A mechanical female voice suddenly echoed inside Li Yiming’s mind, leaving his face full of shock and confusion!
What the hell is going on?!
Is this some kind of hallucination caused by the T-virus injection?
Li Yiming instinctively tried to explain away the bizarre mechanical voice as just a side effect of the virus!
But this voice—it was directly sounding inside his brain!
No matter how he thought about it, there was no scientific explanation for it.
However, before he could even convince himself.
BANG!
A loud explosion rocked the air.
The flickering light in the stairwell suddenly went out.
The entire basement and stairwell were plunged into complete darkness!
Did the power just trip?!
Faced with this sudden development, Li Yiming didn’t dare to be careless.
He immediately returned all the serums to the suitcase and locked it, then stood up.
At this moment, the flashlight in Li Yiming’s hand had become the only source of light in the stairwell.
But even the previously powerful beam of his flashlight now seemed weak against this overwhelming darkness.
The narrow cone of light couldn’t provide full visibility at all!
The areas beyond the flashlight’s reach now looked especially terrifying.
“Damn it, of course things wouldn’t go smoothly.”
Li Yiming cursed under his breath.
He slowly pressed his back against the wall, staying alert to his surroundings.
Just as he was trying to figure out what was going on—
Click.
A pale white light flickered on.
Li Yiming looked up and saw that the stairwell’s emergency light had activated.
The moment he saw it, he immediately understood— It was just a power outage from the circuit breaker.
He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead.
Now that the emergency light was on, the lighting was actually better than the previously flickering one.
With enough illumination, the tension in Li Yiming’s heart finally began to ease.
He decided to use the light to quickly head back upstairs.
The cramped stairwell was just way too suffocating.
But just as he turned to go up— A faint, barely noticeable sound reached Li Yiming’s ears.
His steps instantly froze.
What was that sound?
Puzzled, Li Yiming turned his head and listened carefully.
The sound was extremely subtle.
Normally, he would never have heard it.
But ever since injecting the T-virus—Li Yiming’s senses seemed to have received a significant boost.
That subtle noise—which a normal person would never have noticed—was clearly picked up by Li Yiming!
He tilted his head and listened closely for a long time.
But the sound didn’t come again.
Just as he was starting to think it might have been his imagination.
Splat!
A wet, squelching noise was sharply caught by Li Yiming’s heightened hearing!
This time, it was much louder than before!
Li Yiming looked toward the storage room on Basement Level 2.
The sound had come from inside there.
It sounded like the squelchy paw of some creature dragging along the air duct!
The stairwell still had the pale white glow of the emergency lights.
But the storage room was shrouded in darkness, impossible to see into!
A zombie crawling through the vents… Could it be a mutated zombie from the comic … a Licker?!
Li Yiming took a deep breath, a sense of dread already growing in his mind.
Whether or not that sound came from a Licker, Li Yiming had made his decision:
Get out of here immediately!
Resolving himself, Li Yiming bounded up the stairs—five steps at a time—racing upward!
As he ascended, it felt like wind was rushing beneath his feet.
In just a few swift bounds— He had already climbed two full floors and returned to Ground Level 1!
Even more astonishing—he wasn’t even out of breath.
His breathing was completely calm.
His physical performance… had clearly surpassed normal human limits.
He could feel the transformation within his body.
Just as he was about to exit the stairwell—
Click!
The emergency light shut off.
A moment of darkness followed, then came a sharp crackle of electricity.
The stairwell lights began to flicker and buzz back on again.
Power’s back?
Li Yiming blinked in surprise at the flickering hallway lights.
And just as he was trying to make sense of it—
Bang!
A loud noise echoed from Basement Level 2!
Followed closely by a monstrous growl!
“ROOOAARR!!!”
The roar from the depths below made Li Yiming’s heart seize with terror!
The flickering lights felt like a silent alarm, forewarning an imminent danger!
“F**k, don’t tell me it really is a Licker?!”
Li Yiming’s expression turned instantly grim.
In the comic , this thing was a major problem!
It was basically a mini-boss in the early chapters!
Why the hell would it show up this early?!
There was no time to untangle the logic behind it.
Li Yiming immediately backed out of the stairwell, drew the pistol holstered at his waist, and aimed at the flickering corridor lights!
Splat… splat…
The sound of claws hitting the ground echoed without end!
Moments later— A creature appeared in front of Li Yiming, its entire body blood-red, with no skin covering it at all—a crawling monster!
Its exposed muscle fibers glistened under the hallway light—That appearance—there’s no doubt—it’s a Licker!
Even though he wasn’t optimistic about the unavoidable battle ahead, Li Yiming still chose to open fire immediately.
Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
The M1911 roared, spitting flames.
Three bullets hit the Licker, causing three bursts of blood to explode from its body!
One of the bullets even struck its exposed brain directly!
However— The Licker didn’t go down.
It let out a painful screech, then started to writhe and twist violently.
Incredibly, the three bullets were forcibly expelled from its body!
Firearms couldn’t harm the Licker at all.
Li Yiming wasn’t surprised by this outcome.
As a mini-boss from the early chapters of the comic, this creature could completely ignore bullet damage!
The only way to truly kill it was to sever its head entirely.
Li Yiming had fired the pistol just to confirm that fact one more time.
After ejecting the bullets from its body, the Licker leapt forward in rage—
lunging straight at Li Yiming!
It moved incredibly fast.
But under Li Yiming’s hyper-focused gaze— The Licker’s movements actually didn’t seem all that fast anymore!
Locking onto its motion, Li Yiming rolled to the side, dodging nimbly.
CRASH!
The Licker slammed into the nurse’s reception desk behind where Li Yiming had stood!
Its strike was so powerful, Li Yiming broke out in cold sweat.
The marble countertop was deeply gouged by the Licker’s razor-sharp claws!
He had no doubt— If he hadn’t dodged just now , he would’ve been torn to pieces on the spot.
Facing a boss-level monster this dangerous before even awakening a superpower… What kind of cursed luck was this?!