Chapter 1

Tap, tap, tap.

Footsteps echoed behind Feng Tiegen.

The Black Zang's soles, covered in viscous, filthy blood, scraped against the fine gravel on the cement road, sounding exceptionally grating in the silent night.

Feng Tiegen didn't dare turn his head, only desperately hobbling forward on his fractured ankle, each step a stumble.

The excruciating pain that pierced his brain had to yield to fear and the will to survive.

Snap.

The sound of bone breaking was so clear. Feng Tiegen staggered and fell to the ground, struggling to turn around and look at the gaunt zombie, his face streaked with tears, snot, and dust.

The Black Zang bent its back and slowly approached Feng Tiegen, indescribable, bright red organs falling from its toothless mouth, its single remaining eye cloudy and lifeless.

It stooped, its long, sharp fingernails swaying in the wind, unconsciously scratching the ground.

With a grating sound, the cement surface was torn by the nails, leaving deep scars.

"Mom!" Feng Tiegen cried, tears streaming down his face, his voice hoarse. "Mom, it wasn't me who wanted you to starve to death, it was Zhang Cuifang, that woman Zhang Cuifang who wouldn't give you food!"

The Black Zang remained deaf to his cries.

Hatred, injustice, grief, despair. These extreme emotions that had resurrected the dead completely dominated the Black Zang's mind.

Other than revenge, nothing could be accommodated in its already rotting brain.

Feng Tiegen faced the Black Zang, slumped on the ground, retreating backward on his hands and feet.

"I'm Tiegen, Tiegen! Your own son!"

"Mom! Do you remember? My dad died early, and you raised me all by yourself."

"That year there was a natural disaster in the village, and every family was starving. You were honest your whole life, but to feed me and Grandma, you had to become a rat stealing grain, smuggling food out of the commune's mill."

"The commune discovered the grain was decreasing and tightened security, preventing smuggling."

"With no other choice, you had to sneak into the mill before work ended, and in the dim light, enduring nausea, swallow the dry, coarse grain mouthful by mouthful, swish, swish, swish, filling your stomach."

"Grandma and I were dizzy with hunger at home. When you came back, your face was flushed, and you bent over, retching into a wooden basin."

"Grandma and I thought you were sick and cried, hugging you. You were covered in sweat, your back arched like a shrimp."

"The vomiting sounded like thunder, peas falling into the wooden basin with saliva and blood, like pearls."

"You raised your head, smiled at me, and said in a hoarse voice, 'Son, we're saved.'"

"Day by day, Grandma and I finally didn't have to go hungry, but you grew thinner, like a reed."

"Our family survived the famine."

Feng Tiegen's eyes were bloodshot as he knelt before his mother's zombie, crying, "Mom, I'm sorry, I'm not human, Mom."

The Black Zang stopped, standing before its son, a strange expression seeming to flash across its gaunt, ugly face.

It trembled, bent down, and reached out to hug Feng Tiegen.

A look of joy appeared on Feng Tiegen's face, but the next second, he was tightly embraced by the Black Zang's arms.

The Black Zang's hands clamped around Feng Tiegen like iron tongs, turning his face red and causing the veins on his face to bulge.

"Mom..."

Feng Tiegen's eyes bulged as he moaned a word from his throat.

Crack.

Bones broke, organs ruptured. Feng Tiegen died, collapsing like a pile of mud from the Black Zang's embrace.

The Black Zang stood there, staring blankly at the corpse at its feet. After a long time, it squatted down, cut open the corpse's abdomen, rummaged through the intestines, and chewed and swallowed.

As the blood entered its stomach, the zombie's bark-like skin gradually became moist, and even the hair on its body shimmered.

If its body hadn't decayed, if its mind hadn't been extinguished, it would have laughed and cried wildly.

Unfortunately, there were neither tears nor laughter on that black face.

