Thriller Hunting Program

[THP] Chapter 6: Safe Zone

Translated by: Milky

The male player next to Ling Chengmu was obviously bitten by a zombie. It was a perfect 10 minutes from the moment he got on the bus till now.

Unfortunately, he mutated.

The greenish-purple petechiae quickly spread from his face, his eyes bloody-red and he fiercely opened his mouth and bit towards Ling Chengmu’s direction.

Although Ling Chengmu couldn’t see, she had extremely sharp hearing. Immediately, she grabbed hold of her blind cane and pushed it into between its teeth.

With a “crack” sound, the male player’s incisor was broken. She quickly got up to avoid him and at the same time, she pushed Qin Ce towards him.

“Can you move more nimbly? You think you could run away if I was bitten?”

Qin Ce glanced at her, a slight dislike flashed through his cold eyes, with a hint of impatience hidden beneath.

“Shut up.”

He said as he walked past her to stand in front of her, kicking back that male player, who opened his mouth wide and showed his claws out back to the original place, then flung his rejection stick over to hit right into the male player’s head, directly knocking him down.

A few of the timid girls around saw this scene and screamed in fear, there were also many big men who were affected by this scene as they yelled in panic to get off.

Unfortunately, no one could get out of the car, because there was more than one mutant player in the car.

A sudden howl sound coming from the player who drove this car caught everyone's attention. They saw a player who was originally sitting in the front row, suddenly jumped over without warning and bit through the driver’s neck viciously.

How many potential mutants are in this car?

The driver fell headlong on the steering wheel, the bus immediately lost control and crashed into the roadside stores, overturning on the spot.

The entire bus turned over causing a huge mess within, but the zombies’ actions were still quite flexible, a mouthful of bloodied teeth bit whoever near them, in an instant, several players from the front row, who were unable to run away in time were all gnawed by the zombie until their flesh turned into crumbles and their blood splattered.

From the known-rules, the harder the zombie bites, the faster the player mutates, and if unfortunately, the players were bitten to death, they will definitely get mutated any minute soon.

So the bus instantly turned into a zombie breeding base.

Players pushed and shoved, stepped on each other, scrambled to break the side glass to escape, but in view of the vehicle overturned, it would have been difficult to move, in addition, no matter who climbed up first, they would always be dragged down by others.

As it turns out, the selfishness of human nature is exposed in the face of danger.

Wu Shijiu also fell down due to the violent impact, which caused her head to be accidentally stuck in the seat gap. She wailed and yelled.

“Bro Chang! Hurry! Fucking get me out! Save me!”

The car width narrowed due to the overturned. Even Chang Su even struggled to stand well, he half kneeled on the ground as he tried to pull her head out.

“T-Those…in front…are mutated, l-let’s…h-hurry…r-run.”

“How are we gonna run? Look at them! They’re like people in the market trying to fight for discounted pork meat, how would we be able to squeeze through them?”

Chang Su tried to reason with them: “G-Guys, l-let’s…w-work together. M-make a…q-queue, w-we leave…o-one by one…b-break the g-glass.”

Wu Shijiu was so pissed she hit his chest with her small fist: “What’s the use of reasoning with them?! Who’ll listen?! Bro, are you planning to act as a mascot with that large body of yours?!”

Chang Su went silent.

This time the front row of the few players who survived through the biting started to mutate one after another, their limbs twisted and popped up, and they began to bite people in succession.

The bus vibrated and shook vigorously, the space inside was limited, making the players in front no other way to avoid the mutated players.

The foursome were in the back row so the zombies have not bitten over for the time being, but they will be bitten soon if they don’t get out of this.

Wu Shijiu panicked: “Sis Cheng, Executive Officer Qin, hurry, think of a plan!”

Think of a plan? To them, violence can solve everything.

The next moment, Ling Chengmu grabbed her blind cane and pushed it up—

Crash.

The glass closest to her shattered, and at the same time, she nearly hit the heads of several players who were in the way.

“Sorry,” She apologised casually, “I’m blind, I can’t see if anyone’s there.” 

Qin Ce grabbed the collar of the players and shoved them one by one into the cracked glass. His actions were fast and simple, as if stuffing a featherless duck into the oven.

Finally being able to breathe fresh air, the surviving players with blood on their heads and tears on their faces, rolled and crawled in all directions as they fled away.

