Lin Ya counted; this was probably the fifth floor he had descended. It felt like a budget hotel, with some rooms still accessible, and the walls decorated with patterns. As he moved the flashlight downward, Lin Ya paused, noticing what seemed to be a desiccated corpse.
Wrapped in a bedspread, only the withered head was visible. There were large stains of black blood on the blanket, with a knife protruding from it. Lin Ya leaned in for a closer look.
“This one is from the early days of the apocalypse. It must have been killed after it began to mutate,” he observed, noticing the distinct red markings on the face, a sign of the zombie virus.
This corpse seemed to have triggered something; along the way, Lin Ya encountered many more dehydrated bodies. It was said that when the zombie virus broke out, a complete work stoppage had occurred, leaving most workplaces empty and hotels full of people unable to return home.
This explained why these two floors of the hotel were littered with corpses, resembling a scene of a violent crime.
[Host, there’s something here.] 123 jumped onto a dust-covered table.
Lin Ya strode over, carefully leaping from the area blocked by the wall, perfectly avoiding the cracks in the floor to prevent any collapse from vibrations. He opened the desk drawer and found several unopened black pens, realizing they were still well-preserved, so he stuffed them all into the system’s space, discarding the broken pen he had found earlier.
With new ones at hand, he had no need to keep the broken one. In a nearby cabinet, he discovered not only several unopened notebooks but also some usable staplers and other small items. Lin Ya didn’t hesitate; if they were functional, he collected everything.
This included undamaged blankets from the hotel rooms and unopened shower gels, shampoos, and other disposable items from the storage room.
As he went further down, he found himself in a regular office building. After several more layers, the air became thinner, and the sand increased, prompting Lin Ya to return to the top floor instead of descending further.
Emerging from the top of the ruins, the sunlight was increasingly blinding.
“So, this world really has no night…” Lin Ya squinted; even in protective gear, the sun felt glaring.
Eighteen hours had passed since yesterday, yet he had not seen the sun dip below the horizon, only hanging above as it had in the memories of the original host.
It was indeed marvelous. Constant exposure to ultraviolet rays explained why humans could not survive on the ground. However—
It seemed that only this year had daylight gone without night. The moon was still present.
Lin Ya turned to face the opposite side of the sun and vaguely spotted a crescent moon, barely visible on the other side of the sky.
“Completely overshadowed by the sun…”
……
When the countdown overhead changed to 8 days 15:25:54 seconds, Lin Ya stopped, catching his breath before sitting down in the shadow of the crumbling wall.
[Host, do you need to sleep? I’ll keep watch, and I’ll call you if something happens.]
“Sure, 123, if there’s nothing else, please wake me up in two hours. Thank you.” Lin Ya chose not to push himself; he had only rested for two hours in over thirty hours. Even an ironman needed rest.
[No problem! I’ve got it covered!]
To prevent the potential dangers of delving deeper into the underground, Lin Ya sought a spacious location on the first underground floor of a taller ruin. He placed the short knife he had brought from the original host nearby to ensure quick access to it, then used his backpack as a pillow, putting on his protective gear. He lay down and fell asleep within two seconds.
123 raised a mini camera and snapped numerous photos, later labeling the file as—
【Host’s Pathetic Weakness Photo Collection·250 images】.
Satisfied with this, 123 suddenly remembered what previous mentors had advised: always seize the host’s weaknesses while they are still vulnerable. Otherwise, once they grew stronger, they would refuse tasks and seek to unbind from the system to return to their world.
It was said that one mentor’s host had desired to unbind, but after the system captured embarrassing photos of him, he chose not to unbind and even bought skins for the system.
That host seemed to have come from the realm of cultivation and was an ancient phoenix.
[Just threaten him; if you dare to unbind, I’ll show your embarrassing photos to everyone in the cultivation realm, and he will be too scared to do so.]
Ancient Phoenix: “……” Gritted teeth, furious incompetence.
He certainly didn’t want photos of himself without memories, resembling a bald chicken, competing with real chickens for food, and being pecked by roosters, circulating among others.
It was one thing to revert to his original form. What truly horrified him was a time when he had become a fool, forced into a state of bladder incontinence right after time-traveling, with the bewildered and crumbling expression captured on camera.
Who could endure that? If it got out, his lifetime of glory would be completely tarnished.
Since then, many systems had adopted this tactic, and 123 was no exception.
No matter how useful it was, taking photos first was a given.
——
Completely unaware of 123’s malicious intent, Lin Ya adjusted for a minute after being awakened, tightened his shoelaces, and set off to continue searching for the map.
Two days later, after gathering a pile of supplies, Lin Ya finally found a travel map in a room of a hotel.
This hotel seemed to be quite high-end. Although the original host had not heard of it, the decor and room facilities were impressive, making it unsurprising that each room contained a finely detailed travel map of the local city.
“City Z, this appears to be a coastal city. If I’m not mistaken, it’s over 200 kilometers away from the city where the original host stayed,” Lin Ya remarked, surprised at the original host’s fortune. “So far, surviving this is indeed lucky…”
Yet, after being swept away by a storm, to only break one radio watch, without losing a limb, and leaving the protective gear intact was a staggering 99% luck.