The mall’s central air conditioning had stopped long ago.
The stench of rot mixed with the smell of disinfectant flooded the nose, clinging to the throat until it felt tight.
Outside the shattered glass curtain wall, the low growls of zombies sounded like a rusty saw, scraping against the eardrums over and over.
They crowded the plaza, their decayed feet trampling the remains of neon signs covering the ground.
Their cloudy eyes remained fixed on the building, which was half-sealed by spiderwebs.
In the supermarket warehouse on the basement floor, nine people huddled in the shadows of the shelves, not even daring to breathe loudly.
“Old Zhao, we’re low on ammo.” Xiao Li, a young police officer, gripped his service pistol until his knuckles turned white.
His uniform was torn, and dark red blood seeped from a gash.
“That thing… what exactly is it?”
The veteran officer known as Old Zhao wiped the dust from his face.
His features were deeply lined, but his gaze remained steady as he said, “Doesn’t matter what it is. If it blocks the way, we blow its head off.”
He turned his head toward the woman holding a specimen box beside him and asked, “Dr. Lin, are you sure the plants in this mall will be useful?”
Lin Sui was a botanist.
She was currently gently stroking a withered Datura plant inside the specimen box.
“Datura contains very specific alkaloids. Its sap has strong anesthetic properties. And the Agave in the corner—its fibers can be used to make rope.”
“But that’s only if we can stay alive long enough to reach them.”
Before the words could fully leave her mouth, a soft “click” echoed, sounding like a fine needle scratching glass.
Everyone’s heart skipped a beat.
Through the gap in the warehouse door, a strand of silvery-bright spider silk slowly descended.
Immediately after, a spider the size of a millstone poked its head in.
Its carapace shimmered with a bluish-black luster, and its eight legs were covered in barbs.
They scraped against the hard tile floor with an ear-grating screech.
Its compound eyes were two clusters of cloudy, dark red that slowly rotated, scanning the shadows between the shelves.
“Shh — ” Old Zhao pressed down on Xiao Li’s hand as the younger man tried to raise his gun.
He leaned close to the young man’s ear and said, “Don’t shoot. The noise will draw the zombies outside.”
Among the five civilians, the young mother holding her daughter couldn’t help but tremble.
The little girl’s mouth was covered tightly.
Her eyes were filled with tears, but she didn’t dare make a sound.
The middle-aged man gripped his fire axe, his knuckles twitching.
Two young men huddled behind a shelf, their faces as white as paper.
The spider’s legs swept past a pile of canned goods nearby.
The sound of the metal cans rolling was infinitely amplified in the silent warehouse.
Lin Sui’s back was pressed against the cold shelf.
She could clearly feel the slight vibrations from the floor as the spider crawled.
The tremors traveled up her spine, making her scalp feel tight with numbness.
Suddenly, the spider’s compound eyes locked onto the middle-aged man’s position.
It abruptly arched its body, and its eight legs exerted force simultaneously, lunging forward like a bolt of black lightning!
“Watch out!” Old Zhao barked, violently shoving the middle-aged man aside.
The man stumbled away, and the spider missed its mark.
Its sharp claws shredded the shelf, making a piercing sound.
Xiao Li took the opportunity to pounce, swinging his expandable baton hard at the spider’s compound eyes.
“Bang!”
The baton bounced off, leaving his palm stinging and numb.
“Dr. Lin! Move!” Old Zhao roared, simultaneously pulling out his own expandable baton to snag one of the spider’s legs.
Lin Sui reacted instantly.
She shoved the specimen box aside and grabbed a fruit knife.
Turning, she dashed toward the warehouse exit.
Near the supermarket’s fresh produce section, several pots of ornamental Datura were growing.
She had spotted them when they first hid inside.
Entangled by Old Zhao and Xiao Li, the spider hissed in fury.
Viscous venom dripped from its fangs, sizzling as it hit the ground and releasing wisps of white smoke.
The others finally snapped into action.
The middle-aged man swung his fire axe at the spider’s legs, and the two young men picked up steel pipes from the floor, joining the fray with trembling hands.
Lin Sui reached the Datura plants.
Her fingers were sliced by the thorns on the leaves, and beads of blood emerged, but she ignored the pain.
She quickly cut several leaves and used the fruit knife to crush them, smearing the juice onto the blade.
Right then, the warehouse door was slammed open.
Three fist-sized small spiders swarmed in, heading straight for the little girl huddling in the corner!
“Yuan Yuan!” the young mother screamed, lunging forward.
Lin Sui’s pupils shrank.
She turned and charged toward the small spiders, brandishing the fruit knife coated in Datura juice.
Her feet landed on scattered vegetable leaves with a wet, slippery sound.
She raised her arm and precisely drove the knife into one spider’s compound eye.
Green fluid splashed onto her face, carrying a pungent odor that made her eyes sting.
At the same time, Old Zhao and Xiao Li worked together to break one of the large spider’s legs.
Black fluid sprayed everywhere.
The middle-aged man took the opportunity to jam his fire axe into a gap in the spider’s carapace and gave it a violent twist!
The spider let out a shrill, wretched shriek.
Its massive body convulsed violently before its dark red eyes slowly lost their luster.
Everyone slumped to the floor, gasping for air.
Cold sweat soaked their clothes, clinging to their skin with an icy chill.
The roars of the zombies outside were getting closer.
Something seemed to slam against the mall’s glass curtain wall, letting out a dull, heavy thud.
Lin Sui looked at the spider’s carcass on the floor, then looked up at the crisscrossing webs on the ceiling.
Her expression was grim.
“This was just one,” she said slowly, her voice carrying an undetectable tremor.
“The webs in this mall… there are far more than what we can see.”
Old Zhao looked up at the dark ventilation duct.
Something seemed to be wriggling there.
Silvery spider silk was slowly descending through the vent’s metal slats.
The little girl’s cries finally escaped her throat as she was held tightly in her mother’s arms.
“Just how many of these things are there?!”
The middle-aged man’s shout was laced with a sob.
He collapsed onto the floor, his fire axe clattering as it fell from his hand.
“How many?” The veteran officer let out a low, dry laugh that sounded like sandpaper rubbing together.
“Who knows. Either way, it’s enough to chew us all up without leaving so much as a bone behind.”
His words made the already tense air feel as though it might congeal into drops of blood.
The young mother buried her daughter’s face deeper into the crook of her neck, muffling the girl’s weak whimpers.
The two young men slumped against the shelves, their eyes hollow, as if most of their souls had been snatched away by that brief, bloody struggle.
Xiao Li clutched his shoulder, grimacing as he moved toward Old Zhao.
Using the dim, dusty light filtering through a broken transom window, he checked his wound.
The edges of the torn flesh were an ominous dark red and burned painfully, but fortunately, the injury hadn’t reached the bone.
“Old Zhao, we have to get out of here,” he whispered, his forehead drenched in cold sweat.
“This place is a steel coffin.”
“Leave? To where?” Old Zhao asked in return.
His gaze shifted toward Lin Sui, who was staring silently at the spider’s corpse.
“What do you think, Dr. Lin? After everything we’ve seen on the way here, you know better than anyone what it’s like out there.”
Lin Sui didn’t answer immediately.
She loosened her grip on the fruit knife.
The stains of Datura juice mixed with spider blood on the blade had already begun to turn black.
She leaned down, carefully using the tip of the knife to poke the broken fang of the spider.
On the hard, blue-black shell, a few microscopic, dark red flakes were stuck to the surface.
“The mall…” she finally spoke, her voice somewhat hoarse, “We chose to enter it ourselves.”