When they said their goodbyes again, Fu Qi told Li, “When you get back, have Lu Xing teach you how to use a gun.”
He said she was a girl with a real talent for shooting.
Qin Zhen asked, “What kind of ta-talent do you think I have?”
The two of them were back on the road. Fu Qi was distracted, thinking about Kobayashi Kaye’s situation. At her question, he turned the steering wheel and glanced at her. “You have a talent for doing bad things.”
When they had first come out of the tomb, what a pure and gullible little zombie she had been. She believed everything people told her. A fake talisman had been enough to scare her; she had agreed to be married off without a word and even started calling the other man her brother-in-law; when the old woman bullied her, all she could do was cry. But now…
Now she was full of devious tricks. She pretended to be a Taoist priest, bullied the old and the young alike, and even though she was still afraid whenever she saw the police, that didn’t stop her from doing bad things. She had even threatened a foreigner, saying she would kill him.
Learning to be good took time. Learning to be bad took only an instant.
“You’re being mean!” The zombie felt insulted. She snatched up a bamboo arrow she had begged from Li and pointed the feathered end at Fu Qi. “I-I’ll give you one m-more chance. Say it a-again!”
“Fine, I’ll say it again.” Fu Qi gave in. He turned his head slightly to glance at her and said, “You have a talent for stammering.”
Now that was a genuine talent. At first, she had wanted to act like a cold, aloof big shot and avoided saying anything in long sentences, so she had stammered for quite some time. Just when she had finally learned to speak smoothly, a little intimidation from the righteous police had set her back considerably.
Who could say she didn’t have a talent in this area?
The zombie widened her eyes and said mournfully, “My heart i-isn’t made of stone. I-I can get hurt too!”
“It’s fine,” Fu Qi said. “If this heart gets hurt, just replace it with another one. Next time, get one made of stone, and you won’t get hurt again.”
“I’m really sad!” Qin Zhen declared.
With that, she lowered the arrow, drew her legs up onto the passenger seat, and buried her face in her knees.
“Trying to play the victim again?” Fu Qi’s voice was full of disdain. “You use that trick every day. You’ve overdone it—I’m immune now. I don’t believe you this time.”
The zombie remained perfectly still, as if she really had been heartbroken.
Fu Qi said he didn’t believe her, and he meant it. Keeping his eyes on the road, he said, “Stop pretending and sit up. Contact Chen Xiang and ask where they are. While you’re at it, tell them that, thanks to their captain’s failed mission, our team has been reprimanded by the authorities. Then tell them that their precious treasure found the storage site for those ancient documents and have them praise you properly.”
The zombie didn’t move.
This wasn’t right. This was a rare opportunity to completely suppress her captain while showing off her achievements. A vain zombie like her shouldn’t have been this quiet.
Fu Qi glanced at the curled-up figure in the passenger seat and continued driving. After going several hundred meters, he looked to the right again.
After doing this three times, he stepped on the brakes, leaned over, and said, “Sweetie?”
Qin Zhen still made no sound.
“Are you still playing around?” Fu Qi grabbed her arm and pulled it aside, then forcibly lifted her face, expecting to see the zombie’s fake sorrowful expression.
Instead, he saw her staring blankly ahead, her expression bewildered, as though her soul had been pulled from her body.
She couldn’t fake an expression like that. Nor would she ever be willing to pretend to be an idiot.
“Sweetie?” Fu Qi’s voice tightened slightly. He patted her cheek and called, “Wake up!”
It took three pats before Qin Zhen came to herself. She looked at him blankly and said, “Sweetie…”
“Yes, it’s me.” Fu Qi supported the side of her face with one hand and rubbed the back of her neck with the other. Leaning close, he said earnestly, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have made fun of your stammering just now. I’m sorry. Don’t be angry, okay?”
“Uh…” Qin Zhen blinked several times in confusion. Then she remembered what had just happened and said, “No. You made fun of me, so you have to tell me one of your f-flaws, so I can make fun of you in return.”
Fu Qi nearly agreed. But then he caught the smug delight in her eyes, the look of someone who had just gotten the better of him. His brows drew together, and he asked suspiciously, “Were you really sad just now?”
