Chapter Ninety-One: An Old Acquaintance

Chapter Ninety-One

Ye Jingxuan carried Mei carefully through the snow, advancing with great caution. Along the way, luck was on his side: he found a small mountain cave and took shelter there for a while.

After sealing off the entrance and making certain that the cave held no danger, he finally untied Mei with care. Fearing that she had been bound too long and that her blood might not be flowing properly, he massaged her limbs and, while he was at it, rolled up her sleeves to inspect her. Seeing the red marks left by the rope on her arms, Ye Jingxuan was immediately filled with heartache.

He took out an ointment and gently spread it over the reddened skin. He had wanted to check the rest of her body, but after hesitating for a long while, he still gave up. Then he fetched a clean towel, dampened it, and gently wiped her face and hands, his movements so careful that he was afraid of hurting even the faintest bit of her delicate skin.

He took milk from his storage space and warmed it a little. First he tasted it himself to make sure it would not scald her, then carefully fed some to Mei with a spoon.

Remembering that she had shown no sign of needing the toilet these past two days, Ye Jingxuan did not dare feed her too much.

As for himself, he only ate a few casual bites, enough not to feel hungry. What he should eat or not eat was something he had no heart to consider at the moment.

After resting enough, Ye Jingxuan set out again with Mei. Not wanting her skin to be rubbed raw by the rope once more, he held her in one arm and wrapped her in his overcoat, while his right hand gripped a sharp dagger for safety.

On the way down the mountain, he did not encounter any mutated giant lizards, but he did run into a mutated snow monkey. The creature’s lightning-fast movements left him, already hampered in his actions, exhausted by the effort of dealing with it.

In the end, he remembered that he had mutated fruit in his storage space. He took out a mutated peach and tried hurling it at the snow monkey. Though the monkey had mutated, its interest in fruit was clearly greater than its interest in people, and it immediately abandoned him to race toward the peach.

Yet after only one bite, the snow monkey let out a terrible scream. The peach juice’s powerful corrosive force made it writhe across the ground in pain, shrieking wildly. Before long, it dissolved into a pool of pus.

The farther down the mountain they went, the warmer it became, and the less snow remained.

By the time they reached the foot of the mountain, the overcoat could no longer be worn.

Ye Jingxuan put it away, changed into lighter clothes that were easier to move in, took out a backpack, stuffed it haphazardly with food and the like, and slung it on. Then he carefully removed two layers of thick clothing from Mei, before carrying her onward once more.

There were few mutated animals at the bottom of the mountain, but many zombies. Though they appeared only sporadically, by the end of a day he still came upon twenty or thirty of them.

He did not encounter many mutated zombies, but he discovered that even the ordinary zombies were far stronger than before. Both their speed and their defenses had increased several times over. He even ran into a half-human monster, nimble in its movements, scarcely inferior to a human being. Its claws were extremely sharp and could easily pierce walls. It also had a thick tail covered in scales. When it lashed out, the force was tremendous; if a person were struck by it, they would be lucky to survive without becoming crippled.

If Ye Jingxuan’s abilities had not already risen to level five before he set out on this mission, protecting Mei while killing it would truly have been no easy matter.

After three days trekking through the wilderness, Ye Jingxuan finally met a few living people. After some questioning, he learned that there was no survivor base nearby, only a very small human settlement. Since this area had been remote and underdeveloped even before the apocalypse, with very few vehicles ever coming here, if he wanted a car he would have to find one there.

However, that human settlement was extremely exclusionary and did not easily allow outsiders in.

The people he met were from that settlement. They had come out this time to see whether they could find anything to eat. After Ye Jingxuan took out a few packets of instant noodles, they agreed to take him back to the settlement and introduce him to its leaders.

It was not that they had no designs on the other things he carried. But when they saw Ye Jingxuan alone, holding a little girl, able to make it here unscathed, they knew he was not someone they could provoke.

Fine goods were fine goods, but they still needed the life to enjoy them.

As dusk fell, Ye Jingxuan finally followed them to that settlement.

Before the apocalypse, the settlement had been a village stronghold, encircled on all sides by tall bamboo walls, with only one gate leading inside. The gate was usually kept tightly shut, opening only when someone entered or left. People patrolled the walls with guns. Ye Jingxuan needed only one glance to tell they were homemade weapons, not the real thing.

When the sentries saw those who had gone out returning, they were about to open the gate and let them in. But upon noticing that there was an unfamiliar man among them, they immediately raised their guns in alarm.

“Don’t be nervous, don’t be nervous. This person is here to discuss something with the leader. He means no harm!” the men who had brought Ye Jingxuan back hurriedly shouted.

“What is he holding in his arms?” Because the night was too dark, the people on the wall could not make out what Ye Jingxuan was carrying.

“It’s his younger sister. She’s ill and needs a car to go to the big base for treatment!”

“She’s ill? Could it be the virus?” At the mention of sickness, the people inside grew even less willing to open the gate.

