!
Sun Ya immediately opened his mouth to speak.
Su Jin raised a hand to cut him off, shifting his intense gaze to Cheng Du. "That little girl is definitely dead, right?"
Fu Hu interjected, "Dead as a doornail. I saw it with my own eyes. She took seven bullets."
A flicker of curiosity crossed Su Jin's mind, but he shoved it down. "We'll table that for now. I've made a major discovery!"
"Old Sun, remember when I told you about spotting four people on a rooftop who I suspected were Disguised Infected?"
Sun Ya nodded slowly.
"I got the woman to talk," Su Jin stated. "She was one of them, and that little girl was another. We’ve been marked. There are still two unaccounted for."
"How the hell did you interrogate her?" Sun Ya asked, his eyes wide.
Su Jin suppressed a bone-deep sigh of exhaustion.
How else? By taking an exfoliating bath towel and scrubbing her flesh off, layer by agonizing layer, until she couldn't take the pain anymore and spilled everything.
"A little light torture, naturally. She broke eventually," Su Jin said clinically. "I examined her corpse. The muscle density on this woman was absolutely absurd, and she definitely possessed a special Ability." As he spoke, he fished a plastic ziplock bag out of his pocket.
He popped the seal. Inside sat several severed fingers.
He pinched one between his thumb and index finger, holding it up for the room to see.
He pressed down gently on the fingertip. A small, skin-like flap at the apex gave way under the pressure, folding inward to reveal a completely hollow, tubular bone structure.
"Her fingers were mutated. Notice the tubular structure? I suspect she could use these to fire off compressed air or launch some kind of bodily fluid as a ranged attack."
"Furthermore, I found a shriveled Fleshy Orb attached to her heart. It's highly likely that the unique mutations and Abilities of the Disguised Infected are fueled by absorbing the energy of their own internal Fleshy Orbs."
Su Jin didn't miss a beat. "We had four targets on us. If they were working as a unit, it's a guarantee the remaining two have special Abilities of their own."
"But there's no honor among thieves here. These two females broke off to hunt early. That tells me they were extremely wary of their partners. The remaining two are likely much stronger than the ones we just killed."
"Did you manage to squeeze out what kind of Abilities the missing two have?" Sun Ya asked.
Su Jin shook his head in annoyance. "She croaked right after the confession. Didn't even last for the follow-up questions."
"Director, wait, did you already know she was a Disguised Infected from the start?" Cheng Du suddenly blurted out, hijacking the conversation.
He thought back to that blood-and-gore-soaked exfoliating towel, the gears in his head finally violently clicking into place. Something was very, very wrong.
Dry humping wouldn't produce a mess like that. Now the horrific truth dawned on him; that bath towel wasn't for foreplay or wiping off dirt. It was a literal torture device for flaying skin!
"Correct," Su Jin nodded matter-of-factly. "Back when we were eating those noodles, I was already fairly certain this woman was a Disguised Infected."
"How the hell did you spot that? I didn't see jack!" Cheng Du gaped. "Did you strip them down and realize the grime on their bodies was just painted on or something?"
"Hardly," Su Jin said, shaking his head. "The woman was emaciated. Even with her clothes off, she was covered in genuine filth and reeked of body odor. If it was just a disguise, it was flawless."
"But they overlooked one critical, biological flaw. Five days without food or water, coupled with high-stress physical exertion. When we ate, they perfectly mimicked the ravenous hunger of starving survivors... However, under extreme starvation, a normal woman's breasts will inevitably lose volume and sag. Every female survivor back at our center shows varying degrees of this. Unless they are completely flat-chested, human breasts absolutely do not remain perfectly perky and full after a week of starving."
"Based on that single detail, I knew instantly the bitch was a monster! Stripping her down later was just the final verification. After that, I was one hundred percent certain."
"But... what if she just had fake tits?" Cheng Du pressed, still thoroughly confused. "You know, those rich girls getting high-end plastic surgery. They use that stuff... what's it called, silicone?"
"That was a valid variable I couldn't rule out," Su Jin replied with deadpan seriousness. "Which is precisely why I took the personal risk of going hands-on to conduct repeated physical examinations. I assure you, it was absolutely not silicone."
