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If apologies mean anything, then what do we need zombies for?

—-Mo Ke

No matter what, Icy Inferno was staying by my side -this was my means of protecting the girls and myself.

Even so, Officer Liao had no intention of yielding either. Voice slightly high from tension, he fired off another assurance, “It’s very safe here. I will swear I will protect you… ahem… I meant to say that I will protect everyone. That’s my mission!”

I could tell he was being sincere there. He really did mean to protect everyone, but I did not reply at all. Instead, I trained my eyes on the hoodlums who were sniggering at me arguing with the officer.

Being an experienced officer, he realised where my eyesight was at.

A moment later, he whipped his head around and singled out the hoodlums. “You lot. Apologise to Miss Ke, right this instant! Or else I will teach you a lesson!”

Miss Ke?

I don’t remember introducing myself to him, so how would he know… Wait, I’m not even Miss Ke, I’m Mo Ke!

I got it. It’s those busybodies. They must have spread my picture around the net… who knows how many strangers know my face at this point…

“But Officer Liao, that’s where you are wrong.” The leader of the hoodlums smiled in his typical weaselly fashion. “We’re not the ones carrying a weapon here, why would we go out of our way to antagonise the scary sword lady over there?”

The hoodlum leader was a cunning one. With just one simple question, he easily turned the issue back onto me. His logic was irrefutable as well, who would even try and antagonise a fierce looking newcomer, armed with a sword and a deathly glare…

Officer Liao raised an eyebrow at the implication. “So you’re saying she’s the one who picked a fight then?”

“I never said that. I’m just stating that her weapon is scary.” The hoodlum deliberately danced around the subject again. This was his usual tactic, and it was more than honed at this point. To begin with, what he did wasn’t even that serious so it would resolve itself anyway.

Just like that, we entered into a stand-off; no one wanted to compromise in the slightest.

Officer Liao was put in a spot because of my insistence to hold onto my weapon. On the other hand, the hoodlums were practically giggling to themselves right now as they constantly winked at me, as if to say, what’s the matter, girlie? So what if we harassed you? It’s not like you can swing that fancy sword at us.

Truly abominable, this situation. But I couldn’t just hack them to pieces. That would be against the law, especially in front of Officer Liao…

The atmosphere grew tenser by the minute. Officer Liao was stuck between me and a bunch of hoodlums who were only growing bolder with their taunting.

Looking at those failures of the human race, I truly cursed at their kind, the kind of miscreant who never committed any grave sin, but did enough just to annoy you… Ugh!

Yet just when my temper was about to reach its boiling point, the herald of bad news came riding in on a piercing wail amidst the refugees. “AHHH… he got bitten! Someone just got bitten to death…”

From the epicenter of that scream, a horde of people began running outwards. At the start, no one knew exactly what was going on, but when a person with blood spilling from the sides of his mouth like a waterfall started pouncing on random people, the realisation immediately sank in.

Like a herd of stampeding horses, waves of people rushed towards the closest exit they could find. Within this shelter, there were a total of eight exits – four staircases and four elevators, located in the four directions each.

With a human stampede rushing towards us, it didn’t take long before the five hoodlums were swallowed up by the wave.

Seeing the crowd in such a panicked state, I immediately pulled the girls close to me, herding everyone to the side so as to avoid direct contact.

Naturally, Officer Liao had already sprung into action. Waving his baton about as he yelled, “Everyone. Stay calm… do not panic…”

Yet no matter how amplified his voice was, no one was going to calm down just because he said so. In fact, they seemed even more frightened now.

In mere moments, cries for help and children wailing began to fill the cramped exits as more people fell to the ground, trampled to death by the crowd they were part of not too long ago…

As the trampling got worse, the blind nature of human fear only spurred on their frantic desire to rush for the exits. Everyone was controlled by the monster known as fear, and that monster was cruelly whipping them ever onwards, right through their fellow humans.

Sometimes, it was another person who had failed to keep up with the rapid pace of the crowd, only to get trampled to death as punishment. Other times, it was a mother desperately trying to find her child in the midst of a forest of humans.

“Big brother, what’s going on over there?” Jiaojiao mumbled as she shrunk closer into my arms, horrified by the merciless crowd and their poor victims. Not too long ago, she had witnessed another boy around her age stumble, only to to never stand up again. She dared not raise her head, burying it deep into my chest as she clutched down on my shirt. At the side, that trampled boy continued to look lifelessly in her direction.

“Don’t worry, your big brother is here.” The instant this whole mess started, I made the quick decision to evacuate everyone to the side, basically somewhere where we weren’t in a straight line to any exit. Thanks to that, we managed to avoid the horde entirely.

As for why didn’t we just rush to the elevator… Honestly, my instincts just told me that the elevator most likely wasn’t going to be safe for long.

Officer Liao tried his hardest to maintain order, but the startled masses would have none of that. Faced with an unstoppable, unthinking wave of people, the best he could manage was keep himself safe for the time being.

Amidst the chaos, I could hear other police officers shouting over the crowd to try and calm them down. As I had expected, Officer Liao wasn’t the only officer on duty here.

Unfortunately, without an exosuit, these policemen couldn’t even guarantee their own survival.

Suddenly, Bitong whispered in my ears. “Someone is changing.”

Even amidst the din of the crowd, I was still able to catch some key phrases, like bitten, dead, etc.

It was only to be expected that some would start turning into zombies…

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