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Chapter 16 — Provocation
The next morning, a military jeep quietly drove out of Lin City, which had all but become a ghost town.
The sound of the engine drew countless zombies after them. The creatures swarmed behind the jeep in relentless pursuit, but the people inside never paid them any mind. The vehicle pushed forward through streets clogged with abandoned cars, weaving through the ruins of the city.
Only when the zombies got too close would flames suddenly erupt in front of the horde, exploding outward in a blazing wall that swallowed the undead whole and cut off their path.
Mo Chu leaned out from the passenger seat and looked back. Once she saw the pursuing zombies blocked by fire again, she finally pulled herself back inside and flashed Li Chen an okay sign.
“Keep going.”
But Li Chen slowed the jeep to a stop instead.
“We can’t.”
Mo Chu looked ahead and immediately understood why.
The narrow street was completely blocked by three crashed sedans tangled together in a heap. There wasn’t the slightest gap left for the jeep to squeeze through.
She stared at the wreckage and let out a weary sigh.
Back when she’d asked for a vehicle, she’d done so without hesitation. At the time, she’d still been thinking like someone from the sixth year of the apocalypse. By then, vehicles were priceless. Without one, traveling between survivor bases was nearly impossible.
So she’d naturally chosen a car as transportation.
What she’d forgotten was that this was still the beginning of the apocalypse.
The roads were packed with abandoned vehicles and rotting corpses. Traffic conditions were absolute hell. Honestly, if all she wanted was speed, she would’ve been better off asking the platoon leader for a military motorcycle.
Yesterday, they’d gathered almost all the crystal cores they needed and stuffed the trunk full of scavenged food before leaving the city.
And yet after more than two hours of driving, they hadn’t even made it very far.
Li Chen got out of the jeep. Mo Chu followed after him, and finally Xiao Jin squeezed out through the rear window. The two humans and one dog stood there, staring at the wall of wrecked cars blocking the road.
Mo Chu stepped closer to inspect them.
Two of the cars were empty, their owners nowhere to be found. Maybe they’d died and been eaten by zombies. Maybe they’d become zombies themselves.
But in the third car, she found a human corpse.
There were no bite marks on the body.
Only a knife wound across the throat, deep enough to sever the artery.
Mo Chu fell silent for a moment before sighing softly.
To survive the zombies only to die at the hands of your own kind…
How ironic.
She turned toward Li Chen. “Let’s go around.”
He nodded.
So they detoured once again.
Back in the passenger seat, Mo Chu glanced sideways at Li Chen as he drove, and without warning, her thoughts drifted back to last night.
Last night, Li Chen had absorbed his first crystal core.
He possessed extraordinarily powerful abilities—far stronger than most people, whether in quality or sheer strength of power. Mo Chu had assumed that absorbing a core for the first time would be easy for him.
She hadn’t expected things to almost go wrong.
The moment he absorbed the crystal core, his reaction became violent.
When he closed his eyes, Mo Chu had no idea what he’d seen, but in that instant his body temperature skyrocketed. Veins bulged against the skin of his wrist as if they might burst through at any moment. Even his fingernails turned faintly gray.
It was exactly what a secondary viral infection looked like.
Mo Chu had been terrified.
She didn’t dare hesitate. Just as she was about to forcibly interrupt the absorption process, Li Chen suddenly opened his eyes again.
For a brief moment, he looked awake.
But his eyes were red.
When those crimson eyes fixed on her, there was a terrifying contradiction inside them—calmness mixed with madness. It was not the gaze of someone who had regained clarity.
Every instinct in Mo Chu sharpened at once.
Carefully, cautiously, she called his name.
“Li Chen?”
Those red eyes turned toward her.
And the moment they did, a chill shot up her spine.
But somehow, it was as though that single call dragged him back from the edge. His gaze flickered with hesitation and struggle, and little by little, the red faded away.
Human warmth slowly returned to his eyes.
He looked at her.
After the confusion came a stillness vast and quiet as the sea.
That was Li Chen’s gaze.
That was when he truly regained consciousness.
It had been a close call.
And in that moment, Mo Chu had genuinely, truly felt relieved.
When Li Chen called her name in that slightly hoarse voice of his, she suddenly felt as though her name had never sounded so beautiful before.
Thankfully…
Li Chen survived it.
At the time, that had been the only thought in her head.
But afterward, the more she thought about it, the stranger it felt.
Generally speaking, the stronger the ability user, the lower the risk of infection while absorbing crystal cores. Li Chen possessed such overwhelming power—how could he nearly lose control during his very first absorption?
He’d even fared worse than she had.
In her previous life, Li Chen had been acknowledged as humanity’s strongest esper. There was no way the problem lay with his abilities. If even Li Chen’s powers were flawed, then half the ability-user world might as well give up.
Which meant the issue could only be Li Chen himself.
What exactly had he seen in that moment?
What could possibly throw even him into such chaos that he forgot to defend himself against the invading energy?
But they weren’t close enough to pry into each other’s deepest wounds.
At least, not yet.
Since Li Chen never spoke of it, Mo Chu didn’t ask.
Still, ever since they’d set out this morning, he’d been quieter than usual.
Li Chen had never been talkative to begin with, but somehow, she could tell this silence was different.
Maybe she’d been staring at him for too long, because Li Chen suddenly glanced over and asked softly, “What is it?”
Mo Chu didn’t want to bring up last night, so she blinked and casually changed the subject.
“You’ve been driving for a long time. Want to stop and let me take over?”
