CH 57

The color of the sky was so dull that it was impossible to tell the time, and dark clouds swept along the low atmospheric pressure, approaching a low altitude. Raindrops of varying sizes fell on the rooftop of Enxi Hospital’s garden. Bai Chunian held up a dripping Guanyin leaf as shelter from the rain, squatting leisurely against the rooftop railing.

Next to him was an old man wearing a patient gown, eyes closed and lying on a wickerwork recliner. A parasol was inserted beside the recliner and raindrops dripped along the parasol’s boning next to the old man’s feet. 

Lying on the chair, the old man lightly rocked and picked up the iron cigarette case beside his hand, which held one last hand-rolled cigarette. The aged hand took it out, trembling. He used an old-fashioned lighter to light it and comfortably exhaled a breath of smoke.

He finished smoking a cigarette, stomped out the butt, and continued to relax with his eyes closed. After a while, he picked up the iron cigarette case again. But this time, there were already no more hand-rolled cigarettes in the case.

The old man froze. His skin then began to fester and ooze blood, visible to the naked eye. The two eyes suddenly opened, revealing a pair of pupil-less red eyeballs. The corners of his mouth festered and tore due to the excessive width of his smile.

He smiled sinisterly and rushed toward the only living person beside him, Bai Chunian, opening his huge bloody mouth and biting toward the windpipe.

Just as the crazy infected patient rushed before him, an ice-cold gun muzzle suddenly held out against his forehead. The circulating virus would strengthen the infected person’s strength after they got infected. However, that attack full of immense strength didn’t make Bai Chunian, who was crouched on the thin narrow railing, sway in the slightest.

Bai Chunian only turned halfway, still holding the green leaf for rain shelter with one hand. His left hand pulled the trigger, and with an ear-splitting gunshot, the infected patient was shot in the head and fell straight down on his back, completely becoming a corpse.

Bai Chunian shoved the green leaf into the corpse’s hand, sufficiently covering the bleeding head. He then lay down in the recliner with parasol shelter and said to the corpse, “I waited for you for a long time, occupying the chair, unmoving.”

A signal flickered on the communications device again, and Firefly said, “I’ve already gone and checked Ward 1. The surveillance in Ward 1 has his own mark under the bed. It’s the Big Joker, so Ward 2 and 4 could only be the Little Joker. I’m going to the glass window to tell them right now.” 

“Have them take another escape route.” Bai Chunian used the tip of his shoe to turn over the corpse, which was dead beside him. After turning the corpse to face toward the ground, he found a strange injection device inserted in the nape. A small electronic screen was on the injection device. It looked like the device needed to go through some kind of terminal equipment to control the injection. The whole device was opaque, making it impossible to glimpse the state of fluid inside.

Bai Chunian drew out the tactical dagger pressed up against the gun belt on the outside of his thigh. Using the knife, he dug out the syringe from the corpse and cut a piece of cloth from the patient gown on the corpse in passing to wipe the syringe clean. He blew on it to polish it while facing the light, then wrapped the syringe up and put it into his pocket.

Mlgfois abgf j qjuf ogbw Gg. Ljc’r cbafybbx, kgbaf atf obeg kbgvr “Frf atf Olaaif Abxfg”, raemx la bc atf klcvbk bo Qjgv 4 ojmlcu atf uijrr, jcv atfc tegglfvis abbx Gg. Ljc ab atf rqfmlji fifnjabg obg regufgs.

Ktf rqfmlji fifnjabg obg regufgs kjr j ilaaif wbgf rqjmlber atjc batfg qjrrfcufg fifnjabgr jcv tjv j akb-kjs vbbg bqfclcu vfrluc. Ktf akb delmxis fcafgfv atf fifnjabg jcv atf vbbg ribkis mibrfv. Ycis ja atlr wbwfca vlv tf atfc gfjilhf atja atf fifnjabg‘r lcafglbg kjr mbnfgfv ys rqgjs-qjlcafv ugjoolal. 

The spray paint used was highly saturated, resulting in bright and blinding colors. The graffiti basically revolved around the four types of pictures of the black and red playing cards. A portrait of a malevolent Little Joker smiled eerily. Its expression and vibe resembled that of a patient in their last stage of infection.

