Vixen Above, Mensao Below (6)

Gu Yuan looked at her and then nodded. Without saying another word, he grabbed her by the waist and hoisted her up.

"Can you reach it?" he asked, his eyes looking anywhere but at the flat stomach that was suddenly exposed as her uniform blouse hiked up. Song Jia stretched her arms as far as she could to open the hatch.

"Just a little bit more!"

Gu Yuan lifted her higher and Song Jia shot into the air, finally pushing the trap door open. Another shove, and her upper body managed to go through the small opening. Song Jia gripped the various crossheads and metal bars and used them as leverage to wiggle out.

Song Jia saw that Gu Yuan was right; the entrance doors to Deck 1 was just above her hips. She knelt down over the emergency hatch and helped Gu Yuan climb up. He was tall, so it wasn't as difficult as it had been for her.

"Teacher, I think we can finally get out!"

The two of them stood on opposite sides, keeping their feet as far from the edge as possible. Song Jia didn't dare look down.

"Miss Ye, let's do this on three," Gu Yuan instructed her. "One, two, three—"

They dug their fingers between the doors and pulled with all of their might. It took a few more tries before they opened a wide enough gap for them to squeeze through.

"Finally!" It was obvious from Gu Yuan's shout how much anxiety he held back behind his calm facade.

Song Jia went out first, followed by Gu Yuan. The moment they finally had the time to look around their surroundings, they were shocked by what they saw.

The fluorescent lights shone brightly on the corridors of Deck 1, illuminating a scene straight out of a horror movie.

Song Jia sucked in a breath. It was obvious at once that she was too late.

"What the hell happened here?" Gu Yuan staggered, looking as if he had been punched.

There was blood everywhere. There was blood splattered across the walls and dark, dried pools of blood blanketing the floor. Not far away from them, a blood-covered sandal was left behind, its owner nowhere to be seen.

Boom!

Both Song Jia and Gu Yuan jumped from the sudden sound. It sounded like a small explosion.

"What was that?" Gu Yuan could no longer keep his composure. "Was that a bomb? Did a terrorist group attack the ship?"

Song Jia shook her head. "I don't think so. Teacher Gu, what time is it?"

Gu Yuan checked his phone. "It's six o'clock."

"Then it must be the fireworks display. It was announced earlier that there would be a fireworks display at 6 PM."

"The lower decks became like this, and they have the nerve to set off a fireworks display?!" Gu Yuan couldn't keep the anger out of his voice. He felt as if he was about to descend into hysteria.

"Maybe the staff and the crew still don't know about the situation. Let's go up and inform them." Compared to Gu Yuan, Song Jia was relatively calm. Now that the worst had happened, she could only adjust her emotions and take one step at a time.

They followed the thick blood trail towards the emergency stairs. At the top of the stairs were two long, narrow corridors, one off to the left and one to the right. Some of the doors to the cabins had been left open, and there were various objects littering the floor. Song Jia picked up a rag doll that looked like it could belong to a small child and inserted it into the pockets of Ye Minzhe's blazer.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Three small explosions sounded above them, accompanied by popping and crackling sounds.

"They really are setting off fireworks," Gu Yuan shook his head in disbelief.

By the time they went off to Deck 2, they could hear faint voices as they were climbing the staircase. The voices were mixed with occasional screams, which made Song Jia climb even faster.

"Teacher, let's go!"

At Deck 1, the two of them were met with total chaos. There were children crying and people running around the corridor, arguing in several languages. Some wandered in confusion, while foreigners studied the signs over the walls, looking up the words in their phone and panicking on where to go. An old woman sat not far from the staircase, shaking her young grandson whose arm was bleeding. His small body was starting to convulse.

"Por favor...mi cielo...por favor sálvalo..."

Song Jia saw that the child's arm had been bitten. She crouched next to the old woman and tried to tell her in English that her grandson probably couldn't be saved.

But the old woman just clutched the young child's body closer to her. She grabbed Song Jia's arm and pleaded to her in broken English.

"He...is...sick! Call help! Very sick, needs doctor!" She showed her the child's arm that looked like a small piece of flesh had been scooped out. "Call doctor, hurry!"

Gu Yuan persuaded Song Jia as well. "Miss Ye, it looks like the child had been bitten. The grandmother is right, we need to find a doctor. Otherwise, the infection could be fatal."

Song Jia knew that she wouldn't be able to explain to them that the young child would turn into a zombie very soon. She pulled out the rag doll she had picked up and carefully stuffed it into the young boy's mouth.

"¡¿Qué le estás haciendo?!" The grandmother pushed her away in panic.

"The pain would be very bad, he needs something to bite on."

It took a while, but Song Jia managed to explain her intention. The grandmother started to calm down.

"Gracias, bella chica."

Song Jia knew that the rag doll would only give the grandmother temporary protection from her infected grandson. Even if she tried pulling away the grandmother by force, she would only anger her. Judging from her protective action towards the young child, even if the grandmother knew her grandson was turning into a zombie, she probably still wouldn't want to leave him.

The two of them continued to use the staircase to go into the upper decks. Every time they stopped on a deck, they were met with chaos. At Deck 4, there were more blood and more bodies lying on the ground than they had seen before. They didn't stop but continued onto Deck 5.

"Where are the staff and the crew? Is this a ghost ship? Why aren't they doing emergency level procedures?!" Gu Yuan shouted in frustration.

But when they got to the staircase on Deck 6, it was clogged with people. Many of them were carrying suitcases and duffel bags, while some carried nothing at all, only wearing their bathrobe and slippers.

"What's going on? I heard a scream and when I went out of the room, everybody was biting each other!"

"Is the wifi server still down? There's no signal here, how can we call for help?"

"What kind of cruise ship is this, I will definitely sue the company with my lawyers!"

"We can't go on like this, they should fix the elevators as soon as possible."

Song Jia looked up and saw that some of them had flesh wounds on their bodies, still dripping with blood. There was even a man whose body was shivering uncontrollably, like chills from malaria.

Song Jia subtly tugged at Gu Yuan's shirt. "Teacher, we can't go through here, let's find another way."