The corridor

"Are you sure you don't want me to come along? I could watch your back and keep anyone from ambushing you."

Although Zhao Xiaowen was terrified of what lay outside, she knew she had to overcome that fear now. Even if she was a woman, she could still be useful at a time like this.

If Lin Hao and a Madman got locked in a struggle, she could stab the Madman with a small knife and get him out of trouble.

"Not for now. On my own, I can fight or retreat more easily. Just keep an eye on the place. Once things are more or less settled, come help me carry things back."

Lin Hao had weighed things up before making that decision. If he couldn't handle things with equipment in both hands, bringing Zhao Xiaowen along would just mean feeding the Madmen another mouthful of meat.

"Safety first, no matter what. We've still got enough food here. There's no need to take too many risks."

When Lin Hao reached the security door in the living room, Zhao Xiaowen fussed over him with a few more reminders.

Even if it was for her own sake, she genuinely hoped Lin Hao would return safe and sound. Otherwise, she wouldn't have offered to go out with him earlier.

If she kept hiding here all alone, she would probably go mad sooner or later.

"Right. Lock the door and don't open it for anyone. I've got a key."

Lin Hao nodded. Although not much time had passed, and the evil in human nature might not have been fully unleashed yet, he still had to take precautions. Whether someone was a Madman or not, keeping the door shut was the right choice.

After checking outside through the peephole once more, Lin Hao slowly turned the handle and opened the door.

The corridor of the apartment floor, with its twenty-four units, looked long and narrow. The power had long since gone out, and without emergency lights, the passage was dim.

The multiple "suns" in the sky cast a little sunlight through the window at the far end, outlining the corridor's interior.

Every door was tightly shut. Apart from two or three overturned little trash baskets outside the doors, the corridor was empty. But two faint bloody handprints on the wall ahead and a jumble of drag marks stretched all the way behind the emergency exit door at the end.

And compared with the faint stench of excrement inside the apartment, the moment the door opened, a vague odor of dead rats wafted into his face.

It was the smell human beings were most sensitive to, etched into their genes, and one of the hardest stenches to endure.

Lin Hao frowned, stepped out into the corridor, then gently closed the door behind him.

Click~

The faint sound of the security door closing echoed through the corridor.

Clang~

From behind the distant emergency exit door at the end of the corridor came what sounded like a drink can falling over, clattering as it rolled down the stairs.

It seemed as though someone was hiding behind the door.

Lin Hao glanced that way but didn't immediately approach. Instead, he first looked toward the corridor in the opposite direction.

The apartment he rented was number 2320, already near the end of the corridor. Two more doors beyond it stood the window at the far end. Holding the pot lid in his left hand and the ruler in his right, Lin Hao headed that way, stopping between 2323 and 2324 across from it.

Knock, knock, knock~

He knocked lightly and asked in a fairly quiet voice,

"Anyone there?"

Lin Hao was doing his best to stay calm, and he also understood his current shortcomings.

He had no professional training. Although he had his cheat, he would probably still get flustered if he faced attacks from several directions.

That was why he had gone to the end of the corridor first, intending to check the apartments one by one. He didn't want a surprise popping up behind his backside while he was dealing with trouble ahead.

From knocking on Zhao Xiaowen's door, Lin Hao had also formed a rough judgment about the Madmen.

If there was no response after he knocked, the apartment might contain normal people or be empty. If a Madman was inside, the reaction should be more obvious.

After two light knocks, there was no response from 2323, not even a sound. Lin Hao took out a black marker, drew a [1] on the door, then went to 2324 and repeated the process.

A cautious hand could keep a ship sailing for ten thousand years. With a cheat at his disposal, he couldn't let some minor carelessness capsize him.

Clang~

There was some rustling inside 2324, but no one answered. He even had the feeling someone was secretly watching him through the peephole.

After waiting briefly without a Madman opening the door and lunging out, Lin Hao wrote a [2] with the black marker.

Zhao Xiaowen had given him the two markers, one black and one red. She had all sorts of strange little tools, and Lin Hao was happy to use them to make distinctions.

But before Lin Hao could continue forward, a security door halfway down the corridor creaked open on its own. Then a face wearing a strange, chilling smile, its mouth smeared with blood, slowly emerged from behind it.

A pair of bloodshot eyes fixed on Lin Hao. An exaggerated curve spread across the blood-covered face, as though the corners of its mouth were about to tear apart.

"I see you..."

With that, the figure charged straight out of the apartment. It was a man in ragged clothes, bursting forward at considerable speed. With a grotesque smile on his face, he rushed at Lin Hao, a bloodstained kitchen knife clutched in one hand, looking utterly insane.

At the same time, the emergency exit door, left ajar at the end of the corridor, flew open. A fat man covered in blood also came running toward him in a deranged frenzy, shouting,

"Mine! He's mine! I'm still hungry!"

Even now, the sight before him made Lin Hao's skin crawl a little. But with his earlier experience, he was much steadier this time.

Once you had done something once, everything was different!

Calmly, Lin Hao spread his feet and lowered his center of gravity. He held the pot lid loosely in his left hand and drew back the ruler in his right for a thrust, staying in place to wait for his prey to come to him.

