombies already in the building, they would have a relatively safe hiding spot.

Assuming, of course, the people doing the cleaning hadn’t drunk the serum themselves.

I stealthily winked at Bitong, then asked, “Is there anyone else inside?”

Just based on their appearance, the three of them did not seem like bad people. Yet one could never be too careful – maintaining some distance would be the wiser choice.

“Just the three of us.” The blue-haired youth was the one to answer. “You guys have any idea what’s going on outside? Why did the world turn into a zombie survival game all of a sudden?”

“We aren’t too sure ourselves. By the way, have you guys drunk that Gene Enhancement Serum?”

Just as a precaution, I chose not to reveal that the serum was the cause of this outbreak. After all, if they knew that was the cause, their answers couldn’t be trusted.

“Gene Enhancement Serum?” The blue-haired youth paused for a second. “You mean that suspicious sounding serum that claims to be able to extend one’s life, and has been selling like hotcakes?”

“That’s right, the very same.” I looked him right in the eyes. “Have you guys drank it?”

“Nope.” He answered sincerely. “Our family is from Planet Bodono. We’ve long heard that Southern Plains of Planet Gaia is a tourist heaven, a place where you can really steep in the ancient history of the planet…”

The youth proceeded to explain his situation briefly before we exchanged names.

The youth’s name was Lan Zhi. The older, red-haired girl was his wife, Yang Fei. The other short-haired girl was their daughter, Lan Yue’er.

As the youth said, they were bonafide aliens on a holiday trip to Gaia, this city was their first stop. That’s when the outbreak happened and stranded them…

Thankfully, they did not believe in the advertising of the serum, thus they did not even buy it. If it wasn’t for that serendipitous stroke of mistrust, we would have three exosuit-clad zombies right now.

Naturally, I wouldn’t be so crass as to laugh at someone’s misfortunes… but for their first stop on this planet to be the epicenter of a virus outbreak… that was some next level misfortune right there!

I wonder though… How many of those damned serums were sold to the other planets as well? Bah. That can wait till after this whole situation blows over.

Now that we had basically confirmed that the Lan family was safe, our interactions were a lot less tense. The Lan family did not hinder us from entering the game room either. Once the girls were in as well, Lan Zhi closed the door and patched up the hole I cut.

It was then that I received a system message.

“Ding! Mission: Search for Weapons, complete. Please accept your rewards.”

The reward was a spell to create spheres of fire, Fireball. Upon accepting the reward, the knowledge started flooding into my head as before.

Every exosuit game room was equipped with ten exosuits in total. Jiaojiao in tow, Bitong started her work of adapting the exosuits. Lixiang, on the other hand, said that it would be unbecoming for me to be without an attendant in front of the aliens, so she stayed behind with me…

Huh…

Also, I know the Lans are from another planet, but aren’t they just immigrants from Gaia to begin with? How is that considered an alien?

Jibes aside, these aliens were worth having a serious talk with. They were all armed in exosuits, and based on our short exchange so far, I could tell that their judgement of the situation was adequate. They were potential allies in our quest for survival.

As we continued chatting, Lan Zhi went on with patching up the door, all the while in his exosuit. A natural reaction, seeing as our trust was only at the initial stages in a lawless zombie apocalypse. If he still had his wits about him, he wouldn’t disarm himself so quickly and gamble on a stranger’s kindness.

While we talked, his family would maintain a cautious distance from us. The fact that their weapons weren’t drawn was already a massive sign of trust.

“Oh right, so what are you guys doing here? Looking for someone?” Seeing Bitong work on the systems of an exosuit, Lan Zhi’s curiosity was naturally piqued. “Are you guys locals as well? Also, you mentioned the serum specifically just now. Is there some problem with it?”

“To be honest, we’re tourists as well. We were staying in a hot spring inn when the server jumped us…” I briefly recounted our experiences, finally ending as such, “We just escaped from one of the underground shelters. I have to say, your choice to hide here was a smart one. But it’s not a long term solution either. At the very least, a Game City would not have large stocks of food. And we still can’t be sure if the serum is the only source of the zombie virus…”

Now that I had confirmed that the serum was indeed the source of the virus, the Lans were astonished. Had the advertisement not been so ostentatious, they themselves might have bought it too. After all, in this day and age, products put on sale had to go through some level of checks…

Shameless Self-promotion

Announcement: I’ve re-opened my Patreon in case anyone wants to sponsor more chapters. Every end of the month, those chapters in early access will be released for free for all to read. If you sponsored a chapter, you will gain permanent early access to these chapters. Essentially, everyone gets more chapters to read, but those who donated get to read earlier. More chapters will then be translated at the start of the month. Explanation on the Patreon itself.

