Sixteen Years

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“Alright.” Liu Ruosong on the other end of the phone smiled and whispered, “So… see you later?”

“See you later,” Fu Yan replied.

After the phone on the other end became completely silent, Fu Yan finally hung up. The last 2% of battery life on his phone had been used up during this call. The screen briefly flickered before going completely dark, temporarily turning into a “brick.”

Fu Yan put down his phone and took a deep breath before shifting his gaze back to his surroundings.

He was currently in a small building that was scheduled for demolition. He leaned against a secluded corner on the second floor, far from the doors and windows and his tightly rolled-up sleeve was stained with blood.

Somewhere had ruptured, Fu Yan thought.

Throughout the entire phone call, he hadn’t moved his injured arm.

When Shao Qiu and the others called him to synchronize the mission situation, he was on the national highway. This particular stretch of the national highway was the main route from S Province to the south, and it was congested with private cars fleeing the city overnight. Some of these private cars had people that had mutated along the way, while others met accidents. The road conditions were extremely complex, and zombies occasionally roamed in the corners.

There were too many cars blocking the road, obstructing his line of sight. Combined with Shao Qiu reporting the mission status, including Liu Ruosong’s situation, Fu Yan was momentarily distracted and didn’t have time to evade a zombie charging toward him. They collided forcefully.

The zombie was sent flying in all directions by the impact, and unfortunately, the car Fu Yan had picked up on the road didn’t seem to have an airbag for some reason, and Fu Yan himself was also heavily injured.

Moreover, there were quite a few zombies in the vicinity, and before he could retreat, the rear of his car was pounced on by two more zombies.

These creatures had immense strength after their mutations. The back of Fu Yan’s car skidded at a significant angle. Without much hesitation, he grabbed something nearby and clung to the window frame, flipping himself out through the window.

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He had suffered injuries from his previous crash, and although he had recovered somewhat over time, there were still some lingering problems. His left arm lost strength after the violent impact, and it was still numb now.

Coupled with the fact that the front of the car was completely wrecked, Fu Yan decided to abandon the vehicle altogether. Instead, he found an unfinished house nearby to take temporary shelter in, where he could rest and wait for updates from the front.

Fortunately, Fu Yan had set off earlier than Liu Ruosong and Shao Qiu. He had been on the road for almost a day and night and was now very close to Peng City. If he could find a second vehicle smoothly, he would arrive in another three or four hours.

Right now, Fu Yan had planned to stop temporarily and assess the situation before entering the city. Although there had been a slight mishap, he still had overall control of the situation.

He leaned against the wall for a while, then stood up again, walked up and down the building, checked the door and windows, and made sure of the escape route on the second floor. Finally, he returned to the corner where he had been sitting earlier and took off his jacket.

Fu Yan examined his arm and found no major injuries. There were no fractures or dislocations, just some strain from the abrupt movement. It would likely regain sensation within the next two hours.

Not being physically hindered by the journey was a relief to Fu Yan. He spread his jacket on the ground, carefully inspected the fabric, and then tore off the inner lining of the entire jacket to prevent contaminated blood from seeping in when he encountered zombies later.

The material of this jacket was somewhat similar to a mountaineering windbreaker, with thick fabric and several layers of lining. The innermost and outermost layers were waterproof. Fu Yan rolled it up and tied it around the several wounds on his left arm that had split open.

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The last half-bottle of water in Fu Yan’s pocket had served its purpose during this process, leaving only an empty and fragile bottle.

Fu Yan screwed the cap back on, stood it up beside him, and leaned against the wall, contemplating his next move.

It seemed that the mention of “Shao Qiu” had given Fang Sining some trust in him. Half an hour ago, Fang Sinning had called to inform him about the core documents.

“If you claim that my teacher was murdered, then there’s only one thing I can think of.” At that time, Fang Sining had said on the phone, “That was the only secret in my teacher’s hands.”

“Only one?” Fu Yan asked. “Are you sure?”

“I am.” Fang Sining replied, “Perhaps you don’t know, but there’s a certain process for how research operates. No matter how capable my teacher was, when conducting scientific research, he couldn’t handle all the work alone. There had to be a core research team.”

“I was a member of my teacher’s core research team.” Fang Sining continued, “I’ve been involved in all of my teacher’s research projects, and there was nothing particularly unique about them. I can tell you plainly that my teacher had been researching a data chain and had conducted some bio-chemical reactions for it. These research projects were straightforward and formed the basis for a complex regenerative drug. There was nothing special about them. Many people in the field are working on similar things, and it shouldn’t have attracted any danger.”

