Living with My Aloof Ex-Wife After the Apocalypse - Chapter 16

Chapter 16: The Evolved Entity and the Hundred-Handed Horror

Would she want me to kiss her?

Does Qing Meng want it… it doesn’t seem like it.

From the day she married Qing Meng, a seed had been buried in the corner of Xing He’s heart. Over a decade later, the surface of this seed looked no different than it did at the start it hadn’t sprouted, nor had it grown.

Only Xing He knew that in countless intangible moments, the soil around that seed had been completely taken over by a dense, intricate root system. At this moment, her deafening heartbeat seemed to be urging her to act on her delusions.

A child’s wish is usually beautiful and devoid of desire; it was just a goodnight kiss. But Xing He’s feelings for Qing Meng had long since ceased to be pure.

In the darkness, Xing He rose and swiftly pressed a kiss onto Qing Meng’s forehead, then immediately ducked back under the covers like an ostrich. From beneath the blanket, she said in a muffled voice: “Goodnight.”

The forehead kiss came and went so fast there was no time to savor it.

Qing Meng tried to close her eyes to calm herself, but it felt like being on a roller coaster; the wild thumping of her heart and the weightless sense of unreality left her unable to find peace for a long time. She subconsciously touched the spot on her skin. The fleeting warmth and the heat radiating from deep within her body surged like a tide. Even though Xing He had moved away, that soft touch remained so hot that Qing Meng didn’t dare move.

Her thoughts drifted far she remembered their first night sharing a bed, and the afternoon they signed the divorce papers. Even though the “beautiful dream” felt good, once her logic returned, Qing Meng knew this was merely a concession Xing He made to satisfy Doudou’s wish.

Brutally cutting away those palpitations, Qing Meng’s voice was calm when she finally spoke: “Goodnight.”

Because of her embarrassment, Xing He left early the next morning, leaving a note for Qing Meng: Going out to search for firearms today.

With two more members in the household—Auntie Chen still unconscious and Doudou not even tall enough to reach the table—Qing Meng had to stay behind to care for them. This growing family made the need for weapons even more urgent. If an accident occurred while Xing He was away, the elderly and the child would have no way to protect themselves. If Qing Meng learned to use a gun, the safety of the courtyard would be better guaranteed.

Xing He decided to search near the Civil Defense works first, hoping to find dropped weapons from fallen rescue teams. However, after searching six or seven underground parking lots, she found nothing; anything valuable had likely been scavenged by passersby.

The only thing she found was a rifle taken from a zombie who had been a soldier in life, along with a pack of compressed biscuits and ten rounds of ammunition. Ten bullets wouldn’t even be enough to “fill the gaps between a zombie’s teeth” if she hit a horde. She had to change her strategy.

About a kilometer away was the Municipal Armed Forces Department. The probability of finding stockpiled equipment there was high. In the early days of the apocalypse, resource points occupied by others were often more dangerous than zombies. Xing He had avoided it initially for that reason, but after hitting a wall in the city, she decided to try her luck.

The area around the department was mostly clear of zombies likely cleaned out recently. Still, Xing He stayed alert, keeping her footsteps light as she slipped inside. The lobby was stained with blood and littered with zombie corpses, evidence of a fierce battle.

She checked the nearby office area. Among the dead zombies were the bodies of soldiers. Xing He inspected them; they had no guns or ammo left. She salvaged a functional helmet and a relatively intact bulletproof vest. Now equipped with a semi-automatic rifle, ten bullets, and her trusty entrenching tool, she was no longer “bare-handed.”

Further in was the training base. The number of zombies decreased, but the large warehouse doors ahead were tightly shut. As Xing He carefully pushed the door open, a sound of flesh scraping against the floor came from behind her.

There were so many bodies here that she worried some might be pinned underneath, waiting to crawl out. For the first time in a long time, she felt a pang of nerves. Fortunately, it was just a legless zombie crawling toward her. Xing He slammed her shovel into its neck, and it went still.

Just then, a strange sound came from behind—the sound of teeth tearing through flesh. It wasn’t just one; it sounded like a pack of creatures feasting on a delicious meal.

Xing He whipped around, muscles tensed, rifle ready. Looking through the warehouse doors she had just cracked open, she saw a sea of zombies in military uniforms. Were these soldiers abandoned by the authorities after being infected?

Some had maggots crawling on their faces; others were missing half their heads with brain matter leaking out; some were just torsos, dragging their intestines across the floor. They all stared at Xing He.

A chill rose in her heart the instinctive fear humans feel when facing a horde. Even a battle-hardened commander was no exception; the difference was simply in conquering the fear, not the absence of it.

Without warning, the zombies roared and lunged at her. Xing He’s hair stood on end. She immediately activated her ability and threw the compressed biscuits she had found as a decoy. The front row of zombies swerved to chase the food, but those behind them were unaffected, charging straight for her.

Xing He retreated while dodging. System! What is the limit of the number of zombies my ability can control?

The system appeared instantly: Host, your ability is in the primary stage. The maximum limit is 100 zombies.

Why didn’t you tell me before?

Host turned off the thought-sensing function. Logically, the system should not know you wanted this data. Furthermore, the Host does not like the system; the system believes speaking less is conducive to harmonious coexistence.

If the system had emotions, it would be smug about its “high EQ.” Xing He, however, caught the loophole: ‘Should not know.’ This meant the system wasn’t as blind to her thoughts as it promised.

She pushed the doubt aside—survival came first.

As she retreated, she noticed the horde acted with strange unity, much like the ones at the hospital. Is there an evolved entity here too?

She scanned the faces. They were expressionless and mechanical, sometimes even stepping on their own kind. They didn’t seem to have independent consciousness. As she moved further away, the lead zombies slowed down, losing the aggression they had when they first burst from the warehouse.

She glanced back at the warehouse. Lone zombies were still trickling out to join the main force. A realization struck her: Is the evolved entity controlling the horde inside the warehouse?

If her ability had a limit, the evolved zombie’s control likely did too. If its power was limited by physical distance, its grip would weaken as the zombies moved further away. That explained why the front row was slowing down while new ones kept coming out.

Thinking it through, Xing He stopped trying for a killing blow on the minions. The priority was the controller. She knocked two zombies aside with her shovel and sprinted toward the warehouse.

At the door, she spotted it instantly. Without the cover of a crowd, it was far too conspicuous.

Unlike normal zombies, this evolved entity couldn’t walk upright; it lay flat on the ground. Its structure was no longer human. Aside from its head and upper torso, it was an alien creature. It had no legs; instead, hundreds of appendages it was impossible to tell if they were hands or feet—clustered at its lower body, twisting and horrifying.

The remaining zombies in the warehouse were clustered around it, but they weren’t guarding it—they were devouring its flesh. The floor was covered in bloody chunks left over from the feast.

Even though it looked weak, the evolved entity showed no signs of dying. The hundreds of limbs beneath it writhed; as the surrounding zombies ate its flesh, new limbs grew back just as quickly.

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