Suddenly, the Black Zang, chewing on organs, smelled the scent of a living person. It abruptly raised its head, looking at the forest above the stone wall of the winding mountain road.

Rustle. Li Ang walked out from the shifting shadows of the trees, jumped down from the stone wall, and stood on the road.

Relying on the mask's ability to weaken his presence, he had been hiding in the forest for more than ten minutes, silently watching the Black Zang complete its revenge.

"Debts of gratitude, debts of vengeance, revenge for grievances, redress for injustices."

Li Ang, not caring whether the Black Zang understood, said calmly, "Zombies are born from the resentment, misfortune, and yin energy of heaven and earth, using resentment as power and flesh and blood as food. I won't stop you from taking revenge, but now that the vengeance has been settled, it's time to move on."

The Black Zang didn't say a word, responding with silence.

The two, one man and one corpse, stood silently facing each other in the night. The small truck that had crashed into the stone pile, still emitting light smoke, seemed to finally give out. The headlights flickered, gradually dimming.

The instant the headlights went out, the Black Zang moved.

Its figure was ghostlike, and with one stride, it lightly crossed the distance of more than ten meters, flashing in front of Li Ang and slashing out a claw.

The long fingernails cut through the air, emitting a sharp, whistling sound. Li Ang, who was prepared, planted his feet on the ground as if they were cast iron, his upper body straight as a board, leaning backward.

Dodging the claw attack with Iron Bridge Across the River, Li Ang, without waiting to stand up, picked up the short-barreled xiàndànqiang loaded with steel ball bullets and fired it diagonally at the Black Zang's chest.

The qiang roared, the pellets burst out, and even though the zombie was protected by black hair all over its body, it was knocked back several steps by the sudden, enormous impact.

Taking advantage of the gap to stand up, Li Ang reloaded and fired another xiàndàn at the Black Zang without looking.

The steel balls flew out, completely shattering the Black Zang's shroud, but they were blocked by the pile of messy black hair, making it difficult to penetrate further.

Li Ang quickly reloaded, retreating while firing, and slipped into the forest in a few steps, disappearing from sight.

The Black Zang stomped heavily on the ground, its small, simple shroud shoes crushing out bowl-sized pits on the cement surface. Its figure was like an arrow released from a bowstring, darting into the forest.

The forest was lush with leaves, overgrown with branches, dim, and silent.

The zombie stepped on the soft pile of fallen leaves, opening and closing its nostrils, sniffing the air.

Suddenly, the zombie abruptly raised its head, only to see a black shadow descending from the sky, none other than Li Ang, who had been lying on a treetop dozens of meters high.

Li Ang fell all the way, holding an ax in his right hand and a qiang in his left, using the force of gravity to slam the ax down on the Black Zang's crown.

In a flash, the Black Zang only had time to raise its left arm to block in front of it.

The camping ax, made of high-quality 420 steel, was tough and sharp. The curved blade recklessly tore through the surface black hair, digging into the zombie's shrunken, withered arm and leaving a deep wound on the radius.

Before the Black Zang could react, Li Ang, stepping on the soft pile of fallen leaves, had already steadied himself, holding the short-barreled xiàndànqiang in his left hand, placing the muzzle directly below the Black Zang's left arm, at the ulna.

Li Ang pulled the trigger, and with a muffled "bang," the dense steel balls became embedded in the black hair of the zombie's arm.

Those black hairs of unknown material could indeed resist and weaken the impact of the bullets, but at such close range, the xiàndànqiangzidàn still shattered the bones of the Black Zang's left arm.

The entire arm drooped down like plasticine.

The long black hair on the left arm swayed in the wind, trying to hook the ax blade, but the stainless steel blade, coated with an anti-corrosion and anti-oxidation coating, easily broke free from the shackles of the black hair like a heartless渣男 (zhān nán, scumbag).

Li Ang pulled out the ax and slashed again, carrying the momentum of the wind, and heavily chopped at the Black Zang's neck.