The hallway smelled of rot. It wasn't the stale scent of old garbage, but the sweet, cloying metallic tang of fresh blood mixed with something sulfurous.
Su Chen stood behind his security door, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He gripped the cheap fruit knife in his right hand. In his mind, he kept the connection to his [Infinite Storage] open, where four identical knives were floating in the grey void, ready to be summoned instantly.
Take a deep breath. Calm down.
He wasn't a soldier. He wasn't a martial artist. He was just an ordinary young man who had read enough survival guides to know that hesitation meant death.
Click.
He undid the lock.
Bang!
The moment the latch slid back, the door was slammed from the outside. Mr. Zhang—or the thing that wore his face—threw its entire weight against the wood.
The door swung open violently, but Su Chen had anticipated this. He had already stepped back three paces.
"Urghhh!"
The zombie stumbled into the apartment, its movements jerky and uncoordinated. Its skin was gray, covered in bursting black veins. It wore the same beige cardigan Mr. Zhang always wore, now stained dark red.
It saw Su Chen. The milky white eyes locked onto him, and it lunged.
It was fast. Much faster than a shambling corpse from a movie. It was like a rabid dog.
Su Chen didn't dodge gracefully. He panicked slightly, bracing his legs and thrusting the knife forward blindly.
Pfft!
The blade sank into the zombie's shoulder.
It felt like stabbing through wet leather and hitting hard wood. The resistance was immense. The cheap 2-yuan fruit knife wasn't designed for combat; the plastic handle immediately cracked under the force of the impact.
"Roar!"
The zombie didn't even flinch. It swiped its clawed hand at Su Chen's face.
Su Chen let go of the knife handle immediately, leaning back. The dirty fingernails missed his throat by an inch, the wind pressure stinging his skin.
If he were a normal person, he would be disarmed now.
But Su Chen's eyes narrowed.
Appeared.
In the fraction of a second it took for him to lean back, his empty right hand grasped the air.
Flash.
A second fruit knife materialized instantly in his grip.
"Die!"
He didn't aim for the body this time. He drove the second knife downward, straight into the top of the zombie's skull as it overextended.
Crack!
The blade hit the skull and snapped in half. The metal quality was too poor!
The zombie shrieked, grabbing Su Chen's arm with a grip like an iron pincer. A searing pain shot through Su Chen's wrist.
It's too strong. My Strength is 7. It must be at least 12.
Su Chen gritted his teeth, suppressing the urge to scream. He didn't try to pull his arm away. Instead, he opened his left hand.
Knife 3.
Stab! Into the eye socket.
Knife 4.
Stab! Into the throat.
Knife 5.
Stab! Into the ear.
He didn't stop. He didn't conserve ammo. He turned his arm into a sewing machine of death. The moment a knife dulled or broke, he dropped it and summoned a new one from the copy he had made earlier.
In three seconds, he stabbed the zombie twelve times.
The creature's grip finally slackened. The feral light in its white eyes faded, and it collapsed forward, sliding off Su Chen's body like a sack of wet cement.
Haa... haa... haa...
Su Chen stumbled back, crashing into his shoe rack. His chest heaved violently. His wrist was bruised purple where the zombie had grabbed him, but luckily, the skin wasn't broken. No infection.
[Target Neutralized.]
[Kill Count: 1]
[Experience Gained: 10]
A warm current flowed through his body, alleviating the fatigue slightly.
[System Notice: "Dimensional Travel" Function Unlocked.]
[System Notice: "Status View" Function Upgraded.]
Su Chen didn't check the notifications immediately. He stood there for a full minute, staring at the corpse of the neighbor he had known for two years.
"Sorry, Mr. Zhang," he whispered, his voice trembling. "But it was you or me."
He forced himself to move. He walked over to the corpse. The floor was covered in black blood and broken knife handles.
"Clean up. Analyze. Loot."
He touched the broken knife handles on the floor.
Store.
They vanished. Even scrap metal might be useful later. Or he could copy the scrap metal to build barricades. Nothing was wasted.
Then, he placed his hand on the zombie's head.
[Target: Infected Human (Corpse)]
[Source: Earth (Mutated)]
[Copyable Attributes Detected:]
Virus Immunity (0.1%) - Requires 1000 copies to form a complete antibody.
Basic Strength (White) - Can improve Strength by 0.1.
Rigor (Passive) - Reduces pain sensitivity.
