One person: Starting with the Snow Drinking Blade

Zhang Chulan adjusted his attack method, aiming his next lightning strike at the knee of a zombie on his right. When the lightning struck, a small piece of bone shattered at the zombie's patella, and the entire leg bent outward at an abnormal angle under the pressure. It staggered and rolled to the side, struggling to prop itself up with its hands after landing.

Lu Linglong didn't give the zombie a chance to get up. Her Wind God Leg slashed in from the side, her toes wrapped in a layer of solidified Qi, and accurately kicked the side of the zombie's cervical spine. The sound of breaking bones was crisp and dry, the zombie's head tilted to an impossible angle, and the struggle of its limbs stopped instantly.

"His neck is thinner than the green-eyed one!" Lu Linglong landed in a half-squatting position and then bounced up again. Before she could stand up straight, she went to meet the next one—a man in a gray jacket who pounced down from the left wall. The outline of her profile was reflected in his red eyes.

As she dodged the first lunge, she drew her short sword from behind her waist—an old sword that Nie Lingfeng had given her before he left. The blade was narrow yet resilient, suitable for close-quarters combat. The tip of the sword sliced ​​upwards from below the zombie's right ear, piercing the gap between the skull and cervical vertebrae. The red-eyed zombie lost all momentum in mid-air, swooping past her like a kite with a cut string and crashing into the wall.

"Linglong, sheathe your sword and return to your position!" Nie Lingfeng's voice came from ahead, brief but clear.

The moment Lu Linglong retreated back into formation, Nie Lingfeng took her place, pressing forward three steps. The Snow Drinking Blade's technique was completely different from when dealing with the green-eyed zombies—he used a narrower arc, a faster frequency, and minimized the contact area of ​​each strike. When the blade cut through the red-eyed zombie's neck bones, there wasn't even a noticeable cracking sound, because their bones were thinner and lighter than the green-eyed zombies', and the blade passed through with almost no resistance.

Feng Baobao's team had already switched to a different rhythm. Her katana wasn't aiming for headshots every time; instead, she was rapidly making cuts near the zombies' elbows, knees, and ankles. Red-eyed zombies were fast, but their ligaments and tendons were more fragile than green-eyed zombies. Once their weight-bearing structures were severed, their ability to move quickly vanished. She had only stepped over an area of ​​about three steps square, but within that small circle, four zombies were already piled up, unable to get up. They were still struggling to crawl with their arms, but below the knees, they had lost all support.

Wang Zhenqiu was high up. He leaned out of an open window on the second floor, each palm strike landing on the skull of a zombie, the explosive force at close range shattering the internal structure of the skull. His position allowed him to see the distribution of zombies along the entire street, occasionally uttering brief messages: "Five more have come out of the alley on the left, the leader has climbed over the wall!" "Ignore the hand sticking out of the window to your left, it can't climb out."

The battle lasted almost twice as long as the one at the crossroads. When the last red-eyed zombie trying to climb over the courtyard wall was struck head-on by Wang Ye's True Martial Sword Intent—the tip of the sword didn't touch its body, but the solid, restrained sword intent had already stopped its movement—the battlefield finally quieted down.

Zhang Chulan crouched down, catching his breath, and then glanced around. More than thirty zombie bodies lay scattered across the street, most of them completely still, while a few with severed joints lay on the ground, their fingers twitching futilely. The blood of the red-eyed zombies was a lighter color than that of the green-eyed ones, with a texture like diluted rusty water, gleaming dullly in the moonlight.

"If another wave comes," he said, shoving aside a motionless zombie to make way, "our stamina won't last much longer. These guys are much harder to fight than the green-eyed ones."

"They're faster, more coordinated, but also more fragile." Nie Lingfeng rubbed the Snow Drinking Blade against the sole of his boot, the remaining light red liquid dripping from the blade and spreading a faint stain on the stone slab. "Their strength and defense have both decreased. If their evolutionary path is towards speed and intelligence—then the green-eyed zombies are probably going towards strength and endurance."

"Two directions coexisting?" Wang Ye sheathed his True Martial Sword. His breathing was slightly faster than usual, but his expression remained steady. "The people who created them released two mutation paths simultaneously in the same area, like conducting a control experiment."

"Compare to what?" Lu Linglong shook the liquid off her sword and sheathed it.

"We're comparing which mutant is more efficient under the same conditions," Nie Lingfeng paused after saying this, "and perhaps we're comparing which is easier to control."

A few seconds of silence followed. The sweet, metallic smell in the air became even more pronounced in the area where the battle had just ended, mingling with the odor of the light red blood on the ground to create a sticky, lingering sensation that adhered to the inner walls of the nasal cavity.

"We can't push this any further tonight." Nie Lingfeng glanced around the street. "Find a secluded house to rest in, and resume the search after dawn."

Wang Zhenqiu leaned out of the second-floor window and pointed towards the back street: "That two-story building on the left, the doors and windows are intact, and there are no obvious signs of damage to the exterior walls. I glanced at it when I passed by just now, and the roller shutter door downstairs could be pulled down."

The group moved to the small building. The first floor was small; it had originally been a small general store. The counter had been pushed over and leaned against the wall, and the shelves had long been emptied, leaving only a few dusty tin boxes and a broken measuring tape. The stairs led to the second floor, where there were two bedrooms and a kitchen/dining room. The windows were all closed, but the window seals were still intact, and the pervasive eerie atmosphere inside was noticeably less intense.

