It turns out, women do live more delicately than men. Many small things in a girl's dormitory turned out to be surprisingly useful for survival in the apocalypse. However, Jiang Yi couldn't help but laugh at how many "raincoats" he found hidden around—things he had never used. He shook his head and decided to stash them into his backpack without hesitation.
By now, Jiang Yi had become quite familiar with his surroundings. He knew exactly how to sneak around quietly without alerting any zombies. As he leaned closer to a door to listen carefully, a loud explosion suddenly sounded. The glass of the door, barely ten centimeters from his face, shattered instantly!
A putrid hand shot out at lightning speed, grabbing for Jiang Yi's head.
Startled, Jiang Yi instinctively dodged backward, raising his left arm to block the attack.
"Zzzz!" A dull, grinding pain surged through his arm, making him gasp sharply. Though he narrowly avoided having his throat seized, his arm was still slashed by the sharp, black claws of the zombie.
The fresh blood seemed to drive the zombies into a frenzy. Their hands smashed through the door's glass, and two rotting arms reached out wildly!
Ignoring the pain in his arm, Jiang Yi gripped his knife tightly and quickly wrapped the blade around his arm like a protective sleeve, stopping once it reached his elbow. It looked like he had armored himself with a knife guard. With a swift slash, the weaker of the two arms was cleaved off with a single stroke.
The noise of the battle stirred the entire sixth floor, causing the zombies in the rooms to start howling and violently slamming against their doors. Jiang Yi's eyes reddened, and without hesitation, he struck again, slicing off the other arm.
Just then, a blueish face squeezed through the shattered glass. But since the gap in the door was too narrow, the head could only lash out, biting the air in a frenzied attempt to reach Jiang Yi.
With a cold sneer, Jiang Yi thrust his knife forward, piercing the zombie's mouth. However, it didn't die immediately. Instead, it continued to thrash on the blade. Jiang Yi gritted his teeth and used all his strength to slice through the zombie's skull, cleaving it in half.
A surge of energy filled his body, and the feeling of weakness evaporated. He could feel the white light flowing into his chest, knowing that he had leveled up. With the zombie's body collapsing on the ground, it was replaced by another, and Jiang Yi wasted no time. He struck again, his black blade cleaving the zombie's skull cleanly from its forehead down to the middle of its face.
The fallen zombie struggled for a moment before succumbing to its injuries, and another burst of white light flashed.
Once he confirmed that there were no more zombies inside the room, Jiang Yi shoved the two dead bodies out of the way and entered the dormitory. His eyes landed on an unusual sight: a male zombie, which should not have been in a female dorm. Both of the corpses were grotesquely stacked in front of the door, emitting a stench that made Jiang Yi gag and cover his nose.
Despite the howls of zombies coming from the corridor, Jiang Yi quickly searched the dormitory and was elated to find a metal wardrobe. Inside, several neatly hung male outfits awaited.
His clothes had become torn and soiled with zombie blood after more than ten days of wear, and he was eager to change. Without hesitation, he stripped off his cheap t-shirt and was about to wear one of the brand-name sports jackets hanging in the wardrobe. However, he paused when he noticed the three gashes on his left arm, still bleeding.
Fortunately, he had found a small first aid kit earlier. He used the water to clean the bloodstains from his arm before applying some hemostatic spray from the kit.
The sharp pain made him wince, his entire body covered in cold sweat, but he managed to bandage the wound as best he could.
Jiang Yi wasn't concerned about being infected by the zombie virus. He knew from experience that while regular zombies didn't pose a threat to ability users, those that had evolved to higher levels could still infect them. This had been proven when three ability users who had survived zombie attacks suddenly transformed into zombies after several hours.
Some scholars speculated that the only way for ability users to resist this evolved strain of the virus was to also evolve.
Jiang Yi wasn't the best at physical skills, but he had always been highly observant, noticing every detail about his environment. Every zombie he killed was carefully examined for its level and strength, and this observation allowed him to survive even when he was weaker than an average person. It was this attention to detail that had allowed him to survive for an entire week in such dangerous circumstances.
