“Hey, wake up.”
In the haze between sleep and wakefulness, Shiya only felt someone calling her.
Lifting her heavy eyelids, she discovered that, at some point, the group of survivors had all gathered around her.
Scanning their unfriendly expressions, she didn’t respond immediately.
Instead, she reached up to touch her own forehead.
So hot.
I must have a fever, probably from an infected wound.
It was indeed due to her less-than-proficient bandaging skills.
“Hey, I’m talking to you! Why are you spacing out?”
Toby, who was implicitly regarded as the leader by the survivors, slammed his wooden club hard against the tiled floor beside her.
Seeing her weak state, he lost patience and spoke directly:
“After discussion among everyone, we can’t just sit here waiting to die. We must find a way out.”
Shiya squinted, looking as if she might fall back asleep at any moment.
Still, she managed to reply, “That’s too risky. We don’t know how many monsters are outside. We should hide here and wait for Leonora to return.”
“Enough nonsense. The minority obeys the majority. Now, we’re going to draw lots to decide who scouts ahead.”
Toby waved his hand arrogantly, a stark contrast to how respectful and obedient he had been in front of Leonora just moments ago, acting like a servant.
Immediately after, he produced a pen holder filled with pens, shook it in front of her, and then passed it to each survivor in turn.
One by one, the survivors excitedly and quickly drew pens.
Remarkably, their luck was exceptionally good—not a single one drew the bad lot to be chosen as the sacrificial scout.
Round after round passed until finally, the pen holder was presented to her.
Toby snatched away one of the only two remaining pens first.
In his hand was clearly a good lot, and his face wore a look of schadenfreude.
“Your turn. This is the fairest way.”
Shiya didn’t move.
Instead, she stated in a very calm tone, “None of us can fight the monsters, so I won’t go with you.”
It went without saying that the pen holder, used as the drawing tool, had been rigged.
She didn’t even bother guessing how they had done it.
But just as expected, these people had no intention of letting her off.
Toby instantly flew into a rage and hurled the last remaining uncapped ballpoint pen from the holder directly at her face.
“Do you just refuse to sacrifice for everyone because you know you drew the bad lot?”
Someone behind him chimed in, “It’s your fault that we were abandoned by that young lady from the duke’s family. Shouldn’t you do something now to make it up to us?”
As the crowd grew increasingly agitated, some emotionally charged survivors rushed forward, grabbing her arms and shoving her ahead.
Toby simply stood in the middle of the crowd, hands in his pockets, watching this fine spectacle unfold.
The emergency lights in the corridor were dimmer than ever before.
The windowsills were sealed shut with black sludge, making it impossible to tell if it was day or night.
The doors to the examination rooms on either side were half-open, but nothing was visible in the darkness.
A cold gust of wind from somewhere swept through, and with a bang, a door slammed shut, making everyone’s hearts jump.
Shiya walked down this corridor wrapped in heavy oppression, practically stopping for four or five seconds after every step forward.
The group huddled together far behind her began to grow impatient.
“Walk faster! If a monster finds us and chases us, we’re all done for.”
She pricked up her ears, carefully listening for any signs of danger around her, while glancing back at the group.
“I’m checking if any monsters are hiding in these surrounding areas.”
Toby stepped out from the crowd and berated her, “Don’t get any funny ideas. You just need to keep moving forward and find the exit.”
Shiya didn’t argue.
She stood still for a long moment before, as everyone wished, quickening her pace, almost breaking into the fastest jog of her life.
But her direction wasn’t toward the unknown territory ahead.
Instead, she turned back toward the crowd.
“You damn woman, you’re looking for death!” Toby was almost beside himself with rage.
In his view, Shiya was directly challenging his authority as the leader.
But in the moment they passed each other, Shiya still managed to warn them:
“A monster is about to come out.”
This wasn’t out of kindness.
She was afraid these utterly terrible people would misjudge the situation and try to stop her.
Toby instantly felt as if a bucket of cold water had been dumped on him, sending a shiver down his spine.
A monster’s claws were far harder than his authority.
Without bothering to direct the panicking survivors, he immediately followed Shiya, ducking into a clean examination room free of monsters.
And after Toby made the wisest decision of his life, the door at the end of the corridor was suddenly pushed open.
Over a dozen doctors and nurses filed out in a hurry.
Judging by their rushed demeanor, they were either on rounds or heading to perform major surgery.
If one could ignore the layer of constantly wriggling, flowing black sludge covering their skin, their pale lips, and their eyes, one might have been more appreciative of their medical dedication.
Soon, the unlucky ones who remained outside in the corridor received the “meticulous care” of these medical staff.
Toby pressed his full weight against the examination room door.
The two survivors who had been obedient to him just moments ago were now desperately pounding on it.
“Mr. Toby, let me in! Those monsters are coming!”
“Ahhh! Don’t kill me! I know who all hid in the rooms!”