LINK HERE

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I followed Lixiang’s gaze and found two bifurcated zombies doing their best to crawl towards us. Naturally, I ignored them.

“Start the car.”

“Alright. Everyone sit tight, and make sure to put on your seat belts!” Seeing as I had obediently chosen to sit in the front seat rather than beside Jiaojiao, Bitong was practically beaming as she yanked the steering wheel to the left and slammed on the accelerator.

Under her forceful driving, the hover car jolted to life, then a second later, shot forward like an arrow in the specified direction.

“Woohooo!! Now we’re talking!! Slam ‘em!” Steeped in the exhilaration of the sudden burst of speed, Jiaojiao pumped her fist her in the air and yelled excitedly.

As if by her direction, Bitong actually drove the car into a path filled with zombies. That scene was… disgusting. The sudden bump and splat on the windows… maybe I was just being overly sensitive here… sensitive to zombie parts splattering onto my windows…

“Yahooo!!!”

Amidst Jiaojiao’s excited screaming, our hover car ended up running over a dozen zombies before smashing through the fancy glass gates of Joyworks Game City… And like an excited wolf in a sheep pack, we had no intention of slowing down at all as we raced straight for the exosuits. It wasn’t like there were any survivors wandering around now, so Bitong was more than happy to slam the accelerator like a mad bull…

I mean… the car was like a mad bull… not Bitong… why would I call her mad…

Each time we ran over a zombie, the car would give an obligatory jump, then a bloody mess of parts would come spraying over the sides, like we were a harvester plowing through a wheat field.

Honestly, all that blood and gore wasn’t even the most disconcerting thing right now, it was the sinister smile on Bitong’s face that only grew wider as she slammed into another zombie.

Not to say that I wasn’t happy she was killing zombies, but I wouldn’t want her to turn into Black Bitong because of that…

A while later, Bitong had basically cleared the first floor of Game City, finally stopping outside the room where the exosuits were housed.

“We’re here.”

Upon coming to a stop, Bitong motioned for me to get off first.

“I’ll check the area, you guys watch out in the car.” I said without hesitation, before circling around the car to confirm our safety.

Bitong’s forceful driving was definitely effective, but a hover car was no zombie killer, so the actual number of permanently dead zombies weren’t many; a normal hit that would have killed or maimed a person did not apply to these zombies, as their heads were their only weak point. This stubborn, no, annoyingly stubborn aspect of their undead nature meant that even as a head, they could still bite a person, they just couldn’t move.

With a few well-placed slashes of Icy Inferno, I finished off the two crawling zombies, then sweeped the surrounding areas. At which point, I tapped on the previously bloody, but now cleaned from the force of my swings, windows.

“It’s safe now. Come on out.”

The girls quickly disembarked and took up positions behind me automatically.

I took aim at the door of the exosuits game room, and prepared for the worst. From the flashing light above, this room should still be in use. However, there was no way of telling if it was a zombie or a human inside there right now. Based on the rest of the city however, caution was definitely needed.

Realising my intent as well, Bitong nodded her approval. In an exceptional situation like this, there weren’t many restrictions left, other than murdering, of course.

Sharp as a reaper’s scythe, Icy Inferno cut through the door like it sliced through flesh.

In no time at all, I carved out a large rectangular shaped hole that could easily fit me as long as I kept my head down a little.

“Thump!”

Clearly not used to slicing apart a door, the sliced-off portion summarily slumped to the floor with a hefty thump. I whipped my head around to quickly scan the area, fearful that the sound might have attracted more zombies.

Yet a second later, I remembered that Bitong had taken the liberty prior of knocking over every zombie we came across on this floor. They might not be dead, given a hover car wasn’t the best head smasher around, but they were probably unable to move.

In other words, there was no need to worry at all… or so I thought…

The moment the game room was exposed, a three meter tall, blue exosuit-clad figure stormed out of the room and charged right at us.

I immediately focused my SP into my feet and aimed a kick at its solar plexus.

