Apocalypse Star House Hoarding-Chapter 279

Huang Yue and her husband, Zhang Dong, had come to Fran City for their honeymoon. Fran City was famous for its beautiful Fran Lake and ginkgo forests, and they had planned to stay here for three to four days. They had just arrived from another city today and were planning to find a hotel in the city for the night before renting a car to go camping at the lake the next day.
However, before they even made it to their hotel room after receiving their key card, they saw the emergency announcement on the news in the lobby.
An unknown acute infection outbreak?!
They understood each word individually, but when put together, it left them completely dumbfounded.
Stock up on a week to ten days’ worth of food and water and stay indoors as much as possible? How did things suddenly become this serious?
They hesitated for a moment in the lobby, but the hotel staff had already begun urging guests to return to their rooms and refrain from going outside for the time being. This was a small hotel with limited facilities and no room service.
They only had a small amount of snacks with them. If they were really trapped in their room for over a week, they would likely starve. As tourists, they knew that if the city’s authorities were struggling to manage the situation even for local residents, they were even less likely to care about foreign visitors like them.
They couldn’t go straight back to their room. They at least needed to stock up on some food and water first!
The two quickly discussed their options. Even though they were scared, they asked the hotel staff where the nearest supermarket was.
This wasn’t a particularly busy district, and there weren’t many pedestrians outside, but most of the people they saw were carrying large shopping bags and walking hurriedly. They knew that in a Western city like this, crime could escalate quickly at the slightest sign of unrest.
They ran down the street as discreetly and quickly as possible and found a small supermarket at the next intersection. Inside, there were already many people pushing carts, grabbing canned goods and instant food from the shelves.
The store employees had received orders from their boss to close the store, but the desperate customers refused to leave, making it impossible to shut down immediately.
Huang Yue and Zhang Dong didn’t bother grabbing a cart. They ran straight to the bottled water section and took four large 1-liter bottles, stuffing them into Zhang Dong’s backpack. Then they went to a less crowded snack aisle and grabbed long-shelf-life foods like bread, small cakes, and chocolate.
They already had some vacuum-sealed meat snacks in their bags, prepared for their camping trip. For now, they just needed enough food to maintain basic energy levels.
Since there were only two of them, they couldn’t carry too much.
Because they didn’t use a cart and moved efficiently, they quickly reached the checkout counter. Zhang Dong carried three bottles of water and the heavier food items, while Huang Yue carried the last bottle of water and lighter snacks in her backpack.
They divided their supplies like this as a precaution—if they were separated in an emergency, both of them would still have food and water.
Inside the supermarket, people were already getting into arguments over food supplies. But since Huang Yue and Zhang Dong didn’t take too much, they didn’t attract attention and managed to leave smoothly.
There were more people on the streets than before. It seemed that the emergency notice from the news had spread, and many were rushing home.
They hurried back toward the hotel. Just as they were about to cross an intersection, an ambulance came speeding down the cross street, but it was swerving dangerously.
Zhang Dong reacted quickly, grabbing Huang Yue and pulling her back just in time. The ambulance barely missed them and crashed straight into the glass wall of a restaurant at the intersection. A car approaching from the other direction couldn’t brake in time and slammed into the rear of the ambulance.
Then, a chain reaction followed—five or six more cars behind them crashed one after another.
Huang Yue trembled as she looked up from Zhang Dong’s protective embrace, staring in shock at the massive traffic accident. Their route back to the hotel was now completely blocked.
The accident caught the attention of passersby. Cars approaching from behind saw the pile-up ahead and tried to turn around, but before they could complete the turn, more cars arrived from behind, trapping them in place.
Under normal circumstances, people would stay patient, letting the turning cars leave first before taking turns to detour.
But now, everyone in Fran City had received the emergency notice. They were all desperate to pick up their families and stock up on food and water. People were frantic, and even the smallest issue could ignite a major conflict.