Fu Yan didn’t inquire further about what exactly Shao Xuefan was researching. Since these were technical questions, and Fu Yan’s understanding of them was limited, it would be more productive to let Fang Sining ponder the doubts himself.

“So, if we must say my teacher had a secret, I can only think of that core document,” Fang Sining said. “In biological research, a project could take anywhere from a few years to a lifetime. But my teacher’s document was strange. From his attitude, it seemed like an unfinished project. However, for some reason, he didn’t continue with it and instead sealed the document, never to be used again.”

“Did he succeed in his research?” Fu Yan asked. “I mean, based on what you know.”

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“…No,” Fang Sining sighed and said, “It’s difficult to define success or failure. We achieved some good results, and the progress of small projects went very smoothly, but for some reason, my teacher always felt that the experiments were not progressing. The specific research direction was controlled by my teacher himself, and we didn’t know the exact goal. So, according to his attitude, we can consider it a non-success.”

“Understood,” Fu Yan said. “Please continue.”

“My teacher’s secret document is stored on one of his private hard drives,” Fang Sining said. “That document is not connected to the internet and has been encrypted separately. I have a backup of the encryption key, but the document is not with me—I was merely entrusted by my teacher to keep such things safe.”

Fang Sining paused for a moment and continued, “I think my teacher gave me the key only as a safeguard, not because he actually wanted me to see the contents.”

So Shao Xuefan had likely foreseen that he might face unforeseen circumstances one day, Fu Yan thought, and therefore left this last clue to his closest student.

“Based on what you’ve said, if we find that document, can you fully decode the information inside?” Fu Yan asked.

“Yes,” Fang Sining replied. “I was my teacher’s closest student, and my knowledge in the field is consistent with his.”

“Very well,” Fu Yan said. “Five hours from now, I will be at the Peng City International Conference Center. During this time, do not wander around.”

Four hours remained until the agreed-upon time for Fu Yan and Fang Sining to meet. Fu Yan’s phone had run out of battery, so he had to rely on his strict internal biological clock to estimate the time.

During his previous call with Shao Qiu, he had also asked about the current situation outside. The Yan command center had more information than they did, and Fu Yan had chosen the safest way to travel, but it was also the slowest. After a day and night had passed, the situation outside had changed dramatically.

By the time he contacted Shao Qiu, various parts of the country had already seen the emergence of corresponding mutants.

With limited official manpower, even in a place like S City, they couldn’t control it. The mutation rate was skyrocketing, and people were each trying to save themselves, causing chaos throughout the city.

Based on the lessons learned from S City, it seemed that Peng City wouldn’t fare much better.

Fu Yan didn’t believe that he could rely on a folding knife to make it out of a densely packed crowd of zombies unharmed. However, luckily, the Peng City Conference Center was located near the outer ring road, so he could avoid the overly crowded city center and take a detour.

In just a few minutes, Fu Yan mentally drew a map and quickly planned his route into the city.

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Fu Yan roughly designed several plans in his mind and then took a short ten-minute break before heading downstairs.

Fortunately, it was still the early days of the apocalypse, and there were usable vehicles everywhere on the streets. Despite his injured arm, Fu Yan easily found a backup vehicle within half an hour.

Although the backup vehicle’s fuel level was critically low, it was better than nothing.

Fang Sining was a researcher, and he had no self-defense abilities in the apocalypse. Earlier, Fu Yan had instructed him to stay in a sealed space and estimate the time. It was likely that he had been without water and food for a long time.

Before the apocalypse, Fang Sining had been sent to represent Shao Xuefan at an academic conference. At that time, the conference center, including the participants, staff, and their respective student assistants, had housed at least four to five hundred people.

Fu Yan circled around the city on a coastal highway and parked in front of the International Conference Center when he saw it. He noticed that the building’s doors and windows were tightly shut, and it was pitch-black inside, with no signs of human presence.

To be honest, if all the mission environments were ranked by severity, a building with tightly locked doors and windows like this one would be the top choice for the apocalypse rescue team to avoid entering.

Because inside, it was either mostly ordinary civilians who had hidden there from the beginning, or a bunch of nowhere-to-go zombies.

Based on Fu Yan’s personal experience, the latter situation accounted for more than ninety percent of the cases.

The International Conference Center was a complex building with a total of twelve floors. Floors one to six were office spaces, and above six were hotel rooms.

When Fang Sining had called earlier, he had mentioned his hiding place—he was in a public suite on the eighth floor, room 8032, at the end of the corridor to the right when you turned right from the elevator.

Closed-type large buildings with dense populations and high floors.

Fu Yan’s eyes darkened, and he took steps towards the entrance.