A year into the apocalypse, a caravan of trucks rolled in from F City’s outpost. A female scientist with red-rimmed glasses and a high ponytail stepped out. She glanced around the SG base, noting with interest how this civilian area was already as fortified and more organized than some of the military bases she’d traveled through along the way.

A tough-looking woman with short hair stepped up to greet her. She had a no-nonsense look to her. “Scientist Xi Lisa?”

“That’s me.” Lisa Xi flicked her gaze over the woman with interest. She looked like a fighter. Qualities of leadership. But most bases were run and lead by men.

“I’m a lieutenant of the Survivor Guard. He Zifeng. The leader of our base asked me to show you around. He just got back from a mission—still getting cleaned up.”

“Fine. Lead the way.”

Lisa Xi had a naturally sharp and waspish tone, but the SG lieutenant He Zifeng didn’t bat an eye. She took Lisa Xi through the security checks and had her get into an SG-marked car to drive further into the base.

The outer perimeter of the SG was made of highly defended walls and outposts constructed by earth and metal ability users. Watchtowers dotted the defensive lines like spikes jutting to the sky.

Immediately after exiting the checkpoints, Lisa saw over a hundred tents lined up in orderly rows not far away. Among the tents were medical stations, food stations, and bathroom stations. The area bustled with haggard-looking refugees and outfitted SG members providing aid. The conditions were clean and well-tended.

It was a surprise to see such charity in the apocalypse. He Zifeng didn’t make much note of it, other than, “Refugee camp for people we’ve rescued. They can apply to join the base or head to F City.”

They moved on quickly. Beyond the tents were various buildings in construction. Ability users worked in tandem with large construction machines. The further into the base they drove, the more finished buildings Lisa Xi saw.

He Zifeng introduced some of the buildings, but nothing caught Lisa Xi’s interest until they’d finally driven to the heart of the SG base.

There, the dirt roads turned to worn-out brick. Another round of defensive outposts passed by, and He Zifeng slowed to a stop through another checkpoint.

After passing through, Lisa Xi saw an avenue of trees leading up to a villa.

It used to be a beautiful home, but now it was a fortress covered in defenses. The only remnant of the past was probably in the greenery that hadn’t been cleared out.

“The research wing is in the back. The boss wanted it to be the most protected zone in the base.” He Zifeng parked in front of another building, one that also seemed constructed before the apocalypse.

The two of them got out. The entrance to the research lab had two guards. He Zifeng escorted Lisa Xi inside and showed her around the lobby and the in-building residences for the researchers. “And the lab?” Lisa Xi asked, once she’d looked through the rooms.

He Zifeng shrugged. “I don’t have clearance. The boss’ll have to take you there.”

Lisa Xi raised an eyebrow but didn’t comment. The two women walked downstairs to the lobby, and there, Lisa Xi saw a new face.

The young man noticed her as well. “Lisa Xi, nice to meet you.” He had a warm voice.

This was a handsome young man. Spirited. Ability user. Looked like he had some say around here. Lisa Xi curled her lips. “That’s me. You are?”

“Lu Hao.”

He Zifeng left after exchanging a nod with the boss. In the meantime, Lu Hao held out his hand for a handshake. Lisa Xi didn’t take it. She drawled, “Ooh. So you’re the one who sent me that email.” Her gaze flicked up and down him. “You look so… ordinary. I thought you might look a bit more spiritual. Like a prophet.” She spoke her words with a biting intensity.

The smile on Lu Hao’s face remained shallow. He didn’t respond directly, instead saying, “Let me show you to the labs.”

Lisa Xi snorted and followed him in. Surprisingly, the laboratories were well-outfitted. She wouldn’t have expected this from some random rich kid. It was all the more suspicious. No one could have coincidentally prepared this.

“Thanks for coming to the SG. We need researchers to find a cure to the zombie virus.” Lu Hao stopped the tour in the main laboratory, the one that Lisa Xi assumed would be hers. “My lab doesn’t have the people, and it might not be as well-stocked as the ones in government bases. All I have is some knowledge on where to start.”

Lisa Xi narrowed her eyes. “Oh? And what do you know?”

At this, Lu Hao gave her a strange, sly look. “There are theories that a leading researcher once told me, along with an artifact that might provide valuable material if we’re able to figure it out. Both of them are stored in a safe in the lab.”