In fact, Qin Zhen had suddenly realized something and had been concentrating on thinking it over.
But Fu Qi had already lowered his head and apologized. Even though she wasn’t angry, she had to maintain the pretense that she had been hurt.
“Really!” The zombie opened her eyes wide and answered with utmost sincerity.
From what Fu Qi knew of her, that expression clearly meant she was lying.
But her reaction just now had startled him. His expression relaxed, and he said, “Fine. I’ll tell you…”
He thought for a moment, then said, “Actually, I’m particularly susceptible to conditioning.”
“What does ‘con-conditioning’ mean?”
“It means that if someone keeps saying something to me, I’ll eventually take it as fact.” Fu Qi let go of her cheek and rested his elbow on the seat, facing Qin Zhen as he explained. “For example, if someone keeps telling me that I have to lead with my left foot when I walk, eventually I’ll instinctively step forward with my left foot first.”
“Oh.” Qin Zhen understood. After thinking it over for a moment, she tipped up her face and stared straight into Fu Qi’s eyes.
“Your money is m-mine. Your money is mine. It’s all mine…”
Fu Qi fell silent.
He pressed down on Qin Zhen’s head and pushed the greedy zombie away.
“I memorized it!” The zombie was delighted. “I’ll chant it to you every day from now on. Hee-hee!”
Fu Qi said, “You’re only clever when it comes to doing bad things to me.”
With thoughts like that about playing dirty, how could she have had no defenses at all when Li coaxed the truth out of her? She’d blurted everything out like a fool.
Fu Qi didn’t care about that halfhearted complaint. His heart was full of joy at the thought of the unexpected fortune he was about to receive.
After apologizing and coaxing the zombie back into a good mood, Fu Qi asked, “Why were you spacing out just now?”
“I was thinking—thinking about something.”
It was a major matter, important enough to make Qin Zhen temporarily forget about coveting Fu Qi’s fortune.
She twisted around, braced both hands against the seat, and faced Fu Qi with a mysterious look on her face. “Sweetie, do you think it’s possible that, originally, human hearts didn’t beat at all? Maybe one person came down with a disease that made their heart beat, and it spread to all of humanity?”
Afraid Fu Qi wouldn’t understand, she gave an example. “Like the zombie virus.”
The idea was so bizarre that Fu Qi had never heard anything like it.
He furrowed his brows and seriously considered it for a moment. Then, under the zombie’s expectant gaze, he said, “I don’t know whether that’s true, but I do know your zombie brain needs to see a doctor.”
Qin Zhen, who had been dismissed as spouting nonsense, grew anxious. “I’m serious! I might’ve caught it from you!”
“Oh? Is that so?” Fu Qi rolled up his sleeve and turned sideways. “Come on, let me hear it.”
He had never heard of heartbeats being contagious. Otherwise, how could anyone die in a hospital?
Fu Qi was only joking. They didn’t have a stethoscope, and to hear a heartbeat, someone would have to lie against the other person’s chest. What girl would agree to that?
Sure enough, Qin Zhen covered her chest and hesitated for a moment before saying, “Let me touch and hug you first, then infect you, and then you can listen.”
Fu Qi: “…You know how to beat around the bush before taking advantage of someone now?”
He’d said she had a talent for being bad.
If she didn’t make up all this nonsense and simply tried to take advantage of him, would he even be able to refuse?
“I’m not…” Qin Zhen began to protest, but the moment Fu Qi opened his arms, she immediately stopped and leaned into him.
Her mouth said no, but her body was perfectly honest.
Fu Qi was used to Qin Zhen pawing all over him. As long as she didn’t go too far and embarrass him, he generally didn’t stop her.
With one arm around Qin Zhen, he took out his phone and contacted Chen Xiang.
Li Jiaye had died, and the video evidence from before her death proved that Fu Qi had nothing to do with it. He had even taken the initiative to rescue and care for her.
On the surface, there was no problem at all. But Country A would certainly make other moves in secret. And then there was the DF family—the head of the family was still alive. No one knew what they had really done in Linxiang under the name of a charity hospital back then.
“You and Little Qin go to the bomb shelter to search for the files. Old Mo and I will keep those people from Country A occupied here at Haiyin Hospital,” Chen Xiang said.