The cars trapped behind started honking furiously, but the ones at the front were completely stuck and unable to move.
At the crash site, small fires began sparking, and black smoke started to rise. Some injured people clutched their bleeding heads, groaning as they crawled out of their cars. Others were trapped inside with jammed doors, unable to escape.
The wreckage completely blocked the road. Huang Yue held Zhang Dong’s hand tightly as they ran around the scene, trying to find a way through—but after checking all sides, they found no gap to cross.
The hotel was just across the intersection, originally less than 100 meters away, but now it was completely inaccessible.
As the two of them discussed whether to take a detour and tried to check the map for an alternative route, a blood-covered figure crawled out from the shattered windshield of the ambulance.
His clothes were stained with blood, and his face and arms were covered in dark red, grotesque growths. A strange umbrella-like fungus had even sprouted from one of his eye sockets. He was coughing up dark-colored fluid as he staggered forward with his unfocused right eye, walking straight toward the crowd.
The pedestrians and drivers stuck in traffic were horrified by this grotesque figure. They had only received the emergency notice, and most of them hadn’t had time to check the internet for more information. They had no idea what the “acute infection outbreak” described in the notice actually looked like!
“What… what is that?!”
“Quick—call for emergency rescue!”
“The emergency lines have been busy since the accident!”
“Is he… still alive? Didn’t the announcement say not to get close?”
“Why is he coming after us…?”
Panic spread as pedestrians stumbled backward in terror. Huang Yue and Zhang Dong, who were already the closest to the accident scene, were now also the closest to this terrifying figure.
In an instant, the grotesque man suddenly began convulsing violently, spewing large amounts of dark fluid from his mouth. Everyone watching this scene had a bad feeling. People shoved each other as they tried to retreat, but some were so terrified that they were frozen in place, unable to move.
Amid the chaos, a scorching jet of fire suddenly descended from above one of the shops on the street, engulfing the coughing man in flames. Yet, he showed no sign of pain—he didn’t even scream. Still burning, he continued stumbling toward the crowd.
But the fire continued to pour down, and before he could take more than a couple of steps, he collapsed to his knees and was reduced to a charred husk.
As the flames ceased, a mist-like spray was released from above, covering the scorched remains.
The sharp scent of disinfectant filled the air, masking the previous foul stench. Huang Yue and Zhang Dong looked up and saw a slightly bulky figure standing on the rooftop of the shop.
The person carried a sprayer on each shoulder and had a large backpack strapped to their front. After securing the disinfectant sprayer back to their waist, they sprinted across the rooftop toward them and leaped down, landing right in front of them.
“Are you Huang Yue and Zhang Dong?” The figure spoke in a female voice.
She was wearing a protective suit and had a small, mask-like device covering her nose and mouth. Her cold, clear eyes gazed at them through the transparent visor of the suit.
**
On the phone screen, the two flashing red dots on the map had now turned into slowly blinking green dots, indicating that the targets were no longer in immediate danger.
This map tracking feature had appeared only after accepting the mission. It displayed her own location, the location of the mission targets, several possible routes to reach them, and, after locating them, multiple routes to the designated safe zone.
The navigation function resembled a typical smartphone GPS, continuously updating based on her movements.
Two minutes earlier, the two green dots had suddenly turned red and started flashing rapidly, signaling imminent danger. In response, she had abandoned the street route, climbed onto the rooftops, and parkoured her way across the buildings.
She had barely made it in time.
“I’m here to take you to a safe location,” she said as she pulled out a disinfectant sprayer and instructed them to close their eyes. She quickly sprayed them down, ensuring they were thoroughly decontaminated before retrieving two large rain ponchos and two N95 masks from her front backpack.
“Put these on quickly.”
The ponchos were cloak-style with hoods, large enough to cover their backpacks and protect any exposed skin. With the addition of the masks, as long as they didn’t get directly sprayed by the infected’s fluid, they would be temporarily safe.