Like kicking an iron wall, the resulting force sent me stumbling back, though I managed to steady myself with a quick tumble. As for that exosuit, it staggered and fell to the ground… then got up unharmed a second later.

There were still two more exosuits behind it, both in different colors. However, when the first exosuit fell down, the other two seemed to have been affected as well, coming to a stop immediately.

“Humans?” The blue exosuit promptly switched on his helmet visor, projecting the image of a twenty odd, blue-haired handsome man inside.

“So you guys aren’t zombies…” Even though I could clearly tell that the pilots of these exosuits were human, I did not lower my guard either. Instead, I quickly stepped in front of the girls and asked in a stern voice. “Why did you attack us?”

“Sorry about that. I thought you were a zombie.” The blue-haired youth laughed sheepishly. “Are you okay?”

“Do I look not okay to you?” I snapped back, still affected by the potentially fatal attack he nearly inflicted on us. “Have you not considered that a zombie can’t even cut a hole in the door to begin with?”

Despite my harsh tone, the blue-haired youth did not seem angry. He apologised once more. “That was my bad, I was too nervous. Sorry…”

Honestly, I understood his concerns, but that charge was truly a close call. Had I been a normal person, I would be dead by now. After all, these exosuits, entertainment or not, could hit a person with the force of a hover car.

Shameless Self-promotion

Announcement: I’ve re-opened my Patreon in case anyone wants to sponsor more chapters. Every end of the month, those chapters in early access will be released for free for all to read. If you sponsored a chapter, you will gain permanent early access to these chapters. Essentially, everyone gets more chapters to read, but those who donated get to read earlier. More chapters will then be translated at the start of the month. Explanation on the Patreon itself.

LINK HERE

Leave a comment

A zombie outbreak. Communications and traffic being shut down at the same time. Those were definite signs of a bigger conspiracy at work.

Because of the abruptness of this disaster, the majority of the hover cars stopped functioning by the side of the streets, and were filled by zombies. Naturally, I had no love for riding next to a zombie…

“We will ride a hover car in.” Bitong reiterated, then proceeded to explain her plan. “Those hover cars have stopped working because the traffic system of this city has collapsed. The person responsible for the virus is most likely responsible for this as well. What motives they have for causing such a disaster are unknown… but I do know that I can get those cars moving again!”

Voice dripping with sincerity, Lixiang asked, “Oh? How dost thou intend to restore these cars?”

Bitong gave Lixiang a strange look, probably trying to figure out if she was actually asking or just messing with her.

“The reason why these cars have all stopped moving is because their systems are all linked to the traffic bureau, which has collapsed. The hover cars rely on the Transport Bureau like how our game accounts rely on Game City servers to function.” Having stated all that in one breath, she paused for a second, then upon seeing that we were confused, tried to simplify it for us. “Simply put, we are hacking the cars by removing them from their servers onto a private server.”

Huh…

“And thou hast such a server?”

Bitong raised her left hand, revealing her electronic implant, decorated as a pink rose, for us to see. “We will use this.”

“But even if you can open the car doors, won’t the driving systems still be offline, since the Transport Bureau handles the auto-driving function as well.” I did not know much about cars, but I knew that much at least.

“Don’t worry.” Bitong looked me confidently in the eyes. “Your big sis over here will drive!”

The plan was basically set in stone at this point, at least till Jiaojiao suddenly interrupted us with her objection. A very reasonable objection too, I might add.

“But Jiaojiao does not want to sit in a car where a zombie once sat…”

Hmm… Honestly, I don’t want to touch something a corpse touches. I mean, who even wants to use something a dead person used before? Not like they are antiques…

“It’s fine. We will just search around the vicinity for an empty car.” Bitong tilted her chin. “Over there. That’s a car park, there should be some empty cars there.”

Quiet as a mouse, we proceeded onwards, doing our best to avoid any actions that could potentially attract any zombies.

The car park wasn’t too far from us, so we made it there without incident. However, the area was like a giant car accident. In all likelihood, when their systems went offline, there wasn’t much room for the cars to maneuver before slamming into another.

However, thanks to the sturdy make of most hover cars, even a severe crash would only cause a dent on the car chassis. Normally, the passengers would be safe. In fact, we could see a number of zombies clawing away at their windows, leaving behind an awful streak of claw marks.