They had gone around to the other side of Linxiang. If they wanted to meet up, they would have to circle around most of the town again, which was too troublesome.
“Let’s keep operating separately. Otherwise, once they see that the zombies on your side are stirring, they’ll figure out that you’re there.”
By then, even if they found the files in the bomb shelter, they would be trapped inside.
“Can you and Old Mo manage on your own?”
“I’m not an idiot. Relax. I’ll call in reinforcements from the higher-ups later.”
“All right.”
Once they had finished discussing business, Chen Xiang praised her. “Little Qin is not only capable, she’s incredibly lucky too. She really is a lucky star!”
Fu Qi lowered his head to look at Qin Zhen. To his surprise, she was quietly resting in his arms. Her hands weren’t wandering around, she didn’t get excited at the sight of the phone, and she showed no excitement or desire to brag after being praised.
If her eyes hadn’t still been open, Fu Qi would have thought she’d fallen asleep.
The zombie was acting very strangely today.
“Little Qin? Little Qin, Little Qin! It’s Little Chen!” Chen Xiang called from the other end, summoning his beloved teammate and online friend.
“Little Qin is contemplating life today. She can’t chat with you,” Fu Qi replied. “Anything else?”
“There is, there is.” Chen Xiang said, “Xu the Second wants to know when you’re going to get that head of yours repaired.”
The conversation ended with Xu the Second’s usual greeting. After hanging up, Fu Qi leaned closer to examine the little zombie.
She noticed and lifted her eyelids slightly, then quietly lowered her gaze again and continued concentrating on her thoughts.
Fu Qi said, “I told you, you’re fickle. You’ve already lost interest in my body?”
Qin Zhen: “…”
She sat up, intending to punch Fu Qi, but as soon as she did, she saw that the car had been parked for a little too long. Two zombies had been drawn over by their scent and were now right outside Fu Qi’s window.
An idea flashed through Qin Zhen’s mind. She twisted around to pick up the sharp bamboo arrow.
“Open the window a crack,” she urged Fu Qi. “Watch Coldlight Girl put on an archery performance for you.”
Where had this Coldlight Girl come from? She was simply a chuunibyou girl.
Because she had never seen anyone shoot arrows so skillfully, Qin Zhen had insisted that Li give her a demonstration before they left. Under the sunlight, the teenage girl had drawn her bow, narrowed her eyes, and accurately shot a bamboo arrow through a zombie’s head from a great distance, making the zombie’s eyes sparkle with admiration.
After that, Qin Zhen had taken the bamboo arrow Li gave her and started fantasizing about being just as cool. She had even given herself a nickname: Coldlight Girl.
“…Come back to reality, sweetheart. You don’t even have a bow,” Fu Qi reminded her.
“You know how to shoot arrows by hand, don’t you? D-don’t you!” Qin Zhen said. “F-flying arrows!”
“Yeah, yeah, all right.” Fu Qi lowered the window for her, then leaned back to give her room. “Be careful. Don’t miss the zombies and end up sticking an arrow in your captain instead.”
Humans were too fragile. They feared bullets and zombies—and flying arrows, too. To keep Fu Qi from getting hurt like last time, and to improve her aim, Qin Zhen narrowed her eyes, took aim, and thrust the bamboo arrow outward.
She had imagined herself rushing up to the window, lowered just five centimeters, and forcefully pushing the bamboo arrow through the gap to pierce a zombie with perfect accuracy. Instead, the arrow missed the opening and struck the top of the window with a thunk.
The angle was off, and she had used too much force. With a crack, the bamboo arrow snapped in half.
Qin Zhen couldn’t stop her momentum and slammed headfirst into the window.
At that exact moment, the filthy hand of an outside zombie, smeared with blood and mud, reached through the gap. It was about to grab her zombie face. She couldn’t stop herself and screamed, “Aaaaaah!” in terror. Fu Qi raised an arm, caught her, and she fell sideways into his arms.
