Chapter Thirty: How Can One Tolerate Another Sleeping Peacefully Beside Their Own Couch?

The long-haired woman was teetering on the edge of mutation.

The reason Fan Li was so certain she hadn’t fully mutated yet was because he didn’t feel the same oppressive force that the Titan once emanated. Even so, there was no denying that something strange was indeed happening to her—an inexplicable allure, the ever-growing hair—mutations that no ordinary zombie possessed.

What Fan Li had feared had finally come to pass: the Titan’s corpse had indeed carried within it some kind of code for zombie evolution, and the alluring female zombie before him was clearly one of the successful unlocks.

A sudden, urgent knocking broke the silence. Then came a voice, deliberately lowered: “Brother Li, are you awake?”

“Brother Li?”

“Brother Li... there’s a ghost outside...”

In the stillness of the night, the knocking was painfully clear. Fan Li hurried to the door, gripped the handle, and opened it to see a pale face staring back at him.

It was Yang Shuo. Compared to when he’d left earlier, his face was now ashen, like a dying patient struggling for breath, his eyes ringed with a mist of fear. He’d clearly been badly frightened.

“Brother Li... there’s a ghost outside...” Yang Shuo looked on the verge of tears. He’d thrown up from moving corpses earlier, and his body was already weak. He’d just managed to fall asleep when a faint crying began outside his window.

Yang Shuo was alone at home. Normally, he’d ignore the usual noises like a turtle in its shell, but since becoming Fan Li’s subordinate, he’d learned a lot about the building: only three living people remained—himself, Fan Li, and a madwoman who’d locked herself in her apartment. All the other rooms were either empty or home to zombies, most of whom Fan Li had already killed.

Just that day, they’d cleaned up the corpse of a mutated female zombie, and now, in the dead of night, came ceaseless weeping. With so many deaths in the building, Yang Shuo couldn’t help but wonder—was the woman they’d killed coming back for revenge?

People are always most frightened by their own imaginations.

The more he thought, the colder his hands and feet became. Then he remembered the butcher upstairs who feared nothing and ran up for help.

“Brother Li... there’s a ghost outside...” Yang Shuo kept repeating, clearly terrified.

“Shh!” Fan Li moved quickly to cover Yang Shuo’s mouth. He whispered in his ear, “It’s not a ghost. It’s a mutated zombie.”

“Not a ghost?” Yang Shuo blinked in confusion.

Now on the same side, Fan Li explained, “Some zombies undergo secondary mutations, not just the usual ones. Remember that super-strong zombie downstairs a few days ago?”

“Secondary mutation?” Yang Shuo murmured, recalling the event. “I was scared out of my mind. That zombie smashed a car with one punch. I only caught a glimpse before I hid under the covers.”

Clearly, Yang Shuo was truly frightened. He dropped all pretense and admitted his fear outright.

“Could the zombie outside be one of those?” he asked, startled.

“I can’t be sure yet,” Fan Li replied. “But I’ve observed that her hair is still growing. I haven’t tested her strength, so I can’t analyze further.”

In the dimly lit room, a cold glint flashed in Fan Li’s eyes.

He walked to the window. On the deserted street below, the zombie woman was still weeping, and there was not another zombie in sight.

It was much like when the Titan had appeared. The other zombies, devoid of emotion, would even retreat, only emerging after the battle concluded.

Mutant zombies possessed a strength that seemed to intimidate ordinary ones, keeping them at bay—much like predators in the forest each ruling their own territory. Mutant zombies, too, had their domains.

A single zombie in the midst of mutation. No horde around her.

Compared to the Titan, her strength was undoubtedly inferior.

Fan Li stood quietly in the night, his silhouette blurred, shrouded in the darkness.

He began to piece the information together, and soon a wild thought took hold—dangerous, but as irresistible as opium. Once it entered his mind, it only grew stronger.

The next moment, Fan Li strode to the wardrobe. He searched through his clothes—he had no shortage of combat gear.

The sound of him dressing caught Yang Shuo’s attention. Though the room was dark, his eyes had adjusted enough to make out Fan Li’s intentions.

“Brother Li, you’re not going out there, are you?” Yang Shuo’s voice trembled, as if he himself didn’t believe it.

“That’s right. I’m going out,” Fan Li confirmed.

“He really is crazy!” Yang Shuo stared, dumbfounded.

“There may not be ghosts outside, but there are still zombies. And if that one has undergone a secondary mutation, isn’t it too dangerous?” Yang Shuo swallowed hard, his voice thick with worry.

That’s precisely why I must go!

As Fan Li continued dressing, he sighed to himself.

The Monster Manual required killing points to summon the next helper. Even after clearing the entire building, he’d only accumulated six points—far from the hundred he needed.

The appearance of a mutant zombie, beyond the shock, filled Fan Li with urgent desire. The true challenge of the apocalypse wasn’t hunger or ordinary zombies; those could be managed. It was the Titans and other mutants that posed the real threat.

Right now, the female zombie outside wasn’t fully mutated. With his strength, he had a chance to kill her—or, at worst, could summon Ellie to eliminate the threat early.

How could one sleep soundly with a menace at their bedside?

If he let her be, and she completed her mutation like the Titan, the crisis would only deepen.

Whether to gather more killing points, summon another ally, or nip this danger in the bud, Fan Li had every reason to go out into the night.