T/N;
I will now provide the link to the Dropbox folder for the novel’s illustrations, including all of them (plus 2 that I forgot earlier :()—the ones from Chapter 50 and Chapter 149. Soon, I will add a chapter where you can see all the illustrations. As more illustrations are released, I’ll keep updating them.
Chapter 191: Half Human, Half Ghost
Standing inside a building far from the river, Lin Jiayao observed the activity of the distant crowd through the glass window.
It wasn’t easy to infiltrate…
The area beneath the bridge was mostly wasteland, densely packed with tents and shacks built from wood and metal sheets. People bustled through the area, leaving no room to slip through unnoticed.
Approaching the bridge directly from the city roads above also seemed impossible—there were wooden and metal watchtowers on both sides of the bridge, and the surrounding buildings were filled with armed personnel, protecting the people on the bridge.
This organization, or rather, this camp, wasn’t like the ones Lin Jiayao was familiar with, establishing a base within the city and gradually expanding outwards. Instead, they were centered around a river.
The ordinary zombies deliberately left uncleared around the area were likely meant to prevent people from escaping.
Lin Jiayao wasn’t logged into a B-rank zombie now. She couldn’t just swagger over; a D-rank zombie’s frail body couldn’t withstand bullets.
She should have brought a gun.
All infiltration routes were blocked, and a forced entry was basically impossible. If she really wanted to communicate, the only option left was to speak.
She hoped the people by the bridge were easier to talk to than those downstream.
If they shot at her on sight, then so be it. If New Delhi didn’t work, there was still Mumbai. Lin Jiayao’s “business” had no geographical limitations.
After a brief search inside the building, finding nothing useful like paper or pens, she left and headed out onto the street.
Walking along the path towards the main road leading to the bridge, Lin Jiayao saw zombies roaring inside several buildings.
These zombies became frenzied upon seeing Lin Jiayao, displaying a strong desire to attack, but they all wore collars around their necks and feet, seemingly trapped inside the houses.
This confirmed part of Lin Jiayao’s previous guess. These zombies were deliberately left there to create some kind of “obstacle.”
Lin Jiayao’s sight and hearing were now extremely sharp. She could clearly hear which buildings had guards and which had zombies, allowing her to avoid them in advance.
“Click—”
Suddenly, Lin Jiayao’s long, pointed ears twitched, picking up the faint, crisp sound of a gun being cocked.
If it weren’t for her enhanced hearing, this sound would have been drowned out by the wind and the noise from beneath the bridge.
Hearing the click, Lin Jiayao didn’t hesitate. She yelled “Don’t shoot!” in perfect Hindi and instantly dropped to the ground.
It seemed her shout had worked. After a long while, there was still no gunshot from the direction of the cocking sound.
Then, Lin Jiayao heard the rustling sound of someone getting up from that direction, and approaching footsteps.
Lin Jiayao’s movements were fluid and practiced, a technique she had just learned in America. It was quite useful.
Keeping her hands clasped behind her head, Lin Jiayao slowly stood up, trying to make her movements appear slow.
“Turn around.”
A gruff female voice came from behind Lin Jiayao. With her hands still behind her head, she slowly turned to face the source of the voice, a heavyset woman aiming a gun at her.
This middle-aged woman looked to be at least 300 pounds. Maintaining such a physique after the apocalypse was quite unusual.
“Who are you? Why are you controlling a Sayara?” The woman raised her gun slightly, prompting Lin Jiayao to speak.
The woman had clearly seen Awakened before and wasn’t surprised by a talking zombie.
Sayara?
This was the second time Lin Jiayao had heard this name. It seemed to be what the people here called these blue-faced, fanged, oviparous water monkey zombies.
“Who I am isn’t important. I want to discuss a business deal with your leader.” Lin Jiayao slowly lowered her hands from her head and extended them forward.
When she opened her hands, a translucent rectangular bag, similar to a blood bag, appeared.
It was a bag of Blood Crystal Serum.
The woman frowned slightly at the strange bag that suddenly appeared in the zombie’s hands. The fluorescent red liquid inside did look like valuable “blood stones,” but she wasn’t sure what it was.
“Walmart! Walmart!” Unsure, the heavyset woman yelled. Soon, a rather thin-looking young woman came running out, cradling a rifle.
“Take the thing from its hand.” The woman kept her gun trained on Lin Jiayao while instructing the thin girl.
“Okay…” The girl responded, trotted over to Lin Jiayao, flinched slightly at the sight of Lin Jiayao’s clawed hands, hesitated for a moment, then snatched the Blood Crystal Serum and quickly ran back to the woman.
