Chapter 5: It Can Actually Move

The large mutant spider flipped over, its legs twitched a few times, and then there was no movement. Beside the mutant spider lay a bronze ring, radiating a dazzling white light.

This ring looked like a simple bronze band with no embellishments. Song Jian walked over and picked it up. As his gaze fell on the ring, its properties automatically appeared before Song Jian's eyes.

Ring of Strength (White): Equipment Effect, Strength +1, level requirement for equipping, level 1, Can it be taken out of the game: No

Although the ring only increased his Strength property by a small amount, it was better than nothing. Moreover, once equipped, Song Jian could meet the equipment requirements of the handgun and put it in his equipment bar.

Killing the mutated spider, completing the novice tutorial, and leveling up along the way was quite smooth. But what puzzled Song Jian was that although his level had gone up, his attributes didn't increase at all, instead, he only gained a skill point.

Carelessly, he added this skill point to his [Firearms (Handguns) (Basic) skill]. The passive skill had gone from level one to level two. Originally, it only increased handgun range damage by 5%. After adding a skill point, the effect had become "Damage increased by 10%".

[Firearms (Handguns) (Basic)], Passive skill, Level 2, Increases the damage of handgun weapons by 10%

As for the initial skill "Thick Skin," Song Jian had selectively forgotten about it.

After putting on the Ring of Strength, instantly a warm current spread throughout his body. He felt as though his strength had increased somewhat. The P18C handgun he was holding also seemed somewhat lighter. It was miraculous.

"This gear is really useful. Oh right, I also have a newbie gift pack." Song Jian thought to himself. Opening his bag, the newbie gift pack, which was originally sealed in the first slot, could now be opened.

After staring at the newbie gift pack for three seconds, two options appeared on the pack, "Open" and "Destroy". Seeing the "Open" option and opening it, the gift pack shone brightly and disappeared. In its place were three items: a "Zombie Town Map", 100 rounds of "0.23mm generic handgun bullets", and a white-quality "Tiger Fang Dagger".

Song Jian first opened the map and began to examine it closely;

This map looked a bit old with some signs of tearing on the edges. Clearly, it was a small piece torn from a larger map, and this small piece was the map of the city where Song Jian was currently located.

The pre-apocalypse name of this city was no longer known, and on the map, this city has been renamed "Zombie City".

Song Jian first located his own position on the map, represented by a small blue triangle in the southeast corner of a residential complex known as the "New Garden Residential Area".

Heading north from the residential area is a commercial street, and behind the residential area is a leisure square called Camel Square.

Southern of the Camel Square again, there's a vast residential area. After crossing this residential area, there is a city loop highway. Crossing the highway, the city's edge is reached. Further beyond that the portion has been torn off, clearly beyond the scope of the city.

After taking a closer look at the map and remembering the nearby locations, Song Jian put the map away. The handgun bullets are identical to the ones he found in the room. But he was particularly fascinated by the Tiger Fang Dagger.

This dagger has a blade length of 16.5 cm. The blade surface is smooth and tapers up to form a point, a traditional spear-shaped blade wielding great penetration power. With a thick spine accompanied by a row of serrated ridges like tiger's teeth, the thin blade flashed with a chilling light. Holding it up to examine carefully, a chill emanated from the dagger, causing Song Jian to sneeze involuntarily;

"Hey, this is a good thing. If I could take it out and show it to Song Yu, he'd be drooling for sure." Song Jian chuckled and equip the dagger in his equipment bar.

It's a shame really, this dagger can't be taken out of the game, so there's no way to show off in front of Song Yu.

Even though he had obtained this dagger, Song Jian was clear in his heart that the chance of using this dagger was very small. He didn't have the courage to stand face to face with the monsters in this game, using the dagger to fight. Courage isn't something that Leona could give him;

After resting for a while, Song Jian, with his gun in hand, walked towards the living room door. There was nothing left in this room to search for, so to continue playing, he had to leave this safe house and search the city;

Pushing open the heavy security door, Song Jian smelled a strong stench of blood. After hesitating for a moment, he still stepped out of the room.

With a click, a crisp sound was heard from behind;

Song Jian felt a chill, suddenly remembering something unpleasant.

"Damn it, I didn't find the keys to this room when I searched. Now the door is closed, and if I run into danger, wouldn't I lose my hiding place..."

Clang, Clang~

Struggling to push the security door, Song Jian was near tears. It wouldn't open.

"Warm Reminder. You have completed the novice mission. You can choose to leave the game after twelve hours in the game. Before leaving the game, please choose a relatively safe place. Otherwise, when you log in again after logging out, you may be in danger. If your game character dies, your physical body in the real world will also be eliminated!" A cold mechanical voice suddenly rang in Song Jian's ear, startling him.

Looking at the tightly shut door, Song Jian was helpless: "Why didn't you say that sooner!"

...

The elevator in the building was already broken, and all the doors of the rooms were closed. With Song Jian's current strength, he probably couldn't break in at all. Now, all he could do was leave the building.

Pushing open the door to the stairwell on this floor, a strong smell of blood rushed towards him, accompanied by a rotten smell of corpses, which made Song Jian frown.

Walking down the dim staircase, he had just descended two stories when Song Jian suddenly froze, stopping in his tracks. On the staircase one floor down, about five or six steps away from him, lay a ragged corpse. Judging by its appearance, this corpse must have already been dead for quite a while. Its cheeks were exposed to the bone, and an arm seemed to have been eaten away. Bare-chested with bite marks all over its body, its innards were scattered all over, spreading a foul odor;

At the same time Song Jian saw this body, it also started to move, shaky and trying to struggle to its feet. After half a day of effort without success, it had to lay flat on its four limbs, slowly crawling towards Song Jian;

The moment the body started to move, a line of blood-red text emerged above its head;

"LV1 Mutated Zombie (Weakened during the day) Vitality: 56/112"

"Damn it, it really is a zombie, it can move!" Sweat drenched Song Jian's body as he lifted his gun and repeatedly pulled the trigger. There were nine bullets left in the gun, and Song Jian fired them all, the mutated zombie's body spraying out gouts of unidentified liquid as its Vitality Points were rapidly reduced to zero.

After the mutated zombie died, its body rapidly decomposed, as if a transparent flame was burning on its body, soon turning it into a pile of black ash. Around the pile of ash, four items radiating light appeared, three of which were glowing gray and one was glowing white.

"Eh, the item drop rate in this game is pretty high, haha!" Song Jian's eyes lit up as he picked up the four items.

...