She didn’t speak again.
She silently turned and walked toward the Pharmacy, the snow beneath her feet making a muffled crunching sound.
All the zombies in this area had already been driven away by her, but there were still some lingering inside.
The inside of the Pharmacy looked even more chaotic than the outside.
Shelves leaned haphazardly in all directions, empty boxes and broken medicine bottles scattered across the floor, and a strange odor—dust mixed with some kind of chemical agent—permeated the cold air.
Clearly, more than one group of people had already visited here.
“Look for antibiotics, painkillers, and things like bandages and alcohol. If you see them, grab them.” Lin Mo’s voice rang out in the empty store.
Lu Dongnuan didn’t respond.
She just quietly put down the medicine bag she’d been carrying—her fingers were purple from the strain—onto a relatively clean corner of the counter, then started mechanically searching through the fallen shelves.
Her movements were slow, partly because her fingers were frozen stiff and unresponsive, and partly due to a nearly numb kind of resistance.
Lin Mo didn’t seem to be in a hurry.
He leaned against the door, eyes sweeping the white, snowy street outside, occasionally glancing back at Lu Dongnuan as she moved slowly between the shelves.
Lu Dongnuan found several crushed boxes of antibiotics on the bottom shelf of a crooked rack.
The packaging was damaged; who knew if they were still usable.
She hesitated for a moment but picked them up anyway.
Then she found half a roll of bandages and a small bottle of nearly-used-up alcohol in the corner of a cabinet.
She straightened up, about to move to the next section, but her foot kicked something, making a “gululu” rolling sound.
Looking down, she saw a small, brightly colored plastic bottle decorated with cartoon animals—it was children’s vitamins.
The bottle rolled to Lin Mo’s feet.
He glanced at it, nudged it away with the tip of his shoe, and said blandly, “Useless. Find something useful.”
Lu Dongnuan looked at the bottle of children’s vitamins Lin Mo had just kicked away.
It bumped into a collapsed shelf and stopped.
The cartoon smiley face on it was now covered in dust, looking both ridiculous and a little pitiful.
She suddenly recalled what Lin Mo had said: “People will watch a child starve for a bite of food.”
It felt as if a cold hand had clenched her heart.
She silently walked over, not looking at Lin Mo, bent down, picked up the little bottle, brushed off the dust, and put it into her already bulging pocket stuffed with medicines.
Lin Mo noticed her actions but said nothing.
Lu Dongnuan actually felt that the more it was indoors, the more dangerous it became when there were no zombies around.
Either there would be a Mutant, or there would be a lot of people—she didn’t want to run into either.
Even though she had some special qualities, she didn’t seem to be much of a fighter.
The silence inside the Pharmacy was even more suffocating than the howling wind and snow outside.
Just as she turned to head toward the Storage Room, the light at the Pharmacy’s entrance was blocked by several shadows.
Cold air and wind swept in, along with unmasked, greedy, and malicious stares.
Three men entered, wearing bulky but filthy cotton coats, steel pipes and machetes in their hands.
Their eyes first swept over Lin Mo, who looked relaxed, leaning against the door.
After a brief pause—apparently assessing the threat—their gazes settled more on Lu Dongnuan, who was clearly scavenging supplies inside.
“Hey there, brother, sister, you’re really searching, huh? Got quite a haul, I bet?” The leader, a man with a Scarface, grinned, revealing yellow-black teeth, his voice hoarse and grating.
He tapped the steel pipe in his hand against the doorframe, making dull, aggressive thuds.
Lu Dongnuan’s body tensed instantly, her heart suddenly pounding.
She instinctively stepped back half a pace, edging closer to a toppled shelf, her fingers quietly tightening around the bottle of children’s vitamins in her pocket.
The plastic made a faint creaking sound.
She wasn’t a combat type—this was Lin Mo’s stamped opinion—so faced with obviously ill-intentioned survivors, there was sure to be a good show.
Lin Mo still leaned against the door, not even changing his posture.
He simply shifted his gaze from the snowy scene outside back to the three uninvited guests.
The snow on his scarf shook off a little.
“Got business?” Lin Mo’s voice came muffled through the scarf, emotionless, even sounding a bit lazy.
Scarface laughed slyly, his gaze wandering between Lu Dongnuan and Lin Mo.
“No big deal, just that the brothers here are short on medicine too. Looks like you found something good. How about… sharing a bit?” He put extra weight on the words “sharing,” and his two companions stepped forward in unison, forming an intimidating stance.
“No sharing.” Lin Mo’s reply was blunt, not a word wasted.
Scarface’s expression darkened and his tapping stopped.
“Brother, that’s not cool, is it? Times are hard for everyone—why not—” He didn’t finish.
Suddenly, something changed!
“Huuh… uh…”
A low, inhuman growl came suddenly from the back of the Pharmacy, behind the barely-open Storage Room door.
The sound was hoarse and twisted, carrying a sticky, bone-chilling malice.
Then came heavy, dragging footsteps, and a screeching sound as something hard scraped across the floor.
The arrogance of the three men froze in an instant.
Lu Dongnuan stared at the open door.
A disgusting monster.
Face to face, eye to eye.
‘Why… am I always this unlucky?’
That thing could barely be called “human” anymore.
Its skin was an unhealthy ashen-gray, covered with bulging, spiderweb-like veins of purple and black.
Its eyes were completely clouded, pupils shrunk to pinpricks, mouth split wide, drool mixed with dark blood constantly dripping down, making a guttural, ghastly sound.
Most striking of all was its right arm, mutated to a grotesque thickness, fingers twisted out of shape, nails long, black, and sharp like a beast’s claws.
Lin Mo actually chuckled at the sight, “Well, 🦌-infused zombie.”
“Roar!”
It let out a bellow that didn’t sound human at all, its thick mutated arm swinging down with a foul wind, lunging straight for the nearest person—Lu Dongnuan!
Fast as lightning.
“Crap, hurry back and find Tang Jie!” The three men turned to run but Lin Mo blocked them alone.
“And who might Tang Jie be?” he asked the three, smiling slyly.
Scarface didn’t hesitate, swinging his blade down.
Lin Mo sidestepped, countered with a punch, and knocked out two of Scarface’s teeth.
‘Was… he really just an ordinary person? Could a Reborn really have such ridiculous skills?’
She glanced doubtfully at herself.
The Mutant’s claws paused above Lu Dongnuan’s head, not moving an inch further.
The virus in her body had grown stronger again.
After Lin Mo floored the three men, he picked up a knife from the ground.
He jerked his chin at Lu Dongnuan, then beckoned at the monster with a curled finger.
Lu Dongnuan understood.
She slapped that massive claw.
“Go on, Crab Monster. Crush him.”