Everyone knew that the earliest symptoms of those who later turned into zombies were very much like illness, which was why people now grew tense at the mere word.

“No, no, it’s not that. That child has, what was it called again? Ah, right, it’s called narcolepsy, that kind of condition where one can never quite wake up. I, Old Hu, swear on my life that she absolutely has not been infected with the zombie virus!”

Hearing this, the people inside remained doubtful. More than half an hour passed before they finally opened the gate and let them come to the entrance.

Ye Jingxuan reached the gate of the stockade and, ignoring the guns pointed at him from all around, merely held Mei in silence and stood there, allowing them to size him up. Beneath the surface, however, he remained on guard. His abilities were gathered and ready; if the other side harbored ill intent, he would not mind slaughtering everyone here and finding a vehicle to leave on his own.

Soon someone came out, wanting to see whether Mei really had been infected with the virus. Though Ye Jingxuan was unwilling, he also knew it was impossible to forbid them from looking. He would only permit them to see Mei’s face; as for touching her, they need not even think about it.

The man saw that Mei’s complexion was rosy and that she looked no different from a normal person asleep. It was plainly unlike the appearance of someone infected with the zombie virus, so he did not insist on checking her body. Instead he simply signaled to the others that all was safe. Only then did those people lower their guns and make way for them to enter.

Night deepened. Since there had long been no electricity here, the stockade was lit by torches.

Someone holding a torch led Ye Jingxuan to see their leader, and behind him were four or five others with torches as well, likely because they did not trust him and feared he might have ill intentions.

Ye Jingxuan, carrying Mei, was led into the largest house in the stockade.

“Please wait. Our leader will be out soon.” The man who had brought him there left after ushering him inside.

The five men following behind Ye Jingxuan remained standing there with their torches.

Apart from those few torches, there was no other source of light in the room. Ye Jingxuan’s shadow stretched long and dark in the torchlight.

He found it strange that these people would simply stand guard behind him like this. Under normal circumstances, if they feared he might act against their leader, they should have stood in front, between him and their leader. Their position looked more like they were keeping him from escaping.

Ye Jingxuan became alert.

Just then, someone emerged from within. Ye Jingxuan looked up and saw a man in his thirties, with a refined and handsome face, accompanied by another man in his twenties who looked rather ordinary. The two walked to within five meters of him and stopped.

“I never imagined I would meet the infamous Bloodthirsty Asura of the underworld in a place like this,” the man said, studying Ye Jingxuan for a moment before sighing in surprise.

“You know me?” Ye Jingxuan grew even more guarded at once, tightening his left arm around Mei as power began to gather in his right hand.

Only people who had once mixed in the underworld would be able to recognize him and call him by name.

And among those who had walked that path, few were easy to deal with.

“The renowned young master of the Ye family, one of the great martial families. Who in the underworld wouldn’t know him? I wonder why Young Master Ye has come to such a remote place. Looking for something?”

The man lifted the corners of his mouth, revealing a smile of unclear meaning.

“Passing through,” Ye Jingxuan said tersely, not daring to relax the tension in the slightest.

Though the other man had still shown no sign of malice, he remained unwilling to let down his guard.

“Oh? The world outside is so dangerous now. Why would the Ye family let their young master run about alone?” The man’s gaze brushed over Mei in Ye Jingxuan’s arms as though asking casually.

“We got separated.”

“I see. Then why has Young Master Ye come here?”

“I want a car. Name your price.” Ye Jingxuan did not wish to waste any more breath and stated his purpose directly.

“A car? Young Master, you really have come to the right place. Within a radius of several hundred miles, there is truly nowhere else where you can find one besides here. But if you want a vehicle, you’ll have to trade something for it.”

The man seemed delighted at the words, his smile deepening.

“What do you want?” Ye Jingxuan asked expressionlessly. His instincts told him the condition would not be easy to meet, but he truly needed a car, so he still wanted to hear it.

Seeing the caution and wariness in Ye Jingxuan’s eyes, the man laughed softly. “Relax, Young Master. What I want is definitely something you can produce. It just depends on whether you’re willing to part with it. I want the person in your arms.”

As he spoke the final sentence, the man’s expression abruptly changed. His gaze turned dark and vicious.

The instant Ye Jingxuan heard those words, he was ready to strike. Yet only then did he realize that his body could no longer move.

What was going on?

Though Ye Jingxuan’s face still showed no expression, he was inwardly shocked. His body seemed to have lost control; apart from his head, he could not move anywhere else. Even the power inside him had been restricted, sluggish and stagnant.

“Don’t waste your effort. You cannot move. From the moment I stepped onto your shadow, your body has been under my control. Talking to you just now was only to make it easier for me to activate my power!”

Only then did Ye Jingxuan understand why those people had stood behind him with torches. It was to make it easier for their leader to use his ability.

The man walked forward, stepping on Ye Jingxuan’s shadow, and stopped in front of him. Looking down at Mei in Ye Jingxuan’s arms, he lightly brushed his fingers across her face, and in his eyes a clearly malicious light emerged.