Chapter 18: Diurnal Temperature Variation

The group entered the master bedroom together, and the stench of decay became even stronger.

However, unless one looked carefully after entering, it would be impossible to discover where Su Yan’s parents were hidden until a slight rustling sound came from under the bed.

Su Yan walked to the bedside and pulled out a large storage box from under the bed. Inside lay a female corpse and a male infected person, bound tightly.

Seeing this scene, it was clear without asking that the female corpse was Su Yan’s mother, and the infected person still moving was her father.

Zhou Quan was so frightened by this sight that he retreated repeatedly.

Gao Lin’s face also turned pale.

“When did you find your parents here?” Lou Su asked Su Yan.

Su Yan didn’t hide anything. “I discovered it last night when I came back and entered the master bedroom.”

But because her father was infected, she was worried that Lou Su and the others would kill him if they found out, so she didn’t tell them.

“So, when I asked you to go out and look at the note, you had already seen your parents like this?” Zhou Quan was shocked. “You slept on this bed all night last night, weren’t you scared?”

He simply couldn’t imagine how Su Yan could have taken the note from his hand so calmly last night, then returned to the room and slept above her parents’ corpses!

Although her father hadn’t become a corpse yet, he was no different from one.

“They are my parents, why would I be scared?” Su Yan said, tears streaming down her face again.

She wasn’t afraid at all; her heart just ached so much that she could barely breathe.

“Let’s go out first.” Gao Lin handed Su Yan a tissue.

“Thank you.” Su Yan cried and asked Lou Su, “Brother Lou, can you not kill my father for now? He doesn’t have much strength left, and he should starve to death soon without food, right?”

Humans infected by the Variants were like zombies; they would die if they didn’t eat for a long time.

Starving to death sounded cruel, but Su Yan really didn’t want to watch someone she knew kill her father.

“Push him back in; I won’t kill him,” Lou Su agreed to Su Yan’s request.

Su Yan’s mother had bound her father very well before committing suicide. He had no chance of breaking free unless the house was destroyed by the Variants while Su Yan’s father was still alive; only then would he have a chance to escape.

However, Su Yan’s father probably wouldn’t live to see that day.

The group returned to the living room, and Su Yan immediately locked the master bedroom door, thinking that even if her father broke free from the ropes and crawled out from under the bed, he would be trapped in the room and unable to escape.

“Brother Lou, where are you guys going?” Su Yan had been single-mindedly focused on seeing her parents, but now that her parents were gone, she had lost direction. The only thing she could still do was survive.

However, Gao Lin and Zhou Quan, like her, were ordinary people without awakened abilities. If they stuck together to escape, they probably wouldn’t even be able to leave the city.

So, she wanted to find out if Lou Su and the others were going in the same direction.

“To Jing City,” Lou Su said without thinking, indicating that he had planned this long ago.

However, Chu Xihen was unaware of this.

“What are you going to Jing City for?” He frowned slightly.

Jing City was far away from this city, and with the current inconvenient transportation, how much suffering would they endure along the way? He just wanted to find a place to retire.

This guy, Lou Su, had sweet-talked him last night, and now he was saying something like this?

“I’ll tell you later,” Lou Su replied to Chu Xihen.

Meaning that the reason he was going to Jing City couldn’t be revealed in public.

“Can we follow you?” Su Yan asked cautiously.

Gao Lin and Zhou Quan were both from Jing City, and she also had to go to Jing City to enter a stronghold to survive.

Of course, if ability users built a new stronghold along the way, she wouldn’t necessarily have to go to Jing City.

Lou Su looked at the three of them. “You can follow, but you should also know how many dangers we’ll face along the way. The Variants have only just appeared, and I’m already struggling to cope. The Variants will only become more powerful later on, and I may not be able to protect you.”

In a crisis, he would definitely protect Chu Xihen first.

“We know; you don’t need to deliberately protect us. You just need to travel with us,” Gao Lin also said.

Their understanding pleased Lou Su.

However, he said, “Not everyone can awaken abilities, but you can improve your physical fitness. The climate is harsh right now, and we don’t know when we’ll be able to leave this place. Why don’t you train with me for a few days, learn some self-defense techniques, and practice shooting?”

He wasn’t forcing them, just giving them a little advice.

“Okay!” the three answered in unison.

Of course, they were happy to learn if someone was willing to teach.

“Is he going to train with us?” Gao Lin was referring to Chu Xihen.

Lou Su also turned to look at Chu Xihen, who was sitting on the ground. “Do you want to train?”

“No,” Chu Xihen refused decisively. “It’s too hot; I don’t want to do anything.”

Hearing him say this, Lou Su didn’t force him. He said to the others, “Let’s get moving; start with horse stance.”

Zhou Quan and the other two didn’t have any objections to Chu Xihen’s refusal to train. After all, Lou Su was the one who would be protecting him later. No matter how much he dragged them down, it wouldn’t affect them. They weren’t like Wan Ming and Han Chong, who felt that Chu Xihen’s unmotivated appearance didn’t deserve to be by Lou Su’s side.

Besides, they weren’t in a position to interfere in the couple’s affairs.

Chu Xihen sat on the ground, and just watching the four people training under the forty-degree heat made him feel physically uncomfortable.

He got up, walked to the refrigerator, and, like Zhou Quan had done before, stuck his head inside, wanting to shut out what he was seeing.

He finally endured until the afternoon, and when they were preparing to leave after the sun had set, they discovered that the temperature had suddenly dropped sharply. In just one hour, the indoor temperature had dropped to only a few degrees.

“Seriously, what’s with this weather? Is it even letting people live?” Zhou Quan and Gao Lin huddled on the sofa. They were almost hugging each other for warmth.

“Would we get frostbite if we went out now? It doesn’t look like it’s snowing, so probably not?” Su Yan thought for a moment and mustered her courage. “I’ll go out and take a look.”

“Wait, no need to go out; just try it by the window,” Lou Su opened the window and stretched his hand out.

There was no frostbite.

“It’s fine; now is a good time to travel. Miss Su, could you please find us some down jackets? It might get even colder after dark,” Lou Su retracted his hand and closed the window.

“Oh, okay, I’ll go find them right away,” Su Yan went to the house’s cloakroom and quickly brought out a pile of warm clothes and pants. She also found several lighters for Lou Su, to make it easier to make fires on the road.

After getting dressed, the group took the flashlights they had found in Su Yan’s house and left the villa.

“We can travel when the temperature is low, and when the poisonous sun comes out at dawn, we’ll find a house to rest in,” Lou Su said to the others.

That was all they could do for now; after all, if the sun was always out during the day, they wouldn’t be able to go out at all.