After Han Xingqian got no response from pressing the elevator button, he lifted his fingertips to touch the spray paint on the four walls and twirled his fingers: “It’s not dry yet, we’re in some trouble.”

Firefly found some scattered and fragmented things placed in the darkest corner of the elevator. He squatted over to look carefully and turned back to call Han Xingqian: “Dr. Han, quickly look, there’s a golden scale here.”

A small golden scale of about thirty centimeters long was nailed to the floor with a screw. The trays on both sides were empty and the marked scale pointer pointed to the “0” in the center. 

Twelve total playing cards were lined up under the scale: 3 of hearts, 3 of clubs, 3 of diamonds, 4 of hearts, 4 of clubs, 4 of diamonds, 5 of hearts, 5 of clubs, 5 of diamonds, 6 of hearts, 6 of clubs, and 6 of diamonds.

Firefly crouched on the ground, wanting to pick up these cards, but only one of each number could be picked up. The others were stuck to the ground and could not be moved.

“Such heavy cards.” Firefly muttered, wanting to use the communications device to contact Bai Chunian. However, since entering the elevator, the signal was even weaker and yelling for a long time yielded no response at all from the other party.

Firefly held the 3, 4, 5, and 6 of hearts in his hand and tried to put them on the scale. He first divided the four cards randomly into two groups, then weighed them with both hands. After estimating them to be about the same, he placed the 3 and 5, and 4 and 6 separately on each of the scale’s two trays. 

With a crisp sound, the scales tilted suddenly to the right.

“Ah ah! Did I do it wrong?” Firefly immediately remedied the situation by taking the cards of the scales, but it was already too late as the elevator had begun to descend.

Han Xingqian frowned: “Down there are all infected patients. We just came up from downstairs.”

The elevator stopped at the fourth floor, and before it stopped and settled, they could already hear the yelling of the infected patients who had followed the sounds and gathered at the elevator entrance. Han Xingqian pressed the ‘close door’ button as best as he could to stop the doors from opening. 

However, the ‘close door’ button had a time limit. The door would automatically open after a certain period of time. One must release their hand and press again to close the door.

About ten seconds later, the elevator door opened to a narrow slit. Han Xingqian quickly pressed the close door button again, but those infected patients’ hands were already about to reach in. The elevator had a sensor device. If the door sandwiched something, then the elevator door would open immediately for safety reasons.

Firefly shouted: “Dr. Han, turn around and cover your eyes!”

Han Xingqian had already skillfully loaded Firefly’s pistol. When he heard the little guy say this, he turned his back and raised his sleeve to cover his eyes as a result. 

They only heard two muffled bangs. Two round bombs were thrown from the elevator’s small gap, and the bombs blew up in the group of infected patients. A strong flash of light accompanied by a slight blasting force immediately drove the infected patients away from the elevator.

Firefly gland’s J1 differentiation ability, “Flash Grenade”: Could temporarily shield the other party’s senses (including the blind). Furthermore, it involved a fixed blast impact.

The elevator doors temporarily closed again. The infected patients once again frantically gathered in front of the elevator doors, terrifying strength slamming on the elevator doors violently. Only one door separated the two from the immense slamming, gnawing, biting, and yelling sounds.

Firefly, with his head dripping with sweat, took the cards and did his best to calm down and think: “If it’s not by weight, then, is it by the numbers? 3 plus 6 equals 4 plus 5…” He tentatively put the four cards back on the scale’s trays again. 

This time, the scales tilted again, violently to the left.

The elevator ascended rapidly. Not knowing what floor it would stop at, Han Xingqian called Firefly over to guard the door, himself squatting in the corner, picking up the playing cards and weighing them.

The four cards, although identical in exterior appearance, differed greatly in density. One could feel intuitively that the 6 of hearts was the heaviest and the cards were lighter in succession with the 3 of hearts being the lightest.

He glanced at the rest of the cards stuck to the floor, then placed the 3, 4 and 5 of hearts on the left side of the scale and the 6 of hearts on the right side of the scale. 

The balance swayed from left to right. The swaying gradually decreased and the middle pointer slowly stopped at the “0” position.