Su Chen's eyes lit up. "I can copy stats directly?"
He focused on [Basic Strength].
Copy.
A cool sensation rushed from his palm into his arm.
[Strength: 7 -> 7.1]
"It works," Su Chen breathed out. "But... the corpse didn't disappear."
The copying process didn't consume the target. It just copied the 'concept' of the attribute. However, the System greyed out the [Basic Strength] option on Mr. Zhang's corpse. He couldn't copy the same stat from the same source twice to stack it infinitely. He needed new targets.
"Wait," Su Chen looked at the corpse. "The corpse itself is an object."
Copy.
Buzz.
Inside his [Infinite Storage], a perfect replica of Mr. Zhang's corpse appeared, floating next to the water bottles.
Su Chen felt a sharp drain on his mental energy. Copying a complex organic structure (even a dead one) took much more energy than a bottle of water.
"Why did I do that?" Su Chen rubbed his forehead. "Habit. Never mind. Maybe I can use the corpse as bait for other monsters later."
He dragged the real corpse out into the hallway. He didn't dare go further out yet. He peered left and right. The hallway was long, stretching into darkness. The emergency lights flickered. He could hear scratching sounds from other doors.
Close the door. Lock it.
He retreated into his apartment, engaging the deadbolt and pushing the heavy shoe rack in front of the door.
Only then did he collapse onto the sofa.
He was hungry again. The burst of adrenaline had burned through his energy.
He pulled out a bottle of water and a packet of biscuits from his space. He ate mechanically, his eyes fixed on the blue holographic panel in front of him.
"Show me the Travel function."
[Dimensional Travel]
[Current Energy: 100/100 (Recovers 10 per hour)]
[Available Coordinates:]
The list was vast. It looked like a starry sky, with millions of dim lights. But only three lights were bright enough to be selected.
The System seemed to filter worlds that he could currently survive in.
1. [World: High School of the Dead]
Type: Low-Level Apocalypse / Modern Era.
Danger Level: 1 Star.
Resources: Firearms, Ammunition, Basic Gold, Japanese Steel.
Time Ratio: 1:10 (1 Day Earth = 10 Days World).
2. [World: Demon Slayer (Kimetsu no Yaiba)]
Type: Low-Level Supernatural / Taisho Era.
Danger Level: 2 Stars.
Resources: Breathing Techniques, Special Ore (Scarlet Iron), Medicinal Herbs.
Time Ratio: 1:30.
3. [World: A Quiet Place]
Type: Alien Invasion.
Danger Level: 4 Stars.
Resources: Advanced Alien Biology.
Recommendation: Host will die instantly. Do not enter.
Su Chen ignored the third option.
He looked at the first two.
"High School of the Dead... Guns. Food. Safe houses."
"Demon Slayer... Personal power. Breathing techniques to improve physical limits."
His eyes shifted to the broken fruit knives on his status screen.
"My strength is 7.1. Even with a gun, if I run out of bullets or face a creature immune to bullets, I'm dead. I need to strengthen myself."
He looked at the [Demon Slayer] option.
"Breathing Styles. They enhance the heart rate and oxygen flow to boost physical capabilities to superhuman levels. It's exactly what I need to survive the early stages on Earth."
But he couldn't go yet.
"I look like a civilian," Su Chen muttered, looking at his pajamas. "If I appear in the Taisho era, I'll stand out. I need a disguise. And I need a weapon that doesn't break after two hits."
He stood up and walked to the kitchen again. He remembered he had a heavy iron frying pan and a roll of duct tape.
"I'll tape magazines around my arms as makeshift armor. I'll bring the frying pan. And... I need gold."
He went to his bedroom drawer. He found his mother's old gold ring. A small, simple band.
Copy.
Two rings.
Copy.
Four rings.
He spent ten minutes creating a small pouch of gold rings. In the Taisho era, paper money would be useless, but gold was universal currency.
"Food, water, gold, weapon, armor."
Su Chen stood in the center of his living room. He looked at the swirling portal icon on his screen.
"System, initiate travel to [Demon Slayer]. Coordinate: Sagiri Mountain."
[Confirming Coordinates...]
[Warning: Host cannot bring living matter back from the target world until System Level 2.]
[Transport in 3... 2... 1...]
The space in his living room twisted. A vortex of white light swallowed him whole.
The apartment was empty. On the table, a single copied water bottle remained, trembling slightly from the aftershocks of the teleportation.