Jiang Yi was unable to find any bandages in the box, so he simply tore a strip from a clean bedsheet and wrapped it around his arm. After that, he put on the newly found sportswear. The clothes were slightly large on him, but the soft fabric of the brand-name sportswear didn't restrict his movement at all, no matter how much he moved.
He jumped up and down in place, relieved to find that the men's shoes he had picked up fit him just right, only one size larger than his own.
Feeling refreshed after the successful kills, Jiang Yi felt more confident. Now that he had leveled up, he could clearly feel his speed surpassing his former self.
He checked his stats and saw that he was now level 3. The experience required to level up again had increased to 1/8.
Clenching his fists tightly, Jiang Yi knew that each level he gained would result in a huge boost to his strength. What he needed most right now was to keep killing zombies to earn more experience.
Without wasting time, Jiang Yi decided to continue. Since the door provided a barrier, he didn't have to worry about zombies getting out. Instead of testing each room one by one, he decided to keep using his previous method.
He turned back to room 619. With his left hand holding the skull-slicing knife and his right hand gripping the scabbard, he smashed the glass door. The zombie inside immediately lunged at him, its arm cutting deeply from the broken glass but showing no reaction, still madly reaching out.
Jiang Yi quickly struck down with his black knife, splitting the zombie's skull in a single blow. In the blink of an eye, he gained a small amount of experience.
This method of farming monsters was so convenient that Jiang Yi couldn't help but feel a surge of joy. From that point on, he completely turned the sixth floor into his own personal grind spot. Zombies came one by one, then two by two, until he had finished clearing out the last room, 601. By then, it was already completely dark outside.
However, the haul from the entire floor wasn't as great as he had hoped. Jiang Yi sighed helplessly when he saw that he had just reached the next level.
At the beginning of the apocalypse, the fear caused by the disease had made many students too scared to stay at the school, so there were only about a dozen zombies on the sixth floor. After ten days, most of the zombies capable of leaving their rooms had already gone out hunting. Though his results were disappointing, Jiang Yi wasn't planning to continue grinding for now. Glancing at his watch, he saw that it was nearly 8 PM.
The dark, powerless hallway posed an obvious danger, so Jiang Yi decided it was too risky to go searching for more zombies. He quickly found a clean, unoccupied dormitory, turned on a small desk lamp, and began sorting through his spoils.
The supplies he found were plentiful, mostly consisting of power banks and small items. There were less than ten bottles of water and not much food. These items only filled half of his backpack.
However, Jiang Yi wasn't in a hurry. He had only explored one floor, and there were still five more to go. Besides, killing zombies in the dorms was incredibly safe. He felt he was getting a lot of experience here, and it seemed a waste not to take advantage of it.
Still, Jiang Yi didn't grow overconfident. He could clearly feel that after only a few battles, his body was starting to show signs of fatigue. His strength had become heavier, and his mind felt foggy. If he hadn't been so much faster than before, he almost would have lost an eye to the last zombie's attack.
Moreover, the wound on his left arm had reopened, and blood was seeping out again. After such intense exertion, the wound hadn't had a chance to form a proper scab.
Lying on the bed, Jiang Yi knew that all this was due to his insufficient physical strength, mental stamina, and overall constitution. He couldn't help but regret his earlier attribute choices. If he had focused more on strength and constitution, perhaps he wouldn't be in such a sorry state now.
"All those years of gaming experience are messing with me," Jiang Yi muttered bitterly. Exhausted, he drifted into a deep sleep, filled with regret.
The night at the university was far from peaceful. After a day of hiding, the zombies emerged hungry, drawn by the scent of fresh blood. The stronger zombies would actively seek prey, while the weaker ones fed off the bodies of those that had died earlier in the day. This was why the zombies killed during the day were often gone by the next morning.
But this had nothing to do with Jiang Yi. The sixth floor was by far the safest place in the entire campus.
Ordinary zombies couldn't climb stairs, and the strong odor of decaying bodies covered any trace of Jiang Yi's presence. As a result, he knew that tonight, he would sleep the most peacefully he had in the past ten days.
The excitement of battle, the fear of death, and the adrenaline had all taken their toll, and Jiang Yi fell into a deep, undisturbed sleep. Little did he know, the door handle that had been still for hours was slowly and silently beginning to turn, inch by inch...