The elevator button was finally unlocked. Han Xingqian stood up and pressed the button for the top floor.

Firefly held the mini submachine gun, carefully pointing the muzzle at the elevator door crack. His chest was heaving violently as he asked in a trembling voice, “Is it done?”

“En, it’s an equation of cubic addition. You can think of the four numbers as four rectangular parallelepipeds of the same density and length.” Han Xingqian re-lifted the silver ciphertext box placed at his feet and suddenly separated a line of sight, landing on Firefly’s butt, which was scared into glowing. He hummed out a laugh, “If I don’t tell Xiao Bai, you might be able to get less scolding.” 

Firefly covered his butt in shame, and a wilting pheromone emanated from his glands.

The elevator stopped at the top floor. A staircase still needed to be climbed to reach the rooftop. Firefly took Dr. Han cautiously, feeling his way to the stairway security door. He peered through the peephole to see what was going on outside.

The peephole seemed to be blocked, and he could only see dark red.

“The door is locked. I’ll try to get it open. Dr. Han, stand back.” Firefly nimbly felt out the tool from his backpack, stuck it in the lock, and pried hard. 

With a click, the lock opened, and the security door slowly opened inward.

Firefly stiffened for a moment, a cold chill pouring from head to foot.

An infected patient kept one eye closed to peer into the peephole, and when the security door opened, his face instantly festered and the corners of his mouth ripped terrifyingly into an ear-to-ear smile.

Behind him stood a crowd of countless infected patients. The moment they saw Firefly, the corners of their mouths ripped neatly, revealing a bizarre, exaggerated smile. 

After a few seconds of pause, many infected patients roared and broke into the security door. Two blood-stained hands clung onto Firefly’s body, greedily and frantically opening their mouths to welcome fresh food.

Firefly quickly took off his backpack and threw it to Dr. Han, who hadn’t approached the security door yet. He did his best to press against the security door, gunning down the infected patients around Dr. Han with the mini submachine gun and shouting at him loudly, “Get in the elevator, Dr. Han, quickly hide inside!”

There weren’t many bullets left in the mini submachine gun, and Firefly calculated in his heart: if he left one round for suicide, would it still be enough to protect Dr. Han?

Suddenly, a force pulled the security door in the opposite direction. Firefly couldn’t think further, solely preoccupied with pressing against the door and exerting himself to prevent the infected patients from coming out. The security door suddenly locked, and the heavy force stumbled and fell forward, taking Firefly along. The suddenly closed security door also cut the infected patients crowded at the door in half. 

After a short silence, the thick security door gradually bulged. Then, the protrusion ruptured. A hand wearing fingerless hand protection reached in and gently broke the hydraulic pressure lock from the inside, pushing the door open.

A bullet belt was stuck close to Bai Chunian’s body. He crossed the doorway, carrying a red-flame painted M98B. A bloodstain was splattered on his cold white cheek, and behind him was a large area of scraps of corpses lying down.

He grabbed the stunned Firefly and dragged the person to his side, as casually as dragging a small breastfeeding beast, and raised his chin toward Han Xingqian: “Support hasn’t arrived yet, come with me first.”

“If you had come a little later, your student would’ve been eaten clean.” Han Xingqian breathed a sigh of relief and pushed up the gold silk glasses on the bridge of his nose, hair hiding the white keratin growing vaguely on his forehead in the emergency. 

“How laughable. I almost had a scholar do the task.” Bai Chunian took Dr. Han’s shoulder, turning around to glance at Firefly. The rough palm wearing gloves carelessly wiped across the entire tear-stained face. He raised the corner of his mouth and threatened, “If you cry again, I’ll throw you down for embarrassing me.

Firefly stopped choking with sobs, his face wiped very red by the rough hand.

Han Xingqian moved Bai Chunian’s hand off his shoulder: “Stay a little further away from me. Your body smells like a lion in heat.

The wards on the hospital’s upper floors were mostly high-class wards prepared for VIPs. A few stiff, lifeless patients and nurses roamed the corridors. 

Bai Chunian walked in front while carrying the M98B like he was strolling idly, easily clearing up the patients in the corridor. Flowing bloodstains soaked the marble floor he walked past, leaving rows of disdainful red footprints.