The public elevator slowly stopped on the sixth floor. Four men crouched on the narrow top of the elevator—Pan Di, Li Qi, Zhao Ze, and Shen Chen.
Shen Chen looked down at the deep elevator shaft and ordered, "Zhao Ze, your goal is to go down to the fifth floor, pry open the elevator doors, then lead the zombies to jump down the shaft one by one. Five stories is enough for them to fall to their deaths.
Zhao Ze's teeth were chattering uncontrollably. For the first time, he felt regret. Shen Chen was clearly using him as bait! But he couldn't disobey, because Shen Chen was powerful, because he was aggressive enough! Because if he didn't agree, Shen Chen would kill him immediately!
He could only grit his teeth, once again checking that the rope on his body was tied tightly, then say with a stutter, "Pull me up once the doors are open!"
Shen Chen nodded, then added, "You have to lead the zombies into the elevator shaft!"
Zhao Ze yelled in tears, "What if those b*stards don't go down?!"
"That won't happen. You just have to shout or pee on them, and they'll jump at you immediately," Shen Chen explained calmly.
Zhao Ze wanted to cry. He could only pray that Shen Chen would keep his promise.
"All right! Let's lower him down!" Shen Chen ordered calmly. At the same time, Pan Di and Li Qi slowly let down the rope in their hands. When they lowered the rope to the lowest point, Zhao Ze successfully arrived before the elevator door on the fifth floor.
Shen Chen's voice came from overhead. He said, "Don't be afraid. Open the doors and shout, then we'll pull you up!"
Zhao Ze stared at the dark elevator shaft with blank eyes. It looked like a giant horrifying mouth that wanted to swallow him whole. His fear reached a peak, and tears and snot ran down his face uncontrollably. He used the fire axe in his hand to pry the elevator doors open with extreme caution. At that moment, he really didn't know if he wanted to open the doors or not.
After a while, Pan Di became a little impatient. He urged, "Hurry up, Zhao Ze. If our hands get tired, we won't be able to pull you back up!"
Hearing this, Zhao Ze immediately moved more swiftly. He frantically stuck the fire axe into the gap in the doors and forcefully pried them open. The cold doors lived up to his desire and slowly opened. More and more light poured into the elevator shaft.
The sound of the metal doors opening alarmed the zombies on the fifth floor. When the door fully opened, the zombies in front of the elevator suddenly turned around. When they saw the living human hanging in the air, they all let out an elated growl. Then several zombies charged toward Zhao Ze.
"Ahh!!! Help! Help!" Zhao Ze burst out in shrill cries, screaming while flailing his limbs wildly. His cries were filled with fear and desperation. He had a complete breakdown.
He felt a rotten wind blow toward him. Countless arms grabbed at him like giant wriggling maggots.
"Shen Chen, hurry up and pull me up! You b*stard, pull me the f*ck up! Pull. Pull me up there… You f*cking b*stard. You want me to die, don't you? Listen up. My uncle's in the military. I'm going to shoot you dead! I'll shoot you!"
Just as the zombies were about to get hold of Zhao Ze and bite him, a command came from above. "Pull!"
Shen Chen looked at Zhao Ze, who looked as pale as paper. Below him, countless zombies were growling and reaching for him, but they were all pushed down the elevator shaft by zombies behind them. One, two, three… just like dumplings falling into a pot.
Zhao Ze still didn't get pulled up. He remained in mid-air, screaming and crying madly. At the same time, the zombies' hands were kept at a slight distance from him. He was just like food hanging in front of a donkey: impossible to reach, but forever tempting.
Thirty minutes later, after no more zombies jumped down the elevator shaft, Zhao Ze finally shouted tearfully, "Pull me up… Pull me up!"
Shen Chen was unmoved. He said, "Do one last thing. Check if there are any more zombies on the fifth floor, then tell me."
Zhao Ze said with a stutter, "Okay. Okay, I'll check. I'll check!"
The rope was let down again. Zhao Ze grabbed the elevator door and checked left and right, then said, "None. There's none."
"Alright!"
Shen Chen knocked on the elevator, then said, "Fourth. Boss. The two of you press the fifth floor button and quickly rescue those people. Then take the elevator to the first floor, and we'll ride the through elevator back to the sixteenth floor.
"Alright!" Zhao Zhen and Guo Yuan nodded inside the elevator.
This time, Zhao Ze was finally pulled up. He crouched on the elevator and panted like an old dog. He was completely limp.
Everyone stared at the numbers flashing on the elevator. An evil smile flashed across Zhao Ze's downturned lips.
"Be careful!" Shen Chen warned. Guo Yuan and Zhao Zhen nodded.
The elevator slowly descended. After reaching the fifth floor, the elevator lightened. Shen Chen clearly saw the two walk out alertly and cautiously.
Less than two minutes later, the sound of hurried footsteps and a child's cry came.
Shen Chen's expression changed. 'Not good! Something's happening!'
Then, the elevator dropped slightly. Three men and one child escaped into the elevator in fear. Guo Yuan pressed on the buttons frantically. "Close! Hurry up and close!"
