"Whoa... what the... "
"Was that a dream? Or..."
"Did I actually come back?"
Evan Ran shot upright in bed, drenched in cold sweat. Just moments ago, he had been surrounded on all sides, zombies gnawing on his limbs with blood-red eyes. The pain was so real that his consciousness had snapped like an overstretched wire.
But now his eyes were open again. He was not on the ground, not in an abandoned street, not under a pile of undead bodies.
He was home.
His actual apartment.
"My place was overrun by the second week, right...?"
Heart pounding, he grabbed his phone from the bedside table. The screen lit up.
"One year ago..."
"So it really happened. I went back."
Evan let out a long, shaky breath. He had no idea how the time loop or reincarnation or whatever cosmic glitch had occurred, but being alive again was more than enough of a miracle.
And according to the date on the screen, today was the first official day of the zombie outbreak. The day the world collapsed.
Going outside was impossible.
That was practically a self-executed death sentence.
Anyone who stepped outside now would face not only newly turned zombies, but also terrified, irrational humans who were moments away from losing their minds.
He would stay home. At least for a week.
He had stocked several boxes of instant noodles in different flavors, a habit born from laziness rather than foresight. Living would not be the issue.
The real tragedy was that he only had one box of soda left. Surviving a lockdown without enough sugar and caffeine would definitely not be as pleasant.
"First things first. Reinforce the front door."
Evan pushed his wardrobe and TV cabinet to block the entrance. The apartment was on the 20th floor of a high-rise building. As long as the door held, he would be safe.
At least during the first week.
He remembered clearly that after seven days, a bunch of idiots had gone to the rooftop to blast music and dance like nothing was wrong. The noise had drawn an entire wave of zombies into the building. They flooded the stairwell and trapped every remaining survivor inside.
Evan had avoided dying that day only because he happened to be out scavenging.
Once the door was secure, he turned on his computer and began downloading as much digital content as he could. The power grid and internet usually collapsed within a week of the outbreak.
Download everything now.
In this new world, a hand-cranked generator and a fully loaded tablet of entertainment content could be traded for a month of food.
With everything arranged, Evan settled into his chair and started playing games. For reasons he could easily guess, the queue times were terrible. It took half an hour just to enter a match, and as soon as the game began, someone disconnected.
"Sorry. My cousin got bitten by his dad. Hope you all understand," a player typed.
Everyone did.
Playing a match at a time like this was already a minor miracle.
Evan even felt genuine respect for the boy's father. Even after turning into a zombie, he still tried to stop his kid from wasting time on games.
A true model parent.
Night gradually fell. By then, it was impossible to match with any real players at all. Playing against bots felt pointless, so Evan leaned back and began organizing his survival plans.
Having lived through the apocalypse once already, he was far more prepared than before.
The first week was absolute chaos. After that, the population plummeted by ninety percent. With fewer people, the scramble for resources eased. Food and supplies became easier to find.
The first-stage zombies were weak. Anyone with a bit of strength and a sturdy stick could take one down.
After the first week, it was the perfect window to venture out and secure a new shelter.
Evan already had a destination in mind.
The supermarket two blocks away.
During the outbreak's initial days, it had been completely looted. But Evan knew the truth. The storage warehouse in the back was untouched and loaded with enough supplies to feed a hundred survivors for months.
After resupplying, he could either continue as a lone wanderer or join one of the developing survivor bases.
Around the one-month mark, zombies began mutating. They became stronger, faster, and smarter. A normal door meant nothing to them. Even armed humans struggled to survive.
In that dark period, humanity began to awaken. Literally.
Awakened individuals appeared, gaining powers and abilities beyond normal humans. With their help, the remaining population avoided complete extinction, and organized bases formed across the world. A large base could house dozens of awakened fighters.
As for Evan...
He had been nothing but an ordinary man in his first life. With a bit of luck and stubbornness, he had scraped by for a year, wandering alone.
In the end, he still died under a swarm of mutated zombies.
"This time, I need to find a base with real awakened fighters," Evan muttered, slurping instant noodles.
Ordinary humans were just too fragile in the apocalypse.
Outside, the city grew darker. Tall buildings that once shimmered with lights now showed only two or three glowing windows per tower. The streetlamps remained on, but beneath them stood blood-soaked figures swaying lifelessly.
Not exactly ideal for an evening stroll.
Evan leaned on his windowsill, sipping his last can of soda while enjoying the brief feeling of peace.
Then he noticed something unusual.
On the tenth floor of the building opposite his, a window was still brightly lit.
Both buildings belonged to the same residential complex, only several dozen meters apart. He squinted. It looked like… a girl?
As a hobbyist stargazer, he kept a basic telescope at home. Perfect.
He lifted the telescope and peered across.
Definitely a girl.
A very attractive one.
Fair-skinned, long-legged, fit in all the right places, and dressed lightly in clothes that absolutely did not meet apocalypse safety regulations.
"What a pity," Evan sighed.
"Even if I wanted to introduce myself, crossing a zombie-infested street is suicide."
As he lowered the telescope, the girl suddenly noticed him and began waving frantically. She grabbed a sheet of A4 paper and scribbled something on it.
Through the lens, he read it clearly.
"Help me."
The words were large, shaky, filled with fear.
Evan looked down at the hordes of zombies crowding the street like a sea of rotten bodies and held up his hands helplessly.
Help her? In this situation? For someone he had never met? Not worth risking his life.
Then she wrote another word.
"Hungry."
Judging from her apartment, she was probably someone who relied entirely on food delivery apps. She likely had zero emergency supplies.
Evan sighed. He had plenty of instant noodles. He could spare a little. He would not be able to take everything with him later anyway.
But the buildings were dozens of meters apart.
How was he supposed to get the food to her?
He narrowed his eyes, thinking.
There had to be a way…
And he was going to find it.