Dark Ruins Dawn

Chapter 1 Interrogation
Zhuang Fan was certain that the man in the white coat in front of him was not a doctor; he was more like a seasoned interrogator trying to see through his lies.

Are you sure your name is Zhang Dafan?

"Ah."

"age."

"25 years old, I already said that."

"Freezing date".

"I really forgot."

The conversation stalled again, with only the rustling sound of documents being flipped through revealing the doctor's slight impatience.

“I have checked repeatedly. There is no valid information about ‘Zhang Dafan’ in the original shelter’s database. Your cryo-chamber is like an unregistered person with no identity label. This is very strange.”

Zhuang Fan looked troubled: "I'm also very surprised."

The doctor's interrogation was extremely rapid. He quickly went over the form several times and then suddenly asked, "Do you remember your citizen ID?"

"Citizen ID?"

Zhuang Fan blurted it out, then instantly realized he had said the wrong thing.

This time, the doctor stared at him for more than ten seconds before slowly saying, "You are a person from the Common Era, born before 2100."

"..."

"Only in your generation did the concept of citizenship not exist, so what was your birth year?"

"..."

Zhuang Fan chose to remain silent, but the doctor reminded him that he had to answer, otherwise they would have to implant a mind-reading device in his cerebral cortex.

"My patience is limited, you should think this through."

Zhuang Fan finally compromised: "2002, the year I was born."

"What's the freezing date?"

"2027."

"Why freeze it in such an ancient year?"

"Complex cancer, late stage, there's nothing that can be done."

The doctor glanced at Zhuang Fan's electronic report and shook his head: "Your body is very healthy; no tumor cells were detected."

"Nothing was found?"

This time it was Zhuang Fan's turn to be confused. He thought that after he woke up from the cryo-chamber, his cancer was cured incidentally.

The doctor sighed, "Such a large shelter can't even properly preserve information about people from hundreds of years ago. It's practically a makeshift operation."

The phrase "a makeshift team," an ancient Chinese term, sounded somewhat jarring coming from the mouth of a blond Western doctor.

When he was first thawed, he couldn't understand a word of the dialect the doctor was speaking. It wasn't until he was fitted with a simultaneous interpretation device that he realized they were speaking Esperanto.

Zhuang Fan suddenly noticed something and glared at him: "You just said hundreds of years ago... what hundreds of years ago? Repeat it again!"

"Zhang Dafan, watch your words."

As soon as the doctor finished speaking, the two guards outside the door turned around at the same time and pointed their cold gun barrels at Zhuang Fan, instantly calming him down.

He softened his tone: "Dear doctor, what year is it now? This is very important to me."

"2710."

The doctor was quite satisfied with his attitude of admitting his mistake: "It's been almost 700 years since you were frozen, so you are the oldest person from the Common Era that I have encountered so far."

700...

This was a truly disheartening number. Zhuang Fan was struck dumb, as if by lightning.

Who could have imagined that in the instant the eyes close, such a vast span of time would occur, and that the outside world would have undergone tremendous changes, with everything and everyone altered?
So much time has passed, Mom and Dad, and my sister... they might...

Maybe I'm the only one left.

Loneliness and fear struck him instantly. He became dazed and confused, unable to hear what the doctor was saying, and all he could hear was a buzzing in his ears.

"The Gregorian calendar, plus a very rare and ancient year... Zhang Dafan, I'm increasingly looking forward to your performance."

"What else do I need to show?"

More than eight hours have passed since Zhuang Fan was thawed, and he finally couldn't hold back any longer. "And when are you going to let me go? This is illegal imprisonment."

"No rush, we'll wait for the test results."

The doctor's smile turned slightly gloomy: "Besides... it's much safer for you to stay here than in the outside world, I'm not lying to you."

Realizing he had stumbled into a den of thieves, Zhuang Fan cursed under his breath and began plotting his escape.

This old rascal doesn't seem to have any weapons for self-defense. He looks to be in his fifties or sixties and is quite frail. If I take him hostage, will I be able to break out?

"Let's take it to the testing area first."

Before Zhuang Fan could make up his mind, two mechanical guards, armed with guns, ordered him to stand up and quickly took him out of the room.

The grand plan to kidnap the hostage was thus shattered.

The dimly lit, claustrophobic corridor was filled with tangled wires overhead. There were no windows and no sunlight, so he guessed he might be in some underground building.

Soon, as the gear-shaped gate opened, Zhuang Fan was led into the testing area.

The air inside was murky and dark, and in the center was a large iron cage containing dozens of people.

Calling them "people" is no longer objective; they are more like a group of living corpses dressed in tattered clothes, including men and women of varying heights.

But his skin and eyes were grayish-white, his limbs were rotting and smelly, his white bones were still covered with bits of flesh, and he was roaring out the most primal desires.

Is this really not a movie shoot?
After standing there stunned for a while, Zhuang Fan calmed his astonishment, but a strong sense of unease arose within him.

He noticed that standing next to him was another test subject, a trembling, bald, middle-aged man with a pale face, too frightened to speak.

A man in a white coat walked over, took out a device resembling a detector, and carefully scanned the middle-aged man. He quickly concluded: "Subject 233, the concentration of the strange fog in his body averages 1 milligram per cubic meter."

"So, did I pass?" The middle-aged man didn't want to stay there a moment longer.

The doctor in the white coat gently shook his head: "Sorry, the concentration is too high. You do not meet our screening requirements."

Before he could finish speaking, a mechanical guard stepped forward, opened the iron cage door, and threw the middle-aged man inside like a rooster before slamming the door shut.