Wang Zhenqiu quickly rummaged through the kitchen and found some things—half a bag of flour, a bundle of dried noodles, an unopened jar of fermented bean paste, and a few eggs. He assessed the value of these items and cooked a pot of steaming egg noodles in less than twenty minutes. As the aroma rose from the small pot, Lu Linglong sat on a stool at the edge of the dining table, her gaze never leaving the rim of the pot.

"Brother Qiu, your cooking skills are truly amazing." Zhang Chulan slurped a mouthful of noodles from a rough porcelain bowl, his lips burning, but he still took a second slurp. "You can even make hot soup noodles in this run-down town. It would be a shame if you didn't open a noodle shop after you retire."

"Opening a noodle shop requires capital." Wang Zhenqiu served himself a bowl, placed it on the table, and before eating, stirred the soup with his spoon a couple of times. "Someone like me, used to a carefree lifestyle, can't stop."

"Then let's open a mobile noodle shop, driving around in a small truck, selling noodles wherever we happen to be."

"You want me to carry the blame wherever I go, right?"

"Why not?"

After eating a few bites of noodles, Lu Linglong put down the bowl, warming her palms with her hands. She remained silent for a moment before speaking, "Master, Liu Yanyan... she's been in this environment for two days, can she still hold on?"

Nie Lingfeng sat on a wooden box at the top of the stairs, holding a bowl of noodles in his hand, but he didn't eat it in a hurry. His gaze fell on a faded calendar poster on the opposite wall, the picture of a scenic spot from twenty years ago.

"The Liu family's corpse-driving technique is essentially a method of coexisting with corpses," he began, speaking at a measured pace. "Their qi contains a component that harmonizes with the dead, giving them an innate greater tolerance to corpse energy and yin evil qi. An ordinary person might experience mental disorder or qi stagnation after two days in this qi, but the Liu family members can endure it much longer. If she finds a way to conceal her aura during this time, she can even last longer."

"Then why didn't she retreat?" Lu Linglong pressed. "Since she knew she could hold on, why didn't she back out when she realized something was wrong, and wait for others to arrive before going in together?"

"She must have discovered something," Nie Lingfeng said. "She felt that discovery was worth the risk of going deeper. Given Liu Yanyan's personality, anything that could make her shut up and stay there—it must be no ordinary intelligence."

Zhang Chulan finished the last sip of soup, paused to make sure the bowl was empty, then placed it on the table: "Could she be being controlled?"

"Controlling the Liu family won't be that easy." Wang Ye placed his chopsticks on the rim of his bowl. He didn't eat much, stopping after only a little over half. "The art of corpse driving inherently possesses strong mental resistance. They deal with the mental power of the dead year-round, making their defenses against mental control and interference several levels higher than ordinary people. The first step to controlling her would be to overcome her innate resistance—that's much harder than controlling an ordinary superhuman."

"Is it possible that she stayed on her own accord?" Lu Lin rarely spoke, but this time she did, "What she discovered is too important. She can't leave; she's afraid that if she leaves, she won't be able to find her place when she comes back."

Nie Lingfeng glanced at Lu Lin and nodded slightly: "That's the most reasonable explanation."

After dinner, the watch arrangements were finalized. Nie Lingfeng and Feng Baobao would take the first half of the night, Zhang Chulan and Wang Zhenqiu the second half, and the rest would get some rest. The bedroom on the second floor, towards the back, had no windows, only a door leading to the inner corridor, making it relatively safe. When Lu Linglong wrapped herself in her sleeping bag, it took her longer than usual to close her eyes—she repeatedly went over the movement characteristics and weak points of the red-eyed zombies she had encountered that night in her mind, only slowly closing her eyes on the third time.

Nie Lingfeng stood on the second-floor balcony facing the street, his back against the shadow of the wall, his gaze slowly sweeping across the empty street below. Moonlight shone on the stone pavement, spreading a uniform silvery-gray hue. There were no more zombies on the street—perhaps the recent concentrated battle had cleared out most of the vagrants in the area, or perhaps they would enter a different behavioral pattern sometime before dawn. Feng Baobao stood at the other end of the balcony, two meters to his left, able to see the bend in the alley.

"You're looking at that temple." Feng Baobao's voice was very soft, barely breaking the silence of the night.

Nie Lingfeng did not deny it. His gaze did indeed pass over the rooftops of the town and land on the black outline of a small hill deep within the town—it was a temple, not large in scale, but located high up, and in the moonlight, one could see the curve of its eaves and the lines of its roof ridge. That was the direction with the highest and most concentrated concentration of yin and evil energy in the entire town.

"The location of that temple wasn't chosen randomly." He turned his gaze back to the hilltop, "It's built on the axis of the town's main east-west street. If there's anything underneath it—it would be directly pressing down on the main energy channel."

There's something down there.

"Um."

Feng Baobao didn't ask what it was. She placed her hand on the scabbard of the katana, her thumb pressing against the blade, glanced in the direction of the temple, then looked away and returned to her post at the back alley observation post.

A night breeze blew from the valley, carrying a clump of fallen leaves as it swept through the deserted streets. The leaves tumbled and rolled along the stone steps of a doorway, finally settling in the groove of the threshold. The town remained quiet, but the outline of the temple on the hill maintained a subtle, slow pulse in the moonlight—like some enormous living being breathing peacefully in the depths.

Nie Lingfeng stood on the balcony until his shift ended. Before returning indoors, he took one last look in the direction of the temple.

The shadow of the temple eaves shifted slightly in the moonlight, then returned to stillness. He wasn't sure if it was the result of the night wind or something else.

He closed the door and went back inside.