In this situation, driving would likely result in getting stuck in traffic, making walking the more flexible option.
Although Huang Yue and Zhang Dong were confused as to why this stranger had suddenly appeared to help them, they had no other place to go—especially with infected individuals emerging. The hotel across the street was likely to be locked down soon as well.
At this moment, encountering someone who not only spoke their native language but had also saved them and correctly called out their names left them with many questions. However, with no other options, they followed without hesitation.
The designated checkpoint in the mission was four blocks away. Yu Xi slowed her pace slightly and led the two at a steady jog.
The streets were still filled with hurried civilians rushing to their destinations. When passing by a supermarket, Yu Xi paused to ask if they needed to stock up on food and water.
“Thank you, we just bought some. If we ration it, it should last a week,” Huang Yue replied, panting heavily.
Yu Xi nodded. These two mission targets didn’t talk much, simply following her lead. Even though they were exhausted, they never once asked to stop. Having already prepared food and water in advance made them surprisingly easy to manage.
She continued leading them forward, slowing her pace a little more this time.
Some districts were still relatively calm, while others were in complete chaos. One supermarket had shut down operations, with its doors and windows smashed open as desperate civilians stormed in to loot supplies.
Next door, in a restaurant, seven or eight people screamed as they rushed outside, pursued by a fungus-infected parasite host.
This one had clearly entered its mature phase and was on the verge of exploding to spread its spores.
Seeing no way to go around, Yu Xi raised her flamethrower, stepped forward, and burned it to a crisp before it could self-detonate. As usual, she thoroughly disinfected the area afterward.
Crisis averted. Some bystanders looked at her with gratitude, while others eyed her protective suit and flamethrower with greed, pulling out a handgun in an attempt to threaten her.
Yu Xi didn’t hesitate. She lunged forward and landed a kick under his jaw with half her strength, sending him flying over ten meters before slamming unconscious against a building wall.
She sprayed disinfectant over the dropped gun, picked it up, and stuffed it into her backpack before signaling Huang Yue and Zhang Dong to stay close and pick up the pace.
The two wouldn’t dare disobey, gritting their teeth as they kept running.
Over ten minutes later, they finally arrived at a restricted checkpoint. Several large, fully enclosed military transport trucks were stationed there, decontaminating and evacuating people from a nearby hotel.
Yu Xi led the two forward. “They’re tourists with no fixed residence in Fran City. They qualify for evacuation.”
This evacuation condition had appeared as a scrolling notification at the top of the map app after the red restriction markers were added.
The military had limited personnel and no resources to rescue scattered individuals, so they issued this public notice, essentially offering lone tourists a slim chance of survival.
However, in the current chaotic environment, reaching the military evacuation points was nearly impossible without proper equipment and combat skills.
The soldiers glanced at Yu Xi’s well-equipped gear, assuming she was just another overly sympathetic civilian taking it upon herself to help others. For a moment, they even felt a bit of admiration.
After verifying Huang Yue and Zhang Dong’s passports and visas, personnel arrived to disinfect them thoroughly before escorting them into one of the fully enclosed military transport trucks.
These trucks would soon be relocated, with their current route heading towards the southern outskirts of the city.
Once the handover was complete, Yu Xi’s phone displayed a notification confirming the successful completion of the rescue mission.
Inside the secured truck, Huang Yue and Zhang Dong sat tightly holding hands, only now realizing that, in their panic, they hadn’t even asked for their rescuer’s name or thanked her properly.
**
That night, after completing three rescue missions, Yu Xi found a relatively quiet district. After scouting the area, she entered the tallest building nearby.
The building was eight stories tall, a commercial office space, and most of its occupants had already left to return home.
She went straight to the rooftop, locked the emergency stairwell doors, then carefully checked her surroundings. Once she confirmed the area was safe, she pulled out the small treehouse keychain.
The artifact activated, and moments later, in the dimly lit rooftop space, a towering tree with an attached treehouse sprouted against the stairwell wall.