Chapter Summaries

Ye Lin fused the Tyrant and Observer bloodlines, gaining immense power but nearly attacking his teammates before suppressing his killing instinct. The group finished preparing their gear as the system announced that the second exam would begin in 22 hours and 49 minutes.

• Ye Lin exchanged for the Grade C Tyrant and Observer bloodlines, endured a painful fusion, and collapsed when the enhancement ended.
• Ye Lin awoke in a killing frenzy and nearly struck He Zheng, but used the Observer skill to suppress his bloodlust and assured the others he was fine.
• Ye Lin assessed his enhanced perception and combat strength, then exchanged for the Ancient Blade while the others bought equipment and supplies.
• Zhang Tie revealed his silver bear transformation, and An Ke gave Ye Lin and He Zheng translator earpieces while explaining useful skills available through the system.
• The system announced that the second exam would begin in 22 hours and 49 minutes, leaving all six examinees facing the vortex.

As the exam approached, An Ke showed Ye Lin the supplies she had bought and received a self-replenishing handgun from him. Just before the group was teleported, Hu Jia’s suspicious preparations unsettled Zhang Tie, but all six examinees entered the exam together.

• An Ke showed the group her gemstones and practical supplies, explaining she had saved some of her points for the exam.
• Ye Lin gave An Ke a handgun that generated ammunition, and she accepted it while remaining wary of him.
• As the countdown neared its end, He Zheng noticed Hu Jia was missing and sent Zhang Tie to fetch him.
• Zhang Tie found Hu Jia in his room with suspicious items, and Hu Jia begged him not to reveal what he had seen.
• Zhang Tie brought Hu Jia back, and the system teleported all six examinees when the countdown reached zero.

Ye Lin and five veterans arrived in a crowded city for a Death Exam, where their only newcomer died after fleeing the barrier. As the exam began, Ye Lin proposed killing everyone nearby to prevent zombies from forming, and the exam question appeared to be cut off.

• Ye Lin and the others appeared on a busy street, where He Zheng began explaining the Death Exam to their sole newcomer.
• The newcomer panicked, ran beyond the system's barrier, and exploded; Ye Lin questioned whether the boy's unusually new shoes meant something.
• He Zheng proposed taking weapons by force, while Huang Liang argued for cooperating with local authorities, and Hu Jia asked whether they could escape by plane.
• An Ke explained that fleeing the exam would result in death, and the group continued arguing over their plan as the exam's start approached.
• Ye Lin proposed killing everyone nearby if the virus had not spread, and the system announced that the exam had begun before its question appeared.

Ye Lin’s team escaped the police and suspected the rival team had military backing, then chose to find scientist Carlton while searching for clues about the coming outbreak. Ye Lin left the team at a Manor, where he forced a businessman to mobilize his connections, and wondered how the zombies would appear.

• Ye Lin led the team away from the police after the other team rejected their call, and he warned that the rivals might be using the military against them.
• Ye Lin reasoned that the rival team had probably chosen the military-backed option and might have selected a trap, while An Ke explained that the teams’ answers could depend on their strengths.
• After He Zheng fought the Manor’s guards, Ye Lin chose option two and learned their target was scientist Carlton, an anthropologist who might know how to stop the outbreak.
• Ye Lin threatened a wealthy businessman into using his connections to locate Carlton and investigate unusual military activity, while Huang Liang left the hall in disapproval.
• Ye Lin told An Ke that the rival team mattered less than the scenario and wondered where the zombies would appear when the outbreak began.

Ye Lin’s team tracked Professor Carlton while discovering that the rival team controlled the military and planned to attack them. Ye Lin suspected the system’s apparent advantage was a trap, and the chapter ended with An Ke wondering whether the Death Exam’s horrors would follow them into the real world.

• Frank killed an officer for failing to find Ye Lin’s team and rejected Roger’s call to cooperate.
• Roger agreed to help Frank prepare for a conference, while Frank insisted that killing the opposing team would increase their rewards.
• He Zheng found Carlton’s location, but Ye Lin refused to fly there because the other team controlled the military.
• Ye Lin argued that the army’s advantage could be a trap and that the exam’s real danger might emerge if the teams failed to cooperate.
• Ye Lin ordered He Zheng to drug and imprison the businessman who had found Carlton, then the group set off for the professor.
• An Ke wondered whether surviving the Death Exam would leave them human and whether the real world might become another hell.