Truthfully, Mo Chu had never gotten a driver’s license—not in this life or the last. But after surviving six years in the apocalypse, there was no way she didn’t know how to drive.
Li Chen shook his head. “I’m not tired.”
Mo Chu casually popped a piece of chocolate into his mouth.
Li Chen froze slightly, chocolate caught between his lips.
Then he heard her say, “Even if you’re not tired, you should still keep your energy up.”
From the back seat, Xiao Jin immediately started barking indignantly after realizing Mo Chu had fed Li Chen but not him.
Without even looking back, Mo Chu tossed him half a sausage.
Satisfied, Xiao Jin finally quieted down.
Li Chen watched her with an expression that practically said there’s really nothing I can do with you, and before he realized it, he laughed softly.
The chocolate melted slowly on his tongue.
Strangely enough, it didn’t taste bitter at all.
…
Another two hours passed.
The sun hung high overhead, and just as noon approached, they finally managed to leave the city center behind.
Relying on memory, Li Chen navigated through countless turns before finally reaching the national highway.
Unlike the cramped roads inside the city, the highway was broad and open. There were far fewer abandoned vehicles blocking the way, and at long last, they could actually pick up speed.
After suffering through those nightmare roads for half the day, Mo Chu almost wanted to sprint thirty miles in celebration.
Half an hour later, Li Chen finally pulled the jeep over to the roadside so they could rest and eat.
Mo Chu sat on the roof of the vehicle, nibbling on a piece of bread while absentmindedly looking down below.
Li Chen crouched beside the jeep, eating lazily with one hand while peeling open another piece of bread to feed Xiao Jin.
The dog looked extremely happy.
But watching him eat made Mo Chu worry.
Xiao Jin’s appetite was enormous. Maybe it was because he’d awakened a strength-type ability, but the amount he ate alone exceeded what she and Li Chen consumed together.
Mo Chu had originally estimated that the food they’d packed would barely last until they reached Hai City.
Now it looked like they’d need another plan.
Lost in thought, she bit into her bread again—
And suddenly, three sedans appeared on the opposite side of the road, speeding straight toward them.
Mo Chu glanced over and called out to Li Chen, signaling him to move aside and let them pass first.
Along the way, they’d occasionally encountered scattered survivors and vehicles. Most were people who’d missed the rescue convoy for one reason or another.
Some were trying to return home to find family.
Others were heading to join friends.
Li Chen stood up and glanced toward the approaching cars before leading Xiao Jin to the roadside.
At first, Mo Chu paid the vehicles little attention.
But just as they drew close, all three cars suddenly slowed at the same time.
A moment later, they accelerated violently.
The vehicles charged straight at them, surrounding them from front and back in the blink of an eye.
The moment their speed changed, Mo Chu had already sensed something wrong. Her hand immediately moved toward her waist.
By the time the cars stopped, she’d already drawn her dagger.
Li Chen, however, didn’t move at all.
One hand rested casually on Xiao Jin’s head as he stroked the dog absentmindedly. His eyes remained calm, though beneath that calmness lingered a sharp, icy edge.
The car doors opened.
Seven or eight men stepped out.
The one in front was the largest of the group, broad and muscular, with an arrogant swagger written across his face. His gaze landed on Mo Chu first, lazily sweeping over her from head to toe before deliberately pausing on the dagger in her hand.
A careless chuckle escaped his throat.
At that instant, the calmness in Li Chen’s expression vanished.
He suddenly lifted his head, and a trace of red flashed through his eyes before giving way to a chilling coldness that made the air itself feel sharp.
Mo Chu, on the other hand, became even calmer.
She knew exactly what this was.
Road robbers.
She looked at them steadily and asked, “What do you want?”
The leading man ignored her completely. Instead, he turned toward Li Chen, who had yet to speak a single word, and said in a commanding tone:
“Leave the woman and your food behind. Do that, and we’ll let you go.”
One of the men beside him immediately chimed in, “Brother Ji, their vehicle’s good stuff too! A military jeep—they must’ve gotten it from somewhere special!”
Brother Ji grinned.
“Fine. Leave the woman, the jeep, and the food. We’ll spare your life.” He tilted his head slightly and smirked. “Or refuse, and we’ll break your legs first before sparing you anyway. You can crawl your way back to the survivor camp.”
The others burst into loud laughter.
Amid the laughter, Brother Ji raised his fist.
His arm instantly swelled to more than twice its normal size.
Showing off his power, he looked at the two of them with arrogant satisfaction.
They’d done this kind of thing many times before. With abilities on their side, robbing survivors had become effortless. They’d never failed once.
He waited smugly for the fear and pleading to begin.
But things didn’t go the way he expected.
The two people before him showed no fear at all.
The woman merely looked at him coldly.
There was even mockery in her eyes.
The unexpected reaction unsettled him. A strange sense of losing control crept into his chest, quickly turning into irritation at their refusal to know their place.
Just as he was about to speak again, the woman suddenly said coldly:
“Xiao Jin.”
Who was she calling?
Before he could react, a massive golden retriever burst out from the side.
The dog leapt through the air, jaws spreading wide to reveal terrifying fangs as it lunged straight at the man who’d demanded the jeep.
The sound of bones cracking and flesh tearing rang out clearly beside him.
The man’s scream became shrill and inhuman.
“Brother Ji! Save me!”
Panic surged through Brother Ji, but he quickly forced himself to steady down. Just as he prepared to attack—
The silent man standing across from him finally raised his head.
Brother Ji saw a pair of faintly red eyes.
Cold.
Filled with killing intent.
And he never got another chance to make a move.
