Apocalypse: I Can See Health Bars
Chapter 8: Brave Heart

Chapter 8: Chapter 8: Brave Heart

Lin Fan and Su Qing stood fully armed at the door to 402.

When they first arrived, Lin Fan had already knocked and called out softly a few times, just in case Brother Li’s wife and child were still alive and to avoid any tragic mistakes.

But the room was silent. There wasn’t a single sound.

He had originally prepared for two zombies in the room. Su Qing would hold one off to buy time while Lin Fan killed the other as quickly as possible.

This way, if Su Qing was lucky, she should be able to hold out until Lin Fan could come to her rescue.

But reality was a bit different from what they expected, and it didn’t quite match what Su Qing had said in her message last night.

After all, zombies couldn’t open a security door, walk out, and then close it again...

...

"I remember Brother Li on the fourth floor had a wife and a daughter who was about ten years old."

"So why was he wandering the hallway all by himself?"

"And I remember the message you sent said, ’There are strange noises upstairs,’" Lin Fan asked, puzzled.

Su Qing, weighed down by her paper armor and the iron wok on her back, was exhausted from climbing the stairs. She bent over, panting heavily.

Hearing Lin Fan’s words, she immediately turned to him, her eyes wide.

"You received my message? Then why didn’t you reply..."

But she swallowed the rest of her sentence. Although they had grown much closer during their time together,

asking like that sounded a bit like a complaint, and Lin Fan had no obligation to reply to her in the first place.

Lin Fan cracked a smile, taking some of the iron wok’s weight to help her. "I did reply," he said. "You just didn’t receive it. If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you when we get back."

Su Qing could hear the encouragement in his voice and secretly bolstered her own spirits.

"Okay, you can show me when we get back." Su Qing steadied the iron wok in front of her and said to Lin Fan with resolve, "Let’s open it."

...

Lin Fan carefully inserted the key into the lock. With a gentle turn, the mechanism unlocked with a CLACK.

The door had been double-locked from the inside. Based on his experience, Lin Fan knew that one more turn would open it. He stood to the side, positioning Su Qing directly in front of the door.

"I’m opening it!" Lin Fan said softly. With a CLICK, the security door’s latch retracted, and the door CREAKED open a crack.

"I don’t smell any rotting corpses," Lin Fan murmured, then pushed the door wide open. The room beyond was still silent.

Su Qing peeked out from behind the iron wok. After a moment of observation, she said to Lin Fan, "There’s nothing in the living room."

"Let’s go. Keep the shield up. We’re going in..."

Lin Fan moved behind Su Qing, reaching one hand over her shoulder to help her with the wok’s weight.

His arm brushed lightly against her shoulder, and he could feel her body trembling slightly.

The living room was indeed empty. No bloodstains, no health bars. Aside from a bowl of rotten, moldy grapes on the coffee table, it looked like a completely normal family living room.

But it never hurt to be cautious. The two of them carefully checked the living room, the kitchen, and the bathroom, but found no signs of life.

"Maybe his wife and daughter weren’t home..." Seeing no immediate danger, Su Qing rested the iron wok on a nearby table and asked, confused.

"Shhh—don’t talk." Lin Fan gestured at her nervously, signaling for her to raise her shield again.

Because as he neared the bedroom, he finally caught a familiar scent.

The smell of blood.

Ahead, in the master bedroom.

The bedroom door was closed, hiding the scene within, but the bloody stench in Lin Fan’s nostrils grew stronger.

"There’s a disgusting, strange smell..." Su Qing whispered, her voice trembling.

The smell made her instinctively want to turn and run, but feeling the pressure of Lin Fan’s arm helping her, she calmed herself and held the iron wok tightly to her chest.

Lin Fan frowned, staring at the door. He kept one hand on the wok to help her, while his other hand held his spear.

He took a few deep breaths, then nudged her shoulder with his arm, signaling for her to open the door.

Su Qing could feel both of her hands shaking. In just a second, the doorknob was already slick with the cold sweat from her palm.

But she decided to follow Lin Fan’s command. She slowly turned the doorknob. The moment the door opened, an entire wall of dark red assaulted their eyes...

