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monster. "."

It simply stood there, preventing humans from passing, without uttering a word. Despite this, the humans were still pleased, guessing its intention. "Oh, I see, you don't like having things on your bedside table! I understand, I understand! I don't like it either."

To what extent have humans tolerated it? It's comparable to how humans treat their cubs.

Outside, the group of people in protective suits gasped in shock at the sight.

This group of humans was certainly not there to inspect the room renovations; they were experts from various fields who had gathered at the hospital, having heard that a special kind of Living Dead had arrived and come to check on the situation.

"... It really is conscious."

"... His emotions are really very stable."

"... It really isn't aggressive."

The experts crowded outside the door to observe, discussing in hushed tones as they did so.

Behind the experts, the monster stood silently, watching them as they looked at the "Living Dead" in the room.

The monster had actually left the room long ago. When humans gathered there, blocking the door to observe it, it left behind a puppet and left the room. The situation in the room just now was caused by it manipulating the puppet.

Faced with Living Dead behaving so differently, the experts were getting anxious. "When can we conduct a full examination on her?"

A middle-aged man with a round face and a smile walked over and, upon hearing this, replied to the expert, "Sorry, you may have to wait a little longer."

The expert turned around upon hearing the voice, anxiously asking, "Deputy Pang, when will we get there?"

Pang Wen glanced at the room and said, "Yan Ran said we have to wait until she gets the opinion of the Living Dead himself."

After he finished speaking, the experts fell silent.

Did you ask... the Living Dead for their opinion?

Oh, right, this Living Dead is conscious, unlike the other Living Dead who are mentally impaired. They should ask her if she wants to cooperate with their medical examination. For mentally impaired Living Dead, they won't get an answer anyway, but for a conscious Living Dead, they have to respect her rights.

Having figured it out, the experts agreed with the Special Affairs Office's procedures and stopped mentioning the inspection. Seeing this, Pang Wen's lips curled up slightly.

When Pang Wen returned from outside, he inexplicably fell into a deep sleep in the park. When he woke up, he learned that Yan Ran and the others had brought back an extraordinary Living Dead. Without bothering to investigate whether his sudden sleep was due to a physical ailment, he immediately went to the police station to investigate the identity of the Living Dead they had brought back.

Unfortunately, she hasn't been found yet. The mutation of the Living Dead has made it much more difficult to identify her. They are currently searching in the missing persons database, but haven't found her yet, and it seems there won't be any results anytime soon.

Pang Wen didn't need to keep an eye on things at the police station all the time, so he took some time to come back and see this unusual Living Dead.

Pang Wen persuaded the experts who were gathered outside the room to leave one by one. The experts were all ordinary people; they couldn't resist the aura of the Living Dead, and staying any longer would cause serious problems. The experts themselves were aware of this, and after listening to his advice, they reluctantly left. Once they were gone, the door was finally empty. Pang Wen smiled and went into the room.

Outside the house, after listening to the humans' conversation, a glint flashed in the monster's empty eyes.

A voice came from the room asking if He was willing to be examined. His eyes flickered, and He returned to His place, replacing the puppet.

"I..." the monster spoke for the first time, "No."

Silence.

The three humans in the room fell silent.

Several seconds later--

"Wow! You can talk!" Ye Yanran in surprise, "You can actually talk!"

monster. "."

"What do you mean you're not?" Pang Wen asked.

The monster looked up; above, on the upper floors, lived other Living Dead.

He is not the kind of Pollution, inanimate object that humans believe him to be.

Therefore, do not be pleased by Him, and do not misunderstand Him.

For the first time, the enormous monster showed concern for humanity.

He is learning; not long ago, He heard that humanity was thinking of Him.

The monster pursed its lips. Didn't it look like a human? How was it different from them? Why didn't they treat it as one of their own, but as a Pollution, lifeless thing?

He appeared before humanity because He wanted to be treated as a human being, not as an inanimate object.

The monster felt a growing sense of discontent.

Good news, humans have good comprehension skills and understood what He meant.

"Are you saying you're not Living Dead?"

The bad news is, they think He's lost his mind.

The three humans stared at the monster, from its single eye to the webbing between its fingers.

"... Friend, you're sick. This illness may be affecting your brain, making your self-awareness unclear."

"You're clearly a Living Dead," the three human eyes seemed to say.

monster. "."

Ye Yanran, "Don't be afraid, we will help you, we will cure you. You need treatment, so—can you come with us for a physical examination?"

monster. "..."