The woman took the Blood Crystal Serum from the girl and examined it carefully, becoming more and more convinced it was something valuable.
“Stay here and watch it,” the woman said, then holstered her gun and waddled towards the bridge.
The girl was left standing there, dumbfounded. After a moment, she seemed to realize something and frantically raised her battered AK-203, which lacked any attachments and even had its receiver cover removed, exposing the spring, at Lin Jiayao.
The AK’s safety was still on. The girl was clearly not used to handling firearms.
The girl was obviously nervous, her knuckles white as she aimed the rifle. This puzzled Lin Jiayao.
Why would such a young girl be chosen as a guard? Weren’t there plenty of idle men below?
And, five years into the apocalypse, she still didn’t know how to use a gun?
Was there such a thing as being spoiled and pampered even in the apocalypse?
Lin Jiayao didn’t do anything to make the girl nervous. She simply stood there with her hands lowered, waiting for the heavyset woman to return.
That bag of Blood Crystal Serum was a necessary expense for the “arms display.” She would make it back later, with interest.
If the camp leader was shortsighted enough to kill the No. 2 zombie Lin Jiayao was logged into just to steal a bag of Blood Crystal Serum, so be it.
Lin Jiayao would remember this debt.
The straight-line distance from Kun City to New Delhi was about the same as from Kun City to Donghai City. With enough Blood Crystals, Huayibai could even fly a round trip.
If they struck first, Lin Jiayao wouldn’t have any qualms about retaliating.
Soon, Lin Jiayao heard several footsteps approaching from the main road, coming from the direction of the bridge.
A few women in yellow monk robes stopped in front of Lin Jiayao, pressed their palms together, bowed slightly, and then parted, creating a path.
It seemed she had been granted an audience.
Lin Jiayao glanced at the extraction time. Three hours left. It should be enough time to talk and then extract—if they let her leave.
She followed the women, passing through obstacles and watchtowers, heading straight for the bridge.
It was then that Lin Jiayao finally realized something was amiss.
Starting with the heavyset woman, all the people Lin Jiayao had seen on the bridge and in the surrounding watchtowers were women, and they were even cleaner than the men below.
Now, Lin Jiayao suddenly realized something was wrong—from downstream all the way to under the bridge, she seemed to have only seen men.
A female-dominated camp?
It was very possible.
In the apocalypse, achieving this wasn’t difficult. All it took was a sufficiently ruthless woman to evolve to B-rank first.
Of course, there was another possibility.
That the “leader” was still a man, and he had monopolized all the women in the camp, regardless of age.
The latter scenario sounded slightly more plausible, although both were a bit far-fetched.
After passing through the large tents along the way, the women leading the way stopped in front of the largest white tent in the center.
Lifting the tent flap, Lin Jiayao saw the luxurious decorations with an exotic flair inside, and a woman sitting on the bed, wrapped in a blue quilt, only her head exposed.
Was she the camp leader?
She did have the aura of a B-rank.
Looking at the woman in front of her, Lin Jiayao didn’t feel much, only that she looked a bit… ordinary.
The way she was wrapped in a quilt made it hard to associate her with a camp leader. She looked like a couch potato.
“Aren’t you going to come out yourself?” The leader, seeing Lin Jiayao, twitched the corner of her mouth, clearly displeased. “Hiding behind a little zombie?”
Awakened who controlled zombies weren’t uncommon. The woman seemed to simply dislike this feeling of being in the open while the other party was hidden.
“If I could, I would also like to talk to you face-to-face, madam.” Lin Jiayao tried to retract her fangs, revealing a grotesque smile that could make a child cry. “Unfortunately, my main body is too far away.”
If circumstances allowed, Lin Jiayao would love to be here in person, with her sister, A4, Mask, and Goldie standing behind her, Huayibai in her arms, and No. 5 as a backdrop.
Would she need to be so cautious in negotiations then? Would she need to put on a smiling face to show friendliness?
Not directly robbing them was already considered polite.
“Too far away… Such boasting, you men.” The leader scoffed, then, without further pleasantries, said, “Call me Sharma. I’m very interested in these things… Tell me your price.”
The woman’s hand emerged from the quilt, holding the now-empty bag of Blood Crystal Serum.
“Call me Lin.” Lin Jiayao didn’t correct the other party’s mistake about her gender, because without revealing her main body, this kind of thing couldn’t be explained clearly.
Since the other party wasn’t asking for her details, there was no need for her to introduce herself. It was best to get straight to the point and discuss the deal.
