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“Come over here for a second.” I beckoned to the six survivors who claimed to have drunk that serum. I raised my pearl up to them individually for a quick check and… nothing, as I had expected.

“Are you sure that pearl of yours isn’t a fake?” The first of the survivors to claim to have drunk the serum -the aunty figure- eyed me with barely disguised envy. She bluntly stated, “Young lady, are you sure that antidote of yours is even real?”

Hey now, when have I offended you? Why are you looking at me like I’ve stolen your husband?

“Sigh. Aunty, the antidote is real.” I patiently explained to the best of my ability. “The detection device is real too.”

“Who are you calling an aunty? Do I look that old to you?” The middle-aged woman’s face immediately turned black. “I’m only sixty this year; the only reason I look a little old is because I’m tired from overworking! Don’t you know sixty is the prime of our lives? Hmph, now you’re being rude, young lady!”

She wasn’t actually wrong about the sixty part. Thanks to medical advances, a woman at sixty was the equivalent of a woman in her thirties in the past. Yet for some reason or another, this middle-aged aunty did seem a lot older, resulting in me stepping on that landmine…

Honestly, her hostility towards me was apparent even before I blundered – I wonder when did I ever offend her?

“Calm down, I will look into your situation, so just…” I did my best to placate her, but before I could get another word in, the sounds of someone banging against a door interrupted us…

“Bang! Bang! Bang!” The heavy banging continued. It was that segregation room I had specifically dumped that annoying youth into which was causing this disturbance.

Completely focused on arguing with me, the middle-aged aunty was startled to silence by the suddenness and sheer ferocity of the banging. Because the area we were in was a lounge for the staff, the doors were all made of sturdy wood. The full-bodied thud of the bangs were different from that of a metal door’s banging. I knew right away that youth was the source.

“Lady Mo Ke, that man has started to show signs of zombification…” The pilot’s voice started to trail off at the end, the weight of his blunder finally starting to sink in.

“Didn’t I tell you to make him drink it?” I glared at the pilot. Through his holographic display, I could tell he was desperately trying to avoid my gaze.

“It was inconvenient to feed him the antidote while in an exosuit…” The pilot feebly replied. “So I left the antidote there for him to drink.”

“I guess my words mean nothing to you then.”

The blonde pilot immediately lowered his head in shame. “I did place the antidote there… he just didn’t drink it. That’s all…”

From his story, I’m guessing he just wanted to inconvenience the youth a little. Probably to get some payback for me… or perhaps he thought I was exaggerating the situation. Most likely, both. Even so, the fact was that the antidote was within reach for the man. He could have drunk it anytime before the process started. He had only himself to blame for not doing so.

Regardless, it seems like this die has been cast for me. Whatever reason motivated that pilot to do what he did is no longer important. What’s important is how do I minimise the fallout… I am still under surveillance, after all… I mean I’m livestreaming…

“Open the door.”

“But…”

“Lady Mo Ke told you to open the door, didn’t she?!” Sima Junmo finally lost his temper with the younger pilot, smacking him on his head. “Now, get to it!”

Even his team leader had spoken, what else was that pilot to do at this point.

Having just reprimanded his subordinate, Simo Junmo immediately turned around to me, face as gentle as summer breeze, as if that barking monster from before was someone else entirely. “Lady Mo Ke, this is all my fault for not controlling my men well. If there’s any way I can make up for this, do not be shy.”

I threw the man an annoyed look. “You can start by calling me SIR Mo Ke.”

“Haha. Lady Mo Ke is such a kidder.”

“I wasn’t joking!”

“Hahaha…”

“…” Bah.

Not long after our quick exchange, the blonde pilot had the door to the segregation room opened.

“Rawr!”

The zombie pounced out the moment the door was even slightly ajar. Its sudden appearance sent shockwaves through the survivors. Screams started to erupt amongst their ranks as their already fragile mental state was pushed past the brink.

Now that it was fully a zombie, it had lost all sense of reason. The only thought left in its head was to grab the living and feast on them. It just so happened that the blonde exosuit pilot was the closest.

Still safely protected by his exosuit, the blonde pilot easily grabbed the zombie by his arm, subduing it in a couple of quick moves.

“Wait! Don’t kill it yet!” I yelled -just in time too- as the pilot was mere seconds away from snapping its neck. Instead, the blonde pilot switched his grip back to a restraining chokehold. No matter how much that zombie struggled, there was no overcoming the sheer strength difference between an exosuit and a zombie.

In the meantime, I walked into the room and found the antidote on the floor, just as the pilot stated. It was standing upright, as pristine as the moment when the system first spat it out into my hands. In other words, that annoying youth never bothered to drink the antidote. This was completely on him.

Yet just as I was about to pick up the antidote, Sima Junmo suddenly called out, “Wait.”

“Hm?” I turned around, confused. “What’s wrong?”

Sima Junmo strode across the lounge towards me, his grin as wide as the berth I wanted to give him. “How about I do it instead? There’s no way I can let Lady Mo Ke handle such a dirty job… There’s no telling if the virus is still lingering inside the room. And even if it isn’t, it’s unthinkable to let a lady breathe in the same air as that scum.”

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