With his other hand, Fu Qi shoved the filthy hand away and quickly closed the window. Lowering his head with a laugh, he said, “Coldlight Gir—”
As he teasingly began to call her “Coldlight Girl,” he felt something soft against his arm. But at the time, all he could see was the zombie’s filthy hand. It was only when he lowered his head halfway through the sentence that he realized his arm was stretched across Qin Zhen’s chest, his palm supporting her beneath the armpit—a rather inappropriate position.
Fu Qi’s voice faltered. He spread his palm and quickly pulled his hand back.
Qin Zhen didn’t notice. She was too busy recovering from the shock of the filthy hand that had nearly reached her face.
She braced both hands against Fu Qi’s legs. Thinking she meant to get up, Fu Qi was caught off guard when she merely remained there, panting in lingering fear. As a result, his hand brushed across Qin Zhen’s chest as he withdrew it.
The weather had begun to warm, and there was no longer any need for thick clothing. Zombies did not feel hot or cold, but Fu Qi had urged her to change into a lightweight shirt.
As Fu Qi’s hand brushed over her chest, he felt her icy body temperature, the soft curves unique to a woman, and a faint, subtle pulsation.
His hand felt as though it had been burned, but Qin Zhen didn’t notice in the slightest.
“That scared me half to death. I almost got my pretty face d-dirty!” she said, still shaken. She patted Fu Qi’s leg in thanks for rescuing her.
She was always like this, touching him here and there, enjoying it when he held her and coaxed her. Yet aside from the time she had been injured and needed to remove her clothes so he could take a bullet out, Qin Zhen had never shown much concern for the boundaries between men and women.
Just as she had once allowed Fu Qi, without the slightest reserve, to apply foundation to her face and neck.
She had always considered herself a zombie and never forgot that they belonged to different species.
Fu Qi felt that, in Qin Zhen’s eyes, he might truly be nothing more than an unusually large pet cat. She would cuddle and embrace him, but she could never possibly develop feelings that crossed the boundary between species.
Pressing his lips together, Fu Qi glanced at his left hand. He could still faintly feel the warmth, softness, and pulsation from that momentary touch that had crossed the line…
Pulsation?
Fu Qi froze slightly. Qin Zhen’s words from earlier surged back into his mind. He suddenly put an arm around Qin Zhen’s shoulders, and without warning, pressed his palm against her heart.
This time, unlike the fleeting brush before, his hand was firmly pressed against her through the thin fabric of her shirt.
“Ahhhhhh… What are you doing!”
Qin Zhen finally realized what was happening and reached for Fu Qi’s hand.
The arm around her shoulders moved around to seize her wrist. Ignoring her resistance, Fu Qi kept his other palm pressed against her heart. After feeling it for several seconds, he bent sideways and lowered his face directly onto her chest.
“Thump, thump…”
The rapid beating pounded against his eardrums, and Fu Qi could not tell whether the heartbeat belonged to him or Qin Zhen.
He carefully distinguished the sounds for a long time before finally managing to separate two heartbeats—both rapid and forceful, their rhythms slightly different, yet intertwined.
After confirming it again and again, Fu Qi slowly lifted his cheek from Qin Zhen’s chest.
He turned to look at her. After her initial shock, Qin Zhen had realized what he was doing. She sat with both hands clenched tightly in her lap. When she saw Fu Qi sit up, an expression appeared on her face in which joy, shyness, anticipation, and unease were all tangled together.
“D-did I g-get infected by you?” Qin Zhen asked nervously.
Fu Qi opened his mouth to answer, but several loud bangs came from outside as the zombies slammed into the car door.
He closed his mouth and drove on without a word.
As he drove, Qin Zhen focused on feeling her chest and listening to her heartbeat. After a while, she turned to him and said, “Sweetie, d-do I have a heartbeat now? I feel like sometimes I do, and sometimes I d-don’t.”
It wasn’t that Fu Qi didn’t want to speak. He simply couldn’t think of anything to say.
He remembered clearly that, when they had first met in that silent tomb, he had sensed nothing on Qin Zhen that belonged to a human being.
And he was certain that when a bullet had struck her in the chest last time, he had personally treated the wound. Qin Zhen hadn’t had a heartbeat then, either.
She shouldn’t have a heartbeat.
After a brief silence, Fu Qi stepped on the brakes, turned around, and pulled Qin Zhen close. He lowered his head and pressed his cheek against her again.
