Chapter 64 Spatial Oscillation

Having been through so much, none of them were naive girls anymore. Keeping a low profile and hiding oneself was the most effective camouflage for survival in the apocalypse.

Hearing this, Lin Qingqing approvingly patted Wen Ling's hair.

"Don't worry, Captain, I understand everything you said!" Wen Ling looked up and smiled at her.

"That girl is blessed to have won Miss Lin's regard, don't compare yourself with her!" Aunt Zhang wrapped her arm around Yue Xuanxuan's shoulder and sighed as she spoke.

"Is it just being blessed?" Looking at their tacit interaction, Yue Xuanxuan suddenly thought of his older sister, Yue Tingting.

"When my sister was around, you said the exact same thing, saying that I was a blessed person." He stood on the spot in a daze, until Aunt Zhang finished packing up and pulled him back into the car.

The black SUV set off once again. Barring any accidents, they would definitely reach the base by the afternoon.

Today was March 12, 2020, the seventy-second day since the outbreak of the apocalypse. The sky was clear and cloudless.

At exactly twelve o'clock noon, a meteor with a long trailing tail streaked across the sky.

"Captain, there's a shooting star!" Lei Min pointed at the streak of light in mid-air and said excitedly.

"It's daytime, how could there be such an obvious meteor?" Lin Qingqing reflexively retorted.

"If it's not a meteor, what is it?"

"Could it be a missile?"

Lin Qingqing couldn't be sure what it was either. There was only that single streak in the sky, and she had seen it too. That semi-arc-shaped light and shadow seemed to have appeared out of thin air, vanishing beyond the horizon in the blink of an eye.

"Are you really sure it's not a meteor? I was just about to make a wish," Lei Min said with regret.

"What wish did you make?" Wen Ling asked out of curiosity.

"Of course it was world peace, and for the apocalypse to end sooner—" Lei Min started to say.

Suddenly, the surrounding air surged violently!

Hum— Hum—

"What did you say, I can't hear—"

"What is hap—"

In a split second, everyone seemed to be frozen in place. Lin Qingqing's pupils constricted. Ignoring everything else, she relied purely on instinct and slammed hard on the brakes.

At this moment, the surrounding space seemed to be distorted. Everyone's figures blurred into a haze, and sounds became completely inaudible. This lagging sensation was just like having a video call with an unstable, choppy signal.

***

This bizarre phenomenon lasted for a good ten minutes or so before everyone felt as though they had returned to reality.

"What just happened? What was that?" Lei Min's eyes widened in sheer terror.

The car had already stopped on the road. Lin Qingqing looked back at everyone and found that apart from Aunt Zhang, who had passed out, everyone else was still safely in the car.

"I don't know. I felt as though there was some kind of barrier separating me from you all," she remained relatively calm, though deep down she felt that this matter was highly unusual.

"I couldn't sense you guys just now either. It was as if we weren't even in the same world," Wen Ling said, her experience the most profound.

"Yes, that's exactly the feeling. We weren't in the same world anymore," Lei Min said, recalling the sensation from moments ago.

"But we really were still in the exact same spot," Wen Ling noted, as she could feel everyone's presence once again.

"Could it be that we were isolated by some kind of energy field?" Lei Min guessed.

"I think Minmin makes sense. We might have just been partitioned into different spaces by an unknown energy. To be able to pull this off, this energy is definitely extraordinary," Lin Qingqing concluded finally.

"Can things like that even happen?" Wen Ling understood now.

"Anything is possible!" Lin Qingqing said.

"That's right, this is the apocalypse after all!" Lei Min felt that once the world was linked to the apocalypse, anything could be explained.

Listening to the three of them chatter away discussing the situation just now, Yue Xuanxuan opened his mouth as if to say something, but ultimately fell back into a helpless silence.

The fear and terror in his heart had not yet dissipated, yet these three had already discussed and arrived at a conclusion. At that moment, Yue Xuanxuan felt the barrier in his heart run deeper than ever before: he and they seemed as though they belonged to different worlds...

"Regardless of how this phenomenon was caused, the important thing is, what kind of consequences will follow such an event?" Lin Qingqing was most worried about this.

"I don't feel anything. My body is normal, and my abilities are normal too," Lei Min said after checking herself all over.

"I don't feel any reaction either," Lin Qingqing frowned.

"No, we might not have changed, but the zombies probably have!" Wen Ling suddenly exclaimed in alarm.

