Chu Tian raised an eyebrow. “Dahua?”
The name…
“Yuning-jie used to have a cat. It was originally a stray cat. Once, it was injured and almost died, so Yuning-jie rescued it and brought it home. I used to go feed it whenever I had nothing to do,” Li Nan explained.
Not long afterward, a zombie and a cat slowly walked to a spot very close to everyone before stopping.
No one backed away. Everyone suddenly became incredibly sad, and an overwhelming sense of sorrow spread through the crowd. The only two women among them suddenly broke down, clutching their heads and sobbing as though they had been deeply traumatized, their grief impossible to suppress.
“She’s affecting our emotions!” Chu Tian said. He and Quan Xiaoyu were probably the only two people there who were unaffected.
Chu Tian once again attempted to connect with Yuning’s mind. This time, there were no overwhelming fragments of information. Instead, the moment his mental power approached her, it was ruthlessly repelled.
The mutated cat named Dahua seemed to sense Chu Tian’s attempt to approach with his mental power as well. It let out an extremely hostile howl at Chu Tian, the sound booming like a tiger’s roar.
Chu Tian felt a sharp pain in his head and involuntarily took a large step backward. Quan Xiaoyu hurriedly reached out and firmly steadied him.
Just then, Li Nan collapsed without warning.
Quan Xiaoyu hurried over again to catch him, pulling Li Nan into his arms.
At that moment, Li Nan’s eyes were tightly shut, his entire face twisted in pain. Large tears rolled from the corners of his eyes one after another.
His teeth were clenched tightly against his lips, as though he were enduring tremendous agony.
“Xiao Nan, Xiao Nan.” Quan Xiaoyu gently shook Li Nan, trying to wake him. Of course, it was useless.
Seeing Li Nan collapse, Chu Tian no longer held back. The mental power he released this time was not probing anymore—it was a direct attack at full strength.
The attack was still obstructed, but this time it did not stop Chu Tian. At first, Yuning’s attention seemed to have been focused entirely on Li Nan, but now she had no choice but to divert part of it to counter Chu Tian’s attack.
Two invisible forces of mental power tangled and fought in the air above them, unseen by the naked eye. For a moment, neither side could gain the upper hand.
The mutated cat Dahua finally became agitated as well. It leaped up, carrying Yuning on its back, and lunged directly at Chu Tian.
At almost the exact same moment, Quan Xiaoyu shot forward, his samurai sword slashing toward Dahua’s throat.
Almost simultaneously, the doctor’s vines blocked the front of Chu Tian, forming a crude protective net.
The sorrow that had been affecting most of the people disappeared in an instant. The two women who had been clutching their heads and sobbing stared awkwardly at each other.
Just moments ago, they had suddenly remembered every painful moment of their lives. They had been almost unable to control their grief, but that feeling had suddenly vanished.
Li Nan did not appear any better because of Chu Tian’s attack. His face had grown even paler, and he was now being held in Bai Mingxi’s arms.
Bai Mingxi looked completely at a loss as well.
In fact, everyone was already utterly exhausted. Physically and mentally, they had been pushed to their limits. Nearly an hour of grueling combat had drained every bit of their strength.
Even Chu Tian and Quan Xiaoyu were merely struggling to keep fighting. There was no way they could win.
That was the only thought in everyone’s minds at that moment.
Then Lu Zhongxia walked over. He gently took Li Nan’s hand, and white light began to glow as he tried to help Li Nan in his own way.
No. They couldn’t give up!
Lu Zhongxia’s actions awakened the people who had fallen into despair. One after another, abilities were hurled toward the mutated cat Dahua once more.
The zombie horde not far away became agitated because of this attack. They swayed and roared, but in the end, they did not charge forward again.
At that moment, however, Li Nan was in another world.
Here, he saw complete fragments of a story, one scene after another.
They were all about Yuning-jie.
Li Nan had also been a participant in that most painful, darkest, most unbearable memory. He saw himself. He saw his father.
He also saw the disgusting brutality of the perpetrators, the selfishness and cruelty of the hypocrites.
And he saw Yuning-jie’s heart—filled with anger and hatred, but also with something else…
Deep, deep inside, there was still a trace of humanity that had never been extinguished.
But perhaps it was precisely that remaining humanity that had ultimately brought about her downfall.
Li Nan had once thought that Yuning-jie would slowly kill those people. Even Xiaoyu-ge had probably thought the same thing. It was just that neither of them had ever said it aloud.
Deep down, Li Nan had been filled with contempt for those people, but he had still felt a little sympathy for them.
However, now, he truly could no longer sympathize with them.
Yuning-jie had controlled them. That was true.
Yuning-jie would occasionally torture them. That was also true.
