Chapter 216 - 200: Zombie Outbreak on the Cruise Ship!!

Chapter 216: Chapter 200: Zombie Outbreak on the Cruise Ship!!

WOOF WOOF WOOF~

A small brown Teddy was frolicking around A Port. When it passed a cage, it pounced, scaring the rabbits inside into a huddled, shivering pile.

Seeing this, Teddy smugly urinated in its usual spot nearby, marking the completion of its daily territorial patrol.

WHACK!

Wang Xiuying kicked the little Teddy.

"Shoo! Go on, get! Don’t scare my rabbits! They’re in the middle of mating!"

The little Teddy yelped and ran off.

Wang Xiuying watched the rabbits she had been raising for half a month. In this stable environment, they had finally gone into heat and were beginning to mate and bear young.

It was a cage of six rabbits, brought over by a survivor who had arrived later. Lin Mo had purchased them for 1,200 points and assigned them to her ’Greenhouse Group’.

"Sister Ying, are those rabbits really so fascinating? You check on them a hundred times a day. Do you not even care about your precious son anymore?" a woman from her team asked.

"My son’s tough. It’s been getting colder and colder. If I don’t look after these little things and they die... then the whole cruise ship will be short one future menu item."

"There aren’t enough for everyone to eat. At best, they’re just a fresh treat for the leaders, right?"

"I can tell at a glance you’ve never lived in the countryside. You young people nowadays... you don’t know a thing about animal husbandry. The apocalypse hits and you’re all useless, thinking you can survive just by eating a few damn crackers every day? Rabbits can have eight litters a year! We have six rabbits, and they’re three perfect, unrelated pairs. In one year, those three pairs can produce almost 200 kits. When their babies are six months old, they can start breeding too. If we just let them multiply, a year from now... you’ll see this whole port crawling with my rabbits!"

Wang Xiuying proudly held her head high, every wrinkle on her face radiating with joy.

Raising rabbits at the port was the happiest she’d been since setting up the greenhouses.

After hearing her out, the women of the Greenhouse Group began chattering amongst themselves. Some suggested they should also raise chickens, ducks, or pigs; others said they should plant different crops come spring; and some even wanted to raise pigeons...

Wang Xiuying’s Greenhouse Group was mostly composed of older women. Some were simply retired city dwellers, others were unskilled former factory workers, and a few were retired officials with a passion for agriculture. Their mission was to re-establish production and supply the cruise ship with fresh ingredients.

Wang Xiuying hadn’t wanted to be a group leader or manage anyone at first. But after watching so many city folk, who had never lived in the country or done a day of farm work, bungle things with their foolish assumptions day after day, she finally saw red!

Cursing and grumbling, she took charge of the group, and soon had things thriving.

This rabbit-raising initiative was the group’s first foray into animal husbandry. She was even planning to give their team a more impressive name once the rabbits were successfully established.

The people and projects that required her management helped Wang Xiuying gradually let go of her late husband and her past. She began to accept the world’s new reality and think of the cruise ship as her home.

She was eternally grateful to Yu Dong and Shen Xinyi, because when they had rescued her, they had brought her son along as well.

He was her emotional pillar. If her son were gone... she didn’t dare to imagine whether she could go on living.

This little Teddy had been her son’s, a companion he got after a car accident.

She had never liked dogs, but this was her dear son’s favorite...

Wang Xiuying picked up a basket, preparing to go to the green belt at B Port to cut some fresh leaves for her precious bunnies.

Just then, she heard frantic splashing sounds from nearby.

She moved closer to take a look...

A long fishing line dangled from the middle deck of the cruise ship, its hook caught squarely in the mouth of a bloated zombie that was thrashing about in the water.

"Hey! Anyone down there? Give me a hand and pull it up! Sister Ying, go get a couple of people to deal with this Chubby!"

"You fish for these things every day. You’ve got too much time on your hands!"

"Ah, Sister Ying, you just don’t get it. If I don’t reel this thing in, the waves will wash it into our fish farm, and it’ll steal our fish! No time to talk, I’ve got a bite on my other line!"

Huang Henian hurried over to his other fishing rod.

’Anglers and their excuses,’ she thought.

Wang Xiuying muttered, but she was already used to it.

Huang Henian frequently hooked these kinds of zombies. Ever since Professor Meng said their blood might be toxic, they had stopped killing them in the water. Instead, they would drag them ashore and stab them to death.

Besides, the creatures were incredibly clumsy. The survivors had built a sturdy fence along the shore, making it impossible for them to climb out. Even if one managed to get onto land, it walked slower than a grandma... posing zero threat.