Underneath some of these cars were severed limbs along with multiple incomplete zombies crawling on the floor with whatever limbs they had left. For the most part however, the zombies in the car park were still whole and complete.

Sensing the presence of live prey, the zombies immediately jerked around to face us, limbed or not!

“Flame Arrow!”
“Flame Arrow!”
“Flame Arrow!”

The girls took the initiative by blowing up three unfortunate zombie heads. Then without waiting for these zombies to collapse to the floor, I charged into the zombie horde, Icy Inferno tight in hand.

Like a grim reaper, Icy Inferno swiftly brought final death to a zombie. With my other hand, I erected a Fire Wall to block off the seven or so zombies charging at us.

Thanks to my previous two attempts at casting, I now knew to use only half of my SP, leaving me able to fight.

The zombies on the left charged fearlessly into the wall of flames, their bodies bursting into flames right away, then turning to ash an instant later, all as I had expected…

Mhm. That was good front-lining right there.

Sharp as the reaper’s scythe, every swing of Icy Inferno felled a zombie. Adding on the girls peppering the area with Flame Arrows, we easily wiped out thirty zombies in a minute.

And this was a head-on battle. No tricks this time!

“Jiaojiao’s the best!” Out of danger, the little girl did a celebratory leap before exclaiming, “Just like a VR game. How fun!”

Seeing that, I couldn’t help but wonder to myself, so who was it that was shivering in fright just now? Certainly not the person jumping, right? And game… who would ever want to play a horror game like this?

“Enough horsing around, let’s go find that car.” I gently flicked her on her forehead, then went off in search of an empty car, completely ignoring the pout she gave me.

The car park ended up producing several empty cars, as we had hoped. Whether or not these cars still had owners was unknown… but the probability wasn’t high.

“There’s one.” Bitong stated before applying her AI assistant to the lock. “This should only take a couple of minutes. Everyone, get ready.”

“Got it, sis. No matter how many zombies show their ugly heads, we will guard your back while you’re working, so don’t worry.”

The girls and I took up positions around Bitong. Even though I sounded supremely confident just now, I would much rather no zombie find us.

To be honest, there were car parks nearer to Game City, like the underground ones, but those tended to be more packed. The chances of a giant car pile up were even higher there. That was why we chose this open-air makeshift car park.

Finding an empty car here was a gamble, but it thankfully paid off.

“Done.”

Two minutes later, Bitong popped open the car door with a smug smile on her face, then hopped into the car.

“Wooo! We have a car now!” Jiaojiao dove in next, and waved at me to sit beside her. “Hurry up, big brother, Jiaojiao wants a hug from big brother!”

“Ke, over here!” Bitong immediately snapped back, then glared at Jiaojiao while holding onto the steering wheel. Finally, she turned around and smiled. “Ke, come to your big sis.”

“Sister Bitong is being mean!” Jiaojiao pouted while making a face at Bitong. Unfortunately, that wasn’t going to change her mind any time soon.

Lixiang had boarded the car at this point. She glanced behind us then said, “Your Highness, more zombies are coming.”

Shameless Self-promotion

Announcement: I’ve re-opened my Patreon in case anyone wants to sponsor more chapters. Every end of the month, those chapters in early access will be released for free for all to read. If you sponsored a chapter, you will gain permanent early access to these chapters. Essentially, everyone gets more chapters to read, but those who donated get to read earlier. More chapters will then be translated at the start of the month. Explanation on the Patreon itself.

LINK HERE

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Don’t worry, my driving skills are top of the class!

-Duanmu Bitong

“But this one isn’t delusional… this one really did awaken memories of her past life…”

Sometimes, the creature known as a middle schooler could only be described as inscrutable. To be able to lie to oneself so convincingly… was really a talent in itself.

“Just like a VR game then…” Not even bothering to pay attention to Lixiang’s delusions anymore, Bitong continued focusing on the arrow-shaped flame floating on her palms. “But I guess that’s not true either, since this is all happening in real life.”

I wasn’t entirely sure why she said that, but judging by her maintaining a floating arrow of flame on her palms, she seemed to have just discovered something about her powers.

Regardless… “We should leave soon.”

Even though the girls were all registered with the system now, before accumulating a vast amount of points, they were still relatively vulnerable. I did not want to see them hurt in any way, so procuring some entertainment exosuits was still our first order of business.

“Mhm.”