Blood... It was all blood...

Dried, dark-red blood and mangled chunks were smeared across the entire bedroom wall... No, not just the wall—the ceiling, too, was thickly coated in gore!

"*BLEGH!*"

The moment she pushed the door open, the overwhelming stench of blood and the gruesome sight assaulted Su Qing, and she began to gag uncontrollably!

Just as her body convulsed and the strength in her arms faltered, a black shadow shot out from the corner of the bedroom wall above the door, lunging straight for Su Qing’s face!

[739/739]!

The conspicuous health bar had only just appeared in his vision when Lin Fan spotted it!

"Look out!" As he shouted the warning, his left hand hooked the rim of the wok, pulling it up from Su Qing’s chest and right into the path of the black shadow’s attack!

CLANG! The sound of metal striking metal rang out!

The force of the blow knocked Su Qing off balance. She stumbled back four or five steps before crashing heavily onto the living room sofa!

The impact was so strong it overturned the sofa, her condition unknown!

Lin Fan hadn’t been idle. The attack was sudden, but as he had shouted his warning, he was already thrusting his spear into the empty space just in front of the wok!

The short spear met soft resistance, like plunging into a sponge!

A direct hit!

But not a critical one!

[-120]!

[619/739]

The monster was terrifyingly agile!

The instant Lin Fan’s spear struck, it had already begun to retreat!

As a result, although Lin Fan had hit it, he failed to pierce its skull.

Only when the monster retreated onto the bed, staring back across the room at Lin Fan who predatorily blocked the doorway, did he finally get a clear look at its appearance...

The bloodless, pale head of a ten-year-old girl sat atop a bizarre, spider-like body.

The body was clearly a twisted and modified human form; traces of human organs were still faintly visible.

But its four limbs were completely deformed, with short, thick bone spurs growing from their ends, replacing the function of hands and feet.

Black veins of varying thickness crisscrossed its face, and its pale, ashen eyes stared viciously at Lin Fan!

A bloody hole had appeared on its face. Reddish-brown clots of blood oozed from the wound, dripping onto the bedsheets.

Facing it, Lin Fan was also extremely tense.

’I probably wouldn’t have been able to react to that sneak attack if I’d been alone. It’s a good thing Su Qing took the hit, giving me a chance to counterattack.’

’Fast, strong attacks, and a degree of intelligence, but its defense is weak. It lost over a hundred health from my light stab.’

This was Lin Fan’s analysis. Based on its body structure, he could also guess its movement pattern: its forward dash was extremely fast, but it clearly couldn’t turn well.

’That’s determined by its joint structure. Besides, a normal four-limbed animal would have leaped aside to dodge my attack just now, not retreated in a straight line!’

’The strangest thing is that this monster’s health isn’t a round number. Humans, zombies, even Mutant Dogs—they all had integer health values. But this thing is [739], which makes it even more bizarre.’

’Run?’

The thought had barely surfaced before he instantly squashed it.

’I can’t escape!’

’With the speed of its earlier dash, if I were to retreat... No, I wouldn’t even have to retreat.’

Lin Fan could tell just by looking at its eyes, colder and more sinister than a viper’s, that the moment his center of gravity shifted or he lost his balance even slightly, the monster would instantly charge forward and take his life.

’But now that I understand its behavior patterns, a fight might not be out of the question.’

Lin Fan cautiously adjusted his stance, blocking the doorway and raising his spear with both hands to bar its path.

He watched the monster’s every move intently.

’The force that sent Su Qing flying could undoubtedly smash through the wooden door. So, it wasn’t trapped in here. It was either waiting to ambush prey or it had some other purpose.’

Lin Fan had often dealt with wild, untamable animals. In the nature preserve, he had even come face-to-face with true bloodthirsty predators. He understood that in moments like these, you could never show weakness.

’When you’re cornered, retreating means death!’

The monster, for its part, seemed to possess some intelligence and instinctively recognized that the person before it would not be an easy opponent.

It shuffled back and forth on the gore-soaked bed, searching for an opportunity to attack.