Ye Lin and his team sought Professor Carlton before the zombie outbreak, hoping to learn how to stop the virus. Carlton knew nothing about zombies, but his assistant revealed that Carlton’s suppressed discovery concerned humanity’s ancestors eating every last human.

• Roger refused his teammates’ suggestion to cooperate with the opposing team and prepared to answer other countries’ questions about zombies.
• Ye Lin’s team reached the university with four hours left before the outbreak and discussed whether killing zombies might make the remaining ones evolve.
• Ye Lin and his teammates found Professor Carlton in a dilapidated faculty apartment, where Carlton said he had never heard of zombies.
• Carlton explained that his research concerned prions and mad cow disease, then his assistant claimed Carlton was ostracized after discovering that humanity’s ancestors had eaten every last human.

Ye Lin and his group uncovered the professor’s cannibalistic evolution theory, then fought a rapidly spreading zombie meme outbreak. Ye Lin realized the other team might trigger a worldwide outbreak by warning people about zombies and rushed to stop them.

• An Ke explained that prion antibodies suggested humans had consumed human flesh throughout history, and the professor and his assistant revealed their theory that cannibalism drove human evolution.
• The assistant revealed that he and the professor had found evidence of ancient evolution in a pharaoh’s tomb, while Zhang Tie discovered a cooked human head in the kitchen.
• The professor lunged at He Zheng, who kicked him through a window, and a system alert announced that the Virus meme had activated ahead of schedule.
• The professor and infected students spread the meme by sight, and Ye Lin, He Zheng, Huang Liang, and the others killed the infected before they reached the teaching building.
• An Ke explained that knowing what a zombie was could trigger the meme, and Ye Lin suspected everyone in that world already carried it and that the other team planned to warn the entire population.
• Ye Lin gave An Ke the Communicator and rushed off to stop the other team from spreading the warning.

Roger and Frank tried to prepare the world for the zombie outbreak, but a third party activated the Ancient Stone Slab and triggered it early. Ye Lin’s team was trapped in a city overrun by infected as a giant Mutant charged them, and Ye Lin led the fight to escape.

• Roger learned that Ye Lin’s team was approaching, and Frank ordered troops to intercept them, believing they were making a desperate mistake.
• The Ancient Stone Slab activated and advanced the outbreak countdown, so Roger and his team rushed to broadcast information about the zombies.
• A woman warned Roger that the virus was a meme and did not spread through the means they feared, but the call ended before she could explain.
• As the outbreak began, crimson tears appeared at the conference venue, and the staff who uploaded videos stared at images of roaring Mutants.
• Ye Lin realized the other team had already broadcast the information and suspected a third party had activated the slab; the outbreak then froze people across the city before turning them into zombies.
• A giant Mutant attacked He Zheng’s truck, and Ye Lin told He Zheng and Huang Liang to cover him as he charged into battle.

Ye Lin killed a powerful mutant and led the group through a zombie horde to escape by flight packs. At a highway gas station, He Zheng saw the exam’s A rating and the instruction to “fight to the death,” leaving the group facing their next move.

• Ye Lin dodged the mutant’s punch, severed its arm, and pierced its brain with his sword.
• An Ke warned that the mutant was still alive, and Ye Lin used Flame flash and Backstab to destroy its second head.
• Ye Lin urged the stunned group to move, and He Zheng, Huang Liang, and Zhang Tie helped fight through the zombies.
• After ten minutes of fighting, the six survivors reached a commercial building, used grenades to hold back the horde, and escaped with flight packs.
• At a highway gas station, He Zheng saw the A rating and the system’s “fight to the death” instruction.

Ye Lin concluded that the group needed to find the ancient stone tablet and suspected another team had triggered the zombie outbreak to keep it. As they prepared to leave, he acted unusually intimate toward An Ke, and someone then shouted that a ghost was on their car.

• Ye Lin reasoned that the ancient stone tablet was the objective and that the system had mentioned it because someone triggered the outbreak early.
• Huang Liang proposed that the team who took the tablet had split up, and Ye Lin agreed there was no third team and the tablet's holder would likely contact them.
• Ye Lin planned to evade the pursuing monsters, wait for the tablet holder to reach out, and investigate who had suppressed the professor's research.
• Ye Lin asked An Ke to keep his belongings, tightened her ponytail, and said he would get her a new hair tie, leaving her unsettled by his behavior.
• Someone shouted that they had seen a ghost on the car.

