Chapter 42: Probing Device
They were trapped within this game without any idea of when a rescue would arrive. If they were too weak, they wouldn’t be able to protect themselves. They couldn’t wait for another encounter with a strong player like Liu Gan to continue protecting them, so they had to become stronger themselves. Just as Liu Gan had said, they had to strengthen their bodies both physically and mentally. This way they wouldn’t be parasites that had to leech off of others to survive.
“You and me together? How will that work?” Pan Hua wasn’t too convinced. Since LuLu was lacking courage, she would definitely freeze in place if she saw a zombie. By that time, if he had to deal with his own zombie, he wouldn’t even be able to rescue her.
“I think I need to build up my courage slowly…” LuLu frowned as she replied to Pan Hua. She witnessed ZhangYu die horribly and was scolded by Liu Gan. This was especially traumatizing for her. She knew that she couldn’t push her luck by not fighting; otherwise, her ending could be worse than ZhangYu’s.
“I guess—if the situation turns bad, then run and keep running. Don’t worry about me and run as far as you can; I will find a way to escape.” Pan Hua finally agreed to LuLu tagging along.
Honestly, when LuLu brought up the idea of killing zombies together, he was very happy. Being able to kill zombies with his idol was like a dream come true to otakus like him. It was everything he could ask for, but in reality this dream was nothing amazing. Nothing in dreams occur as planned.
If it was just pressing a few buttons in game to massacre zombies, then that would be best. But now, it naturally meant walking up to a rotten corpse to kill it. There would also be a stench of rotten flesh and blood—definitely, not romantic at all.
After traveling down together, they surveyed the surroundings before going any further. If they found an injured, limbless, or solitary zombie, they would use it for practice or a warmup. Maybe that would be enough for them to level up.
“I have survived through a couple zombie games as a female broadcaster, so I can’t let my fans look down on me!” LuLu picked up the machete and swung it a few times to regain some of her lost courage.
“Okay, good! If we encounter a zombie, I will go up front to distract it, and you will find the chance to kill it at the neck! Try your best to hack at it!” Pan Hua replied to LuLu, clenching his own iron rod. He felt brave.
No matter what, he wouldn’t let his female idol be too disappointed in him.
With Pan Hua in front and LuLu following behind, both of them departed through the doorway. They carefully looked and walked around the Lucky Garden District . Since this district was newly built, there hadn’t been many people moving into the area before the outbreak. Previously, because the local survivors and Liu Gan had cleared the remaining zombies, it made it difficult to find a living zombie in this area.
First, Pan Hua searched through a few houses, confirming that the inside of the building was safe. They only found fallen zombies but were unsuccessful in finding anything else.
Catastrophe struck only a few days ago, but the local survivors had been very thorough with their plunder. Also, several hundred thousand players descended upon The Trembling World the day before yesterday. Assuming that players were transferred into this small residential district, they would’ve already looted this area. Finding anymore resources or food in this district would be even more difficult.
But after experiencing this detailed search and investigation, both players gained newfound courage. They wouldn’t tremble in fear like before.
“Fatty, what do you see there?” LuLu asked while standing on the balcony of one of the households and lifting up her finger to point in the direction of the residential plaza center.
This particular household had a full view of the plaza center, so everything that occurred on the plaza could be seen clearly.
Lucky Garden District had a dozen residential buildings, and the residential plaza was right at its center. Pan Hua made his way onto the balcony to see where LuLu was pointing. They saw a black misty orb at the center of the plaza. Then, the black orb dissipated as quickly as it had appeared, but a person was now lying down on the floor in place of the black orb.
“No way, is it another player that got transferred here?” LuLu was surprised as she asked Pan Hua. She remembered the moment when they had entered; it was the exact same scene when all 7 or 8 of them were lying down on the rooftop.
“No, he’s not a player. He’s a San Xing Corporation worker!” Pan Hua saw that the male lying down on the ground had the exact same San Xing Corporation uniform and its distinct three circle logo.
Pan Hua participated in the San Xing Corporation hosted event that announced the game. So he was very familiar with their work uniform, and from his angle, it was the same uniform distributed within San Xing Corporation.
“That is awesome! Finally there will be someone to rescue us! We should hurry and go down!” LuLu encouraged Pan Hua.
“Yes, we should hurry and ask him what is going on around here. Maybe he will have a way to help us escape back to the real world!” Pan Hua was also excited just thinking about this idea. Quickly, they both left the room and headed downstairs toward the center of the residential plaza.
At the center of the residential plaza, the male person had woken up. He was just sitting on the floor and looking around at his surroundings. He saw LuLu wielding the machete and Pan Hua charging at him with his iron rod, frightening him. Quickly, the male took off his backpack. From it, he pulled out a ten inch PDA and a trumpet-like device that could attach to the PDA, and he aimed it towards Pan Hua and LuLu.
[TN: It’s not a laptop, and it isn’t an touch pad so closest was PDA, personal digital assistant]“We are players! We don’t mean you any harm!” Pan Hua saw the odd movement of the guy, so he quickly dropped his iron rod onto the ground. LuLu copied Pan Hua and laid her machete onto the floor; both were several meters away from the guy.
The male used the trumpet-like instrument to probe the location of Pan Hua and LuLu to initiate a deep examination. After discovering that Pan Hua and LuLu both had dropped their weapons and had no ill intentions, he relaxed, moved his hand away from the PDA, and put back the probing installation.
“How are you? Are you San Xing Corporation’s worker?” Pan Hua asked. Seeing that the man had put back the weird instrument, he walked up to greet him.
“Yes, are you guys the players from the day before yesterday?” The man replied to Pan Hua and LuLu. His hand was still on the PDA, but the machine didn’t turn off. It was still on, and it seemed like it was gathering information.
“Yes, my surname is Pan, as in Pan Hua. She is LuLu. You are…” Pan Hua got excited since he heard the guy confirm that he is worker from San Xing Corporation. Furthermore, as a worker from San Xing Corporation, he must have known that they had been trapped here since the day before yesterday. This could very well be the rescue they had been waiting for.
“My surname is Jiang. Call me Jiang JinYuan.” The male introduced himself to Pan Hua and LuLu.
[TN: Well sh*t. New characters. He better stay alive to be relevant. By the way, I like to stick names into two words instead of having three words.]