The latest research

Xu Duoduo followed Qin Luo and sat on the rug beside the sofa. Looking at everything on the table, she silently took out several more large containers of food.

Beef rolls, lamb rolls, a box of assorted meatballs, duck blood curd, wide glass noodles, crispy tofu skin rolls, fried tofu puffs, enoki mushrooms, shrimp paste-everything they needed.

Qin Luo and Bai Shu stopped chatting and watched her pull out food instead. This was incredible!

"Little Class Monitor, you really are a treasure chest! Whatever we want, you have it. And everything's packed in food storage containers. You can tell those beef rolls are sliced from whole cuts, not reconstituted meat!"

Chen Xiaofei came out carrying a small basin of vegetables, his face full of delight as he spoke.

The little zombie finally pulled out a large jar of canned yellow peaches. All three of them went, "Wow!" and couldn't help applauding. That was good stuff too.

Bai Shu smiled. "Little Class Monitor, could we put in a request for some alcohol? Old Wang likes spirits. A few beers will do for the rest of us. We definitely won't drink too much."

Xu Duoduo gave another demure nod and took out a dozen beers, followed by a bottle of Moutai.

Ta-da! Wow! Suddenly, even the table seemed to sparkle with gold!

Bai Shu burst out laughing again. "Old Wang, come look! The Little Class Monitor got you some Moutai!"

"What?" Wang Weihu rushed straight out of the kitchen and hurried into the living room to look. He was absolutely overjoyed. "Little Class Monitor, you're an angel!"

He really loved his liquor.

But Chen Xiaofei yelled from the kitchen, "Old Wang, your sink's about to overflow!"

Only then did Wang Weihu go back to washing the vegetables. He was in such a wonderful mood that he even hummed a little tune. Wearing an apron as he washed vegetables, he looked every bit the perfect homemaker.

After a flurry of work,

they could finally sit down to dinner. By then, it was already eight in the evening.

Bai Shu played the latest research report aloud on his tablet.

Then they started eating and drinking.

"Little Class Monitor, do you have sesame paste? Hot pot without sesame paste has no soul."

"Put some beef in for me."

"Little Class Monitor, I want an oil-based dipping sauce."

"Holy crap, this meat smells amazing! Good beef really does taste best cooked in clear broth!"

"As a proud member of the spicy camp, I absolutely disagree!"

"Xiaofei, what did you buy? Why are there all these chunks of pink meat?"

"Whatever it is, I'm not brave enough to eat it."

"Tch, I bought shrimp! Shrimp! Mutant shrimp! Another squad brought it back, and the Research Center checked it. It's edible, and twice as delicious! God, I only managed to snag one box. Do you know this stuff costs three hundred points a box?"

The little zombie stared at the basin of so-called shrimp meat. It really was shrimp meat, just magnified countless times over. Each chunk was the size of a fist.

This was the good stuff Chen Xiaofei had mentioned. He'd fought a whole crowd of people for it at the supermarket.

"Damn, it really is delicious!"

"Eating shrimp like this is so satisfying!"

"Little Class Monitor, want to try a bite? Can you eat mutant shrimp?"

Qin Luo had just offered Xu Duoduo a piece of shrimp. "Want to eat it as sashimi?"

Xu Duoduo stared at it for a while. She didn't want the raw shrimp held in the serving chopsticks. Instead, she set her sights on the cooked shrimp in his bowl, actually looking tempted for once.

Qin Luo understood instantly. As he spoke, he put the shrimp held in his chopsticks into the spicy broth and cooked it for a minute, then took it out to cool. While it cooled, the little zombie rested her claws on his arm and silently swallowed her saliva.

Chen Xiaofei and the other two laughed. "So even the Little Class Monitor gets cravings?"

Bai Shu took off his glasses and set them aside. "Why wouldn't she? We just don't know whether she'll like it cooked. Didn't the new research say mutated people prefer eating mutant animals?"

Wang Weihu took a sip of his liquor, completely relaxed. Watching everyone eat and drink, he felt that life couldn't get much better than this.

Qin Luo listened to his friends, then looked at the little zombie pressed against his side, her entire undead body drawn in by her craving. Of course she gets cravings. She even climbed into my arms that night and gnawed on my wrist. "All right, it's cool now. Eat up."

When Xu Duoduo saw the shrimp being held right up to her mouth, she opened wide and gobbled it down. The huge chunk of shrimp was sweet and juicy, and her eyes lit up!

She could actually taste it!

A flavor other than crystal cores! The taste of shrimp! Her face was filled with delighted surprise.

The little zombie froze.

Chen Xiaofei bit his chopsticks, startled too. "What's wrong with the Little Class Monitor? Why does she look like she's lost her internet connection and frozen?"

Bai Shu and Wang Weihu also watched her anxiously. This was the little zombie's first time eating something other than mutant cores.

Qin Luo stayed calm. After observing her for so long, he could understand her little thoughts. "It probably tasted so good her brain crashed. She's fine. Give her a moment."

Sure enough,

the little zombie began chewing again, her eyes sparkling and her claws still gripping Qin Luo's forearm.

It wasn't that Xu Duoduo didn't want to eat by herself. She could grab things just fine, but delicate tasks like using chopsticks were beyond her. Her claws hadn't adjusted yet.

But that was all right.

She had an automatic feeder beside her.

Qin Luo took a couple of bites himself, never forgetting to cook more mutant shrimp for her.

Chen Xiaofei and the others breathed a sigh of relief, then smiled again and went back to eating and drinking.

"So what does the latest report mean? I can't really understand it."

"Me neither."

Hearing Wang Weihu and Chen Xiaofei, Bai Shu said helplessly, "Were you two even listening?"

The report had practically become background music.

Wang Weihu and Chen Xiaofei chuckled sheepishly. They really hadn't listened closely.

Bai Shu looked at the two of them, then at their captain beside him, who was busy playing feed-the-little-zombie. Not one of them could be relied on. He simply cleared his throat, leaned against the sofa behind him, took another sip of beer, and began explaining.

"One of the Research Center's latest discoveries concerns the uses of mutant cores. These things are the key to the evolution of both living and nonliving things worldwide."

They still hadn't identified the source of the infection affecting the entire planet.

But infected living and nonliving things all evolved through [Devour]. That was why zombies wanted to bite people, mutant animals wanted to eat people, and mutation monsters were even less picky, eating anything that came their way.

Their goal was to accumulate enough energy to evolve and grow stronger.

All infected entities contained this energy element. At the initial stage, there was very little of it; the higher their level, the more they contained.

For example, ordinary zombies and ordinary mutant animals didn't have mutant cores, but they constantly improved through [Devour]-in other words, by eating.

Eventually, mutant cores would form inside them.

[Devour] was also one of the main skills all mutated people currently possessed. It was a fairly common one.

"The second new finding is that the Mutant Core Dilution Injection has been approved and is entering mass production. Ability users can improve their abilities by getting these injections, but whether they can absorb and use the energy depends on the individual. Pushing past your own limits is another way to speed up your improvement."

Using the Mutant Core Dilution Injection was much like using spirit stones in cultivation novels. Without the injection, they relied on naturally absorbing the world's source of infection, and could achieve a breakthrough after exhausting their abilities. With the injection, they could level up faster, but they would be nothing more than an empty shell propped up by artificial gains.

Abilities were like blades. They had to be tempered over and over to become truly sharp.

Levels built up through drugs were hollow.

All of them were stunned.