The worst news: He offered an explanation, but it was not believed.

The monster was a little annoyed, yet felt bewildered; it seemed more... than it had thought.

Emotional.

Dissatisfaction, anger—when did He start having so many emotions?

The monster ultimately did not refuse their request to take it for an examination.

For some reason, He found it difficult to refuse them.

The examination was conducted in the hospital building in front, with personnel from the Special Affairs Office accompanying the patient throughout. Some results were not available immediately after the examination, so the Special Affairs Office personnel first escorted their important patients back to their rooms.

As they passed the inpatient ward, the monster suddenly stopped and turned its head to look in one direction.

This hospital used to be a private hospital, and the landscaping was very well done. There was a small hillside downstairs in the inpatient building, covered with lush greenery. Most of the plants on the hillside were not planted intentionally, but rather a large area of native plants were preserved, with a patch of wild ginger growing freely on the hillside.

Monsters

Staring at that patch of wild ginger, I stopped in my tracks.

There were three Special Affairs Office accompanying the monster, all except Qin Xiu. They assumed it didn't want to go back to its room and indulged it, letting it rest on a bench nearby while they kept it company. The monster was attracted by the patch of wild ginger and sat down as instructed.

A gentle breeze blew as the monster sat on a bench, staring intently at the patch of wild ginger.

When Qin Xiu from the Special Affairs Office arrived with the test results, the monster hadn't returned to its room yet. The humans didn't avoid it and began discussing the results.

The monster heard this, and the result of this inspection was--

No results found.

It's normal. Ordinary human instruments can't detect His body data; humans just get a bunch of gibberish.

What is normal for monsters is extremely abnormal for humans. Experts and the Special Affairs Office were baffled. They had also conducted physical examinations on other Living Dead and obtained strange data, but none of them had yielded anything like this, which only resulted in a bunch of gibberish.

The four members of the Special Affairs Office gathered together, discussing things the monster couldn't understand.

Their expressions were so strange that the monster stopped observing the wild ginger opposite it and looked in their direction.

A book was left behind on the bench by one of them, and the monster set its sights on it.

The shy boy noticed his gaze unintentionally, and hesitantly picked up the book.

"You like this?" he asked.

The monster didn't answer, it just stared intently at the words on the cover.

The shy boy, Jia Le, handed the book to the monster; it was the book he had brought with him.

The monster looked up at the boy, and after a moment, answered.

The interaction between the human and the monster caught the attention of the other three. They all stopped their discussion and looked at the monster, which ignored their gaze and kept looking down at its book.

Setting aside the doubts surrounding the test results for the time being, Ye Yanran asked the monster with a smile, "You like books?"

The monster remained silent, so Ye Yanran asked again, "Can you read?"

The most severely damaged part of the Living Dead is their brain, which is why she asked that question.

The monster remained silent, but when Jia Le reached for the book he had handed out, it avoided him.

"..."

"..."

"Pfft, you really like books!" Ye Yanran chuckled.

Jia Le stretched out his hand in the air, scratched his fingers, and whispered to the monster, "There are drafts I tucked inside this book. I just wanted to take that... book... to give to you."

The monster wouldn't listen.

Jia Le: "..."

"Haha!" Ye Yanran laughed loudly, "You love books so much, you can't bear to let go of them! Our Jia Le isn't a stingy child, if he says he'll give it to you, he means it, there's no need to worry about him going back on his word... If you're really worried, I'll write your name on the book for you, that way everyone will know it's yours! Haha."

She treated the monster like a child, pulling a pen from Jia Le's shirt— Jia Le always carried a pen with him. She leaned forward, intending to sign the book. She was just going through the motions, but the monster actually let her write.

Ye Yanran paused for a moment, then smiled, removed the pen cap, and turned the act into reality.

"What's your name?" she asked before putting pen to paper.

"..."

Receiving no reply, Ye Yanran raised her head.

Don't you remember?

"..."

"I don't remember," Ye Yanran. "Then do you want me to give you one? I've always wanted to say that it's inconvenient not having a name."

"..."

"Not refusing means agreeing. Okay, I'll give you a name. Hmm, what should I call you?"

Ye Yanran straightened up, looked around, and her gaze slowly settled on the patch of wild ginger in front of her. She remembered that the monster had been looking at that patch of wild ginger for a long time.

"Hmm... how about Jiang Ye?"

"..."