On the third day after they left the abandoned house, they encountered the first living person.
More precisely, someone who had once been alive.
That afternoon, they headed west along a country road. On either side were dead rice paddies, the soil cracked into chunks like cookies scorched under the sun. The cloying sweetness in the air was heavier than it had been the past few days, thick enough to make Lin Wan's tongue taste bitter.
Lu Yu suddenly stopped.
His arm swept across her path, blocking her behind him.
"Don't move."
Lin Wan followed his gaze.
At the end of the road stood a person.
The person stood in the middle of the road with their back to them. They wore a gray shirt, their pant legs caked with mud, their feet bare. Their posture was strange—their body leaned slightly forward, arms hanging at their sides, like a rag doll suspended from a clothes rack.
"Is it... a survivor?" Lin Wan asked in a lowered voice.
Lu Yu didn't answer.
He slowly set his backpack on the ground, pulled the folding knife from its side pocket, and silently snapped the blade open.
"Lu Yu?"
"Quiet."
The person moved.
It wasn't a normal movement. Their head turned first, rotating far too far, as if the bones in their neck were no longer restricted. Only then did the body follow.
Lin Wan saw their face.
Her stomach clenched violently.
The face was grayish white. The eyes were stretched wide, the pupils dilated into cloudy milky-white pools. The corners of the mouth were split open, the cracks stretching all the way to the ears and exposing the dark-red muscle beneath. Fine black lines covered the surface of the skin, as though something had dyed the blood vessels black.
It wasn't a living person.
But it wasn't dead, either.
It was moving.
That thing tilted its head, as if trying to identify something. Then its mouth opened—not to speak, but to produce a low, hissing sound forced up from deep in its throat.
Lin Wan's legs began to weaken.
"Back up." Lu Yu's voice was low and steady. "Slowly. Don't run."
She did as he said. One step. Two. Three.
That thing suddenly moved.
It was too fast to be human. Its body shot forward as if propelled by something. Its limbs moved out of sync, but its speed far exceeded that of a normal human.
It charged at them.
Lu Yu stepped forward.
Not back. Forward.
He stood in front of Lin Wan.
"Run."
"Wha—"
"Run!"
Lin Wan turned and ran. She didn't want to. Her legs were moving, but her mind screamed at her to look back.
She heard an impact behind her.
Then the sound of metal slicing through something.
Then Lu Yu let out a muffled groan.
She stopped.
She turned around.
Lu Yu had been knocked to the ground by that thing. His left arm shielded his face, while that thing's teeth were clamped down on his forearm. His right hand gripped the folding knife, the blade buried in the thing's shoulder, but it acted as if it couldn't feel pain and kept biting down without letting go.
Black fluid flowed from its wound. It wasn't blood. It was a viscous substance that gave off a cloying sweetness.
Lin Wan's mind went blank.
Then she saw a chunk of broken concrete by the roadside.
She didn't know how she got over there. She didn't know where she found the strength.
She picked up the chunk of concrete and brought it crashing down.
It struck the back of that thing's head.
Its body stiffened for one second.
Lu Yu seized that second, yanked the knife from its shoulder, and drove it into the side of its neck.
That thing convulsed several times before collapsing onto the ground. Black fluid gushed from the wound, spreading across the dirt and bubbling with tiny bubbles.
Then it stopped moving.
Lin Wan dropped to her knees, bracing both hands against the dirt as she gasped for breath.
Her hands were shaking. Her whole body was shaking.
Lu Yu climbed to his feet. His left forearm bore a deep bite mark, and blood dripped from his fingers onto the ground.
"Are you okay?" Lin Wan's voice trembled.
He didn't answer.
He looked at his wound.
Lin Wan noticed his expression change. It wasn't pain. It was something she'd never seen on his face before.
Fear.
Only for an instant.
Then his expression returned to calm, as if nothing had happened.
"Move," he said. "We can't stay here."
"Your arm—"
"Move."
He picked up his backpack and turned away, walking off immediately. His pace was faster than usual.
Lin Wan followed behind him, nearly jogging to keep up. Her mind was filled with the images from moments ago—the thing's face, the black veins, its unnatural speed, its mouth clamped onto Lu Yu's arm.
And that flash of fear when he saw the wound.
They walked for nearly an hour, until the road gave way to an abandoned industrial complex. Lu Yu led her into one of the factory buildings and didn't stop until he'd confirmed there was nothing inside.
He leaned against the wall and began treating his wound.
Lin Wan crouched in front of him.
"Let me."
He glanced at her.
"I can—"
"Let me," she repeated. Her tone was firmer than she'd expected.
Lu Yu was silent for several seconds.
Then he handed her the iodine antiseptic and gauze.
Lin Wan took them. Her hands were still shaking, but she drew a deep breath and steadied herself.
The bite was deep. The flesh had split open, its edges blackened and mixed with blood and that viscous black fluid. She dabbed iodine antiseptic onto the gauze and carefully wiped around the wound as gently as she could.
Lu Yu didn't move.
He didn't even furrow his brow.
"That thing..." Lin Wan asked as she cleaned the wound. "Was it human?"
"It used to be."
"What made it turn into one of those things?"
Lu Yu didn't answer right away.
She looked up at him. His gaze rested on his own wound, his expression calm, but Lin Wan felt that something lay pressed beneath that calm.
"Infection," he said. "The airborne contaminant. Some people's bodies can't withstand it, and they turn into one of those things."
Lin Wan's hand stopped.
"Then you... you were bitten..."
"It doesn't necessarily cause infection," he said quickly, as if stopping her from thinking any further. "A bite wound and airborne infection aren't the same."
Lin Wan stared into his eyes.
He was lying.
She didn't know which part was true and which part was false, but she could feel it—he was hiding something.
But she didn't press him.
Because his arm was still bleeding. Because the most important thing right now was to bandage the wound. Because even if he was lying, she had no way to force the truth out of him.
She wrapped the gauze around his arm, layer after layer. She followed the way he'd bandaged her foot before, neither too loose nor too tight.
When she reached the final wrap, her fingers brushed his skin.
His hand was cold.
"Done," she said.
Lu Yu lowered his head and looked at the bandaged arm.
"...Not bad."
Lin Wan heard it.
There was a hint of surprise in those two words.
She sat down beside him, her back against the wall. A fist's width separated them.
They remained silent for a long time.
"Why didn't you run just now?" Lu Yu asked.
"You told me to run. I ran."
"Then you came back."
Lin Wan lowered her head and looked at her hands, still covered in dirt. There were black smudges beneath her fingernails.
"Because you stood in front of me," she said. "When you stood in front of me, I couldn't run anymore."
Lu Yu said nothing.
"You can tell me to run," Lin Wan said softly. "But you can't make me watch you stay behind alone."
Wind poured through the factory's shattered windows, carrying dust and that lingering cloying sweetness.
Lu Yu leaned against the wall and closed his eyes.
After a long time, he spoke.
His voice was so low that Lin Wan almost didn't hear him.
"...Don't be too good to me."
Lin Wan turned to look at him.
His eyes were closed. His expression was calm.
But she felt that those words concealed a weight she didn't yet understand.
She didn't answer.
She simply sat quietly beside him.
Her shoulder almost touched his.
Just barely.
But it didn't.