The sound of impacts outside the door never stopped. The constant banging made everyone restless, but no one inside had time to pay attention to it anymore. Everyone’s thoughts were focused on how to escape from here.
The buildings along the nearby streets were all the kind where the first floor was made up of shops, while the upper floors were residential units.
Ruan Ning watched as Gu Yicheng walked around the fresh produce supermarket, then found a spot and used his ability to create a hole in the ceiling big enough for one person to pass through.
After that, he took a ladder out of his space. Once the people clearing the way climbed up and confirmed it was safe, the others climbed up one after another using the ladder.
Not long after everyone reached the second floor, Gu Yicheng had only just put the ladder away when there was a loud bang. The entrance on the first floor could no longer withstand the zombies’ impact from outside and let them in. Standing beside the hole, Ruan Ning personally saw the fresh produce supermarket below quickly fill up with zombies, packed so tightly that there was not even a gap between them.
Standing upstairs and watching this scene, she could not help sucking in a breath. Fortunately, Xue Chen and Lin Yang quickly sealed the hole again. They even moved a table over to block it, preventing the zombies from smelling the living people and climbing up through that place to chase after them.
The home on the second floor was decorated very warmly. From the photos hanging in the living room, one could tell that a family of three had lived here. But the people who originally lived here were nowhere to be seen. There were also traces of a struggle on the floor. The survivors had probably left in a hurry.
The front door was not locked. They left the apartment and went up the stairs, making their way all the way to the top floor. The door to the rooftop was locked with a large padlock. At a time like this, they did not have the time to pick the lock, so they simply used brute force to dismantle the door.
They had not come to the rooftop to seek death.
Rather, this was now their only way to avoid the zombies.
In fact, if there was enough time, they might even be able to escape the current predicament without directly confronting the zombies.
After all, before a zombie died, it had once been human. It could not fly either.
This area was full of residential buildings, and the distance between each building was not far. The fresh produce supermarket below was also the best entry point Gu Yicheng had found after observing the surrounding environment.
The method he had thought of was to cross over from the tops of these buildings.
Fortunately, they were not currently in the city centre. The buildings there were often several dozen metres tall, and the distance between each one was too great. With the length of the ladder and Lin Yang’s ability, they would not be able to reach. Even if they wanted to use this method there, there would be no way to begin.
Ruan Ning had mild acrophobia. Back at the university campus, when she had looked down from the third floor, her whole body had trembled with fear. Now that the height had become seven floors, merely glancing down made her feel dizzy and weak-limbed.
Gu Yicheng could tell that Ruan Ning was scared. Although she did not say a word and stayed quietly to the side, looking incredibly obedient, her eyes betrayed her.
“When you cross later, you can hold my hand. That way, you won’t be afraid of falling,” Gu Yicheng said gently.
“O-okay.” Ruan Ning hesitated before agreeing, but her heart was still unsettled. A person’s physiological fear was not something that could be overcome in a short while. It was different from fear of zombies.
Very soon, it was Ruan Ning’s turn.
Gu Yicheng had originally planned to be the one covering the rear himself. But now, seeing the girl beside him pressing her lips together and trying hard to overcome her fear, something stirred in his heart, and he handed the job of covering the rear to Xue Chen.
“If you’re scared, close your eyes and just follow me,” Gu Yicheng’s gentle voice sounded beside her ear.
Ruan Ning glanced at the man beside her, then secretly glanced at the “bridge” stretching between the two buildings, which did not look particularly sturdy. Her delicate brows furrowed, and then she obediently closed her eyes tightly.
After closing her eyes, she could only hear the whooshing wind and feel the warmth of another person’s body temperature in her palm. Her mood slowly calmed down. That feeling of standing somewhere high, clearly terrified yet unable to stop herself from looking down, also disappeared.
It seemed that the method Gu Yicheng taught her was indeed useful. If she could not see it, she would not overthink it. But it was also thanks to Gu Yicheng being there. If it were someone else, Ruan Ning might not have been able to close her eyes with peace of mind and entrust her safety to another person.
After everyone crossed over, the ladder was quickly taken back.
This was the advantage of having a spatial ability. If it were another team in this situation, even if they thought of this method, they might not necessarily have the conditions to carry it out.
Using this method of setting up a ladder between buildings, they crossed five residential buildings in total. Only when there were no longer any nearby buildings close enough for them to cross to did they finally stop.
“Brother Gu, there’s no path left,” Lin Yang said as he withdrew his ability.
Gu Yicheng narrowed his eyes and stood upstairs, looking down. Although this building was not far from the building with the fresh produce supermarket where they had come up, there were already far fewer zombies nearby.
Zombies were ultimately different from humans. They could not see and could only rely on smell and hearing to identify things. Even if the mental-type zombie was more cunning than other zombies, it would not be able to discover that their group was here. That was why they could escape right under its nose in broad daylight.