Looking at the Blood Crystal Serum bag in the woman’s hand, Lin Jiayao raised her hand, and another bag of Blood Crystal Serum appeared in her palm.
Holding it up, she said slowly, “2500g of blood stones per bag.”
Lin Jiayao used the local term, “blood stones,” and to avoid unit confusion, she used grams instead of the number of crystals.
“Five blood stones?!” Sharma frowned deeply, kneading the empty bag in her hand.
This woman, Sharma, clearly wasn’t experienced in negotiations. Her thoughts were written all over her face.
“That’s too expensive. Even banks don’t make that much profit, Lin.” Sharma didn’t make any threats, but instead adjusted her posture slightly and made a small joke, trying to lighten the atmosphere.
The scene of the bag suddenly appearing in the zombie’s hand had made Sharma take her a bit more seriously.
It seemed the other party wasn’t some small fry trying to bluff. At the very least, they were a formidable B-rank.
The bag was exquisitely packaged and printed with foreign text, a bit like Chinese, but with her level of education, she wasn’t sure.
The only thing she could be sure of was that this person, or the organization behind them, had the ability to mass-produce these things.
What did this mean?
She had torn a small opening in the bag earlier, wanting to see what was inside.
But the moment she tore open the bag, she felt the blood crystals in her body stir, a frantic craving that made her gulp down the entire contents of the Blood Crystal Serum in one go.
This bag of blood crystal liquid suppressed the restless blood crystal energy that was twisting and deforming her body, even stopping the further mutation process. Her mind even felt clearer.
It was as if the bag of blood crystal liquid had “soothed” the increasingly restless blood crystal energy in her body.
She needed this thing, and she needed a lot of it, but she couldn’t accept such a high price.
Because she could feel that she needed at least a dozen more bags of this liquid to fully recover, and she might need even more in the future, but she couldn’t afford so many blood stones.
These inner thoughts of Sharma were clearly displayed on her face – although she was saying something else, her eyes were fixed on the Blood Crystal Serum in Lin Jiayao’s hand, as if she wanted to snatch it away immediately.
She desperately needed the Blood Crystal Serum.
Lin Jiayao quickly came to a judgment in her mind.
“Banks can’t make this.” Lin Jiayao brought her hands together, and the remaining eight bags of Blood Crystal Serum instantly appeared in her palms, stacked neatly.
But in the next second, all the Blood Crystal Serum disappeared again, as if they were just a fleeting illusion.
The moment the large amount of Blood Crystal Serum appeared in Lin Jiayao’s hands, Lin Jiayao saw the woman’s pupils constrict and her breathing become rapid.
This directly confirmed Lin Jiayao’s previous guess.
“If you want a lower price, no problem.”
Lin Jiayao looked at Sharma and said with a smile:
“If you can provide me with a general map of India’s power distribution, and the locations of more than ten B-rank zombies, I can lower the price to 1500g of blood stones per bag.”
Three blood stones for a bag of liquid.
What a profit…
Sharma was about to agree, but suddenly froze.
“You’re not Indian?” Sharma looked at the zombie, suspicion in her eyes.
“As I said, I’m from very far away.” Lin Jiayao nodded slightly, not elaborating.
Not Indian… wanting a power distribution map… and also a distribution map of B-rank zombies…
This sounded like they wanted to take over the whole of India? And even wanted her to lead the way?
That would be great, this way, please, sir. (TN: This is a reference to a meme about collaborating with invaders)
“Deal.” Sharma agreed decisively. “Can you wait a moment? I’ll go get the B-rank distribution and power distribution map for you.”
“You don’t have it on you?” Lin Jiayao was a little puzzled.
Wasn’t she the leader?
“I only manage production by the river. Most of the intelligence and combat supplies are in the main city area.” Sharma was quite honest, directly revealing her cards.
“Then should I talk to them directly?”
“No, don’t!” Sharma said quickly, “I’ll buy all your goods, they can’t.”
“Wait a moment, I’ll be right back.” As if worried about missing this excellent opportunity for recovery, Sharma lifted the quilt, revealing her terrifying body covered in black sores. There was even a sharp, half-meter-long bone spur protruding from her tailbone.
She looked like a monster with a human head and a zombie body.
“Buzz—”
With a flash of purple, Sharma disappeared, leaving Lin Jiayao alone in the white tent.
This was truly a woman without any scheming… she could even be called a bit stupid.
No wonder, as a B-rank, she could only live on the bridge, sleeping in a tent.
It felt like half of her brain had been abandoned during the blood crystal evolution.
Thank you for the drop box 🙂↕️👌