Whoosh~

The instant the smiling man lunged at him, Lin Hao guarded against the kitchen knife with the pot lid while thrusting the ruler in his right hand. Bang~

The end of the ruler struck the smiling man's chest without any flourish.

The Madman charging at high speed seemed to have been struck in the chest by a demolition hammer. His forward momentum stopped dead!

Crack~, clang~

The ruler, imbued with tremendous force, not only snapped the Madman's ribs with ease but plunged straight into his chest like a sharp blade, gouging a hideous wound. A fair amount of blood sprayed onto Lin Hao's clothes.

Under that blow, the kitchen knife in the Madman's hand clattered to the floor!

Then Lin Hao drove the pot lid on his left arm forward. With the iron pot's enchantment, even the thin aluminum lid carried brute force in its strike, slamming the abruptly halted Madman to the ground.

As the Madman fell, he also pulled the bloodstained ruler

back out.

Ignoring the fat man behind him for the moment, he casually struck the fallen Madman on the head to finish him off.

Crack~

The deformation of the skull more or less confirmed that the Madman was thoroughly dead. Lin Hao locked onto the fat man behind him again.

With his previous experience and the support of his new equipment, Lin Hao was even steadier now. He didn't suffer the slight loss of strength caused by excessive excitement during his first Madman kill. Instead, he immediately swung the ruler at the fat man behind him.

Bang~

The ruler struck the fat man's shoulder. Its additional ten kilograms of weight, combined with the impact generated by its speed, hit the man, who weighed over a hundred kilograms, like a thunderbolt. His shoulder gave a chilling crunch of shattered bone, and blood soaked through his clothes.

His entire obese body involuntarily staggered in the direction of the ruler's swing, crashing into the wall beside him.

Thud~

His fat smacked against the wall with a dull splat.

Then Lin Hao delivered another finishing blow to his head.

He collapsed to the floor without so much as another grunt.

Blood trickled from the wound in his head.

"With the dumbbell equipped, this destructive power really is something. That thrust earlier went straight into his body..."

He examined the ruler in his hand. Its cross section couldn't compare with a blade's edge at all, but the added mass and the speed of his thrust more than made up for it.

Even a dull knife could cut meat!

And with the dumbbell equipped, even a hit that missed a vital spot had enough impact to quickly rob a Madman of the ability to fight. The extra iron pot also let him defend with his left hand, greatly increasing his margin for error!

After killing another two Madmen, Lin Hao felt far more confident. Having checked the situation at this end of the corridor, he no longer had to worry about someone attacking his back, so he raised his voice.

"Anyone still alive here? Answer if you are. Otherwise, don't blame me if you get hurt by mistake."

No one answered, which didn't surprise Lin Hao. As long as he could more or less clear the Madmen from this floor, that was enough.

As for normal people turning into Madmen later, he would simply have to kill them again.

Stepping over the two Madmen's corpses, Lin Hao continued casually tapping the doors on either side with the wooden ruler, marking them with his marker and calling out as he went. Then he headed toward the door the smiling Madman had opened earlier.

Since the door was already open, he naturally had to do a little scavenging.

In this world, the things in these apartments could all be considered nonrenewable resources now. The quick-handed got them; the slow-handed got nothing...

Meanwhile, Zhao Xiaowen had been nervously watching outside through the peephole in 2320.

She had also heard Lin Hao's movements in the corridor and remained ready to help him. If he ran into trouble, she would open the door and hurry him inside, saving him the time it would take to unlock it with his key.

Although the peephole's field of view was narrow, the sounds and movements outside still allowed her to piece together a rough idea of what was happening.

More Madmen had charged out just now, and Lin Hao had dealt with them quickly!

He could deal with Madmen that fast?

And it seemed there had been two of them?!

Whatever the reason, it proved what he was capable of!

Perhaps he had some other equipment helping him, but at the very least, having the courage to do this was already quite remarkable.

Sure enough, in a world like this, he was an unparalleled pillar to cling to...

I need to find a way to cling a little tighter...

Zhao Xiaowen murmured inwardly. She knew perfectly well what her greatest asset was.

But things hadn't settled down yet, so she didn't need to think that far ahead. Once they truly had, she would have to learn ways to handle a repressed virgin like him...

Leaving the door, Zhao Xiaowen quietly returned to her room and dug out a few books she had bought for self-improvement.

"How to casually show off a woman's charm," "What types do men like?" and "Alternative expressions of yoga."

After all, she had been preparing to enter the livestreaming industry. Although she hadn't planned to hook a top donor, she still had to learn how to keep fans watching through a screen, and buying some professional books was necessary.

Luckily, she had bought a set of paper copies. Time to work hard!

After thinking it over, Zhao Xiaowen quietly went into the young couple's room and carefully searched around, hoping to find something useful.

"Don't they have any romance guides? What books do couples read...?"

After searching for a while, she opened a drawer and found two boxes of little "umbrellas" beside a jewelry box. Zhao Xiaowen froze for a moment, seeming to consider something. Then, with a faint blush, she quietly took them out and slipped them into her pocket.

"They're all nonrenewable resources. Who knows when they might be useful for trading? I'll keep them for now."

After solemnly reassuring herself, Zhao Xiaowen touched her slightly warm, pretty face and carried the books to the window. Then she took out the rimless glasses she hadn't worn in a long time, settled them on the bridge of her pert nose, and began studying word by word...