“A leading researcher?”

Over the past year, Lisa Xi had heard a lot of theories about the virus outbreak. Some people suspected that the zombie virus was a manmade biological weapon. Although Lisa Xi didn’t follow this way of thinking, Lu Hao’s preparedness made her wonder.

How else would someone have any deeper insights into this disaster that had come out of nowhere?

“Before I tell you, I’ll explain a few things. I’m sure you’re wondering why I have this lab ready, and how I knew something was going to happen.” Lu Hao paused. “I won’t beat around the bush, but you might not believe me right away. I ask that you keep an open mind.”

To add such a heavy disclaimer piqued Lisa Xi’s curiosity. “Tell me.”

“Alright.” Lu Hao paused, and smiled. “Actually, everything I know came from you. I’ve lived through ten years of the apocalypse, until I was twenty-eight. After I died, I woke up as an eighteen-year-old. It’s time travel… or a prophetic dream? Either way, I leveraged my foresight to build this base and reach out to you. You worked with me in that alternate future. I don’t have your precise data, but I have the insights you discovered over those ten years. This should give you a head start.”

Lisa Xi stared in disbelief.

This guy…

“What the absolute fuck?” She exploded in English. “You’re saying it’s time travel? Seriously? Fine, then—how did you do it? Can you replicate it? If you can harness something like that, you could have infinite do-overs. We could solve for the virus cure and distribute it before the virus even hit! If this were real, you couldn’t be so calm about this.”

A serious expression with a bit of gloom crossed over Lu Hao’s face. “I’m serious about the time travel. I don’t know why it happened, and I’m not going to try and replicate it. I’ll never repeat what happened at the end of my last life. Treat this as our one shot. As for the research data…”

Lisa Xi stared at him, waiting for him to crack and admit he was joking, or tell her the truth. But the more time passed, the more apparent it was that Lu Hao really meant to give ‘time travel’ as his explanation. With a sharp sneer, Lisa Xi backed off. “Fine, then. Whatever. Time travel. Sure. Show me your fucking data, then.”

Did she believe it? As if.

She just couldn’t disprove it. Best case, it was true. Worst case, Lu Hao was lying, and in reality, he was involved in something that’d take her down a rabbit hole of conspiracy theories.

Lisa Xi’s job was just to research and find a cure for humanity. She’d figure out sooner or later if Lu Hao’s story wasn’t lining up.

In the end, as they walked through the lab, Lisa Xi just asked, “So where was I, ten years later?”

Lu Hao took Lisa Xi to the secure storage room of the lab, showing her the code and method to unlock the room. “You turned into a zombie.”

Lisa Xi just muttered another curse word in English, but she was otherwise ambivalent. That was the obvious fate for everyone. What else could happen? Either someone would die, or they would turn into a zombie. “So this is it?” She asked, when Lu Hao pulled open the hidden safe and showed her the apparent research materials he’d stored. There was a sheaf of papers and… a small box. “What’s in there?”

“The holder for a potential cure, from what I saw in the future.” Lu Hao grabbed the box and opened it. Inside was a jade pendant. He briefly explained, “The owner of this pendant was an extremely powerful and advanced zombie. Near the end of my life, I became its captive. Whenever I became infected, it used what it called its ‘healing spring water’ to cure me. Although I don’t have solid proof, I suspect that it was able to access this ‘spring water’ from this necklace.”

Lisa Xi gave him a strange look. He… and that zombie…

Lu Hao had been deep in thought, until he looked up and noticed Lisa Xi’s expression. At once, he sent her a chilling glare. “It’s not what you’re thinking. Don’t let your imagination run wild. Focus on this artifact. If you can find a way to activate it and release the spring water, we’ll have a ready-made cure on our hands.”

Lisa Xi just nodded her head with difficulty.

Alright.

Not only did this guy believe in time travel, he even believed in intelligent zombies kidnapping him as a pet and curing him with magic water!

If she couldn’t disprove it, she’d just go along with it.

 

 

When Lisa Xi and Lu Hao parted ways, the last instruction from Lu Hao was to not tell anyone about his ‘time travel’. Lisa Xi had rolled her eyes but agreed. She wasn’t an idiot.