But in the terrifying apocalypse, in a world where the zombies had evolved after the heavy rains, Yuning-jie had also protected that building. She had protected the people inside it.
Not a single one of them had died because of the zombies.
In fact, with Yuning-jie’s help, they could even obtain food.
Yet they still weren’t satisfied.
No matter how powerful Yuning-jie was, she was still only one person. Faced with a pack of scheming jackals, there would eventually come a day when she could no longer withstand them.
They found a way to make her unconscious.
They drove sharp nails into her skull.
That pack of beasts once again became the monsters from Yuning-jie’s nightmares. They abused her, tortured her, cut her face with rust-covered knives, drove a nail into her left eye, and then hammered nail after nail into her head.
Blood. Pain. Torture—
Hatred!
The zombies, having lost control, tore through the iron gate and flooded into the building. No one could escape, including Yuning, who was barely clinging to life.
It was only when Dahua suddenly returned after mutating that it lifted Yuning up and carried her away from that place filled with sin and filth.
The pain, anger, and hatred were so real—so real that Li Nan felt as though he were experiencing them himself.
“Yuning-jie!” he cried out. “Yuning-jie!”
He knew she was telling him how much she was suffering.
Every day she continued to exist was like another cycle of hell. She could not escape those dark memories. Every day, they played over and over again in her mind like scenes from a movie, making her angry, making her cruel.
In her memories from long ago, Yuning-jie had been so kind and beautiful.
“Yuning-jie!”
This time, as his cry rang out, Li Nan opened his eyes.
Yuning had never intended to hurt him.
She had recognized him.
In her own way, she had been telling him about her pain.
But after opening his eyes, Li Nan discovered that Xiaoyu-ge was already locked in battle with Dahua, and the situation was anything but favorable.
At that moment, Yuning suddenly slipped from Dahua’s back and fell to the ground.
At the same time, Chu Tian crashed to the ground as well. Bai Mingxi did not even have time to catch him.
Meanwhile, Dahua swept Quan Xiaoyu aside, sending him crashing heavily to the ground.
He struggled twice, but ultimately could not get back up.
He couldn’t move. There wasn’t a trace of strength left in his entire body.
Just before he was about to activate his spatial ability, he turned his head and looked at Chu Tian and Li Nan.
If he used his spatial ability in front of everyone, it might mean that he could never return to that team.
A space that could allow people to enter did not exist anywhere else, and it never would.
It was far too special.
Even if he survived because of it, he could only fake his death and leave the team.
But the moment he looked back, he was utterly shocked.
Chu Tian had fallen.
And Li Nan was frantically running toward him.
“Xiao Nan! Go back! Don’t come over!”
Quan Xiaoyu lay on the ground, shouting desperately.
“Xiao Nan, come back!”
Bai Mingxi was equally horrified.
The instant he had run over to help Chu Tian, Li Nan had darted out.
No one had expected it.
No one had been prepared.
And in that split second, the cat’s claws swept toward them again.
This time, they went straight for Quan Xiaoyu’s throat.
“Dahua! No! Stop! Stop, Dahua!”
Li Nan shouted as he ran.
Then he threw himself at Quan Xiaoyu, who was lying on the ground, using his small body to cover Quan Xiaoyu and trying to take the cat’s attack himself.
And somehow, the cat’s claws really did stop at that moment.
When Li Nan turned around, his face was already covered in tears.
“Dahua, you can’t. You can’t kill Xiaoyu-ge.”
“Yuning-jie, you remember him, right? Xiaoyu-ge saved you. He isn’t a bad person. You can’t kill him.”
At that moment, Yuning, who had fallen from the cat’s back, had already staggered to her feet.
She stood right beside the two of them.
Her only remaining eye, cloudy and pale, was fixed firmly on Li Nan.
“Yuning-jie, I know. I saw everything.”
“You don’t want to hurt me. I know you still remember me. Dahua remembers me too…”
“Can you please not hurt everyone?”
“They aren’t bad people. They aren’t those beasts.”
“I know you’re in a lot of pain. Brother Chu Tian and the doctor are both very smart. Let them help you, okay?”
“Yuning-jie…”
Li Nan sobbed so hard that he could barely speak.
After all, he was still just a child.
He could feel Yuning’s pain, but he had no idea how to resolve such pain. The words that came out of his mouth carried a hint of childishness, but his sincerity was absolute.
He didn’t want Xiaoyu-ge to die.
He didn’t want everyone else to die either.
At the same time, he hoped they could rely on the adults’ strength to help Yuning-jie, who had been buried beneath her suffering.
In his eyes, Yuning wasn’t a zombie.
She wasn’t a terrifying monster.
She was a friend who had suffered tremendous hardship and needed his help.