Apocalypse Star House Hoarding-Chapter 44

On the TV screen, Liancheng morning news was broadcasting last night’s threat and riot incident. The scene was chaotic with many people present, and the arriving ers couldn’t get too close. In the footage, three or four people were acting crazed, yelling and cursing at a window of a house while holding threatening objects.
One of them suddenly threw what they were holding at the house, which hit the outer wall and exploded in a bright flash. The person filming flinched, and someone nearby exclaimed, calling them crazy and noting that it was really a Molotov cocktail.
The scene was utter chaos. Despite the danger, the attackers showed no fear, even throwing multiple Molotov cocktails at the police. Many people were affected, and eventually, the police had to deploy armed forces to subdue them with force.
Yu Xi watched the footage of one of the subdued attackers. Their eyes were unnaturally red, and despite being restrained, their face was twisted with hatred, showing no sign of fear or remorse.
She furrowed her brow slightly.
Liancheng is not a coastal city, confirming her suspicion that a global-scale apocalyptic disaster wouldn’t only pose a latent threat in one city. No matter where she went, it would be the same—she might be lucky enough to find a city with a slightly better situation, but she could just as easily end up in a worse one.
Yu Xi turned her head to the computer screen, which was paused on a photo she had found over an hour ago. It was a picture taken during a revisit to the construction site where the workers had fought. Due to the angle, part of the mountain in the background was also visible.
A small path hidden among the trees at the mountain’s base was partially revealed. The path led up towards the mountain, and at its entrance, there was a small green sign with a drainage symbol and the number of the drainage outlet.
The photo wasn’t very large, and the sign was hard to notice among the foliage. Most people wouldn’t pay attention to it even if they saw the picture.
Fragmented and seemingly unrelated pieces of information were coming together.
The old and neglected mountain drainage system was actually behind the coastal construction site, with a path leading up directly to it.
The text record from the interview mentioned that the construction workers often used that hidden uphill path to gamble during their breaks. These were normally easy-going and friendly people, so it was puzzling why they suddenly fought so fiercely.
Yu Xi deduced that the workers might have entered the drainage system at some point, possibly encountering the same situation as in the underwater tunnel.
Unlike a metro tunnel, news of an incident in a drainage system wouldn’t spread immediately. Thus, when the organization sent people to investigate and obscure the incident, they didn’t consider that the black insects had already spread.
The construction workers’ sudden erratic behavior, the emotional breakdown of the girl with the tide-like smell, and the similar violent incident in Liancheng all happened around the same time.
And then there were the disturbances and arguments she heard yesterday…
Does this mean they have all been parasitized by the black worms?
Normal people suddenly losing control over minor issues, with the angry part of their emotions magnified, losing their restraint and rationality, becoming extremely combative, and needing external force (like a stun baton) to be forcibly calmed down.
Simply put, the human part is weakened, while the primal, animalistic part is strengthened.
This should be the negative effect brought about by the black worms parasitizing the human body. By comparing the times in the two news s and the timeline of the girl’s injury and emotional breakdown, it can be roughly judged that the incubation period is about three days.
Some people do have parasites in their bodies, mostly due to poor dietary hygiene, and these usually enter through the mouth or nose.
The thought of these blood-seeking worms that can enter the human body and alter emotions is enough to make one’s skin crawl.
She estimated that this was just the initial change, and it was still unclear whether the condition would worsen or if there would be other changes later.
From the police’s attitude and actions just now, it was evident that the higher authorities in Hai Ru City had long known about and dealt with this matter, but had temporarily sealed off all information to prevent panic or for other reasons.
So, the problematic areas in Hai Ru City are not just the underwater tunnel but also the mountain drainage system, and perhaps more. Other cities are likely the same—nowhere is safe.
Yu Xi checked the time. There were still six hours left until the end of the peace period.
If things were already like this during the peace period, what would happen when it ended?
Would the people in Hai Ru City who were already parasitized but still in the incubation period suddenly erupt?
The blood-seeking nature of the black worms is what makes them terrifying, but it also limits their parasitic conditions. Only people who have both the black worms (or their eggs) on their bodies and an open, bleeding wound can be parasitized.
So the number of such people shouldn’t be too high, but even a simultaneous outbreak among them would be enough to cause panic.
However… it still doesn’t seem to reach the difficulty level of an intermediate world.
At this moment, Yu Xi had no idea that this disaster would roar to life in a completely unexpected way.
**
Today was an overcast day, with dark gray clouds hanging low over Hai Ru City, creating a heavy, oppressive atmosphere.
The temperature had dropped from 15-16 degrees Celsius yesterday to 7-8 degrees today, and it seemed like a heavy rain was coming.
By noon, the rain hadn’t arrived, but the wind had.
The strong wind made it hard for people to open their eyes, and pedestrians on the streets were shivering from the cold. Some couldn’t bear it anymore and hurriedly walked into a small coffee shop to escape the wind.
But just as one person opened the door of the coffee shop, they suddenly fell to the ground with a thud.
A server in the coffee shop saw this scene and ran out, confused, to help the person up.
However, when he turned the person’s head, he saw their face covered in blood, with their forehead smashed by something, and blood still gushing out.
The server was scared and momentarily stunned. He noticed something beside the person and reached out to pick up an egg-sized object, only to find that it was a cold, hard hailstone!
Hailstone!?
He looked up in fear, just in time to see a hailstone even larger than the one in his hand coming straight down at him.
With a thud, the server fell without even a scream, blood flowing from his face onto the street, mingling with the continuously falling hailstones…
The same thing happened in every corner of Hai Ru City.
During lunchtime, despite the windy weather, there were still many people outdoors. Office workers going to eat near their company, students rushing from their classrooms to the cafeteria, elementary school kids being picked up by their grandparents for lunch, and workers looking for a place to sit during their break…
When the first hailstone fell at their feet, almost no one reacted.