“Oh, my…” Qin Zhen felt embarrassed, but she didn’t push Fu Qi away. She simply stared at the head resting against her chest, her hands hovering awkwardly at her sides, unsure where to put them.
Two minutes later, Fu Qi lifted his head. With an unruffled expression, he turned back to continue driving and said, “There is a heartbeat… When did it start?”
“I don’t know,” Qin Zhen said.
She had never had a heartbeat before. The first heartbeat she remembered feeling was Fu Qi’s. After that, she’d kept thinking about it. Later, whenever Fu Qi held her, she would feel it again—thump, thump, so loud that she had never paid attention to when her own heart had begun beating.
When she first noticed it, she had assumed it was all in her head.
Qin Zhen had never suspected anything else. After all, the power of the mind was truly immense; she had nearly been scared to death by Fan Kong because of it.
Fu Qi nodded, then asked, “Did it ever happen when you were in the tomb?”
“No.” Qin Zhen was certain about that. “It never beat—beat before. Not that I remember.”
This was the first time Fu Qi had encountered a situation like this. He drove calmly for a while, mowing down several zombies, before organizing the information he had and reaching a conclusion: Qin Zhen’s heartbeat had most likely restarted after she was injured last time.
A heartbeat had too many literary meanings to consider for now. Physiologically, however, it meant that the heart had resumed pumping blood—that blood was flowing and circulating, allowing the human body to maintain its warmth and the healthy color of its skin.
Fu Qi slammed on the brakes. Before the vehicle had even come to a complete stop, he turned sideways again to check on Qin Zhen.
This time, he directly pulled down Qin Zhen’s clothes, revealing her slender, pale-blue shoulder. Qin Zhen let out an “Ah” and tried to stop him, but he caught her hand.
“Don’t move.” Fu Qi tossed her hand aside and stared at the bluish skin over her heart. It had already recovered completely, with no trace of a wound. Frowning, he reached out and gently rubbed the area with the pad of his finger.
The zombie’s body shuddered, and she leaned back slightly.
Fu Qi looked up and saw her looking bashful, as though she were embarrassed.
“What does it feel like?” he asked.
Qin Zhen’s lashes rose and fell. Like a shy young girl, she answered softly, “Warm… itchy…”
Fu Qi placed his fingertip there again and left it for a moment before saying, “Where is it warm? It still feels cold to me.”
“Your hand is warm,” Qin Zhen said. “It tickles when you touch me.”
Fu Qi fell silent.
His brain must have stopped working too. He had misunderstood what Qin Zhen meant.
But how could the heart of someone who had been dead for so long suddenly start beating again?
Regeneration.
That word flashed through Fu Qi’s mind.
If that was really what was happening, then it meant Qin Zhen’s heart had grown back after being hit by a bullet—a brand-new, healthy heart capable of beating.
Following that logic, if every other part of her body were injured, would an entirely new Qin Zhen grow in its place?
It was too strange.
And if this newly grown, beating heart were injured again, what would happen then?
Fu Qi couldn’t figure it out, nor could he do anything about the situation. He stared at Qin Zhen’s chest for a while, pulled her clothes back into place, and asked, “Was your heart ever injured when you were in the tomb?”
“I don’t know,” Qin Zhen said.
“Then how do you know you won’t die?” During the brief stop, more zombies had gathered around them, so Fu Qi could only ask while driving.
“I’ve been injured many times. I don’t remember whether my heart—heart was ever hit.”
Fu Qi said, “Think about it.”
“I can’t remember.” Qin Zhen shook her head. “I never kept track.”
Her memories were fragmented. She knew she was a zombie because she vaguely remembered how stiff her body had felt when she first awoke. She knew her name because it was carved into the coffin, right where she could see it as soon as she opened her eyes—almost as if someone had deliberately left her a reminder. And she knew she couldn’t die because she had never bothered to dodge the mechanisms in the tomb. They didn’t hurt anyway.
“My head, neck, body, arms, and legs were all shot—shot,” Qin Zhen tried to recall. After a long while, all she could remember was roughly where she had been injured. She had never noticed whether her heart had been hit.