If it weren’t for the rule against killing them in the water, Wang Xiuying would have grabbed a spear and stabbed it to death herself.

’This one today... seems even rounder. Its belly is huge. Did it really go and steal that angler’s fish?’

Wang Xiuying gave it a couple of glances, then prepared to head over to the metalworking area to get two people to deal with it. A Port was now home to various production teams, all actively working to restore normalcy, so the area was bustling with people during the day.

Suddenly!

The bloated zombie in the water tilted its head, its ears twitched, and a powerful jet of gas suddenly shot out from beneath its belly!

PFFT!

It kicked up a spray of water, the powerful force launching its body into the air like a two-shot firecracker!

The bloated zombie leaped high out of the water, cleared the fence along the shore, and pounced toward Wang Xiuying.

Wang Xiuying’s eyes flew open. She saw the fishhook tear free from the bloated zombie’s mouth, taking a chunk of its rotten tongue with it. Its mouth was full of green blood, and its putrid, stinking belly, crisscrossed with green veins, loomed closer and closer...

THUD!

...

"Got a bite!"

Huang Henian had hooked another bloated zombie. After fighting with it for a full half-hour, he finally managed to drag it to the edge of the water and tie the line to the railing.

Looking down, he saw that the first bloated zombie was gone. Wang Xiuying had left, too.

"Hey! I said there was still one more! Why’d they just leave after dealing with the first one?"

He had no choice but to grab his walkie-talkie.

"Gate, Gate, send two people over to the greenhouses... to take care of a Chubby."

Because the bloated zombies were fat and oafish, Huang Henian had affectionately nicknamed them "Chubby."

’It’d be great if all zombies evolved like this...’ he thought. ’Aside from floating in the sea and stealing fish, they’re no threat at all.’

If he had only looked closer, however, he would have noticed that today’s "Chubby" was exceptionally round...

The guards at the gate received Huang Henian’s call and were just preparing to head out when suddenly, screams erupted across A Port!

"Aah! A zombie!!"

"The zombies are here!!!"

"Help me! Help!"

"Someone kill the zombies!"

"Everyone, get back to the ship!"

The shouts instantly jolted the entire port. People emerged from their work areas, all looking toward the main gate.

But they saw no zombies. The guards at the gate looked just as confused, even glancing behind them... the gate was as solid as a rock.

Besides, there was another gate beyond this one. Even if zombies did attack, they couldn’t possibly reach this far in.

The guards looked back into A Port. It was a vast area, cluttered with stacks of shipping containers, making it impossible for them to immediately pinpoint the location of the zombie.

They raised their walkie-talkies.

"Officer Wang, Officer Wang, we have a situation. We think there’s a zombie inside the port."

"What?! I’m on my way!"

Startled, Wang Dingbei rushed out of the office with Lin Mo.

Of the four regular defense members on duty, two remained at the gate while the other two grabbed their crossbows and moved toward the general direction of the noise.

They couldn’t see the source of the commotion, but Huang Henian, from his high vantage point, could see a chaotic crowd moving north from the greenhouse area in the southeast.

’What’s going on??? Surely no one got bitten by one of those stupid zombies, right???’

’Sister Ying, what are you up to?’

And just as a group of panicked survivors rushed toward the water’s edge, near the Chubby he had just hooked...

PFFT!

The Chubby zombie launched itself from the water, its body soaring through the air, over the fence, and onto a person in the crowd.

The immense force allowed it to instantly break free from the fishing line. It pinned a man to the ground and began gnawing on his neck!

SQUELCH!

Crimson blood sprayed everywhere!

"AAAAAHHH!!!"

These ordinary survivors had never witnessed such a horrifying scene. Terrified, they scrambled toward the cruise ship!

After taking a couple of bites, the Chubby zombie immediately fixed its sights on another survivor, and a jet of gas shot out from under its belly.

PFFT!

Its body launched into the air and pounced on another survivor.

SQUELCH!!!

The ground was splattered with blood!

The man who had first been bitten on the neck quickly began to turn. After a few twitches, his body stiffly rose from the ground, and he started shambling after the others!

One survivor was caught but managed to wrench free of their clothing, scrambling desperately toward the cruise ship!

Huang Henian was stunned. The fishing rod slipped from his hand and clattered to the ground.

When two members of the combat team rushed over, they found a dozen or so zombies between the containers, feasting on the people they had tackled, their mouths stuffed with entrails.

And the people being eaten, after a moment of convulsions, opened their eyes, stood up, and lunged toward the two combat team members, trailing their own intestines on the ground.

"HOLY SHIT!!!"

In an instant, the interior of A Port had become a living hell!

Crowds of panicked people ran screaming toward the cruise ship!