After He Zheng reported seeing a ghost, Ye Lin’s group left the roadside and continued toward the Academy of Sciences, where they hoped to find Carlton’s suppressed research records. As the team discussed the Stone Tablet, the other group, and Ye Lin’s abilities, a strange chorus of rasps rose around their truck.

• He Zheng panicked after claiming something ghostlike had run past him, but An Ke said the trial’s Zombie Crisis could not include ghosts, and Ye Lin ordered everyone back into the truck.
• Ye Lin explained that Carlton’s research records might still be preserved at the Academy of Sciences, and argued that the professor’s university apartment suggested someone had secretly supported him.
• Hu Jia asked whether they would have to rescue the other team if its Stone Tablet holder was trapped downtown, and Ye Lin said the holder was more likely on the outskirts while the Communicator was the main concern.
• Ye Lin explained that his [Flame Flash] ability could be used once every twelve hours and that its incineration effect only worked on corpses.
• As He Zheng asked about Ye Lin’s sword and powers, Ye Lin heard a muffled mass of overlapping rasps outside the truck.

Ye Lin and his companions were surrounded by hundreds of thousands of unusually fast zombies, and their truck became immobilized as they fought to survive. Ye Lin realized an intelligent mutant was directing the horde, but he could not identify it among the ordinary-looking zombies.

• Huang Liang fired a flare and revealed that zombies had silently surrounded the group in every direction.
• Ye Lin ordered everyone to open fire, and the group fought off waves of zombies as they charged toward the truck.
• A zombie climbed onto the truck, and Huang Liang killed the attackers threatening An Ke.
• The horde jammed the truck's wheels and stopped it, while zombies bit He Zheng before Zhang Tie pulled him onto the roof.
• Ye Lin told the group that something was commanding the zombies and searched for an intelligent mutant hidden among them.

As the horde overwhelmed the vehicle, Ye Lin used blood-soaked clothes to expose the intelligent Mutant directing the zombies. He spotted the suited Mutant and prepared to pursue it as it tried to escape into the crowd.

• Zombies dragged Hu Jia off the roof, but Zhang Tie transformed into a bear and rescued him from the horde.
• With the group close to being overwhelmed, Ye Lin ordered everyone to bleed on their clothes, and An Ke realized he planned to identify the unusually calm Mutant.
• Ye Lin leaped above the horde and had the others throw their blood-soaked clothes into it, driving the zombies into a frenzy.
• Using the Observer's perspective, Ye Lin spotted a tall, thin zombie in a shabby suit that remained still and watched the chaos.
• The suited Mutant noticed Ye Lin and tried to disappear into the horde, but Ye Lin recognized it as the one directing the zombies.

Ye Lin defeated the suited zombie after losing control to his Tyrant bloodline, allowing the group to escape the horde. The first survival round ended, but the system announced that each of the six remaining hunts would be twice as difficult.

• Ye Lin rampaged through the zombie horde, killed the suited mutant, and eventually broke free of the corpse wall.
• He Zheng and the others escaped in their vehicle while Ye Lin regained enough control to order them to leave.
• Hu Jia injected himself with an Antidote after admitting he had delayed using it, and He Zheng discovered he might also be infected.
• An Ke warned the group that they might not have enough medicine as they faced seven days of survival.
• The system ended the first twenty-four-hour round and announced that the second hunt would begin in twenty-four hours, with difficulty increasing by 100% each round.

After the broadcast revealed that seven increasingly difficult pursuit rounds would begin each day, Ye Lin argued that the scheduled breaks gave the team time to find answers and prepare. He planned to question An Ke as their journey continued.

• He Zheng and the others reacted with shock to the announcement that the zombie horde had been only the first, easiest pursuit round.
• Hu Jia asked Ye Lin and An Ke whether the rising difficulty meant stronger Mutants or greater danger overall, and An Ke warned him to protect himself.
• An Ke feared the team would gradually die from exhaustion and asked Ye Lin whether they should seek a safe place to rest.
• Ye Lin argued that nowhere would be truly safe, but the twenty-four-hour intervals between pursuits gave them time to uncover the Stone Tablet's clues.
• Ye Lin said the scheduled rounds could help them earn rewards and prompt the Stone Tablet's holder to contact them; Huang Liang grew hopeful about completing his mission.
• Ye Lin called An Ke into the rear compartment to ask her something, and she followed, intent on asking him questions too.

