Outburst

In the depths of his being, Chen Changsheng felt that this willow tree would one day bring him immense help.

He didn't know what to call what he was doing—was this the legendary act of awakening all things? Had he truly awakened a willow tree?

If he could awaken other things in the future, that would be incredible, but just awakening this willow had already drained a massive amount of the Original Virus within him. Any more, and he really wouldn't be able to handle it.

Though the willow couldn't speak to him yet, it could already understand his commands. Its branches swayed in the wind like a joyful little dog.

Now, with the willow constantly absorbing nutrients from the earth and converting them into high-energy sustenance that Chen Changsheng could absorb, he no longer needed to buy enormous amounts of food. Without such bizarre behavior, he wouldn't draw attention to himself, increasing his chances of escape.

But clearly, the willow was still far too weak. For now, Chen Changsheng needed to do things that would help it grow.

For example, he could try to construct special transport channels for the willow, allowing it to move energy quickly and grow faster.

Once the willow matured, Chen Changsheng could imagine the benefits it would bring—high-energy sustenance would probably be the least of it.

He reached out and broke off a willow branch, wrapping it around his wrist. Flesh tendrils sprouted from his skin, intertwining and fusing with the branch until they became one.

Under Chen Changsheng's will, the branch could snap out in an instant.

After being transformed by the Original Virus, the willow branch was exceptionally tough. If used as a whip, it would surely make a fine weapon.

Unfortunately, Chen Changsheng's own combat skills were mediocre at best. With a soft weapon like a whip, his fighting ability would be even more lackluster.

In truth, being able to catalyze the willow's rapid evolution wasn't originally his own ability—but now it was.

His own ability leaned more toward devouring and replication. Earlier that day, when he began absorbing Elizabeth's blood, he felt the Original Virus inside him quickly copy the ability of the virus within her. It seemed that Elizabeth's power was evolution.

If he could rapidly catalyze this mythical willow today, Elizabeth could likely do the same.

Thinking carefully, if it were Elizabeth, she might be even faster, since the ability to evolve living things was originally hers.

But then again, maybe not. The amount of Original Virus in Elizabeth was far less than in Chen Changsheng, and even he couldn't afford to consume too much of his own virus.

If Elizabeth expended a large amount of Original Virus, she would likely suffer a serious blow to her vitality.

Fortunately, Chen Changsheng now possessed this ability, and in the future, he would have more virus.

After two days of heavy eating, the Original Virus inside him had multiplied rapidly. In a short time, it had grown considerably. Now, his entire body was composed of the Original Virus, giving him an extremely dense physique.

The other residents of Hope Town only carried trace amounts of virus. Even Elizabeth, who had the highest concentration, possessed only a few hundredths of what Chen Changsheng had.

In terms of pure Original Virus content, Chen Changsheng felt he had the upper hand. But his enemies weren't these unknowing townsfolk—surviving was the most important thing right now.

Originally, he could only command the Original Virus within his own body. But today, having spurred the willow's evolution, he felt he could also influence the virus inside the tree.

This discovery thrilled Chen Changsheng. It seemed he had found another way to grow and strengthen himself. For the sake of future safety, he had to develop and expand with all his might.

If a small town full of Original Virus could be leveled by a military nuke, what if the whole world were filled with it? They couldn't blow up the entire planet, could they?

The willow's weakness right now was its inability to move. Even if it evolved the ability to hunt small animals, it was still fundamentally a plant.

Compared to animals, Chen Changsheng always felt plants were lacking something.

After conveying his will for the willow to spread its roots far and wide, he took the green branch in his hand, gently swinging it as he walked toward home.

He could only hope the willow's roots would grow beyond the blast radius of a nuclear bomb, giving it a better chance of survival.

Having become the embodiment of the Original Virus's will, Chen Changsheng no longer seemed to need sleep.

Lying in bed all night, he thought about how to develop in the future. This wasn't like a game where he could charge in mindlessly—if he got killed here, there would be no second chance.

Waking up in the morning, Chen Changsheng headed to school as usual. But something was different—unusual people had arrived. They wore full protective suits and carried instruments, scanning everywhere as if searching for something.

The school entrance was also controlled by soldiers from Black Watch, wearing masks and special combat gear. These soldiers didn't pay attention to students coming and going; they stood like statues, carefully observing every passerby. Chen Changsheng at the gate naturally caught their eyes.

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Chen Changsheng and some other students looked at the ominous setup, too scared to move forward. Unlike the others, his heart sank heavily—things were always developing beyond his control.

Yesterday, he thought Black Watch wouldn't get involved so quickly. Yet today, their soldiers were already here.