“It probably happened,” she guessed.
Fu Qi asked, “Why didn’t you pay closer attention to the mechanisms and remember where you were injured?”
“What use would that have been?” Qin Zhen complained. “Every day was the same. It was just—just me. It was boring.”
The days in the tomb had passed in a dull, endless repetition, with no distinction between day and night. No one spoke to her. What was there to remember?
If she had really written it all down, then the day archaeologists discovered her, they would surely think its contents were even more boring than an elementary school child’s diary.
After she said this, Fu Qi fell silent. He drove at full speed, smashing every zombie that came toward them.
Beside him, Qin Zhen touched her chest and said dolefully, “Sweetie, do you think I was—was infected by you?”
“…Is having a heartbeat a good thing—or a bad thing?”
Qin Zhen muttered to herself, asking and answering her own question. “I hope it’s something good. There’s something inside me that’s… that’s beating. Fun!”
Fu Qi kept his eyes on the road without saying a word.
Qin Zhen grumbled to herself for a while, then turned to look at him. He seemed a little strange, as if he were in a bad mood, but she couldn’t figure out why.
Fu Qi had always been the one to guess her feelings. She had never been able to understand humans.
After touching her chest in fascination for a while, Qin Zhen glanced at Fu Qi again. Finally, she said, “Sweetie, help me listen. I feel like it stopped… stopped beating again.”
Fu Qi pulled over, pressed his lips together, and leaned toward her. He heard the rapid thump-thump of her heartbeat, loud as thunder.
Once he confirmed that it was still beating, he turned back and continued driving.
About fifteen minutes later, Qin Zhen called out to him again. “This time it really stopped beating!”
Fu Qi stopped the car and leaned over. The thump-thump of her heartbeat was exactly the same as before, unusually loud.
He raised his eyes to look at Qin Zhen. With a silly zombie grin, she said, “It really stopped just now. The moment you came over, it started beating again.”
Fu Qi stared at her in silence. Then, suddenly, he smiled, pulled Qin Zhen into his arms, pressed her head against his chest, and lowered his head to kiss the crown of her hair.
Qin Zhen had no idea that he was kissing her. She only felt that Fu Qi was hugging her too tightly. If she were human, she might have suffocated against his solid chest muscles.
But she wasn’t, so she happily sprawled against him, wrapping both arms around Fu Qi and running her hands over his lower back.
Then Fu Qi caught her by the wrist.
He looked down at her and said in a very low voice, “Get out of the car. Walk by yourself, all right?”
“...?” Qin Zhen’s eyes widened, and she shouted in disbelief, “I only touched you twice, and you’re kicking me out of the car?”
“Yes. Get out and leave. Find a tomb and go back underground. Never come out again.” Fu Qi gazed deeply at Qin Zhen and said softly, “All right?”
Qin Zhen thought he was acting strange. “Fine, but…”
Her tone shifted as she continued, “But first, connect me to the internet, buy me a phone and a computer, build and decorate a grand golden tomb for me, and then give me all your… your money!”
Fu Qi: “...None of that is happening.”
Qin Zhen struck him with the back of her fist. “None? Then why say it in the first… first place?”
Putting on such a gloomy act. He deserved a beating!
“...”
Fu Qi came to his senses after the punch.
He rubbed his temples, thinking that there really might be something wrong with his brain. He had clearly made so many preparations, yet he still kept assuming the worst.
There was no problem in this world that couldn’t be solved. And if there was, he could always leave this world.
—There was no need to leave just yet.
He turned around and started driving again. As the car pulled away, he heard Qin Zhen say, “You’re definitely afraid I’ll subtly… subtly influence you, and that you won’t be able to bear giving me your… your money. That’s why you want to drive me away… How much… how much money do you have?”
Fu Qi: “...”
This zombie was so annoying. He didn’t want to talk to her anymore.
He gathered his chaotic emotions and silently drove on.
Qin Zhen gave a little “hmph” and said, “Avoiding the issue won’t… won’t help…”
Then she began rapidly muttering beside him, “Your money is all mine. Your money is all mine…”
Fu Qi: “...”
All his negative emotions had vanished. Now, he only wanted to give Qin Zhen a good beating.
