GETOP CH4

Today was a workday, yet the streets of City K were completely empty.

Only the area near the Pollution Disease Prevention and Control Center was bustling with people.

It was now the third day of the lockdown.

Many powerful and influential families in City K had already begun to evacuate secretly.

Naturally, they wouldn’t make a big show of it; they would simply be escorted by the military in a coordinated manner to the Pollution Prevention Center.

After undergoing almost draconian testing, these people would be able to board planes and leave this precarious city.

Of course, for safety reasons, they would first stop at an uninhabited island. After passing the danger period, they would return to the mainland.

At the same time, the city’s important scientific research personnel were also put on a whitelist, along with the children of martyrs.

Out of a massive city of millions, in the end, fewer than five hundred people came to the center to be tested for the qualification to leave early.

Lin Sinan stood by a jeep smoking, maintaining order in passing.

Many staff members had wrapped themselves tightly in protective suits, yet his attire was no different from usual.

Lin Sinan wasn’t afraid of pollution; after all, he himself was a mobile source of pollution.

His brows were tightly furrowed, and cigarette butts were already scattered all over the ground by his feet.

The cigarette in Lin Sinan’s hand wasn’t just a cigarette; it was a tobacco-flavored sedative.

An inspector from the center stepped forward: “Captain Lin. Smoke less.”

Sedatives had side effects.

“I can’t stop.” Lin Sinan grabbed his head in frustration and squatted on the ground, muttering with hollow eyes, “I only knew that parasitic fish eggs attached to a human body wouldn’t cause secondary pollution, but I never expected them to evolve in just a few days. I shouldn’t have sent Ah Bai directly to the hospital, or I shouldn’t have let Dr. Li go without observing him for a few more days.”

“And we also failed to successfully retrieve the pollution source. It was my arrogance that led to such consequences. I should have listened to that kid Ah Bai and not tried to save him. But his parents are gone, and he’s their only son left. How could I not save him?”

“If the parasite becomes uncontrollable in City K…”

Lin Sinan covered his face with his hands and whispered, “Then I will be the sinner who killed these millions of people.”

They had already tried so hard.

To control the pollution, Awakened died all over the world every day. They were either devoured with nothing left of their bodies, or they ended their own lives to avoid becoming Pollutants.

The more they fought against the Pollutants, the more powerless they felt.

The growth speed of the Awakened could not even begin to catch up with the growth and spread of the pollution sources.

Who knew when this precarious balance would be broken.

Humanity had never gained the upper hand in the struggle against the Pollutants.

Since the water was cut off, gunshots in the night had noticeably increased.

He didn’t know if it was his imagination, but Lu Yan felt that his hearing had become much sharper.

Therefore, without earplugs, he found it very difficult to fall asleep at night.

The city hall arranged for staff to go door-to-door to conduct pollution testing. Infected patients would be taken away together.

Word was that they were going to receive treatment. Or perhaps, to be cremated.

On the fourth day of the lockdown, Lu Yan discovered that it was no longer possible to send messages outside. The signal seemed to be confined to the city limits.

When Lu Yan called his colleagues, the calls would still go through. But when he called the director, there was always only the “please dial again later” prompt.

He glanced at the WeChat groups; there wasn’t much discussion about this. He didn’t know if it was being suppressed or if people simply hadn’t noticed yet.

Compared to not being able to make phone calls, another message was clearly more eye-catching in the major WeChat groups of City K.

It was a screenshot of a WeChat Moments post.

“Help! Why are my boyfriend’s behavior and looks becoming more and more like a frog! I’m going to break down, he’s right outside the door now! Somebody save me!”

It was accompanied by a picture, taken somewhat hastily, so it was a bit blurry.

In the picture, a man squatted on the ground in a frog-like posture. His eyeballs bulged out, almost as if they had been squeezed out of their sockets, with a few blood-red vessels hanging onto the ends to keep them from sliding off. The man’s skin was also covered with a strange water membrane.

A bizarre smile hung on his face. His mouth was split open, as if he was about to spit out a tongue at any moment.

It made many people’s scalps tingle with fear.

It was said that the girl could no longer be contacted.

Even through the screen, Lu Yan got goosebumps.

Unlike the many people who treated it as a bizarre novelty story, Lu Yan felt that this was, in all likelihood, real.

[Just an F-class Pollutant at the bottom of the food chain. They are no longer human, nothing surprising.]

[If you get the chance, you can dissect one. This thing looks disgusting, but… the meat is quite tasty.]

[Oh right, this ugly toad also has a trait: it likes to eat swan meat.]

Lu Yan half-understood what it meant.

He boiled a bowl of instant noodles with mineral water to calm his nerves. He cracked an egg into it while he was at it.

Although eggs could be kept in the fridge, they couldn’t be kept too long; it was best to finish them early.

