Fighting Back

Watching Ren Ze's slightly disheveled retreating figure, Alice covered her mouth and snickered. The Alices looked at one another, still unable to understand why Ren Ze, who in their memories had shared such tacit understanding and mutual affection with them, was suddenly so afraid to face them.

Guided by the artificial intelligence, Ren Ze quickly found the base's residential area. It was quite large, enough to support a thousand people without issue. Even the most basic rooms were single dormitories with private bathrooms and showers. If they squeezed people in and converted the single rooms into the bunk-bed dormitories found in schools, the base could accommodate five thousand people without any problem.

Ren Ze casually chose a room that looked clean. After enjoying a long-overdue shower for the first time since the apocalypse began, he lay leisurely on the bed. After more than two months of remaining tense beneath the threat of the apocalypse, the string in his heart finally loosened. Looking at the room's simple modern furnishings, he felt somewhat like he had returned home to the base city.

However, Ren Ze could not stay still for long. After resting for a while, he went to the underground base's training ground.

After a round of training, he was preparing to return and sleep when he discovered that Alice had come as well.

Alice stood before him in a red dress and leather boots, just as she had when they first met.

For a moment, Ren Ze stupidly could not tell whether this was Alice herself or one of her clone sisters. Facing over a hundred Alices had made him somewhat nervous, but with only one before him, he felt much calmer.

Before Ren Ze could probe whether Alice was the original or one of the clone sisters, a wave of Psychic Power suddenly pushed toward him. It was not particularly strong, but Ren Ze had not guarded against Alice. He was immediately forced back several steps, stumbled, and fell onto the ground.

Confirmed. This was definitely the original. Those clone sisters had not awakened their Psychic Power yet...

Alice entered the training ground and casually shut the door behind her, cutting off the curious gazes of the Alices secretly watching from every corner outside.

"You?"

Ren Ze felt that something was off. Just as he tried to stand, another wave of Psychic Power—gentle yet forceful—pressed down on him, leaving him unable to rise.

"Hey, hey, hey..."

"Don't talk! Fight me properly!"

Alice seemed deeply dissatisfied with Ren Ze. She locked both hands around his neck, trying to subdue him, just as she had at the moment they separated in The Hive.

At that moment, Ren Ze could no longer hold back. Although he had initially approached Alice with ulterior motives, they had fought side by side and faced life and death together for so long. She could not just awaken Psychic Power, turn hostile at the drop of a hat, and start bullying him.

No, he had to resist. At this point, how could Ren Ze care about anything else? He began resisting with all his strength.

Alice seemed delighted that Ren Ze was willing to properly spar with her, and no longer used Psychic Power to suppress him.

As long as she did not use Psychic Power, Ren Ze felt that winning would be easy. In this atmosphere, while studying his opponent's openings and weaknesses, his thoughts drifted to the poem in his memories, "The Peach Blossom Spring."

Ah, that poem had said it well!

The ancients truly did not deceive me!

Ren Ze possessed the body of a mid-level War General, while Alice had been enhanced by the T-Virus. When the two fought, they were truly evenly matched, like a worthy opponent meeting a worthy rival...

Only when both were exhausted did they return to their rooms to rest.

Back in his room, Ren Ze let out a breath and thought over everything that had happened since arriving in the Resident Evil World.

When he had first arrived, he had only wanted to cling tightly to Alice's thigh. With impure intentions, he had flirted with her a little, never realizing that it was the most vulnerable time after Alice had lost her memory. Ren Ze had taken advantage of that weakness and etched his own image into her heart.

Afterward, Ren Ze and Alice had traveled all this way together. Calling them companions who had shared life and death would not be an exaggeration.

But now Ren Ze was conflicted. He did not belong to this world after all, and he did not know whether he could—or whether he should—take Alice away with him.

Besides, ever since entering the Resident Evil World, he had either been killing Zombies or on his way to kill Zombies.

He had kept these feelings suppressed all along.

But now, he no longer needed to struggle. Things had naturally fallen into place anyway. To hell with it.

When he woke again and glanced at the electronic clock by the bed, it was already past noon.

Since beginning martial arts training, this was the first time he had indulged himself so completely. Sure enough, tenderness was a hero's grave. Restraint! He had to restrain himself!

Women would only slow the speed at which he drew his blade!

Ren Ze silently made up his mind...

After getting himself sorted out, Ren Ze and Alice left the residential area. Along the way, they occasionally ran into a few of Alice's clone sisters. Not daring to look too closely at their complicated, indescribable gazes mixed with envy, resentment, and other emotions, Ren Ze kept his eyes on his nose, his nose on his heart, and silently recited the Heart Sutra...

As for the base they had just taken over, Ren Ze wanted to bring Dr. Ashford over from the settlement as soon as possible to develop the Reverse T-Virus that could completely end the apocalypse. Given Dr. Ashford's experience developing the Anti-toxin Serum for the T-Virus, it presumably would not be difficult for him.

On the other hand, the base needed manpower as well. The stored supplies needed sorting, the damage caused by Dr. Isaacs needed clearing up, and people were needed to keep the various parts of the base operating normally.

Ren Ze also wanted to find Kaplan and see whether he could modify the underlying logic of the base's artificial intelligence, molding it completely into his own shape, so that he would not have to worry about it stabbing him in the back one day while he was busy dealing with the Umbrella Corporation.

Ren Ze felt that the base should have more than the one entrance they had used. After finding the base's artificial intelligence and questioning it, he learned that aside from the passage through which he and Alice had entered, there was another dedicated passage for large vehicles such as cars and helicopters.

Following the artificial intelligence's directions, they found a garage near the passage. It was packed with dozens of brand-new vehicles of various models and functions. Naturally, the majority were the SUVs that had appeared in Raccoon City, while eight helicopters were parked on a distant helipad.

What a haul! Unfortunately, Ren Ze had not unlocked the skill of flying helicopters. He did not know whether Alice could fly one, though. He remembered that she could pilot those old propeller planes. But Alice did not seem interested in flying a helicopter. The two got into an SUV and started on their way back.

Nothing went wrong along the way. Instead, the two had a conversation on the road.

Mm... a very proper conversation. Alice finally asked Ren Ze about the question that had been troubling her for so long.

"Ren, can you tell me now? Why were you so skilled, yet completely unknown before? I have no impression of you at all. But in The Hive, you suddenly appeared before me and treated me so well?"

"Can we not talk about it for now? I don't want to make up a lie to deceive you, and I'm not deliberately trying to hide anything. I just haven't figured out how to explain everything that happened to me. One day, I'll tell you everything in full, but I'm really not ready yet..."

Sure enough, Alice had still asked. Yet Ren Ze did not dare tell her the cruel truth. Skillfully changing the subject, he also voiced a doubt that had lingered in his heart. "Tell me about yourself. You're so charming now, so you must have been adorable as a child, right? But I don't think I've ever heard you mention your relatives or friends. How did you end up joining the Umbrella Corporation?"

Perhaps because she trusted Ren Ze deeply, Alice was not angry at his answer. But upon hearing his question, her expression dimmed.

"When I was very young, my parents died in a car accident. I only remember government workers taking me to an orphanage. After I came of age, I joined the military. Back then, I excelled in every aspect in the army, and the Umbrella Corporation recruited me with a high salary. Later, I became the supervisor in charge of security at The Hive's entrance."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to bring up painful memories..." Ren Ze comforted her.

"It's all right. They're more like symbols in my memories now. Besides, don't I have you by my side now?"

Alice quickly emerged from the sadness of her childhood memories. Looking gently at Ren Ze, she began telling him amusing stories about things that had happened around her in the past.