"Ding-a-ling, ding-a-ling."
Wen Yu opened his eyes groggily, as his consciousness returned to his body with the sound of the alarm clock beside his bed.
"What? What is this?"
Looking at the familiar rented room, and feeling his intact body, Wen Yu's thoughts couldn't help but drift back to just moments ago.
Just moments ago, Wen Yu and his hunting party were on a mission.
The so-called hunting party was nothing more than a small team from a minor gathering place in the post-apocalyptic world.
As the strongest member of the team, Wen Yu had just successfully advanced to a level 2 warrior.
Everyone knew that a team like this, in the doomsday era, was nothing but cannon fodder.
The so-called mission was, of course, a cannon fodder level task... to attract the attention of a level 5 mutant beast.
Then, lure it into a trap set by the main force team. The huge rewards and sharp swords made it impossible for Wen Yu to refuse this suicidal mission.
Unfortunately, cannon fodder can never change its inherent nature.
As Wen Yu's cannon fodder squad made contact with the target creature, they also faced a staggering number of 30 level 3 mutant beasts.
By the time Wen Yu realized the situation and turned to flee, a third of his cannon fodder squad had already been torn to shreds.
As for Wen Yu himself, he had his head smashed by the level 5 mutant beast's palm a hundred meters away from the trap.
Then, when Wen Yu opened his eyes again, he found himself in the small, rented room where he had lived for three years.
"What... what's going on?"
Wen Yu immediately straightened up and stood beside the mirror near his bed.
Looking at himself in the mirror, his frail body had none of the strength he once had.
It's important to know that in the past, although he was merely a cannon fodder, he at least had the strength of a second-level soldier, with a physical power of about a ton. His muscles were well-defined, and his frame was robust.
Now, however, the body before his eyes appeared frail, like an ordinary older brother from a neighboring family.
The more Wen Yu looked at his body, the more familiar it felt, as if it was the way he was before his class change.
"Could it be?" Wen Yu seemed to have thought of something, and suddenly dashed to the computer, scrutinizing the date displayed on the screen.
"May 25th, 2017... This is the beginning of the apocalypse, a year ago! Could it be that I've been reborn? I've been reborn, hahaha, hahahaha!"
Wen Yu's laughter grew louder and more hysterical. Recalling his past life as cannon fodder, he laughed until tears streamed down his face.
If he could live another life, would he still become a weak cannon fodder? Would he still accept being exploited and despised by the strong? Would he still live through those unspeakably miserable days?
"Never, never again!" Wen Yu cried out in frenzy, believing this to be a blessing from heaven.
Wen Yu took a deep breath.
"Ahh..."
Suddenly, a piercing scream shattered the tranquility of the residential area.
"What's going on? Can't a person get some rest?"
"Damn, is someone mad?"
"Damn it, what a terrifying scream."
Countless curses and complaints emanated from within the building, as many people expressed their strong protest against the sudden scream.
However, instead of subsiding, the screams grew more intense, not only from the ground floor of the apartment complex but also from the hallways and residences. Different cries of terror filled the air.
"Help, someone's being murdered!"
"Honey, what's wrong with you? Don't bite me, ah!"
Wen Yu suddenly had a terrible premonition. He swiftly locked his front door, found a table to barricade it, and rushed to the window to look down.
Below, the source of the screams was a newlywed couple who had just gotten married. Now, they were suddenly displaying their affection in the middle of the residential area's square.
The man tightly embraced his wife, passionately kissing his "lover's" cheek. This would have been a beautiful act, if not for the bits of flesh and blood in the man's mouth.
Wen Yu had seen this scene in his previous life as well, as it was the first image he witnessed when the apocalypse arrived.
At that time, the sight of blood and eyeballs splattering everywhere had made Wen Yu vomit on the spot. In this life, all he could do was mutter to himself, "What the hell."
Wen Yu knew the apocalypse would come and had mentally prepared for its arrival.
However, his preparation was limited to his mindset, as he had only been reborn for a mere five minutes.
In those five minutes, acknowledging and accepting the fact of his rebirth was already a testament to his mental fortitude.
Just as Wen Yu thought about preparing some supplies and weapons, the apocalypse had already kissed his smooth forehead.
"Heavens, are you playing with me again? What happened to the benefits of being a reborn person? Even without benefits, at least give me a usable weapon!" No matter how much Wen Yu complained, the situation remained the same.
Wen Yu carefully surveyed his small rented room, trying to find something that could be considered a weapon.
Within three seconds, Wen Yu became disappointed.
The rental room was small to begin with, so naturally, there was no space for a kitchen. Therefore, Wen Yu couldn't find a kitchen knife or a cleaver in the room.
With no other choice, he picked up a fruit knife from the table and lightly scraped its edge with his finger, thinking, "Having something is better than nothing, right? Even if it's a fruit knife that struggles to cut an apple."
At this point, Wen Yu could only find solace in the fruit knife.
He checked his food reserves. As a perennial bachelor, an orphan without parents, and a homebody who spent his days with his computer, he had a lot of instant noodles. Besides that, he also had a small jar of fermented bean curd.
He recalled that in his previous life, he had survived a month on two boxes of instant noodles stored in his room.
Before he starved to death, a team of survivors searching for supplies found him, and that marked the beginning of his year-long journey as cannon fodder.
Wen Yu carefully packed his belongings, placing a few packs of instant noodles into his backpack, along with a few bottles of mineral water and some sausages.
hese were the basic supplies he was going to take with him. He then found a mop, kicked off the head, and tightly wrapped the handle with the fruit knife, creating a makeshift spear freshly made. Of course, its actual combat power was yet to be tested.
He put on his thermal underwear and found some discarded books and magazines to wrap around his wrists as makeshift armor.
With his backpack on and spear in hand, Wen Yu slowly opened a crack in the door, making sure there was no danger in the hallway before opening it fully.
Wen Yu lived on the third floor, and upon opening his door, he saw that the door opposite was slightly ajar, with strange squelching noises coming from inside.
"They were such a nice elderly couple. I should help them find peace." Wen Yu understood that a tragedy had befallen the kind old couple living across the hall.
Quietly, he pulled open the door to their apartment and saw the once kind old man facing away from him, hunched over his wife, tearing into her flesh with large bites.
The old woman's eyes were wide open, staring lifelessly at the ceiling.
Zombies—the hallmark of the apocalypse's beginning.
The widely accepted view in later generations was that with the opening of the demonic realm's portal and the leakage of demonic energy, some humans without antibodies in their genes mutated into these decaying, filthy creatures.
Although they looked terrifying and disgusting, these zombies were actually the weakest creatures in the early stages of the apocalypse. The corruption of their bodies by demonic energy caused the softening and collapse of their muscle tissue, making them far weaker and slower than humans in terms of strength and speed.
As long as humans could overcome their fear and had a weapon capable of breaking open a zombie's skull, even a woman could kill several zombies in succession.
For Wen Yu, who had survived a year in the apocalypse, these low-level creatures couldn't instill any fear in him.
Perhaps the sound of the door opening disturbed the feasting zombie, and the zombified old man slowly turned his head, his pale pupils fixed on the fully-armed Wen Yu.
Wen Yu naturally understood the importance of striking first. He forcefully kicked the zombie, knocking it down and stepping on its body.
The zombie struggled incessantly but couldn't muster the strength to throw Wen Yu off. Its bloody mouth let out continuous roars.
Wen Yu ignored the zombie's screams, adjusted the angle, and thrust the spear viciously into the zombie's eye socket. The fallen zombie convulsed a couple of times and then stopped moving.
"Ding, killed a level 0 zombie, gained one point."