Out of all the theories behind how Lu Hao had prescient knowledge of the zombie outbreak, time travel was the least credible in Lisa Xi’s book. Inwardly, she still believed that there must be some tangible and scientific reason. For example, someone in this city had done research that tipped Lu Hao off.

And one thing that had caught her eye as she had traveled down to F City was the decoy lure.

Lisa Xi had once seen in action the metal capsules that had come out of the SG. They were thermos-sized canisters that released sounds and heat in a way that mimicked human presence. It lured zombies away, and could work on a timer. It could even be programmed as an alarm. An ingenious invention.

And a suspicious one.

How could a metal canister mimic humans so well that it fooled zombies? Animals were unaffected by the zombie virus, and zombies showed no aggression to them. So it wasn’t like just heat and a heartbeat was enough.

Tricking zombies meant having a deep knowledge of zombie behavior and senses. Only by deeply understanding how zombies ‘tracked’ their prey could someone create ‘false’ prey.

Not even military engineers could create something like this within one year.

Yet according to the SG and the officials of the F City base, the nineteen-year-old kid that was the SG’s second-in-command did it.

Lisa Xi spotted him at the back of the villa. The kid didn’t get out much. He stayed in the villa, and even got his meals delivered to him so he didn’t have to go to the canteen. He was a pale, gangly thing with long bangs. Lisa Xi worked in a lab. She was used to people like this.

But at least this guy got some sun. He knelt in the garden patch, weeding. It was all vegetables and fruits.

“Hey,” Lisa Xi called out to him. She stopped a few paces from the garden. Her heels started to sink into the dirt. “My name’s Lisa Xi. New researcher. You’re the Vice Captain, right?”

The guy stopped weeding. He stood and brushed off some dirt from his hands, and when he raised his head, it wasn’t enough to look her in the eye. “Yes.” Then he paused, and he said slowly, “I’m Hong Sheng.”

“Nice to meet you. I was wondering if you had time to answer a few research-related questions for me?”

He nodded.

“Great. I’ll be in my lab. Find me when you have time.”

It didn’t take long for Hong Sheng to make his way over. Lisa Xi was in the middle of watching her lab assistants run the pendant through the X-ray diffractometer. It wasn’t the kind of machine she used normally; she didn’t give a shit about inorganic structures like crystals, which was what this thing had been built to scan.

But here she was, sending a jade necklace through it.

“Alright, show me the results when you’re done.” Lisa Xi waved at her assistants and walked over to Hong Sheng. “Thanks for your time. Let’s go to my office.”

Once they sat down. Lisa Xi cut straight to the chase.

“I’m researching a cure to the zombie virus and need information on zombies. Do you have data on zombies that I can use?”

At this, Hong Sheng glanced up at her. For the first time, he met her eyes, and she was stunned by the disturbing intensity he gave off through eye contact. But if she wasn’t wrong, mixed into his expression was a bit of…

Grumpiness?

He quickly dropped his gaze. “…I’ll write it down for you.”

“Perfect.” Lisa Xi passed him a notebook and a pen, and Hong Sheng immediately started writing. “You don’t have to—never mind.”

She was about to stop him, as she didn’t want her question and answer time spent watching him write. But he wrote extremely quickly, small letters interspersed with diagrams.

Seeing his confidence, Lisa Xi considered him some more and narrowed her eyes. “I was impressed by your invention,” she said, tapping a finger to her desk. “The zombie lure is an ingenious design. How did you find the right values to make zombies perceive it as human life?”

Hong Sheng didn’t stop writing. “Trial and error.”

“Really? When did you make your first version of the zombie lure?”

“Probably five or six…” He stopped. “…months ago.”

Lisa Xi noticed the pause. Clearly it wasn’t only half a year. Was it something he began studying before the outbreak? “It only took you that long to iterate the design to this level. That’s impressive.” Lisa Xi smiled, her blood-red lips curling. “The defenses around the villa, too. It’s only been a year since the outbreak, but you guys have really got a cushy set-up here. What did you think when Lu Hao started building this?”

Pursing his lips, Hong Sheng spoke tersely. “Lu Hao didn’t... I asked him to change the villa. He just… humored me.”

“Oh, I see. Are you two that close?” Lisa Xi raised an eyebrow. “I can’t imagine agreeing to renovate my house out of nowhere because a friend asked me to.”

