Surviving the apocalypse with a wife and a system! [GL]

Chapter 223: Build Up.

Yan Cijin stared down at the figure in the courtyard a little longer. Bai Li had just finished off another zombie with a neat downward slash and was already stepping toward the next one as if the fight had no end. The realization became even clearer with every movement.

And once Yan Cijin understood that, the rest of Bai Li’s strange behavior made perfect sense. It explained why she kept pushing farther out instead of retreating. It explained why she treated each zombie as a target worth taking down carefully. It explained why the courtyard was turning into a graveyard so fast while Bai Li still looked like she had room to keep going. Her speed, her accuracy, and even her lack of fatigue all pointed in the same direction. She was not wasting energy for nothing. She was turning danger into advantage, one corpse at a time.

She knit her brows together and leaned lightly against the balcony railing, letting her eyes stay fixed on the scene below while her mind kept turning over the same problem again and again. The wind moved across the balcony, brushed against her sleeves, and carried up the faint chaos from downstairs, but Yan Cijin barely noticed any of it. Her focus was locked on the thought that had been sitting in her mind ever since the apocalypse first started to change everything. From her previous lives, she knew very clearly that collecting cores was important. Not just important in some casual, passing way, but important in the kind of way that could decide whether a person lived or died in the future. For most people who survived until the later stages of the apocalypse, the cores were even more valuable than their own lives. Of course, that was especially true for the higher level ones. As for the low level cores, they eventually replaced money all over the world and became the only universal currency in this new world. It was strange to think about, but that was how things worked now. A thing that used to come from monsters and corpses would one day become the most normal and most precious thing in daily life. That kind of change sounded ridiculous before the apocalypse, but now it was just reality.

Even though she herself did not need crystal cores the way everyone else did, Bai Li needed them. That much was obvious. Yan Cijin thought it over seriously for a second. In fact, a part of her even considered just going out and hunting down a few thousand zombies herself, then bringing the cores back to Bai Li so Bai Li would not have to keep fighting all the time and could stay safe away from the battlefield. That would have been the easiest and most direct way to protect her. If she really wanted to, she absolutely had the ability to do it. But after only a brief glance at Bai Li, she could already see that this kind of thinking was probably not going to work. Bai Li was not the type of person who would happily stay hidden behind others. She had the spirit of a true fighter. She had the look of a warrior who wanted to fight, the kind of person who enjoyed the act of fighting itself. She was not just enduring the battle because she had no other choice. She was actually moving through it with a strange kind of energy, almost as if the more dangerous the situation became, the more alive she felt. That kind of person was impossible to force into a safe little corner and keep there forever. If Yan Cijin tried to do that, Bai Li would probably be unhappy, and maybe even feel trapped. So after thinking for a moment, Yan Cijin could only let out a quiet sigh and keep watching from above.

At the same time, no one else knew that there was already a faint blue light glowing at the tips of her fingers. It was not bright enough to be immediately obvious from a distance, and because she was standing a little back from the edge, most people would not have noticed it at all. But the thin strands of light had never disappeared. They kept dangling between her fingers like little threads of electricity or some kind of magical force waiting to be released. She was ready. Completely ready. The moment Bai Li came anywhere close to life threatening danger, she would launch an attack without hesitation. There was no need for anyone to tell her to do it. There was no need for any second thought or hesitation. She had already made up her mind that no matter what happened below, she would not let Bai Li die here. Bai Li herself had no idea she was being protected in this way. She was completely unaware of the blue light gathering at Yan Cijin’s fingertips or the way Yan Cijin’s attention had become razor sharp, as if she were waiting for a single wrong move so she could respond instantly. Bai Li just kept moving through the battlefield, killing more and more zombies with steady hands and a fierce expression.

Right at that moment, a little girl came rushing out onto the balcony.

Lili was small and soft and full of the kind of childlike energy that could turn any tense moment into something lighter in just a second. She ran straight to Yan Cijin with her little feet pattering against the floor and then rubbed her head affectionately against Yan Cijin’s leg. Her big eyes were wide and innocent as she looked up, trying her best to act cute in that natural child way that little girls sometimes did without even realizing how effective it was. Her voice was sweet and clear when she asked, "Mommy, what are you looking at down there? It looks interesting. I want to see what is happening too!"

The moment Yan Cijin heard that, her whole body stiffened slightly.

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TO BE CONTINUED.