Panicked, David shoved open the storage room's double doors and collided with Ollie, electrician Jim, and several others who had been about to go in and check on the generator.
"Hey! Slow down, David! What are you doing?"
"What happened?"
Back under the supermarket lights, David finally calmed down a little. He licked his cracked lips, steadied himself, and looked at them. "Did you hear anything?!"
The storage room's double doors were well insulated, so none of them had heard the rolling shutter rattling violently.
"The generator? We were just about to go in and check it." Ollie pointed toward the storage room and guessed.
"No, no!" David held Ollie back. After hesitating for a moment, he said nervously, "I shut off the generator. The batteries are fully charged. That's not what I mean—the shutter! There's something outside! Something is pressing against that... door!"
Old electrician Jim, an old American with a tradition of anti-intellectualism, kicked a box of detergent on the floor without much concern. Shaking his head, he sighed. "What sound? A monster, maybe?"
Just then, Norman, the supermarket assistant, approached with the flashlights they had asked for, looking at them in confusion. "Weren't you going in to check the generator?"
"David says there are strange sounds coming from inside." Another maintenance worker shrugged.
Ollie looked thoughtful, then hooked his thumb in a certain direction and suggested, "Why don't we get Mr. Li Wei to take a look?"
Li Wei was indeed the only person they knew who had passed through the white fog, but none of the people here truly believed that strange Asian man.
Even though they had seen the monster's shadow, it could have been a trick!
David believed there really were monsters in the fog, but he did not want to ask that man for help.
Old electrician Jim was more straightforward. Waving a hand, he said, "Don't get carried away. You were probably just scared. Maybe it's some nasty prank. Let's go take a look!"
After saying that, he took a flashlight from Norman, went around David, and entered the storage room.
The others hesitated where they stood. When they saw Jim had already opened the door, they picked up flashlights and followed him into the storage room.
David glanced in a certain direction, then turned and walked into the storage room as well.
He thought, They were all human. If they really ran into a monster, what difference could there be?
By the partitioned stove, a large group of people had gathered around Li Wei as he cooked curry. Most of them had no attachments, the kind of people who lived alone in town and only had themselves to worry about.
Even with monsters outside, they could still eat and drink without a care. If no one had taken the lead, they might have worried about their safety just like everyone else.
But Li Wei had set a bad example, and they had begun drinking and fooling around. If they had not been afraid of disturbing the others, they might have made the atmosphere even livelier.
"Mmm, the curry's ready. Save me a portion. I'll bring some to the old lady first." Seeing that the curry was done, Li Wei put a piece of bread on a plate, added a spoonful of curry with potatoes and fresh carrots, then got up to deliver it to the white-haired old woman.
He brought the curry to Aisle Six and handed it to Grandma Repla, who was leaning against the shelf, earning a word of thanks from her.
Li Wei nodded and glanced at Billy, who was dozing off in Turman's arms. He did not deliberately mock him again, turning to leave instead.
At that moment, his sharp hearing let him faintly catch some noise coming from the direction of the storage room.
There were strange muttering sounds mixed with someone's screams. Curious, he quietly asked Repla, who was eating curry, "Is someone in the storage room?"
"Oh!" Repla swallowed her food and smiled. "David is. He went to get Billy a blanket."
Li Wei gave an acknowledging "Oh," thanked her, and left, running into Amanda as she returned from looking for medicine.
Amanda placed the medicine on the ground and slowly sat down, her gaze fixed on Li Wei's retreating back. "That Asian guy always feels a little strange... like a character from a movie."
"Mysterious, right?" Turman, who was comforting Billy nearby, smiled and offered a fitting description.
Amanda turned around, handed the medicine to Turman, and nodded in agreement. "He really is like that."
"All right, ladies, it's not nice to talk about people behind their backs. Want some curry?" Grandma Repla raised her plate with a smile.
Inside the quiet, peaceful supermarket, no one could have imagined that a terrifying tug-of-war was taking place in the storage room.
The storage room's rolling shutter had risen about half a meter. Several thick, terrifying tentacles reached in through the white fog beneath it, burrowing into the storage room and turning everything inside into a mess.
More deadly still, one tentacle had wrapped around Norman, the supermarket assistant. Heart-wrenching screams tore from his mouth as the spikes along the inner side of the tentacle ripped his chest into a bloody mess, leaving a gruesome wound.
David and Ollie gripped Norman's arms and wrestled against the tentacle, not daring to let it drag Norman outside. That would mean death.
Jim, who had seemed so decisive before, and his apprentice were now frightened stiff, their eyes vacant. Their mouths opened and closed as they leaned against the side, not knowing what to do. They did not respond to David's shouts for help either.
"Ahhh! Save me! Hurry, save me! Ah! I don't want to die!" Norman's screams and pleas echoed through the supermarket storage room, while several other huge tentacles rampaged around the room, knocking over storage racks at random.
When Li Wei entered the storage room, this was the scene he saw.
He immediately strode forward, smashed the glass of the fire equipment cabinet hanging on the wall, and pulled out the fire axe with one hand, as easily as if he were picking up a plastic toy.
David and Ollie were still wrestling with the tentacle. Hearing the crisp sound of shattering glass, they thought Jim and his apprentice had finally come to their senses and were here to help.
But the people they glimpsed were not Jim and his apprentice.
It was Li Wei.
Carrying the fire axe, Li Wei walked up to the three bedraggled men, grabbed the massive tentacle with his left hand, and yanked it inward!
The two men had barely been able to slow the tentacle's retreat, but with Li Wei's pull, their hands suddenly felt light. Their bodies toppled over from exerting too much force.
David and Ollie climbed to their feet in a daze and looked at Li Wei, who held the fire axe high in one hand.
The heavy fire axe came down. Metal struck the ground, and the thick tentacle was severed in half with a single blow.
The tentacle wrapped around Norman loosened slightly from the pain. The remaining tentacles rampaging through the storage room recoiled as though they had caught fire, knocking over more merchandise and shelves as they withdrew.
Under David's terrified gaze, Li Wei once again pulled the fire axe from the concrete floor with one hand, planted his gleaming black leather shoe on the enormous tentacle trying to retreat, and swung down again with his right hand...
Bang!
Another dull impact sounded, and the remaining half of the flesh was cut through as well.
Seeing this, Jim and his apprentice, who had been standing there blankly, were not relieved but even more terrified. After letting out several screams, they rushed for the storage room exit. Not watching where they stepped, they were tripped by the other tentacles as they rapidly recoiled.
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