Because the water was cut off, the property management guy started delivering water at nine o’clock every morning.

One small box per household, 12 bottles. This water was all allocated by the city hall and was free of charge. The property management would directly leave it at the door for the residents to pick up themselves.

After a family washed rice and flushed the toilet, it was barely enough. But if they wanted to shower, they just had to endure without it.

There were a few times when Lu Yan didn’t pick it up in time. When he opened the door, he found that a lot of his share of water had been taken.

However, although the person took the water, they left behind a solid one thousand yuan in cash. A bottle of water was two yuan; looking at it this way, Lu Yan had made a profit.

Although at a time like this, water was more valuable than money.

Lu Yan thought for a moment and put the bills away. The other party buying water at such a high price was probably also out of desperation.

He lived alone and used little water. Coupled with the fact that he had hoarded a lot of goods from the supermarket earlier, he wasn’t short on water.

It’s just… his relationship with his neighbors was usually okay, so why be so sneaky about it? It wasn’t as if they couldn’t discuss it.

The next day, Lu Yan specially pulled up a stool, sat by the door, and turned on the smart peephole.

In his hands, he held an animal atlas titled After Human Extinction. He would read for a while, then look up at the monitor screen.

At 9:30 AM, the property management left the water at the door.

Ten minutes later, the door diagonally opposite quietly opened, and a person sneakily poked his head out.

It was a young rich kid who lived opposite Lu Yan.

Lu Yan had some impression of him; the rich kid was his junior alumni, though not in the same major. He also studied chemistry and biology, but didn’t study well. Around finals, he would often come to him with a bunch of idiotic questions.

The heating in the building was clearly on, yet the young rich kid was wearing a thick hat.

This hat was overly large, almost covering the bridge of the rich kid’s nose.

Lu Yan rested his chin on his hand, watching the rich kid walk up to his door, frantically grab half the mineral water, and leave a thousand bucks behind.

The rich kid also lived alone; logically, he shouldn’t be so short of drinking water.

Lu Yan paused the monitor, zoomed in, and took a screenshot.

He didn’t know if it was his imagination, but the rich kid’s hands were excessively long and slender. Lu Yan stretched out his own hand to compare; the webbing between the other’s fingers was also obviously larger than a normal person’s… and nearly translucent, allowing the blood vessels underneath to be seen.

By the looks of it, people polluted by the parasitic fish eggs would also suffer from dehydration.

Rationally speaking, Lu Yan should call to report him right now.

But the rich kid’s current appearance was vastly different from the photo.

And he was somewhat curious about the mutation process of the Pollutants.

Lu Yan asked the System, “Under normal circumstances, can I handle an F-class Pollutant?”

System: [About fifty-fifty. After all, you are also an Awakened at the bottom of the food chain. This kind of Pollutant can still be killed with ordinary physical attacks.]

Thus, Lu Yan gave up on making the call. Furthermore, he pulled out his compound bow from under the bed and practiced archery for an entire afternoon.

The seventh day of the lockdown quarantine.

Night fell.

Lu Yan didn’t have many recreational activities. His usual hobbies were swimming, archery, and reading. Now he couldn’t swim, and he was bored of doing archery at home, so he could only read. Fortunately, he had installed bookcases on all four walls of his bedroom, categorized and sorted, holding at least two thousand books. Enough to keep him reading until the end of time.

Lu Yan closed the book, rubbed the sore spot between his brows, and went to sleep.

But this time, he didn’t sleep well.

Because outside the door, there came the very faint sound of… lock-picking.

Lu Yan’s gaze shifted to the alarm clock by the bed.

It was currently 3:00 AM.

…

…

The dead of night in City K was completely silent. Ever since the lockdown order was issued, everyone’s nighttime activities had turned into playing on their phones.

Therefore, the relentless ringing of the doorbell seemed exceptionally eerie.

He picked up his compound bow and hid the military dagger he had sourced earlier under his clothes, finally feeling a bit of confidence.

The lights in the hallway were dim, flickering as if they had a bad connection.

Lu Yan walked softly to the door, then turned on the peephole monitor.

The screen revealed the visitor.

From his clothing, it was the rich kid who lived diagonally opposite Lu Yan. Lu Yan vaguely remembered his name was Zhou Kaiwen.

Zhou Kaiwen’s entire skin looked wrinkled from soaking in water, and a moss-like green had appeared on his body.

His gaze was vacant, and more than half of his eyeballs were exposed to the air, looking as if they could fall out of their sockets at any moment.

Zhou Kaiwen’s excessively long fingers pressed the doorbell anxiously, translucent mucus dripping down his webbed fingers.

[Oh ho, the toad has come for the swan meat.] The System’s tone was teasing.

Lu Yan abandoned his plan to open the door. This giant humanoid frog was too ugly, making him a bit nauseous.