Is this… a glass bead?
Hai Ru City, with its mild climate, often experienced rain and typhoons but had never seen snow or hail, let alone such large hailstones.
“Hail?” A boy picked up a hailstone the size of a glass bead, playing with it in his fingers, “Wow, this is so big and cold—”
However, when he looked up to show it to his friend, he found his friend staring at him with blood streaming down his face before silently collapsing to the ground.
“Help, help, help—” the boy stammered in panic, but as he looked around, he was horrified to see people being struck by hailstones, some able to scream and run, others falling silent as they collapsed.
He barely managed to move his trembling legs, scrambling to the nearest stairwell, shivering as he watched the scene unfold, feeling like he was in a nightmare.
Many of the hailstones on the ground were submerged in blood, and the thick smell of blood filled the air. This intense scent, so close, awakened certain creatures from their dormant state…
In the internet café’s private room, Yu Xi had just finished lunch.
Before lunch, she used the 【Instant Cleanser】 again to see if, without any wounds and sharing a room with the girl, the black worms would spread out.
Fortunately, there were no abnormalities after using it, further confirming the blood-seeking nature of the black worms.
After lunch, she noticed the temperature drop. Though she didn’t feel very cold due to her enhanced physique, she was considering whether to take out a lightweight short down jacket from the Star House storage when she suddenly heard a faint tapping sound on the glass window.
She turned to look at the window. The two sliding glass windows in the private room were tightly closed, and the blinds were drawn. The desk lamp on the computer table was on because of the dim light.
Her first thought was that the people looking for her had found her.
But she quickly shook her head. If they had found her, they would have already broken down the door, not thrown stones at the glass window of her room.
“Smack!” Another clear sound hit the glass window, followed by a rapid series of taps, like countless small stones being thrown at the window simultaneously.
Yu Xi walked to the window and lifted the blinds cautiously. To avoid being seen, she stood against the wall next to the window instead of directly in front of the glass.
Outside the glass was a gloomy sky, with transparent beads of varying sizes occasionally hitting the window and making clear sounds.
Hail?
Just as the thought crossed Yu Xi’s mind, she heard a heavy thud, and the glass in front of her shattered with a large hole, as a tennis ball-sized hailstone crashed into the room and rolled on the floor.
She stared at the hailstone, eyes wide in shock, feeling a surge of fear. If she hadn’t been cautious and stood to the side of the wall, she would have been struck by the hailstone.
The acceleration due to gravity alone would be enough to cause internal injuries if she were hit by this hailstone!
She immediately looked down at the street, and as expected, there was chaos with people scattering in all directions.
Panic breeds confusion. Some people, in their haste, sought shelter under the fabric awnings of street shops, only to be struck down by hailstones that pierced through the awnings within moments. Others collided and fell together, one of them getting struck in the eye by a hailstone, blood pouring from the wound. Writhing in pain, his limbs convulsed, while those around him screamed in horror, too terrified to stand up, instead crawling and rolling away in a desperate, clumsy attempt to escape.
Some, protecting their children, cleverly took refuge under parked cars on the roadside, avoiding harm. Many others managed to seek shelter inside buildings, shivering and watching the continuous hailstorm outside, grateful to have survived.
However, they did not realize that this was only the beginning.
Years later, people would recall this hailstorm as the starting point of the apocalypse.
At the same time on this day, several coastal cities in the country experienced the same massive hailstorm, resulting in fatalities and numerous injuries. The hailstorm lasted from twenty minutes to almost an hour in different places, destroying countless houses, cars, and farmlands.
Hospitals were soon overwhelmed with the cries and moans of the injured, city traffic came to a near standstill, and the sounds of police cars, fire engines, and ambulances filled the air for an entire day and night.
Television news, radio broadcasts, and internet webpages were flooded with s on the giant hailstorm. Cities unaffected by the disaster quickly mobilized resources and personnel to aid those hit by the hailstorm, with news anchors everywhere delivering encouraging words with vigor and confidence, urging the public to unite and overcome the disaster together.
But no one knew that amidst all this, mutations were silently occurring everywhere.
Returning to the present noon.
Yu Xi watched the hailstorm outside with a mix of suspicion and uncertainty, when suddenly she smelled that familiar briny scent.
She quickly turned to look at the hailstone that had fallen onto the private room’s floor. Due to the higher indoor temperature, the hailstone had already started to melt on the dry floor.
The briny smell was emanating from the melting hailstone.
She took out rubber gloves from the Star House storage and, after putting them on, picked up the hailstone. With a flashlight and her enhanced vision, she could clearly see tiny black specks in the melting water of the hailstone. Some of these specks dripped onto the floor, while others landed on her rubber gloves.
She gasped.
These were… eggs?!
This wasn’t ordinary hail; it was hail filled with insect eggs!
The briny smell grew stronger as the black specks began to move, gradually elongating into thin, thread-like shapes.
The black worms had hatched!
As more and more of them emerged, they began to intertwine and wriggle together like a tangled mass of hair. Despite their minuscule size, making it nearly impossible to distinguish head from tail with the naked eye, the sight was nauseating.
Yu Xi dropped the hailstone, took off the contaminated rubber gloves, and incinerated everything with the 【High-Temperature Perfume】, reducing the insect eggs and worms to ashes.
Outside, the hail continued to fall, and two more larger hailstones shattered the glass and fell into the private room.
Yu Xi quickly melted and burned these hailstones as well, but she knew that no matter how much 【High-Temperature Perfume】 she had, it would be impossible to incinerate all the insect eggs.
With this hailstorm, the black worms would be everywhere.
This world’s apocalypse had begun in such a terrifying and bloody manner.