Captivity

Chapter 1: Doomsday

【One】

It happened one afternoon. Wu Zhi could still clearly remember how the heat of the sun felt on his skin back then. In the distant sky loomed dark and gloomy clouds. Only the sky above the school was enveloped by sunlight.

　　 That was an overly peaceful and calm afternoon. Even the cicadas were silent, leaving the place deadly quiet.

Then, just like that, misery arrived like a bolt from the blue.

The classrooms ahead were in an uproar. Numerous students scampered out from the classrooms. Shrill, frightening screams left their mouths as they ran for their lives. Hands extended from the classroom doors, and Wu Zhi discovered in astonishment that it was a whole gang of people. At the very minimum, five or six students were squashed together at the door frame, stuck as none allowed others to shove their way out of the classroom. The expressions on every student were eminently twisted. Their pupils contracted sharply, but their eyes were opened so widely that they practically bulged out — those were faces of extreme terror.

What happened?

Wu Zhi looked towards the classroom despite himself. And so, he saw Hell — a human catastrophe.

Blood was everywhere in the classroom like a ridiculously absurd Impressionism art piece, and the countless monsters were the artists. Wu Zhi’s eyesight was good enough to see those monsters with sharp clarity: they wore the school uniform, but their bodies were already decaying. Their dark red rotting flesh was akin to soft mud, stretching down nonstop under the pull of gravity. With a final “splat”, the soft and sticky flesh hit the floor, translucent greenish yellow fluid oozing out. Wu Zhi watched it all, a strong repulsion swelling up in him.

The monsters moved slowly. Shaped like a ball of utterly disgusting rotting flesh, they inched towards the classroom door. Clumped together at the door, the students screamed in desperation, the shrillness heartlessly hammering straight into his mind like a sharp nail. Wu Zhi broke from his trance and dashed to pull them out.

The moment he extended his hand, innumerable hands grabbed him. The students were all wailing and screaming. “Help me! Help me!!”

“Make some way first! Make some way!! The ones at the back, move back a little. Free up space for the ones in front, then let them through one by one—” The hold on Wu Zhi’s hand was painful. He pushed the people that were packed together like sardines, hoping to make a gap for the people to pass.

“Back away? You fucking bastard! You want me to move back all the way to the monsters’ mouth as a sacrifice? Fuck off!” People at the back began to curse, pushing relentlessly towards the door.

“Fuck!” Wu Zhi was now pissed too. He was about to yell back when blood rained down on him, freezing him to the spot. Wu Zhi widened his eyes. Before his eyes, the girl at the very back had her head crushed by a monster’s hands. Fresh blood and cerebrospinal fluid sprayed out. Having lost half of its head, the corpse swayed and fell onto the students before it.

—Why did humans die so easily?

In that moment, that was the sole thought that remained in Wu Zhi’s mind, and he almost comically denied reality.

Weighted down by the body, a girl emitted a despairing shriek, eyes rolling back as she fainted. It drove all the students crazy, and they pushed towards the door with increased aggression. After scream after scream, a male student was trampled upon. With the freed space, the students hysterically escaped outside in fear of becoming the monsters’ food.

“Fuck!”

The escaping students knocked Wu Zhi to the floor. The fall nearly sprained his wrists. But before he could voice his discontent, a rotting stench hit his nose. Wu Zhi looked up, his entire body freezing in place. What his quivering eyes saw was not the monsters inching closer, but the female corpse that slowly got to “her” feet. “She” tilted the remaining half of “her” head, countless pustules swelling and popping on “her” originally pretty face, leaving behind only rotting dead skin. The oozing pus splashed on “her” skin, triggering a new wave of infection. Very quickly, there was no longer any difference between the female corpse and those rotting monsters.