But the giant frog clearly didn’t intend to let Lu Yan go.

Zhou Kaiwen’s nose twitched, and his vacant pupils instantly turned into vertical slits.

“Senior, I like you. You know that, right.” Zhou Kaiwen’s tone carried a hint of imperceptible excitement. “I know you like me too, you’re just more reserved. I’m so rich, it’s human nature to have thoughts about me. My dad must have said something to you to make you avoid me. But now, I’ve thought of a way for us to be together forever.”

The next second, he spat out his tongue with great agility.

Frogs rely on that tongue to catch prey; long and flexible, with a forked tip.

Now, this tongue twisted into a bizarre arc in the air, and then slid right into the lock cylinder.

At that moment, Lu Yan somewhat regretted not installing an electrode tube in the lock. Of course, he couldn’t be blamed; it was mainly because his life experience limited his imagination.

If someone had told him in the past that a person could pick a lock with their tongue, he definitely would have told them the psychiatric department was out the door and to the right.

Lu Yan silently raised the bow in his hands.

A few minutes later, with a soft “click,” the door opened a crack.

The light from outside seeped in, and Lu Yan heard his own not-so-intense heartbeat.

Zhou Kaiwen’s already mutated webbed hand clamped onto the door as he asked gently, “Senior, you’re clearly at home… why won’t you open the door?”

Lu Yan’s mind fell into a state of high tension.

He stood behind the cabinet, an angle that allowed him to immediately dodge after shooting.

Lu Yan didn’t answer. His fingers released, and the arrowhead shot toward the intruder’s neck with unparalleled precision.

If facing a normal person, this sharp arrow would have been enough to pierce completely through them. But when it hit Zhou Kaiwen’s neck, it only sank in shallowly by the arrowhead.

Foul-smelling blood sprayed out. The frogman trembled in pain, his eyeballs bulging as he spewed streams of yellow fluid.

The wound caused by the arrowhead wasn’t fatal, but it clearly enraged the monster even more.

It leaped up, its head almost hitting the ceiling. Both the distance and speed completely exceeded human limits.

Too fast.

So much so that when Lu Yan heard the System’s voice, he subconsciously chose to obey.

[Roll.]

Lu Yan rolled on the ground and grabbed the military dagger in his pocket, but then quickly let go.

Not yet. Having tried the compound bow, standard cold weapons would have a hard time causing incapacitating damage to Zhou Kaiwen. He could stab him in the eye, but because the gap in strength between them was too large, Lu Yan likely only had one chance to try.

Zhou Kaiwen landed heavily on the ground on all fours. His dripping saliva eroded the floorboards into a layer of foam.

[You should be glad it doesn’t have a lot of that stomach acid, which is comparable to sulfuric acid, either.]

[Its weak point is the belly. Back when you studied medicine, you dissected quite a few frogs; you know what to do, right?]

Lu Yan’s gaze became sharp.

He wasn’t skilled at fighting, but when faced with danger, the desire to survive made him incredibly clear-headed.

[Step back.]

[To the left, reverse thrust. Run.]

Lu Yan’s stamina was actually quite good. After all, when the nurses couldn’t make it in time, he would take the initiative to help lift patient stretchers. But in front of Zhou Kaiwen, who had deteriorated into a Pollutant, it was entirely insufficient.

He was pinned to the ground.

Zhou Kaiwen grabbed his neck, looking puzzled: “Why aren’t you afraid?”

Humans who die in terror are the most delicious food for Pollutants.

Yet Lu Yan’s expression was exceptionally calm.

However, this wasn’t important.

Zhou Kaiwen’s hand moved up, his slender fingers prying open Lu Yan’s eyelids, his smile practically splitting to the roots of his ears: “Let’s start with the eyes. Senior, you don’t even know how beautiful your eyes are.”

It opened its mouth, sticking out that long, nauseating tongue.

This was exactly the moment Lu Yan had been waiting for.

A twisted madness appeared on his calm face, yet his hand was very steady.

When Lu Yan held a scalpel for the first time, his mentoring teacher praised him, saying he was born for this line of work.

But it isn’t just doctors who hold knives steadily; butchers do too.

The foul tip of Zhou Kaiwen’s tongue was only an inch away from Lu Yan’s eye.

The hidden dagger was finally revealed.

The blade plunged deeply into the other’s abdomen.

Red blood gushed out, drenching Lu Yan’s entire head.

…

…

The battle ended. The disemboweled frog basically lost all mobility; fearing it wasn’t completely dead, Lu Yan went up and stabbed it a few more times to make sure.

By the time he came out of the bathroom, the Pollutant lying on the floor was completely cold.

Lu Yan picked up a mop and started mopping the floor. The blood was a bit difficult to wash away, but fortunately, he was prepared. Using light salt water mixed with a 10% potassium iodide solution, the floor was soon as clean as new.