Ye Lin heard An Ke recount how learning about a flesh-made moon had doomed examinees in a previous meme survival exam, leaving them uncertain whether to seek clues or hide. The group then found a crashed glider that might contain the academy officials and the item they sought, and Ye Lin suspected it could be a trap.

• Ye Lin explained to An Ke that the Tyrant Gene's brutal urges were assimilating him, then asked whether a survival exam could involve a meme.
• An Ke described her fifth exam, where examinees discovered that the moon was made of growing flesh and that seeing it drove people insane and infected them.
• An Ke warned Ye Lin that investigating the current meme might be dangerous, while hiding might also lead to their deaths.
• Ye Lin told An Ke they would survive.
• He Zheng spotted a crashed glider on the highway, and Ye Lin suspected its infected occupants were academy officials and that the documents and locked case nearby might be bait.

He Zheng's group recovered a case containing a letter that linked mass extinction, evolution, and a mysterious God, but it offered no direct way to stop the zombies. After a survivor called for help and mentioned the Stone Tablet, Ye Lin decided the group had to enter the city despite the danger.

• He Zheng found a case beside a crashed plane, but An Ke warned that its convenient appearance might mean it was a trap, so Hu Jia volunteered to inspect it.
• Hu Jia safely read documents describing extinction as part of evolution and a letter claiming that a mysterious force was driving life to evolve through catastrophe.
• Huang Liang and Hu Jia debated whether accelerating the zombies' merging could help the group survive, while Ye Lin concluded that an evolved being might be necessary to prevent the catastrophe from destroying everything.
• An explosion shook the city, and An Ke received a call from survivors fleeing a monster who said they had found the Stone Tablet before the call cut off.
• Ye Lin decided the group would go to rescue the survivors and seek the Stone Tablet despite the danger.

Frank fled through the West City Ruins with Kelin as a giant spider Mutant pursued them, and he escaped its attack after the other team arrived. When Frank tried to get a gun and retreat with Ye Lin’s group, Ye Lin charged directly at the Mutant instead.

• Frank escaped the exploding ammunition depot while Kelin followed, and he killed a zombie with his Flame Ability as they ran through the streets.
• A ten-meter spider Mutant appeared behind Frank and Kelin, and they froze until Kelin accidentally crushed glass underfoot.
• Frank fled toward the highway as the spider chased them and sprayed venom that burned his skin.
• A powerful gunshot from the arriving team briefly stopped the spider, allowing Frank to run toward them with Kelin.
• Frank threatened Kelin to keep him quiet and asked Ye Lin for a gun, but Ye Lin drew his sword and charged at the Mutant.

Ye Lin’s team killed the Mutant pursuing Frank, then confronted him about his betrayal and demanded the Stone Tablet. Frank tried to bargain with his knowledge of the tablet, but Ye Lin threatened to torture him until he agreed to talk.

• Ye Lin, He Zheng, and Zhang Tie killed the Mutant that had marked and pursued Frank.
• Frank realized Ye Lin’s team was far stronger than he had expected and carefully followed them to a deserted stretch of highway.
• He Zheng accused Frank of causing the trouble and planning to get the team killed, while Frank blamed his own captain.
• Ye Lin demanded that Frank hand over the Stone Tablet and threatened him when he could not find it.
• Frank claimed he had deciphered the Stone Tablet and knew how to lower the difficulty, but Ye Lin ordered He Zheng to skin him until he talked.
• Frank panicked and agreed to reveal what he knew.

Frank revealed that creating a Mutant by fusing an examinee with zombies could stop the difficulty from rising, and his team knew how to trigger the process. As Ye Lin weighed whether to use Frank’s information, An Ke and Hu Jia argued that the rules would eventually force the two teams to fight over a major reward.

• Frank told Ye Lin’s group that they had to create a Mutant through a specific fusion method to stop the disaster’s difficulty from increasing.
• Frank admitted that the fused creature also had to eat nearby zombies to evolve, and claimed he knew where to find one and how to lure it out.
• He Zheng interrogated Frank’s teammate, who confirmed Frank was the captain and explained that microchips could control fused teammates and draw them toward the group.
• He Zheng reported that Frank said the Mutant’s blood might have unusual effects, but Frank still refused to reveal the Stone Tablet’s location.
• An Ke reasoned that the documents and letter gave Ye Lin’s team information equivalent to another Stone Tablet, while Hu Jia suggested the teams would ultimately fight over the reward for surviving seven days.