“Kay.”

“This one will always be at Your Highness’s side, ready to serve and protect.”

The heat from the flame spell had already dissipated significantly. At the very least, walking was possible as long as one did not linger too long at a single spot.

I swiftly led the girls out of the shelter, following the guidance of our electronic map towards Joyworks Game City.

The roads were littered with zombies, as one would expect, but they were scattered about. Adding on the fact that the girls just learnt some spells, our trip was a smooth one. Furthermore, we already had experience working together in VR games, so unless we were completely surrounded, these zombies did not stand a chance.

Their newly learnt spell, Flame Arrow, was a powerful fire attack that had a 100% accuracy rate on whatever targets they locked on. As a spell, it could be fired off instantly, required little energy, and was quite destructive for its level. Its only weakness was that there wasn’t much room for scaling -suitable for weaklings, but a lot less effective against zombie equivalents of BOSS monsters.

As a side note, we did not encounter many survivors en route to Joyworks Game City. We did not even encounter any policeman or soldier. Yet this sense of abject desolation did not end there. Because of the in-built system within each hover car, every hover car we encountered ceased to function completely. The collapse of the city’s traffic system meant that every car was in effective lockdown. Some were parked along the sides of the road, with a zombie locked inside and banging away at the windows. Others had smashed into a nearby lamp or object.

Because car doors required an electronic implant to open, and these zombies did not possess the intelligence required to operate their own electronic implants, these locked-up zombies were basically harmless.

We first hid in the vicinity of Joywork Game City’s entrance, observing the thoroughfare from a safe distance away. Honestly, there wasn’t much to see. Just a bunch of zombies blocking the entrance… a definite obstacle to entry… but also a massive hassle to clear. Mostly because there was a risk of attracting more zombies.

The fact that we hadn’t encountered any survivors yet was probably due to them congregating in shelters or buildings. By my estimates, that shelter we fled from had at least three to four thousand people. Judging by how much of a mess that was, there shouldn’t be many who got out of that gauntlet. Perhaps a few hundred lucky ones.

Those were the stakes we were working with now. A low survival rate with no restart button here to save us from death. One false move was all it took and game over.

“Look at all the monsters…” Jiaojiao gasped as she snuck a peak from behind me.

“Game City has always been a popular spot to congregate. I’m sure the virus struck when the crowds were high as well… But for it to be this bad…”

“They are numerous. But if we gather them up, and His Highness throws out his wall of flames…” Lixiang was completely vested in the whole magical world set up at this point. Magical girl was basically her identity at this point. Primal Angel of the Apocalypse was probably her ethnicity…

As a bonus, she seemed to object a lot less to Bitong now.

“That could work, but how do we attract their attention to one spot?” I gazed at the mass of zombies before us. There was a good hundred meters of empty space between us. Taking into account what would be required to enact Lixiang’s plan, I soon discovered that the plan wasn’t going to work at all.

The zombies moved too slowly, and the area was too spacious to erect a flame wall that could catch them in their mindless meandering.

It was at that point that Jiaojiao made her opinion heard as well. Fists tightened, she said, “Jiaojiao thinks we can just charge right in, then make a beeline for the room where the exosuits are stored.”

“That’s just too haphazard…” I was left a little speechless by the sheer absurdity of her brute force approach. Yes. We might have had the power to break through that blockade, but there was no telling what kind of dangers awaited us inside. If we were to rush through and then find ourselves facing another horde, we would be completely surrounded at that point.

And it would be of our own doing!

“Her plan is a little rough, but there’s some wisdom to it.” Surprisingly, Bitong agreed with Jiaojiao’s suggestion. “With some adjustments, of course.”

“Sis, what’s your plan?”

Everyone turned to look at Bitong in unison, eagerly anticipating her opinions.

She pointed at a nearby hover car, lips curled into a devious smile. “We can drive that hover car into the horde.”

“Huh?”

Drive it? Aren’t they all locked down now?

Shameless Self-promotion

Announcement: I’ve re-opened my Patreon in case anyone wants to sponsor more chapters. Every end of the month, those chapters in early access will be released for free for all to read. If you sponsored a chapter, you will gain permanent early access to these chapters. Essentially, everyone gets more chapters to read, but those who donated get to read earlier. More chapters will then be translated at the start of the month. Explanation on the Patreon itself.

LINK HERE