"Obviously, this isn't a suitable place to cremate your sister's body. We have to find somewhere secluded. Otherwise, lighting a fire here will only attract more zombies. First, use these clothes to wrap up the blood on your sister's body, then seal her mouth shut too. If she suddenly turns into a zombie and bites you on the way, you'll just have to accept your fate."
Zhao Tianlei said this, then took some things from his backpack and tossed them to the man. The man hesitated at first, but after thinking it over, he followed Zhao Tianlei's instructions and got to work. Meanwhile, Zhao Tianlei chatted with him and learned that the man was named Li Xuyang and was just over twenty years old.
His family wasn't wealthy. He had grown up in a village within the city and was an honest, straightforward person. He had liked martial arts since he was young and had trained at a martial arts school for several years. Because he was too honest and blunt, he had often been bullied. In the end, he had been forced to drop out and joined a martial arts class in the city as an instructor, earning only a thousand or so yuan a month.
He had never been in a relationship. But after his family's home was included in a demolition and relocation project, people began introducing him to potential girlfriends. The woman was quite attractive, and Li Xuyang had never imagined that anyone would introduce such a beautiful woman to him. He had fallen for her at first sight. After they went on several dates and chatted, Li Xuyang's younger sister learned that her brother had found her a beautiful sister-in-law. She was delighted and wanted to see what her future sister-in-law looked like.
So Li Xuyang took his sister along with the woman, planning to go on a date at the park. Then the apocalypse broke out. Their pleasant outing instantly turned into a flight for their lives. As everyone fled, they encountered quite a few zombie hordes.
During their escape, the woman was wearing high heels and couldn't run fast. In her panic, she tripped and fell. Just as she was about to meet a terrible end, Li Xuyang's younger sister leaped forward and slammed into several zombies, giving the woman a chance to escape. His sister was bitten by a zombie and suffered a scratch as well. Li Xuyang immediately used a long stick to knock the zombies away, then carried his sister and followed the fleeing crowd into this small supermarket. What happened afterward was exactly what Zhao Tianlei had witnessed.
Zhao Tianlei then said, "Your sister is gone now. Once we get outside and cremate her body, do you have any plans? Of course, I mean apart from taking your sister's ashes on trains, ships, planes, Ferris wheels, to zoos, and so on."
After hearing Zhao Tianlei's words, Li Xuyang fell silent for a moment before replying, "Actually, after the apocalypse broke out, my family also met with disaster. I'm the only one left now, and I have nowhere to go. I don't know what to do either."
Zhao Tianlei smiled faintly. "Li Xuyang, right? I haven't introduced myself yet. My name is Zhao Tianlei, and I'm a year older than you. From now on, you can call me Big Brother. My goal is to build a powerful, united survivor team. Then we'll find a safe, defensible place, establish a sturdy survivor base, and slowly develop and survive there."
"As long as you obediently follow me, Big Brother guarantees that you'll live well. But if you try any tricks behind my back, I definitely won't let you off. You should know that betrayal is what I hate most. Of course, if you don't want to build a team with me, I won't force you. I can give you some food and let you leave on your own."
After hearing Zhao Tianlei, Li Xuyang barely hesitated before saying, "I may not have any special talents, but I value loyalty above all else. You saved me and my sister just now. Although my sister is gone, your intervention kept her from dying horribly at the hands of those people—and you saved my life too. I have nowhere else to go anyway, so I'll follow you. As long as you don't do anything vile, I won't go our separate ways."
"Good. Very good. But there's something we still need to deal with. I can see nearly twenty people down there. Those people were extremely cold toward you just now and even abandoned you and your sister. Now they're trapped below, desperately waiting to be rescued. The decision is yours: whether to save them is up to you." As he spoke, Zhao Tianlei shoved the rope into Li Xuyang's hands.
Everything Zhao Tianlei had just done and said had been heard clearly by the people below. It was obvious that after Zhao Tianlei said those words, many of them wore looks of despair—especially the girlfriend Li Xuyang had mentioned earlier. Her expression was particularly sour.
"Xu Yang, throw the rope down quickly and save us! I was just too scared before. I couldn't accept the fact that your sister had been bitten, so I spoke harshly to you. I'm your girlfriend, after all. As long as you pull me up, I'm willing to keep being your girlfriend and follow you forever."
Seeing fate play such a cruel joke on her, the woman hurriedly cried out to Li Xuyang on the roof. To survive, she was willing to discard her dignity and didn't care in the slightest about the cruel things she had said to Li Xuyang moments ago.
After the woman finished speaking, the others around her also began pleading. "Little Brother, throw the rope down and pull us up! We're all willing to work with you from now on. When you cremate your sister, we'll kowtow and apologize to her."
"Damn, I've seen shameless people before, but never anyone this shameless." Looking at the people below and seeing how quickly their attitudes had changed, Zhao Tianlei couldn't help spitting in disgust.
As soon as Zhao Tianlei finished speaking, Li Xuyang threw the rope down. The people below immediately descended into chaos. Some began fighting desperately over the rope, all wanting to be the first to climb up. But the more they refused to yield to one another, the slower they became. In the end, not a single person managed to climb up.
Zhao Tianlei, Li Xuyang, and Cheng Yao watched the people below and all revealed cold expressions. The arrival of the apocalypse had completely erased the humanity from some people. Even those who still retained a little humanity gradually lost it under the influence of the indifference around them.
"Let's go. There's no point staying here. We need to find somewhere quickly to cremate your sister's body first. Then, before it gets dark, we have to find a place to hide and rest. Otherwise, once night falls and the temperature drops, we'll grow tired too. Those zombies, however, don't know fatigue."
With that, Zhao Tianlei prepared to leave, and Cheng Yao followed close behind. Li Xuyang glanced below at the people who were still fighting over the rope, yet none of them had managed to climb up. He hardened his heart, picked up his sister's body, and followed Zhao Tianlei and Cheng Yao across the rooftops.
Most of the nearby zombies had been drawn away by the survivors inside the store, so the three of them faced little danger as they left. They occasionally encountered a few isolated zombies along the way, but they posed no threat to the trio. Their journey was safe enough, and after walking for about half an hour, Li Xuyang finally began to feel somewhat tired.
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