Chapter 291 – One Against Many

“No, I can’t use that attack. I promised Ling-Ge that I would never expose myself.”

Xia Na swiftly moved her hand and then seized the neck of the variation zombie, giving it a sharp twist.

With a “crack,” the zombie immediately collapsed to the ground.

Though it was only a brief moment, being able to suppress her true nature at such a critical time was quite a feat for Xia Na.

She lowered her head and rubbed her eyes, the redness in her irises slowly fading back to black.

However, if one looked closely, there would still be a hint of red in her eyes, not very noticeable but enough to give her an eerie aura.

After taking the necessary photos, Xia Na turned and left the building.

In the next two hours, she would face many more struggles like this one.

With each success, Xia Na felt her control over her dual personalities strengthening.

No matter how crucial the next step might be, laying a solid foundation was always beneficial.

“Actually, I’m a bit worried…”

Xia Na looked up at the zombies wandering in the distance, her face showing an expression she had never revealed in front of Ling Mo.

“What if, after I improve, the old me completely disappears? Will I still be Xia Na then? To Ling-Ge, will I still be the Xia Na he knows?”

On this street filled with danger and carnage, Xia Na’s expression was like that of an ordinary girl, lost and confused.

The wind blew against her clothes, outlining her slender figure.

“No matter how I evolve, I don’t want to change who I am…”

Xia Na glanced down at her outstretched hands, then clenched them tightly.

Her seemingly ordinary nails immediately pierced her fair palms, and a drop of bright red blood emerged.

“Actually, I… Ling-Ge, I really want to go back to how things were, back to the moment we first met. I want… to be human again.”

Xia Na’s irises turned red again, their color shifting constantly. She grabbed her collar with her other hand, pressing it against her chest. “It’s strange, this feeling of heartache… Is this what humans call sadness? It seems my Psychic Realm has never been completely infected and mutated, so I still have these human emotions.”

In her mind, Xia Na recalled the soul-deep fear and extreme pain she felt when she was about to be infected and mutated.

Because Ling Mo was there, she had not become a creature driven only by the urge to hunt and eat, unlike the zombies wandering aimlessly on the streets.

She hadn’t gone through the processes that would have completely overturned her human nature. Even during the infection and mutation, she had never truly mutated from the inside out.

Any deviation from the natural order will eventually be corrected by the laws of nature.

Xia Na knew that being stuck at this crucial step was the Virus’s way of guiding this “anomaly” back on track.

“But that idiot Ling-Ge, even though he guessed my dual personalities are actually the coexistence of human and zombie natures, he doesn’t know what to do about it. How could these two natures possibly merge? I will probably be devoured by one of them,” Xia Na thought as she squatted in the middle of the street. The zombies around her wandered as if they hadn’t seen her at all.

“But no matter which nature devours me, I’ll end up being a different person to Ling-Ge,” Xia Na sighed, then slowly unclenched her hand, raising her blood-stained palm into the air. “I can’t let Ling-Ge know that a zombie like me can have worries too. I need to find a way myself so that he won’t have to worry about me anymore.”

The nearest zombies immediately turned their heads towards her as if they had smelled something delicious.

Blood trickled down her pale arm, and the zombies growled, hesitantly moving towards her.

“Cowardly, low-level creatures, just like those wretches who used to grovel before the rich and powerful. Disgusting!”

Xia Na suddenly clenched her fist, a strange smile forming on her lips as she looked at the approaching zombies…

Over an hour later, Ling Mo emerged from a store just as a variation zombie was suddenly hoisted into the air by an invisible Psychic Tentacle.

“Bang!”

Ling Mo kicked a clothing rod towards the zombie, which fell heavily and got impaled through the chest and abdomen by the rod.

“Using the Psychic Tentacle as an auxiliary attack method saves much more energy than direct attacks. Plus, I’ve gotten much better at controlling the expenditure.”

A glimmer of satisfaction flashed in Ling Mo’s eyes. This past hour had allowed him to grasp the key points of using Materialized Tentacles.

However, to practice these methods to a highly proficient level, Ling Mo thought there were no better practice partners than Ye Lian and the others.

Variation zombies wouldn’t cooperate obediently, nor could they tell him if his force was appropriate or how it felt.

“Speaking of them… I wonder how Xia Na is doing. Even though we’re still within two kilometers of each other, our connection has become very weak. I can only roughly sense her location, but I can’t detect her Psychic Activity at all.”

Ling Mo snapped a photo of the zombie’s corpse and then walked out of the store with some concern.

Just as he stepped through the shattered glass door, a strange look flashed in his eyes:

“It seems someone is planning to steal my phone. This is getting interesting.”

He felt a scanning sensation near his head and immediately closed his eyes.

In his Psychic detection, Ling Mo could sense some mental energy surrounding him.

He quickly deployed his Psychic Tentacles to block these mental energies.

In simple terms, he created a Psychic Barrier around himself, preventing the other party from directly detecting him.

This detection was fully encompassing, and Ling Mo’s Psychic Tentacles could freely wrap around him in a 360-degree shield.

“What a powerful blocking ability!”

In a room, Chen Youdong suddenly opened his eyes, wiping the sweat from his forehead.

“And his Psychic Power is highly aggressive, completely different from my detection-focused approach… If he had wanted to, he could have shredded my external mental energy just now, leaving me unable to recover for at least a day.”

Chen Youdong rubbed his eyes with some lingering fear and let out a long breath.

He looked up towards the door and said, “Alright, you guys were right. We need to take him on together; there’s no way I could handle him on my own.”

“Are you sure this isn’t against the rules?”

Lin Tianxiang glanced at Zhou Guocheng, Sun Zeya, and Tom beside him, frowning as he asked.

Sun Zeya giggled and said, “I don’t remember any rules about this, so it’s not really cheating, is it?”

“But I’m still excited to face him. Someone who can survive alone in a zombie-infested area must have plenty of tricks up his sleeve.”

Zhou Guocheng rubbed his hands together excitedly, “Don’t you think this is a great learning opportunity? We’ve always had teammates to rely on. To be honest, when it comes to using Superpowers, we’re still a bit behind him. It’s frustrating to admit, and I won’t feel satisfied until we’ve given him a good thrashing!”

Tom blushed and coughed, “Well… fine, I’m curious about him too!”

Lin Tianxiang muttered under his breath, “I always feel that our way of ganging up on him alone is just… too shameless! But, I’m in! That guy’s been getting on my nerves for a while now, strutting around with three beauties, and they even slept in the same bed last night! Damn it! I’ve been single for over thirty years!”

“Haha, we’re giving him a chance to see if he can take us all on. But seriously, what have you been doing these past thirty years, Doctor? Staying pure?”

Zhou Guocheng looked at him in astonishment.

Lin Tianxiang adjusted his glasses and said indignantly, “Of course, I was studying! Pursuing my Dr…. If I’d known this day would come, I would have taken more time to enjoy life! Well… but I was studying to change my fate and live a better life. Fate is so unpredictable…”

“Alright. He’s somewhere near the Department Store, but I couldn’t pinpoint his exact location. Everyone knows their roles, right? The target is Ling Mo’s phone!”

Chen Youdong stood up and said.

“Interesting. That scan just now was definitely from Chen Youdong, but if he doesn’t want to get himself killed, he shouldn’t be coming after me, should he?”

Ling Mo opened his eyes, frowning as he pondered.