But before long, these pitiful pleas faded away into the distance, accompanied by the sound of something being dragged along the floor.
Faintly, the sounds of breaking bones and the roar of a chainsaw could be heard.
However, that had nothing to do with the silence inside this examination room.
Shiya, also using half her body to brace against the door, was quite satisfied with Toby’s compliance this time.
Seeing Toby about to open the door, she stopped him directly.
“Wait another half hour.”
Toby, his back still covered in cold sweat, nodded obediently, not daring to utter a single word of refusal.
Only when the voices of survivors talking could be heard from outside did the two of them finally let out a long sigh of relief.
“Mr. Toby, there are only a few of us left now. Some who hid in other examination rooms never came out, and no one dares to knock on their doors.”
Outside in the corridor, a white-haired survivor finished his report.
Seeing Toby’s face twitch and darken for a moment, he continued:
“Maybe we should listen to that girl and hide back in the main hall first.”
“You old fool! We lost so many people getting here, and now you want to retreat? Besides, if we hide in the main hall, won’t those monsters just follow us?”
A hot-tempered survivor immediately started cursing after hearing this.
Toby was very pleased that this male survivor had voiced what he himself didn’t want to say outright.
He shot a glare at Shiya, who had been silently observing with a cold expression the whole time.
Finally, a female survivor beside him spoke up.
“Everyone, I just peeked and saw those monsters heading somewhere else. Maybe we can go check that place now.”
The female survivor pointed toward the end of the corridor, at the room marked ‘Dean’s Office.’
The hot-tempered survivor clapped his hands.
“Right! I’ve heard in taverns that these wealthy big shots usually build secret passages for their own comings and goings.”
“In that case, let’s go explore inside.”
As the leader, Toby nodded, naturally passing judgment.
Then, they all turned their gazes toward Shiya.
The meaning was clear.
They still wanted her to be the vanguard, the sacrificial pawn.
Shiya took a step back, frowning as she stared at Toby.
“If I hadn’t warned you earlier, how could any of you have survived?”
Again, the hot-tempered survivor spoke up first.
“What does that have to do with you? It was everyone’s sacrifice buying us time that gave us a chance to live.”
“Enough. If you hadn’t driven away the young lady from the duke’s family, none of us would have been hurt or killed.”
Toby waved his hand impatiently, then gestured with his chin for the hot-tempered survivor to produce a club wrapped with nails at the head.
This thing was completely useless against the sludge monsters, but it was more than enough to deal with a young girl like Shiya.
Though reluctant to admit it, Shiya could see that Toby still held deep hostility toward her, his savior, and wanted to push her toward certain death.
It was somewhat absurd and ridiculous.
And so, with everyone chiming in, they “persuaded” Shiya all the way to the door of the Dean’s Office.
Her hand rested on the doorknob.
She was still thinking about how to escape at this moment.
The hot-tempered survivor, however, threateningly swung the nail-wrapped club.
“Hurry up. You don’t want a few bloody holes in your face, do you?”
Shiya had no choice.
She slowly, bit by bit, turned the doorknob and pushed the door open a crack.
Seeing Shiya enter, Toby slammed the door shut with a thud.
Immediately, several survivors whooshed into hiding behind nearby cover.
A long time passed with no movement from inside the Dean’s Office.
Toby grew restless and called out, “Hey! What’s the situation in there?”
A muffled voice from inside the Dean’s Office replied:
“It’s safe. And there’s food here too.”
Hearing this, the few people present couldn’t sit still.
After all the running, everyone’s stomachs were already growling with hunger.
“You bitch, trying to hog all the food for yourself!”
Toby gritted his teeth, charging ahead and barging through the Dean’s Office door.
What he saw then was not the aroma of fresh bread.
A centipede large enough to blot out the sky, its twisted, tangled legs and segments intertwined with tendrils that would make anyone with trypophobia scream in horror.
Sticky green bodily fluids mixed with muddy water dripped onto the floor, emitting a nauseating, fishy stench.
With a volume that seemed capable of bursting through the Dean’s Office ceiling, it loomed from above, staring down with nearly a hundred compound eyes at the frail, trembling girl before it.
Though frozen stiff with fear and unable to move, Shiya pressed her lips tightly together, not uttering a word.
She had been waiting for this moment, waiting for Toby to be lured in by her, to create this one and only chance to escape.
Toby was scared out of his wits, but his momentum carried him forward uncontrollably, and he stumbled right next to Shiya.
Toby’s voice shot up an octave.
“You—”
But Shiya’s eyes held an unprecedented chill.
She grabbed Toby by the hair and flung him toward the giant centipede’s mandibles.
Then, without looking back, amidst Toby’s screams, she charged out of the Dean’s Office, pushing past the survivors who had rushed in.
With a polite gesture, she slammed the door shut firmly behind her.