However, once they appeared downstairs and the scent of living people spread out from their bodies, their whereabouts might not stay hidden. The zombie horde would soon catch up again.
But the time difference created here was already enough for them to shake off the zombie horde below and that mental-type zombie. As for what would happen later, that was not something they needed to think about right now.
That mental-type zombie was not low-level. Gu Yicheng could not deal with it by himself. He had already obtained enough Tier Three crystal nuclei at B University. Advancing to Tier Four was only a matter of time, so he did not necessarily have to obtain the crystal nucleus in this mental-type zombie’s head.
So as for this mental-type zombie, he would leave it for Base Three in B City to worry about themselves.
Gu Yicheng had other, more important things to do. He did not want to risk his own life or the lives of this group just to deal with this zombie.
However, in his previous life, while Gu Yicheng was in the Imperial Capital, he had never heard anything about a high-level mental-type zombie existing in B City. Perhaps it had been dealt with during this period, or perhaps his rebirth had caused a butterfly effect, just like how the evolution speed of zombies had also accelerated in this life.
And Ningning was the same…
Gu Yicheng remembered very clearly that when the apocalypse broke out in his previous life, she had definitely been at school. But in this life, she had been in the apartment.
Gu Yicheng did not care why things had turned out this way. It was just that the moment he thought of the word “death” being placed on the girl in front of him, the hostility in his heart uncontrollably grew a little stronger.
Gu Yicheng’s gaze was too intense. Ruan Ning soon noticed that he was looking at her, and his eyes felt strange. She asked, “Brother, what’s wrong? Why are you looking at me?”
Gu Yicheng rubbed his thumb a few times. The depth in his eyes disappeared in an instant. He smiled and said, “Nothing. There was just some dirt on your clothes.”
Following his gaze, Ruan Ning turned her head and looked. Sure enough, some white wall dust had rubbed onto the black jacket she had just changed into today. It must have happened when she accidentally brushed against the wall in the stairwell while going upstairs.
Ruan Ning felt puzzled as to why Gu Yicheng had been staring at her clothes, but when she thought that he would not harm her, she did not take it to heart. After patting her clothes a few times, she let it go.
…
Time waited for no one. The group did not delay on the rooftop for long. They hurried downstairs, then took the three vehicles out of the space and placed them on the road, planning to drive away from this place.
Ruan Ning discovered that whenever they were outside, Gu Yicheng never let her do things that might expose her space. Every time, he did it himself. Only in hidden situations like collecting supplies, where only their own people were present, would he let her act.
Only belatedly did Ruan Ning realise that Gu Yicheng was indirectly protecting her by doing this. Because of Gu Yicheng’s other ability, others were wary of him. So even if they discovered the existence of his space, they would not dare say anything or make any moves.
But she, a weak little rookie with no strength to even truss a chicken, was different. As for guns and ammunition, compared with abilities, they were still far inferior.
The feeling of having someone backing her up from behind was truly very nice. No wonder so many people wanted to cling to powerful thighs. At times like this, Ruan Ning increasingly felt that this brother she had picked up for free was just too good.
As expected, not long after they drove out, the mental-type zombie received the news and controlled the other zombies to chase after them.
But the current situation was no longer the same as it had been half an hour ago. Now, it could only chase from behind instead of surrounding them from all sides, so it could not trap them at all.
It could also be said that Ruan Ning and the others had been lucky. If this zombie had chosen a terrain that was unfavourable to them earlier, they might really have fallen there, instead of resolving the matter now by paying only a small price.
Since everything had been settled, they could now leave B City’s urban area and head for the Imperial Capital.
On the road, they would pass by Base Three again. They could conveniently send over the three people they had rescued together with Father Jiang and Mother Jiang. Those people would definitely be safer staying at the base than outside.
Because there were more people in the team again, Jiang Jingchao’s parents came over to ride in the same vehicle as Ruan Ning and the others.
Ruan Ning looked obedient and well-behaved, the kind of appearance that especially appealed to elders. Not long after getting into the car, she had already become familiar with Father Jiang and Mother Jiang.
Especially Mother Jiang. In fact, after giving birth to her eldest son, Jiang Jingchao, she had wanted her second child to be a cute daughter. Unexpectedly, in the end, it was still a son. The daughter she had imagined was exactly like Ruan Ning: obedient, sensible, and so soft-looking that one’s heart would melt just by seeing her. Mother Jiang’s maternal instincts surged. After holding Ruan Ning’s hand and chatting with her for a while, she was only one step away from treating Ruan Ning as her own daughter.
Perhaps it was her imagination, but when she heard Mother Jiang trying to match her with the two Jiang brothers as sworn siblings and make her her goddaughter, Ruan Ning felt the temperature around Gu Yicheng beside her drop.
So Ruan Ning shyly declined Mother Jiang’s kind offer.
After all, even if she was willing, the person beside her was probably unwilling.
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