The teachers beside the Black Watch soldiers seemed to have received orders from the military. They were now using a loudspeaker to explain to the townspeople and students that classes would go on as usual, and the military was only here to borrow some scientific instruments.

The teacher's words were clearly a lie. After all, what kind of equipment did a small-town school have that the military would need?

But since the teacher had said so, Chen Changsheng couldn't just leave and go home. Seeing his classmates gradually entering the school, he had no choice but to act normal and walk in with them.

Once inside, he noticed that the researchers in protective suits were monitoring students as they had their blood drawn.

Those who had given blood were herded back to their classrooms. Chen Changsheng didn't know what to do—he wasn't Alex, and suddenly causing a scene would likely get him captured for research.

So he obediently gave a tube of blood and followed the crowd back to his classroom.

He could only hope that blood was the virus. Hopefully, these people wouldn't mess around.

In the classroom, Elizabeth wore the same grim expression as Chen Changsheng. Her belly was now slightly visible.

He tried using his thermal vision to look at her stomach and saw that the baby inside seemed nearly fully formed.

Elizabeth's expression was hard to read. One moment, she nervously glanced out the window; the next, she buried her head on the desk, looking both anxious and helpless.

Somehow, Chen Changsheng couldn't help but walk over. He gently patted her shoulder and said a few comforting words. "Elizabeth, I'm sorry about yesterday. Are you feeling better today?"

Chen Changsheng's sudden arrival startled Elizabeth, but once she recognized her classmate, she let out a huge sigh of relief.

Elizabeth hesitated for a moment, then looked at Chen Changsheng and said, "Jack, do you know why those soldiers are drawing our blood?"

Chen Changsheng knew that Elizabeth had also noticed the abnormalities in her own body—like the inexplicable baby growing in her belly—and he imagined the pressure on her must be immense.

But he couldn't spell it out so plainly. After a moment's thought, he said slowly, "It should be some unknown change happening in the town. Those soldiers and scientists are probably here because of that."

No sooner had Chen Changsheng finished speaking than Elizabeth's face darkened even further, clearly lost in thought about something.

After exchanging a few more words with Elizabeth, Chen Changsheng left her side. And once he was gone, Elizabeth seemed to have made up her mind.

Sitting in front of Chen Changsheng, Elizabeth gritted her teeth and sliced open her palm with her fingernail.

Then, from behind her, Chen Changsheng felt the classroom fill with some unknown hormones. Under their stimulation, the Original Virus inside him evolved rapidly.

The virus's evolution consumed a great deal of Chen Changsheng's energy, but fortunately, it was still within his tolerance. Lately, the Willow Tree had been feeding him plenty of high-energy matter, so even as all the viruses in his body evolved at breakneck speed, ceaselessly draining energy, Chen Changsheng managed to hold on.

But the others in the same classroom weren't so lucky. Chen Changsheng watched as a frail classmate in the corner quickly withered, his eyes losing their luster.

With an incomprehensible roar, that classmate—whose energy had been exhausted and evolution failed—turned into a zombie, ruthlessly lunging at the person beside him, feeding to replenish energy and continue evolving.

From Chen Changsheng's unique perspective, the Original Virus inside that classmate was evolving and multiplying at a terrifying rate. But that required massive energy, and his frail body couldn't supply it. So the virus's evolutionary will devoured his physical consciousness, turning him into nothing more than a feeding zombie.

Chen Changsheng could sense that the zombie wouldn't attack him. In essence, they were both viruses—the difference being that he still had his mind.

Still clinging to his human identity, Chen Changsheng couldn't bear watching his classmates one by one turn into zombies and tear into each other. And witnessing such a horrifying scene, he also felt a flicker of fear.

Like any ordinary person caught off guard, Chen Changsheng shot up and bolted for the classroom door. As he passed Elizabeth, he grabbed her hand and shouted urgently, "Elizabeth, run!"

Elizabeth already knew the effect of her blood—it could turn animals into zombies.

The day before, after her nosebleed stopped, she'd gone home to change clothes. Her pet cat had licked the blood off her shirt, and right before her eyes, it had turned into a Zombie Cat.

But that cat hadn't hurt Elizabeth. Maybe because it was her pet, she even felt a strange closeness to the zombified cat...

The only thing that bothered Elizabeth was that her pet didn't look as cute as before.

As for the zombies in the classroom, Elizabeth didn't feel threatened by them either. But since Chen Changsheng had already pulled her along, she decided to head home first and seek help from her family.

Elizabeth was just an ordinary girl at heart. Faced with something like this, she still wanted to turn to her family—after all, in most people's minds, home is the safest place.