"Please, I still have money in my account, really, my password is... Ah—!"

The wailing stopped abruptly.

His throat was pierced by a sharp claw.

The horde of zombies went completely berserk, their roars filled with excitement as they frantically tore at their prey, putting on a truly bloody feast right before Zhuang Fan's eyes.

There were large amounts of dried, dark brownish-red stains around the iron cage, mixed with fresh blood and broken organs, and the air was filled with a fishy stench and gray fog.

This is the worst hell on earth.

Zhuang Fan's face also turned pale. Movies are movies, but reality doesn't need to be too realistic. At this moment, he only felt physically nauseous and couldn't help but want to move back.

But a cold, mechanical hand blocked his way out.

"Subject 234, it's your turn."

Am I destined to die?
Zhuang Fan's legs were as if nailed to the ground, he remained motionless, thus resisting the fate that had befallen him.

When the mechanical guard beside him reached for his shoulder, Zhuang Fan suddenly exerted his strength and lunged at the spear, only to find that... it didn't budge an inch.

It turns out that the gun handle and the guard's mechanical fingers were integrated into one piece.

"Hey, you test subjects love to snatch guns, wait... damn it, you actually broke the gun handle."

Zhuang Fan was also stunned. Was my strength really that great?
Enraged, the guard kicked Zhuang Fan hard, sending him flying like a rag doll, crashing into the wall and falling to the ground.

He curled up in pain, unable to speak.

The doctor in the white coat said with a kind expression, "Don't do anything foolish, or you'll die even faster. I'll be waiting for your good news outside."

The gear-shaped door slowly closed, and the laboratory returned to darkness.

After the pain subsided, Zhuang Fan staggered to his feet and wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth.

His eyes were fixed on the doorway, as if a cluster of flames were burning within them.

After a long while, he looked away and sighed softly, "That iron lump really hurts when it kicks people. I'll have to be more careful in the future."

By this time, the feeding in the large cage had ended, and the zombie horde had devoured every last bone.

The still hungry zombies quickly set their sights on Zhuang Fan's living body, their eyes gleaming fiercely as they let out threatening roars.

The arm, with flesh and bone still attached, looked fragile, but when it hit the iron cage, it produced a crisp, dull thud, and the cage bars were even slightly deformed.

Zhuang Fan was filled with doubt and surprise. Could this iron cage hold up? It shouldn't be able to break out, right?

Wait, something's strange... He stood by the cage and observed carefully for a while before finally noticing the oddity of the zombie horde.

Perhaps stimulated by the smell of blood, the bodies of these crazed zombies continuously exuded a light gray mist.

The mist is odorless and not corrosive at the moment.

Zhuang Fan recalled the "strange fog concentration" mentioned by the man in the white coat and guessed that it must be this thing. The middle-aged man was captured and fed to the zombies because the concentration of strange fog in his body exceeded the standard.

If being infected by the mysterious mist turns one into a zombie, then the whole experiment is to find a test subject who can be immune to the mysterious mist... and then create a vaccine?
The line of reasoning seemed sound. Recalling the middle-aged man's miserable state, Zhuang Fan quickly realized that what he should do most right now was to avoid getting involved with the eerie mist and remain "clean".

Seeing the eerie mist gradually spreading in the testing area, Zhuang Fan quickly held his breath and retreated to the corner, forcefully overturning a side table in an attempt to block the mist's encroachment.

The table did successfully block some of the eerie fog, but an even stranger thing happened:
On the dark side of the table back, a strange mist was slowly forming. Although the formation was extremely slow and the concentration was weak, he was very certain that the mist was generated out of thin air and had nothing to do with the zombies.

The desktop couldn't block the eerie mist emanating from the zombies either, which seeped in little by little and merged with the newly generated mist.

When something is truly bizarre, there must be something fishy going on. This is truly bizarre to the extreme.

Zhuang Fan had nowhere to hide at this point and was soon surrounded by a light mist. He tried to hold his breath, but in less than three minutes he turned red in the face and squatted on the ground, panting heavily.

"call……"

Although the eerie mist was odorless and non-corrosive, it was psychologically unsettling. He could only hope to inhale as little eerie mist as possible, and his expression grew increasingly solemn.

"Fine, whatever."

Having given up entirely, Zhuang Fan simply stood up and searched the eerie fog for any weapons for self-defense or any hidden escape routes.

He wouldn't be willing to just wait to die.

In reality, nothing was found, and cameras in all four corners were watching his every move.

Realizing he was wasting his time, Zhuang Fan stopped struggling and sat cross-legged on the ground to rest and conserve his energy.

Half an hour later, the gear gate made a "click" sound as the motor drove it to rotate and open.

A group of people walked in, the two at the head of the group being the man in the white coat and the blond doctor who was interrogating him.

Zhuang Fan stood calmly beside the cage, his face expressionless, as if awaiting a death sentence, but in secret he had already calculated the distance between himself and the cage door.

"Zhang Dafan, I look forward to a good outcome for you."

The blond doctor had barely finished speaking when he gestured to the doctor in the white coat: "Go get tested."

The doctor in the white coat nodded, took out his equipment, skillfully collected several markers on Zhuang Fan's body, and then looked down to examine the data closely.

Zhuang Fan's right palm was slightly sweaty.

As soon as he senses something is wrong, he will immediately take the man in the white coat hostage or open the cage door to release all the zombies, resulting in a fight to the death.

The doctor in the white coat stared at the instruments for a long while, then slowly looked up, his tone filled with disbelief.

"Subject 234, the average concentration of the eerie mist within their body is..."

"0 mg/m³".

(End of this chapter)