Chang Su helped Wu Shijiu to climb out of the windows first, he deliberately cleared the broken glass pieces along the edges in advance to clean up so she wouldn't get cut. 

“D-Don’t…s-simply run away…w-wait for me…t-to get out.”

“Alrighty, Bro Chang.”

It was quite successful for Wu Shijiu to crawl out, but Chang Su’s body size was too large which made him stuck through the windows.

That was an awkward scene. If he couldn’t get out, Qin Ce and Ling Chengmu couldn’t get out either, and the zombies from the front row were rushing towards the back any second now. 

And so Wu Shijiu gripped Chang Su’s neck, while Qin Ce kicked him from behind to forcefully get him out of the bus.

The moment Chang Su was kicked out, well, according to Wu Shijiu’s description: “It was like a falling meteorite, that moment I nearly crashed to death.”

Qin Ce backhandedly threw the backpack left behind by some player, hitting the first zombie that rushed towards them right in the face.

With force, his hand pushed against the seat to get enough force to leap out of the car window, and then gripped Ling Chengu's neck and carried her out of the car.

The last second, Ling Chengmu just poked the eyes of two zombies, and the next second, she suffered such unjust treatment.

Fuck, this son of a bitch had strong hands.

She sat on one leg at the window, propping up her blind cane like a garlic pestle, pounding the zombies that were trying to climb up back inside.

“Executive Officer Qin, are you even a man?” She said: “Shouldn’t it be a ladies first at such a moment?”

“If that’s what I do, you’ll block me in the bus,” Qin Ce’s voice was cold, he asked a rhetorical question: “Why should I let the mob get out first?”

Though his words weren’t nice, Ling Chengmu still had to admit, he was right.

Of course she would kill him if she’s gotten the chance to do so.

Sigh, whatever, since he found out my intentions, I’ll get better luck next time.

Then, she felt a slight vibration coming from her wrists, it was the System’s message.

Yet Wu Shijiu and Chang Su were nowhere to be found, no one could read it out for her, and she couldn’t see.

Reluctantly, she held her hand up and asked Qin Ce: “What did it write?”

Qin Ce clicked on it and eyed through the green notification box that popped up: “...The safe zone is shrinking, they’ll start bombing danger zones in half an hour.”

As he spoke, Wu Shijiu and Chang Su came back happily.

“Sis Cheng, inside a store selling hot dry noodles over there, there are two motorcycles hidden!”

“This System prompt…it’s really well hidden.”

“Good then, let’s go.” Ling Chengmu said, “The System notified us that the safe zone will shrink in half an hour, so we should leave.”

Wu Shijiu lowered her gaze to check and was shocked: “Fuck! Seriously?! We’re still in the danger zone! Ain’t we fighting zombies?! Now we’re fucking running poison?!”

T/N: Run poison, a network buzzword, is that players must run to the safe zone within the specified time, otherwise they will be poisoned, slowly lose blood and finally die.

Their current location, being in the center of the map was marked red, with a rough estimation, the time they needed to reach the safe zone by riding the motorcycle was barely enough.

When Wu Shijiu led the way and found the two motorcycles hidden in the noodle shop, it was needless to say that Chang Su would carry her, but Qin Ce and Ling Chengmu’s side had a disagreement.

Qin Ce patted the motorcycle, his voice deep: “Go squat in front.”

“...Are you ordering me?” Ling Chengmu was unhappy, “If I squatted in front of you, rounded up to the equivalent of being in your arms, it will make me seem sissy, I’ll sit behind.”

“When you nagged about wanting the privilege of ladies first, have you ever thought of looking sissy?”

“Guys, calm down, don’t fight, you guys ain't being a sissy,” Wu Shijiu said with a straight face: “The one sissy in our group is Bro Chang.”

Chang Su: “What?”

Wu Shijiu lead towards Ling Chengmu’s ears and whispered: “Sis Cheng, if you sit at the back, your hands would have to extend out when he rides it because you two are handcuffed—won’t it seem like you’re hugging him?”

Ling Chengmu gritted her teeth in silence.

Hugging Qin Ce, or being hugged by Qin Ce, that was a question to ponder.

The handcuffs between her wrists sounded with a crisp ring, with force, the blind cane in her hands shrunk to about ten inches and she tucked it in her arms. When it’s done, she squatted on the pedals of the motorcycle without any other expression.

Between being active or passive, she chose the latter.

Let her hug Qin Ce’s waist? Dreaming might be a better option!