"......." The four men plunged into a heavy, collective silence.
Cheng Du chewed on this for a second, his expression twisting into a bizarre grimace. "Okay, I get it now. You already knew what she was. Then why did you still do it? How do you explain that? Unless you were just that damn desperate for a woman, I can't think of any other excuse!"
"You were eavesdropping on me?" Su Jin's brow furrowed in genuine irritation. "What exactly did I do?"
Cheng Du stammered and choked on his words for a good moment before giving up. He aggressively thrust two fingers into the air and made a crude, hooking motion.
"Kobe."
Fu Hu and the others stared in utter disbelief, violently side-eyeing Cheng Du.
"I fingered her..." Su Jin barked out a humorless, exasperated laugh before his face hardened, turning his intense gaze to Sun Ya and Wei De. "Listen to me, this was another major discovery. I provoked her on purpose. I discovered that the Disguised Infected still possess primal lusts, which presents us with a catastrophic problem... they might be capable of reproducing through sexual mating."
"Here are the infected bodily fluids I collected during the procedure. Old Sun, take them for your research."
Watching Su Jin casually produce a sealed bag sloshing with a turbid, milky-white viscous fluid, Sun Ya took a sharp intake of breath and frantically swatted it away.
Groping for silicone, 'Kobe-ing' the enemy, extracting vaginal fluids, flaying them alive, dismembering them, dissecting them... this rapid-fire succession of atrocities simply didn't seem like the actions of a sane human being.
"Little Li, your intelligence gathering is undeniably crucial, I give you that," Sun Ya stammered. "But frankly, I'm more worried about your mental state right now. Aren't you taking things a little too... Is this some kind of side effect of your evolution?! You'll just shove your fingers into anything? Aren't you terrified of getting infected?! Catching some horrific apocalyptic STD isn't exactly a joke!"
Bearing the brunt of their horrified, questioning stares, a wave of profound bitterness washed over Su Jin.
Did they think he enjoyed this? Didn't he find his own actions utterly repulsive and depraved?
But he had no other choice. Only by completely understanding the enemy could they ever hope to survive.
The Apocalypse was vicious. To beat it, he had to be infinitely more vicious, more ruthless, and far stronger than the monsters at their door. It was the only way to drag this pathetic group of survivors through hell alive.
Faced with an extinction-level threat, no matter how nauseating or morally bankrupt the methods, he would adapt and overcome... even if he had to strip away his own humanity to do it!
"Relax," Su Jin said, his voice flat. "I only take action when I am completely prepared, both psychologically and materially." To prove his point, Su Jin pulled a crumpled foil packet out of his pocket. "I wore a condom on my fingers before going in."
The four men were collectively stunned into silence, trading shell-shocked glances.
Noting the suffocating awkwardness in the room, Su Jin cleared his throat and declared with absolute, deadpan sincerity, "A minor personal sacrifice is nothing. I thrust my fingers deep into the belly of the beast. I did it for all of you. I did it for the future of humanity."
"Truly magnificent, Director Li," Wei De said, clapping with a completely blank, traumatized expression.
"It is my solemn duty."
"No, no, no, hold the phone," Cheng Du muttered, vigorously shaking his head as he squinted suspiciously at Su Jin. "Then how the hell do you explain stripping completely naked?!"
"Simple. Once I confirmed the target's identity, I had to prepare for the interrogation and vivisection. That process guarantees massive arterial spray," Su Jin shrugged like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I don't exactly have an endless supply of clean laundry. I stashed my clothes in the wardrobe beforehand so they wouldn't get soaked in gore."
"Besides, I haven't showered in days... I figured I might as well get a good scrub in while I was at it."
A scrub...?
Dark, horrified shadows instantly fell over the faces of Cheng Du and the other three men.
He really has snapped and turned into a full-blown psychotic pervert... does he honestly not realize it himself?!
"Alright, you're all caught up on my end. What exactly went down with you guys?" Su Jin demanded, steering the conversation back to reality. "What flaw did that little girl expose that forced you to put her down?"
Fu Hu immediately perked up, his eyes practically shining as he looked at Su Jin. "Director, I figured out my daughter's special Ability! She can physically sense malicious intent!"
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