Chapter Eighteen: Survivors

"What will the fifth floor be like?" Carter Hayes was very satisfied with the attacking power of the mutated lizard's tail. Wrapped around his body, it was still a decent weapon even if the machete was lost.

Returning to the fourth floor to rest and recover his strength, Carter shifted his attention back to the fifth floor.

Although the previously encountered mutated lizard had been killed by Carter, he was still very uneasy. Without checking the fifth floor, he couldn't relax at all.

If there were indeed more mutated creatures upstairs, then staying in this building would be too dangerous.

"Step, step."

Carter knew that if he didn't go up to see what was happening, he wouldn't feel safe even sleeping in the warehouse at night. Rather than living in fear, Carter gritted his teeth, took his machete, and headed towards the ladder leading to the fifth floor.

The stairs were short, and soon, Carter arrived at the entrance to the fifth floor.

He had imagined what the fifth floor might look like from below, but seeing it now was still quite surprising.

Looking in from the stairwell, the fifth floor was completely chaotic. Shelves were in disarray, not far from the stairs lay a greyish arm, and a pool of almost dried black blood.

Having killed over a hundred zombies already, Carter was completely numb to body parts like arms. His expression didn't change much upon seeing human body parts like this.

The relationship between mutated creatures and zombies was similar to that between humans and zombies. If they encountered each other, they would still attack.

From the scene, it seemed that the owner of this arm had been bitten to death by the mutated lizard seen earlier.

Unlike humans, mutated creatures weren't afraid of the potent toxins in zombie bodies. With their stronger physical qualities, they didn't have to worry about being infected by the virus and actually preferred to prey on zombies.

"Looks like they've all been killed." Carter cautiously walked around the fifth floor, apart from the remains of zombies, he found no other dangerous presence. He sighed with relief, but also gained a deeper understanding of the terror of mutated creatures from the lack of any damage to them from the zombies' remains. From the zombie remnants, Carter estimated there were probably no fewer than forty or fifty zombies on the fifth floor before. Yet, these zombies hadn't caused any harm to the mutated creatures.

"The manager's office?" In a corner of the fifth floor, Carter discovered an office, its door tightly locked.

"Click." Carter saw that the door was tightly locked from the inside, momentarily feeling both nervous and excited.

He hadn't seen a living person on the fourth floor for days. Now he finally had hope.

"Is anyone in there?" Carter noticed the door was indeed locked from the inside and called out.

"Hello? Is anyone in there?" After a moment's pause, the room remained silent, no one answered. Not giving up, Carter called out again.

"Guess I'll have to break it open." After waiting for a few minutes without any response, Carter, not giving up, held his knife and began to chop at the door.

"Clang."

After a dozen or so strikes, the entire door was battered by Carter. Then, with a hefty kick, he kicked the door open and stepped back a pace.

"No zombies." Carter, seeing no zombies rushing out of the room, slowly entered.

"You're human." As soon as Carter stepped into the room, he saw a chair flying towards him.

Although the chair's flight speed wasn't slow, Carter's current speed made it easy to dodge. Dodging to the side, he spotted a figure hiding behind a large office desk, holding a golf club in hand. Was that supposed to be his weapon? Due to the lighting, Carter couldn't see his face clearly at the moment.

Upon seeing Carter, the figure's voice trembled as he asked, "Are you Carter?"

"Are you familiar with me?" Carter was puzzled. This person actually called out his name at once.

"Really you? Carter, I live on the floor above you. I'm Tone." With Carter's confirmation, the person hiding in the shadow jumped up excitedly, shouting.

"Tone." Hearing this name, and seeing the burly figure standing over one meter and eighty centimeters tall, Carter understood.

Indeed, there was such a person who rented a room in his building, and their relationship was quite good.

"I really didn't expect you to still be alive." For the past few days, Tone had been living in constant fear. Now seeing a familiar face alive, instead of those expressionless but extremely bloody living dead, the feeling of surviving a disaster was truly indescribable.

"Yeah, it's alright." Seeing even someone as burly as Tone seem so helpless in this post-apocalyptic world, Carter couldn't imagine what the future would be like. "Why were you hiding in the office?"

"After the meteor shower four days ago, the entire mall lost power. Someone was causing trouble on the fifth floor, so I came up here. But just as I was about to send those two troublemakers away, something incredible happened." Tone thought for a moment before continuing.

But even as he described these events, his expression remained tense, indicating that what had happened must have been extremely terrifying.

"When I was about to send those two away, I found their eyes had turned gray, and their facial skin was rotting. At that moment, I took several steps back in fear. Then I bumped into a consumer, and the same thing happened to him. He swung his hand—no, should be claws—towards me." Tone closed his eyes in pain, clearly still unable to accept what had happened.

"I quickly dodged, but at the same time, the entire fifth floor was filled with screams. Luckily, I managed to escape into the manager's office and avoid disaster. Afraid of making any noise that the living dead might hear, I've been staying still under the desk for the past few days." As Tone spoke, he still seemed somewhat traumatized.

"Are the police coming to look for us now?" After recounting his experience, Tone was extremely excited to see Carter in front of him. He had been hiding under the desk for so long, hoping that someone would rescue him.