Shen Chen was frantic. The elevator door hadn't closed yet when a zombie's arm reached inside.
"Oh, no!" Zhao Zhen's eyes instantly widened. Guo Yuan chopped at the zombie's arm with his fire axe, but the obstruction made the elevator doors open. At the door, three or four zombies growled excitedly. The moment they saw the door open, they jumped toward the people inside.
Guo Yuan and Zhao Zhen watched the approaching zombies in despair. Guo Yuan suddenly yelled angrily, "Zhao Ze, even if I get eaten by zombies, I won't let you off!"
On top of the elevator, Pan Di grabbed Zhao Ze's collar. "You f*cking dared to put my brothers in danger!"
Zhao Ze yelled in terror. "It's not my fault… I didn't see any zombies!"
Before he finished his sentence, the spot next to him became empty. Shen Chen had lifted the ceiling of the elevator and had jumped down onto the zombie before Pan Di and Zhao Ze's astonished stares. The first zombie that entered didn't get a chance to grab anyone before it was stepped on by Shen Chen. With a splat, its head shattered beneath Shen Chen's feet like a watermelon.
Before anyone could even get a clear look, a knife flashed, and they heard two crisp noises. The zombies in front of them only had half a head remaining, and fell to the ground slowly. The whole process was over in a mere ten seconds. It was a total blur. Not only Guo Yuan and the others, but even the rescued man and the child in his arms, had stopped crying and stared at Shen Chen in disbelief. Was he even human? Was this a movie?
Shen Chen quietly kicked out the zombie under his feet. He looked at the people in the elevator and asked, "Are you alright?"
"I'm… I'm fine!" It was the man, who had an incredulous expression, who answered. His eyes lit up. "It's you. You're the one who picked up the phone!"
Shen Chen flashed a faint smile. "Of course I'd do what I promised you." Then he pressed the button to go down to the first floor. He turned around and said to the people inside the elevator, "Now we're going to experience the pleasure of crushing zombies!"
There were still zombies who hadn't fallen to their deaths that were standing on top of the mountain of corpses and screaming in the elevator shaft. But the elevator was like a mountain, crushing down on them mercilessly. Their brains and blood streamed out endlessly like smashed watermelons. Li Qi and Zhao Ze finally couldn't stand it anymore and began violently vomiting on the elevator.
More and more zombies appeared below. The elevator lowered to the space between the second and first floor and could no longer go down.
Shen Chen opened the elevator door from inside and said, "Let's go!"
Everyone hastily crawled out from the opening on the first floor. Pan Di, Li Qi, and Zhao Ze also hastily jumped down from the elevator, then followed Shen Chen to the through elevator.
Seeing the elevator rise closer and closer to the sixteenth floor, they finally fell limp to the floor after all they had experienced.
When they entered the room, all the girls inside immediately gathered around them. They saw that all the men looked very shabby, and immediately understood what horrors they had experienced, especially Shen Chen. He was drenched in zombie blood.
Seeing Ye Xiaoyu run over anxiously, Shen Chen got a warm feeling in his heart. He quickly stepped to the side. "Don't come over here. There's zombie blood all over my body." Then he ordered hastily, "These two are survivors we rescued. Everyone go get cleaned, and we'll gather again later."
Half an hour later, the aroma of food filled the room. The man, who had been holding the child the whole time, looked at the neat room, which appeared so ordinary, and finally started crying uncontrollably. The little boy in his arms, who was only two or three, got a frantic expression on his face and started crying as well.
A long while later, Zhao Zhen passed him a cigarette. The man holding the child took it with trembling fingers, lit it, and put it to his mouth. But looking down at the child in his arms, he hesitated, then slowly put the cigarette down. His calm voice was filled with great sorrow. "His mother didn't let me smoke in front of him…"
His words were filled with immense sorrow. It struck everyone's hearts. Suddenly, everyone's eyes reddened.
"I've been working away from home. My wife took care of the house. She was always working in and out of the home, taking care of the child, taking care of our parents, and all those trivial social matters, she did all of them. I knew she was exhausted, but I was busy working and never fulfilled my promises to her. This year I thought, I must compensate her. The three of us will come out for the holiday, for Valentine's Day… but I didn't expect… When she turned into a monster in the end, I was the one who killed her… She was holding our child. I was afraid she would harm him… but she didn't. She must have still remembered that was our child. Her mouth paused in mid-air and didn't bite down. But I still killed her… I ought to die…"
The man was immersed in great sorrow. His gaze was blank, staring straight ahead. He was like a piece of wood, seeming to not want to accept the tragedy that had occurred. The more he acted like that, the more pity everyone felt for him. The girls' eyes all dimmed watching the heartbroken man and the ignorant child in his arms.
'This was once a happy family, but during the apocalypse, countless families were destroyed like this…' Shen Chen quietly sighed, then said to the man, "Dead people can't come back to life. The most important thing is for you to live on—for her sake too—with your child."