Chapter 18

After a quick discussion, the players decided to head into the lab right away. But before they could, they had to clear out the hospital beds, cabinets, and all the other junk the survivors had stacked up to block the corridor. That took the whole afternoon. It was only around four or five, when everyone was starving, that they finally managed to carve a path through to the lab door.

Lin Tu turned to the survivors huddled in the shelter hall. "Coming?"

The two nurses stepped forward immediately. A beat later, Officer Robert followed. Rita and the others stayed put, shrinking back—they'd be glad to leave this place, but they weren't about to risk their necks.

Lin Tu didn't mind. She sat down on the floor with the other players and leisurely unzipped her backpack.

Ever since she'd gotten the Single-Use Backpack and could haul a ton of supplies with her, Lin Tu had adopted a simple philosophy: live well at home, but don't skimp on your stomach out in the field either. She'd packed every quick-and-easy instant food she'd stashed in her rundown house.

She'd stocked up on convenience foods back then—crispy dry noodles in barbecue, Orleans grilled wing, and tomato stew flavors; self-heating hotpots in spicy assorted, beef with chicken wings, tomato brisket, and tom yum; self-heating rice in braised chicken, twice-cooked pork, curry beef, shredded pork with fish fragrance, and clay-pot potato rice; and self-heating soups like aged tangerine peel duck, black truffle fish maw with chicken, and bamboo pith coconut chicken.

Of course, ham sausages, braised eggs, fish balls, and other sides to heat up with the mains were a must. And finally, a few snacks to fill gaps before or after meals, or serve as dessert—chocolate and potato chips, that sort of thing.

The eight-square-meter limit of her little cabin had cramped her stockpile, so she'd kept snacks to a bare minimum, just enough to cram on a shelf for emergency calories or a quick treat. Fortunately, her recent scavenging in the disaster worlds had made up for that regret.

After asking everyone what they wanted, Lin Tu pulled out several boxes of self-heating rice, hotpot, soup, and some snacks from her backpack like a magician.

The packaging was plastered with food photos: a red-broth hotpot with neatly arranged rice noodles, sliced seaweed, potato slices, lotus root slices, and beef rolls; freshly plated shredded pork with fish fragrance sprinkled with scallions, the meat strands, lettuce slices, and wood ear strips glistening with thick sauce; a spoon scooping up stacked chunks of tomato brisket; braised pork belly with perfect marbling of fat and lean.

The vivid colors especially—every edible morsel shone with just the right sheen of oil. It was enough to make anyone's mouth water.

They hadn't even opened the packaging yet, and people were already swallowing hard.

Everyone's eyes went wide. "?"

Ever since that one good meal, the players had gone right back to their daily routine of dense rye bread. Survival was hard, and players who'd been through multiple disaster worlds knew that especially well.

Things like self-heating hotpots and rice weren't sold in the shop—you had to scavenge them in disaster worlds or buy them on the Black Market. But they didn't fill you up much, took up a lot of space, cost a lot, and weren't practical. Apart from tasting good and being quick to fix, they had no other merits, so almost nobody bought them.

Survival-minded players stuffed their packs with dry goods like rye bread. Who'd have thought Lin Tu would bring a whole bag of tasty junk? Was she here to survive? She was here for a picnic!

But then again... this... this really did look delicious! Everyone couldn't help swallowing.

"I've got a special connection—these aren't expensive for me. No need to be polite at a time like this." Seeing Zhang Zisheng already starting to pull up his points, Lin Tu hurriedly stopped him. "If you want some, just trade me a loaf of bread each. One box of hotpot won't fill me up anyway."

Since there were non-players present, the others quickly crowded around Lin Tu and slipped their vouchers into her backpack.

Karen, for her part, handed over the bag of cookies she'd brought for lunch.

"Thanks." One by one they thanked her while earnestly stuffing several vouchers into her pack. These things were relatively scarce, and since Lin Tu said she had a special connection, they must not come easily.

Lin Tu found it a little absurd, so she pulled out some chocolate candies and pork jerky to share around.

On this side, everyone was happily swapping food and getting ready to eat. On that side, they were staring bug-eyed, utterly incredulous.

The moment the others tore open the packaging and the heating packs started warming beneath the trays, the rice, hotpot, and soup bubbling away as the smells of meat, vegetables, chili, and spices slowly spread through the shelter hall, the other group finally found their words.

"So you people have food!" Rita's tone was that of a dog whose tail had been stepped on, rage leaping out of her. "Fine! Then why didn't you say so? Were you just waiting to watch us make fools of ourselves?!"

The most maddening part was that among the snacks she could see in the middle of their little circle were the exact cream-flavored cookies and chocolate hazelnut sandwich cookies she'd fantasized about while trying to persuade Lin Tu.

It was... infuriating! She was already hungry, and now she was even hungrier!

Lin Tu caught her look and smiled sweetly at her.

