After eating and drinking until his stomach finally stopped growling, Adam felt a strange surge of strength humming beneath his skin—an energy so abundant it felt almost unnatural.
Perfect. Time to hunt.
A lone zombie was all he needed.
If he was lucky enough to find a crystal core, maybe his mysterious gray space would expand again.
He picked up the hatchet he had sharpened the night before. The blade gleamed with a cold, metallic glint—reassuring, deadly.
Adam didn't rush down to the ground floor of the community. Only idiots fought zombies in open areas. That was how people got surrounded… and torn apart.
He stuck to his methodical strategy: floor-by-floor sweeping.
Up here, encounters were rare—two or three zombies at most. And with his newly strengthened body and the hatchet in hand… that was a fight he could take.
More importantly, people had abandoned entire lives while fleeing.
Gold, silver, jade, jewelry—things Adam once ignored—were now treasures. Not for himself, but for the other him in the urban world.
Money meant influence.
Influence meant resources.
Resources meant survival.
It was a cycle he planned to exploit ruthlessly.
Adam reached the twentieth floor. With practiced calm, he bent down, slid two wires into the lock of Unit 2001, and popped it open in under ten seconds.
Inside—silence.
No groans.
No rot.
Just the stale, hollow air of a home long abandoned.
He moved through the apartment like a shadow, searching where people hid valuables—bedside drawers, personal safes, hidden boxes.
Jade pendants.
Gold chains.
Silver bars.
Even a few old antiques.
Whether the parallel world's value system matched his own didn't matter. Anything over a thousand years old would be worth something somewhere.
By the time he swept from the 20th floor to the 29th, his pockets were heavy with wealth.
But still—no zombies.
That changed the moment he unlocked Unit 3001.
The door swung open—
ROAR!
Three zombies lunged at him, jaws wide, eyes burning with manic hunger.
Adam didn't flinch.
This time… he was ready.
The hatchet came down in a brutal arc—
CRACK!
The first zombie's skull split open like rotten fruit, brain matter spraying across the wall. It collapsed instantly.
The doorway bottlenecked the remaining two. They roared, flailing to push forward, but the narrow frame worked against them.
Adam's expression didn't change.
He drew a second axe from his belt.
And then—
He attacked.
No fancy technique.
No hesitation.
Pure brute force, speed, and a cold will to kill.
Wooden floors cracked beneath his feet as he hacked, slashed, chopped—
One zombie's arm flew off, another's jaw split sideways, a skull caved under repeated blows.
In under ten seconds, it was over.
The three corpses twitched in a pool of decaying blood.
Adam stood among them, chest heaving, hands trembling—not from fear, but from the adrenaline burning through his veins.
Still too sloppy.
He grit his teeth.
"I prepared for this… and I still panicked."
His voice was low, angry at himself.
"With my current physical strength, fighting three zombies should've been effortless. If I didn't have the axe and knife today…"
His expression darkened.
"…I might have died."
He knelt, forcing himself to stare at the mangled corpses without blinking.
"I must completely crush my fear.
No hesitation.
No panic.
Every strike must be clean, precise, and lethal."
Then he got to work—
breaking open skulls with the hatchet.
Inside the head of the largest zombie lay a milky-white crystal core, the size of a glass bead. The other two were empty.
"So not every zombie has one… interesting."
Clutching the core, Adam returned to Unit 1901, locked every door, barricaded the windows, and took a deep breath.
He didn't hesitate.
He swallowed it.
Ten seconds later—
BOOM!
Heat exploded from his chest, ripping through him like molten lava. His vision blurred; his skin flushed crimson; veins bulged across his arms and forehead.
The pain was… unbearable yet familiar.
Less intense than yesterday's—but still enough to make a normal man scream.
Adam endured it in silence.
His teeth cracked from how hard he clenched them. His
eyes reddened as muscle fibers tore and reformed, bones throbbed with pressure, organs seemed to shift and tighten.
Inside him, something—some virus, some unknown force—was rewriting his biology.
Then—
HUNGER.
A ravenous, animalistic hunger tore through him, worse than starvation.
He lunged at the food pile, devouring everything within reach—rice, canned meat, biscuits, water—stuffing it all down like a beast freed from hell.
Only after consuming enough food to feed a grown man for five days did the pain finally ease.
The agony receded like a wave.
In its place came a feeling so euphoric he almost collapsed.
Lightness.
Power.
A sense of unstoppable energy thrumming through every inch of his body.
He tested his strength.
Push-ups — 500 straight.
100 per minute.
Not even near his limit.
Squats — 2000.
Sit-ups — 2000.
Pull-ups — 50, slow and controlled.
Punching speed — 380 punches per minute.
Running speed — at least under 9 seconds for 100 meters.
In just two days, he had evolved far beyond human limits.
His mindspace—
the gray storage dimension—
had expanded again.
Now roughly two cubic meters.
Twice the space.
Twice the potential.
He was grinning—
when—
KNOCK.
KNOCK.
KNOCK.
A sudden knock at the door of Unit 1901 froze him instantly.
The smile faded.
Adam slowly reached for the two machetes resting against the wall.
His eyes turned cold.
Zombie?
Or a survivor?
Either way…
it meant danger.
And if whoever stood outside threatened him—
Adam tightened his grip on the blades.
He would kill without hesitation.