Just then, she had specifically used her ability to scout the surrounding area and discovered that ever since the previous anomaly, the surrounding zombies had become exceptionally restless. In particular, those wandering corpses not far away could sense their presence from such a great distance, and their movements were much more agile than before.

"At this distance..."

Hearing this news, Lin Qingqing and Lei Min simultaneously frowned.

"Normally, only level-two zombies have that kind of sensory range," Lin Qingqing said to Wen Ling: "Little Bell, observe closely again and see what other changes these zombies have undergone. Have any level-two zombies appeared?"

"Level-two zombies? What kind of energy field could allow zombies to evolve into level-two within such a short time?" Lei Min's eyes widened once again.

***

Lin Qingqing did not answer Lei Min's question; she wasn't entirely certain either.

This time, Wen Ling observed very carefully for a long while before shaking her head and saying, "I don't think they've reached the standard of level-two zombies, but they are definitely much stronger than previous level-one zombies in every aspect! If I had to describe it, we could think of them as version 2.0 of evolved zombies."

"That's not too bad then," Lin Qingqing breathed a sigh of relief. "If it really caused all zombies to upgrade simultaneously, that would undoubtedly be a major catastrophe."

At this very moment, just like Lin Qingqing and her companions, people all over the world experienced this spatial tremor at the exact same time.

For those who happened to be in daylight or inside safe bases, they were considered fortunate, but for those caught in darkness or currently locked in combat with zombies, it was far more terrifying.

Tragic events frequently occurred in every corner of the world. The lives of those survivors vanished from this world in large batches, much like fireworks filling the sky.

Everyone was making various deductions and speculations regarding the sudden, unprovoked anomaly that had just occurred. Although they could not figure out the truth of the matter for the time being, one thing was certain: this upheaval could well be considered a disaster—a disaster sufficient to shatter the current status quo, from which humanity's plight would become even more precarious.

***

Following the incident, thousands of miles away at Qingfeng Shan, an emerald-green mountain, a figure draped in a deep cyan Taoist robe appeared on a winding, tree-lined path weaving through the verdant peaks.

The person wore their hair in a traditional Taoist bun, sported a grayish-white goatee, and had a lean yet upright build. By attire alone, he was unmistakably a Taoist priest.

Slung across the priest's back was a bamboo basket, and in his hand, he held a horsetail whisk, radiating an ethereal, transcendent aura. He hurried down the mountain as if tending to some urgent matter.

After walking for a long time, the old Taoist priest finally stopped beside a mountain stream. First, he looked up at the sky, then he lifted the hem of his robe and sat down upon a large boulder.

The clear spring water of the mountain stream flowed, babbling against the rocks below to form a small pool. Once filled to the brim, the water slowly overflowed, following a smaller ditch further down toward the base of the mountain.

At that moment, a pair of withered, bony hands gently scooped up a palmful of spring water. He first looked at it, then used the water in his hand to wash his fingers, sending water droplets splashing in all directions as he flicked his hands.

"Sigh~ I'm getting old; even this mountain spring water can't be enjoyed carelessly anymore." With that, those hands reached behind to the bamboo basket, pulling out a transparent vacuum flask inside of which chrysanthemums and goji berries were clearly steeping.

"Sip—" The old Taoist priest took a sip of the hot tea. "Hot tea is much more comforting. When a person gets old, they need to drink more hot water." Having said that, he took another sip.

After finishing his tea, those hands once again reached into the back basket and felt around, this time pulling out a packet of food. Untying the paper string and peeling back the layers of oiled paper, five ghee pastries were revealed. He had snatched these from the kitchen right before heading out. The pastries were fragrant, crisp, and delicious, small enough that two bites could finish one.

"Who knows when I'll get to taste these pastries again after this trip; every one eaten is one less."

"Born in a troubled time, alas! Who tells poor me to have old folks above and young ones below? Originally, I thought I could manage to be lazy and steal a moment of peace, but what must come has finally arrived. Sigh~ Heaven has sent down a calamity; who knows how many living beings in this world will be able to endure through this trial?"

"Misfortune is what fortune leans upon; fortune is where misfortune lies hidden. This old Taoist shall do his utmost!"

Having muttered to himself, he stood up, patted the pastry crumbs from his robe, shouldered his bamboo basket, picked up his whisk, and continued on his journey down the mountain.