Yes, she was a little bit deliberate about this.

If this world was a dog that chased people and bit them, then this lot was pure dog excrement—stinking to high heaven and somehow still shoving itself under your feet for no reason. Lin Tu had no intention of indulging them.

"And why would I give you any?" Lin Tu smiled. If not for the gold-rimmed glasses, she'd have loved to blow a cheerful wink at Rita. "Is it because you talk so sweetly and I just love hearing you speak?"

"Pfft..." Zheng Yangyang couldn't hold in a laugh.

"At least other people don't just flap their gums," Lin Tu said, tossing three loaves of rye bread to the nurses and Officer Robert. Under Rita's expectant gaze, she added the caveat: they could eat it themselves or give it back to her. That finally crushed any lingering hope for Rita and the other survivors, who could only grind their teeth and watch everyone fill their stomachs bit by bit, sinking into helpless fury.

Lin Tu happily finished a box of self-heating hotpot and a box of fish maw chicken soup with soaked rye bread, then polished off the chocolate sandwich cookies on the ground as dessert. Only after patting her slightly round belly did she bring the meal to an end.

After eating, everyone cleaned up the trash and prepared to enter the laboratory.

Because Rita and the others wanted to leave this place, yet were terrified of what was in the lab, they made a racket demanding that Officer Robert promise to come back for them if he could get out of the hospital, and that everyone would definitely shut the door behind them so nothing inside could get into the shelter hall.

Officer Robert was indeed a devoted, duty-bound officer, and he actually agreed. Rita shot Lin Tu a smug look, as if to say, look at him, and then look at you. Lin Tu found it utterly exasperating.

At least the one suffering was Officer Robert, not her.

The group pushed open the laboratory door, and the moment the flashlight beams swept outward, they heard the door slam shut behind them—

BANG!

Followed by a heavy thunk of something hitting the ground.

Zheng Yangyang: "?"

He immediately pulled the lab door back open, only to find a cabinet blocking the entrance, with the blurry faces of several people barely visible behind it.

"?" A single question mark surfaced in everyone's mind... They'd trapped them inside?

"Sorry, Officer Robert!" someone outside shouted. "We'll definitely move this cabinet when you come back!"

The voice was loud, and it stirred some restless stirring from the pitch-black depths of the laboratory.

"Close the door!" Lin Tu said coldly.

Zheng Yangyang immediately shut the door again. The door had pretty good soundproofing, and the voices outside faded to a faint murmur.

Which was also how Lin Tu noticed a few light, quick footsteps not far away.

She swung her flashlight over—a zombie was shambling toward them. Its speed was neither fast nor slow. Lin Tu was about to shoot it, but then remembered there was still a mutant zombie somewhere around here, and she couldn't hold both a gun and a crowbar. So, with a quick eye and quicker foot, she kicked it into a nearby cabinet.

A soft thunk. Lin Tu braced the cabinet's base with her foot and slammed the door shut, locking the zombie inside.

She tipped the cabinet onto its side, swept her gaze left and right, then kicked it up against the laboratory door.

Well, now. Both sides of the door were blocked by cabinets, and inside the cabinet on the inner side was a freshly caught zombie, still nice and lively.

Officer Robert's task of coming back to fetch the others had suddenly gotten a whole lot harder.

"What?" Seeing Officer Robert staring at her, Lin Tu said with justified impatience, "I can't fire a gun in here. Did you expect me to fight a zombie barehanded? Besides, they're afraid of what's inside getting out—I'm afraid of them coming in and pulling another stunt like slamming the door on us!"

Officer Robert sighed.

He leaned against the door and knocked twice. "You all have to wait for me! Don't come in on your own! When I get back, I'll deal with this zombie!"

Whether they heard him or not, Lin Tu and the others had already moved on.

Past the main door, there was another sealed door. After pushing through two doors, they finally entered the laboratory proper.

Unexpectedly, the lights were still on here.

Even more unexpectedly, the place was a mess, but clean—not a single zombie in sight.

"So many instruments," Dong Huadan said delightedly. With her sharp eye, she couldn't identify every piece of equipment here, but she could fully recognize their value.

Lin Tu was different—she could barely identify one kind of instrument: the microscope.

"Would anyone need these?" Lin Tu asked.

"Of course," Dong Huadan said with a smile as everyone looked at her. "Since there's human mutation like zombies, there will be people studying these things. It's just a sideline, or rather, a very small minority, because that kind of work takes talent. Think of the great scientists in our history—they didn't just pop out of thin air every time. If they hadn't appeared at the critical moment of a crisis, guess what would happen?"

The players looked at the messy research room with sudden understanding. No question about it—that world would become the next disaster world, like this D-level global zombie crisis they were in now.

"Don't argue, Xiaoling, I know you love me, and I love you too. But right now, what matters more is..." At that moment, an easygoing, joking voice drifted through the silent laboratory. "You have to use active components, okay? Let me think again..."