“He’s… Lu Hao is… He’s just really nice.”

Lisa Xi’s lips twitched. Was he saying that she wasn’t nice?!

Lisa Xi watched Hong Sheng scrunch into himself like he wanted to show just how much he was focusing on writing. He really didn’t want to answer any more questions. Lisa Xi had also probed enough information, for now. It seemed like whatever was behind Lu Hao, Hong Sheng was involved in it, too.

Though she had to wonder why Lu Hao had told her not to tell Hong Sheng about his ‘time travel’ speech.

After a while, Hong Sheng finished writing. Lisa Xi took the notebook from him and took a quick glance through the notes, raising an eyebrow. He’d written at least ten pages of notes. “You have a good head on your shoulders. And you obviously know a lot about zombies. I wouldn’t mind you helping in the lab when you have time. You can be my assistant.”

This, it seemed, was the one interaction that didn’t throw Hong Sheng off. In fact, he seemed to relax after hearing this. “I don’t have the practical skills for research. All I can do is keep watch and… move things around.”

“Sure. Works for me.”

After she finished getting some information out of Hong Sheng, Lisa Xi returned to the lab. There, the assistants were looking through the data they’d gotten about the jade pendant.

“What have you found?”

“Not much. It seems like ordinary jade,” an assistant answered. “Though there is something else in here. It might be… a trace amount of organic material.”

“Oh?” Lisa Xi raised an eyebrow and walked over. “What kind of organic material?”

The assistants looked at each other and hesitated. “We’ll need to verify it, but going by the chemical composition… it seems like… blood.”

“Blood?”

“We can’t be sure. There aren’t any visible cracks or seams in the jade, but jade is semi-porous, so it’s not out of the realm of possibility for it to have absorbed liquid through prolonged contact.”

‘Prolonged contact with blood’ wasn’t the first thing people associated with jewelry. Wondering just where Lu Hao had dug this pendant out from, Lisa Xi waved an encouraging hand at her assistants. “Alright, keep running it through. Let’s see what else we can find out about this thing.”

On his way out, Hong Sheng overheard this conversation and noted it with a dull frown.

 

 

In an underground facility not far from the capital.

A cold and clean-looking man stood behind a heavily reinforced one-way window. He was handsome yet strange. If Lu Hao had seen him, he would have recognized this man as the humanoid zombie he had once seen by Ji Ling’s side.

But that man was currently human, and he observed the other room through the window with a chilling lack of humanity. From the room beyond came torturous, horrific screaming, of the kind of agony none should ever bear.

Silence permeated the observation room. The researchers and guards had no words to describe the horror of what happened before them. Blood soaked the window, making it difficult to even see the test subject on the other end.

“A failure.” The man’s clinical voice broke the silence. “Proceed to the next trial.”

Half of the people in the room stared, aghast, at the lone researcher standing in front of the glass. The other half obeyed his orders, and continued working with pale faces.

One of the military guards clenched his fists, his arms trembling, the veins popping from his skin from effort. His face was twisted with rage and horror. He wanted to scream at the man, dig his fingers into his neck and choke him. How could the man be so careless? How could he be so cruel?

Those were the soldier’s comrades he was experimenting on!

Those were good people, good men, that were now turned into those… those things!

Uncaring of the hateful, accusatory eyes around him, the lead researcher of this secret facility merely watched the zombie in the containment cell as it raged against the glass.

By attempting to induce abilities in ordinary humans, they created zombies.

Unknown to everyone, a fanatical idea spawned in that man’s mind.

This was a turning point in history. One that would lead to the birth of the world’s first zombie king.

What followed was a stream of events similar to what happened in the previous timeline. For all that had changed in Lu Hao’s corner of the world, here at the edge of B City, nothing had caused even the slightest ripple.

The mad experiments of the lead researcher continued.

Soon after, a massive zombie wave swarmed B City, and in the chaos, the zombies within the laboratory escaped confinement.

The country then learned of a new, terrifying development: mutant zombies with powers similar to ability users existed.

And in the spring of the first year after the apocalypse, these mutated zombies stormed F City and attacked the SG base.

 

 

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After meeting Lisa Xi
Hong Sheng: The professor wants me to write my homework again.