Aroma

Xu Huo pulled the door open. A woman in a courier uniform stood outside, tugging at her collar, which was unbuttoned three notches down, and said in a sugary, coy voice:

"Handsome, my colleague went to the restroom. The fridge you bought is way too heavy; give me a hand and I'll help you move it in."

Xu Huo took a drag of his cigarette, staring at her, unable to stop himself from swallowing a mouthful of saliva.

The woman seemed accustomed to this, bending over to wheel the cart into the doorway.

After unloading the refrigerator from the cart, the woman sat down uninvited on the two-seater sofa in the living room.

Xu Huo stubbed out his cigarette and poured her a glass of water. "It's a hot day; thanks for the hard work."

On the coffee table, his tablet screen lit up, displaying a striking red headline:

"Newlyweds disappear in the mountains, widowed old mother suspected as killer—is this the collapse of morality or the distortion of Human Nature?"

"Fifty sows at the village entrance scream every night; the culprit is actually him..."

"Even a tiger won't eat its own cubs; why did the sixty-year-old elder smother his seven-year-old grandson..."

Click. The screen went dark. The woman looked up at Xu Huo, her face flushed, her breathing rapid.

The vigorous beating of her heart pumped fresh blood, and a rich, savory aroma seeped from her pores, making his mouth water uncontrollably.

"Let's watch some TV." Xu Huo avoided her gaze and turned on the television. The female anchor's flat voice rang out:

"Recently, temperatures across the country have shifted drastically. Multiple cities experiencing thirty-degree heat have reported strange celestial phenomena such as hail and snow..."

Xu Huo changed the channel: "A hiker encounters a tornado in the deep mountains; a livestream records the final moment of their disappearance..."

He changed it again: "A black cloud hole has appeared over Haishi, sucking in air currents. Experts claim it is a pressure phenomenon caused by the storm..."

"Over a dozen children have gone missing in Binshi in the last month..."

"...During this period of high criminal activity, a dismemberment maniac has appeared in Ting City, leaving victims' remains incomplete... We warn all citizens to travel in groups and try not to go out after dark..."

BOOM!

The previously clear sky suddenly changed, turning thick with dark clouds. The light in Xu Huo's small one-bedroom apartment dimmed. As his vision became suppressed, his sense of smell sharpened; the meaty fragrance radiating from the woman sitting beside him became impossible to ignore.

Gulp! The sound of swallowing was exceptionally loud, but it wasn't Xu Huo. He turned his head just in time to see the woman leaning in close. Her mouth was agape, no longer the sweet, coy look from minutes ago. Suspicious red residue was stuck between her teeth, and her wide-open eyes were filled with greed and hunger!

She opened her mouth wide, lunging to bite his face!

Xu Huo tilted his head and jumped back quickly, grabbing the floor fan and smashing it head-on into the woman as she leaped!

Bang! The woman's face dented the fan, but she bounced back onto the sofa as if nothing had happened, assuming a frog-like squatting posture!

"You smell so good." Her saliva dripped down.

Xu Huo set the fan aside and lit a cigarette. "Smells good, but doesn't taste good."

The woman hadn't expected him to be so calm and grew wary instead, probing, "Were you on that train too?"

Xu Huo's eyes brightened, though he didn't show any emotion on his face. The woman, however, caught this minute change and flew into a rage. "You dare lie to me!"

The opponent's speed far exceeded that of a normal human, and her pouncing posture was not human either; the force of her feet as she leaped sent the sofa sliding three meters away!

The old sofa screeched against the floor tiles. Xu Huo grabbed the insecticide from the side cabinet and sprayed it wildly at the woman. Dodging her grasping hands, he took the opportunity to kick her and bolted toward the bedroom!

Behind him came the woman's angry roar, barely audible amidst the thunder. Xu Huo accurately sensed she was following and slammed the bedroom door shut the moment he entered!

Crash! The finger-thick door panel couldn't withstand the impact, and the lock was ripped right off. By the time the woman kicked the shattered door aside in a fury, Xu Huo had already grabbed the fruit-knife-turned-spear hidden behind the door and stabbed it into her chest!

The woman was fast and strong, but she was still flesh and blood. She collapsed to the ground, clutching her bleeding chest.

"Haa... haa..." The fruit knife had pierced her lung. She made a wheezing sound, her violent, fierce gaze gradually turning sorrowful. "Save me... save me... You are an Evolver too, and you haven't gone through the Initial Screening yet... I can help you survive..."

The narrow bedroom was filled with the thick scent of fresh blood. The pungent, fishy smell was dizzying. Xu Huo took a deep breath, ignoring the "sweet" and "fragrant" sensations spontaneously rising in his brain. He stepped back, sat on the bed, and lit a cigarette, staring at the woman.

The woman's rosy complexion gradually turned pale, but she showed no sign of dying. She stared at Xu Huo urgently. "Are you very hungry?"

She wiped some blood and reached out her hand. "Smell it. Doesn't it smell delicious? The flesh and blood of an Evolver taste better than a normal person's—sweet and savory, more nourishing than mother's milk..."

Hearing Xu Huo's involuntary gulp, the woman looked triumphant. "Take one bite and you'll understand. Evolvers like me are the strongest; we have the highest survival rate on the train..."

Silence was his only response. The woman's tone became urgent. "Aren't you hungry? Don't you want to eat me?"

"...You don't understand how dangerous the Initial Screening is. More than half of all Evolvers die in the Initial Screening, you..."

Xu Huo exhaled a cloud of smoke, stubbed out the cigarette, and interrupted her: "You're getting more energetic."

The woman's expression froze. Seeing him walk toward her, her eyes filled with fear.

"What do you want to do!"

"Isn't it you who has been tempting me to eat you?" Xu Huo countered.

The woman's facial muscles couldn't adjust in time; after a twisted smile, she offered her fair, tender arm.

Xu Huo grabbed her wrist and said unhurriedly, "A dismemberment maniac has appeared in Ting City recently; that's one of your kind, right? The fact that you dare offer yourself to me, not fearing that I'll eat all your flesh, suggests that this hunger can be sated with just a little blood and meat. Or is it that you can even regenerate lost limbs?"

"The former is more likely."

"Those who have eaten human flesh have the highest survival rate on the train, so there are also... Evolvers on the train who haven't eaten human flesh?"

"Looking at your pathetic state, desperate to drag the whole world into the gutter with you, the consequences of touching human blood must be quite bad... You surely didn't know that before you started eating people, right? You only discovered it after the Initial Screening?"

The woman's expression shifted from astonishment and surprise to shock and fury. Her eyes darted around, her teeth ground together, and finally, it turned into bone-deep hatred. "You Evolvers... I'll kill you!"

The moment she lunged at Xu Huo, another fruit knife pierced her throat, and bubbling blood began to spill out. The woman convulsed and rolled over; the knife that had been in her chest was gone, and the wound had already begun to heal.

Even a fatal wound could heal automatically; if she were given a few more minutes, a counter-kill would not be out of the question.

Xu Huo brushed off his clothes, finding no signs of any potions or medicine, but he did discover a red tattooed serial number on the back of her shoulder: E33586.

"Given your intelligence," he said thoughtfully, "if I were to ask you where to find the train for the initial screening, you certainly wouldn't know."

The woman's eyes bulged, and she breathed her last in resentment.

Xu Huo swallowed hard, stopped looking at the corpse in the bedroom doorway, and headed to the kitchen to find something to eat. Passing through the living room, he saw the newly purchased refrigerator, tore off the outer packaging in a few swift motions, and as the door swung open, a head flopped out limply.

As expected... He sighed and dialed the police.