After All Species Mutated, I Activated Cheats [Apocalyptic] - Chapter 2

The next morning.

After taking his medicine and getting some sleep, Lu Mian finally had the strength to deal with the large box of deliveries he had struggled to drag home the day before.

He had purchased various food items online a few days ago—milk, biscuits, instant meals, self-heating pots, various noodles, and even vacuum-sealed meats.

There was a time during his childhood when he never had enough to eat, which led to a habit of hoarding food. Looking at it now, this habit couldn’t have been more appropriate. He could stay at home for a long time without worrying about food shortages, the only thing missing was fresh vegetables.

After taking inventory of his supplies, he planned to head out to buy some produce to stock up.

The typhoon had just passed, but rain was already falling again outside. Lu Mian took his only umbrella and headed downstairs. In the first-floor hallway, he carefully tried to shake off the green dust clinging to the fabric. To his frustration, no matter how hard he tried, the green powder seemed to have seeped into the material, refusing to budge. It left the entire surface of the umbrella looking filthy.

The rain gradually intensified. Having no other choice, he opened his small green umbrella and stepped out. Just as he reached the community entrance, an ambulance drove in and pulled up in front of his building.

A team of medical staff jumped out, carrying various emergency equipment, and went straight into the convenience store on the ground floor. A few moments later, the store owner was carried out on a stretcher.

Lu Mian’s brow furrowed, that eerie feeling in his gut deepening. He had felt something was off with the owner yesterday, but he hadn’t expected the man’s condition to deteriorate so rapidly. In just one night, it was as if his very life force had been completely drained.

He watched as the convenience store owner was loaded into the ambulance. From his vantage point, he could clearly see the man’s face, which was as pale as paper.

What struck him even more was that the owner wasn’t wearing the black windbreaker from yesterday. Instead, he was bundled in a heavy down jacket and a thick cotton coat. Despite the layers, the man’s lips were a bruised blue from the cold, and his entire body was shaking uncontrollably.

It wasn’t the dead of winter. He couldn’t understand why a common flu could make someone freeze like this in the middle of July.

First, there was Brother Zhao, who had been taken away by people in hazmat suits, and now the store owner with such severe symptoms. In just one day, two people in his immediate circle had been hospitalized because of this “flu.” This forced him to re-evaluate the situation.

He pulled a mask from his pocket and put it on. Regardless of what was happening, it was best to stay hunkered down at home for the time being.

It wasn’t safe outside.

That night, Lu Mian was jolted awake by a bizarre sound.

In the silence of the night came a scratching noise. It didn’t sound like a cat or a dog, but more like a person slowly and rhythmically clawing at the ground.

He opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling in annoyance, wondering what on earth was wrong with his usually quiet upstairs neighbor.

He reached for his phone by the bed. It was just past midnight, and the neighborhood WeChat group was unusually active.

He tapped into the messages and stared at the rapidly scrolling text for a long time.

Building 1, 1302: What do I do? That thing is still there! I don’t dare open the window to drive it away. Its face… its face looks like a human’s!

Attached to the message was a photo.

Lu Mian clicked the image. While it was loading, he let out a huge yawn, but in the next second, all traces of sleepiness vanished under the shock of the picture.

The photo was of a window. The person taking it hadn’t dared to turn on the lights, so the thing clinging to the outside of the glass was clearly visible.

It was a butterfly with two pairs of wings. The translucent wings were covered in complex patterns that, at first glance, looked like a skull tattoo.

If it were an ordinary butterfly, it wouldn’t have caused such a panic in the group chat. The issue was that this butterfly… was half the size of a human!

Lu Mian stared at the creature that took up nearly half the window, his heart rate quickening. Any insect, once it exceeds its natural dimensions, becomes a source of primal terror.

The neighbor’s mention of a “human face” lingered in his mind. Lu Mian swallowed hard and forced himself to look at the butterfly’s head.

A wrinkled, puckered thing that looked uncannily like a human face was pressed tightly against the glass. Where the mouth should be was a hollow void, its contours curved upward into a stiff, frozen grin, as if it were smiling while peering inside.

Building 1, 1302: Wait! It moved! It’s crawling down!

Building 2, 1304 (Zhang): The person downstairs turned on their light!

Building 1, 1302: Quick! @Building 1, 1202 (A-Zhen), turn off the lights! Lock your windows!

Building 1, 1202 (A-Zhen): They’re off! They’re off! What is that thing?!

Building 2, 1304 (Zhang): I don’t know! I’ve never heard of a butterfly growing this big! I… I’ll take a video for you guys! From my perspective, it looks like some kind of alien species!

Building 2, 1304 (Zhang): My hands are shaking right now!

The video took a moment to upload. Lu Mian waited until the clip from the opposite building appeared.

Because of the distance between the buildings, the footage was blurry and shaky, but it clearly showed a giant butterfly crawling down the exterior of Building 1 from the roof. It was moving surprisingly fast.

A wave of revulsion washed over Lu Mian, the hair on his arms standing on end. He watched the video repeatedly, trying to make sense of it.

Suddenly, his sharp eyes caught a blurry, familiar-looking shadow at the edge of the photo sent earlier by the resident in Building 2.

With trembling hands, he paused the video, took a screenshot, and zoomed in to the maximum while cranking up his phone’s brightness.

Lu Mian: !!!!!!

Tucked along the side of Building 1 was a dense, swarming mass of those “human faces”!!!!

Moving faster than he ever had in his life, he circled the entities in the screenshot with a red line and posted it to the group.

Building 1, 402 (Lu): This is bad! Everyone, turn off your lights and close your windows! NOW!!!! There’s a whole swarm of them!

He immediately dropped his phone and sprinted through his apartment, bolting every window and pulling the curtains tight. He left only a tiny sliver of a gap in the living room curtains to monitor the outside.

For a moment, the entire complex echoed with the sound of doors and windows slamming shut. The ruckus woke many sleeping residents, and several units actually turned on their lights, followed by a chorus of cursing.

“Who is it?! Who’s slamming doors in the middle of the night!”

“Have some respect! Some of us are trying to sleep!”

“What’s going on? If you aren’t sleeping, don’t ruin it for everyone else!”

Amidst the shouting, someone managed to dig out a megaphone. A voice crackling with electronic static suddenly drowned out the complaints: “Stop shouting! Everyone, check if your doors and windows are locked! If not, get up and lock them now! If you have questions, check the owner’s group! Move fast!”

The shouting died down briefly, followed by even louder cursing from some. But after ten seconds, the sound of windows being secured rippled through the complex again.

The property management group was flooded with messages scrolling too fast to read. In the chaos, someone tagged him.

He tapped the notification and saw it was the person from the opposite building who had posted the video.

Building 2, 1304 (Zhang): @Building 1, 402 (Lu), @Building 1, 602 (Boxing Appliances), did you guys hear something?

The cryptic question left Lu Mian confused. He scrolled down further and finally understood why the neighbor had tagged them specifically.

It was a thirty-second video clip, even blurrier than the last.

In the video, on one of the lower floors of Building 1, the human-faced butterflies were squeezing through an open window. At first, it was just a few, but in the next second, the “main force” waiting on the side of the building arrived. The scene became utterly grotesque.

A massive swarm of giant butterflies scrambled to shove themselves into the single opening. Many had their wings snapped off in the crush. Large fragments of broken wings drifted down like falling leaves, while the wingless butterflies, now looking like smooth, fleshy grubs, wedged themselves into the gaps and dived headfirst into the room.

Lu Mian slowed his breathing. He could clearly hear that the rhythmic scratching sound from before was now growing frantic…

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