The two motorcycles drove side by side, through the wretched streets, in accordance with the system map, and quickly rushed to the safe area.

On the way, Qin Ce rode fast, in a difficult position, dodging the interception attacks of countless zombies.

And Ling Chengmu crouched in front of the pedal, staying still and calm, as if she was going to become immortal.

Qin Ce lowered his gaze indifferently: “If you’re alive, don’t play dead.”

Ling Chengmu repeated his words before: “Seeing how much fun you are having, I was afraid I’ll affect your movements.”

Yet before she could finish her words, Qin Ce directly rode over a large pothole on the road ahead of him, and the motorcycle lurched up, nearly throwing LingChengmu off from the sides.

And imagine if she really flung away when she still had one hand attached to the handcuffs, she would only end up being dragged by him and her body would slide through the way, probably when they reach their destination, her legs would be torn and worn out. 

But is Ling Chengmu someone easy to pick on? Of course she’s not.

Her reaction speed was extremely good, immediately she used her other free hand to stabilize her body by using his arm as support, while at the same time her nails moved down, leaving five clear blood marks on the back of his hands.

…That last act was purely for revenge.

The other uncle and Loli combination, did not notice the dark tide of this side, still enjoying their speedy ride and the thrill of cutting zombies.

“Bro Chang, are we almost there?”

“A-Almost…t-there, E-Executive Officer Qin…w-we’re g-going to…”

Qin Ce answered calmly: “To the steel factory.”

Surprisingly, the map showed that a very obvious landmark building at the edge of the safe area turned out to be the steel factory they had discussed earlier.

“...Roger.”

Chang Su was deeply ashamed of the speed of his speech.

Five minutes later, they arrived at the steel factory.

Unfortunately, the front door of the factory was locked from the inside, apparently some players had used it as a base in advance and they were a step late.

Wu Shijiu was panicking when she inadvertently turned around and saw the scratch marks on the back of Qin Ce's hand. She was surprised.

“Executive Officer Qin! What happened?”

Qin Ce’s expression was as cold as an iceberg: “A dog scratched me.”

Ling Chengmu rolled her eyes. Although she was blindfolded with a tie, and no one could see her eyes, but the murderous aura was as substantial, making Wu Shijiu next to her jolt.

“Well…guys, calm down.” Wu Shijiu changed the topic: “Let’s find out how to get in since the doors are locked.”

Ling Chengmu answered casually: “Find the windows, tear them down if there’s any, of not we’ll just dismantle the door.”

In the eyes of this Missy, anything in this world could be dismantled.

Chang Su went around the factory with the motorcycle and came back to them very soon later, stutter as he reported the situation:

“T-There’s…a-a window…b-back there, n-nailed by…w-wooden strips.”

“It’s fine.” Wu Shijiu waved her hand, “To Sis Cheng, it’s like they used newspaper pastes to nail it down.”

The four of them reached the back of the factory, where they saw several layers of small containers stacked on top of each other there, just climbing up of it and they’ll be able to reach the third floor, where the nailed window was located. 

On the top of the containers, a ladder was placed horizontally, the person who climbed up could put the ladder down to meet other teammates.

After ten seconds of an unusually hasty discussion, they all agreed that Chang Su could take on this task, the reason is that he was the oldest, the tallest, and looked like a powerful container climber.

Chang Su was not good at talking, so he could only agree in silence.

But then again, in fact, the skills he obtained in the violent block system after training there in the early years was there, climbing this kind of thing, for him, was really not difficult.

It took him less than two minutes to climb to the top of the container and put the ladder down.

He took a duffel bag from the supermarket previously, unlike Wu Shijiu, who loaded snacks in it, his was far different. Besides a few bags of bread and water, the rest he added in were pliers, a wrench, a small hammer and other tools.

He squatted there as he started to pry the boards nailed to the windows. His expression was so serious it made others who looked at him wanting to give him a thumbs up and praise his professionality. 

He was so efficient that by the time the other three came to join him, only the last two crossed pieces of the boards were left.

Qin Ce weighed his rejection stick in his palm, then suddenly pushed it with force, with a “click” crisp sound, the board from the center cracked.

Hearing the sound, Ling Chengmu decisively helped with her blind cane, this time the wooden board was completely knocked off, revealing the window leading to the interior of the factory.

Curiously, Wu Shijiu leaned in to peek inside.

She suddenly froze.

“...Fuck.”