Chapter 25: Sophia in Peril
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On a highway in Georgia, a white car sped along.
Li Changsheng gripped the steering wheel with one hand, idly toying with the dagger Amy had given him with the other.
He had been driving for three hours and was growing rather bored.
There was still a third of the way to go before he reached the wind farm. He stifled a yawn and glanced distractedly at the dagger in his hand.
Should he get out of the car and practice his “throwing knife” trick again?
He had stopped twice on the way—once to move abandoned vehicles blocking the road, and once to practice his knife-throwing skills on wandering corpses.
Ever since he became a G-type creature, he could control every muscle in his body, so throwing a knife with precision was child’s play.
With constant practice along the journey, his aim was not as uncanny as the legendary Little Li Flying Dagger from the martial arts novels of his past life, but it was more than enough to kill the undead.
Suddenly.
He snapped to attention, his demeanor growing serious.
Up ahead, the road was completely choked with abandoned cars, blocking any passage.
“Another traffic jam?”
He frowned. He’d encountered several such blockades on his way, but never one quite this severe.
Stretching for miles, the line of deserted vehicles was endless.
With so many cars, it was clearly impossible to move them by hand...
He’d have to find a detour...
As he mulled this over, Li Changsheng suddenly noticed a figure standing atop a camper further up the road, holding a gun.
The figure saw him too and stared in his direction.
Li Changsheng eased off the gas and stopped when he was four or five hundred meters away.
With eyesight far sharper than any ordinary person's, he could see the figure clearly from this distance.
A straw hat, a hunting rifle, an old man...
Wasn’t that Dale?
It seemed to be Rick’s group.
A thought flashed through Li Changsheng’s mind, and he drove over.
...
“There’s someone coming!” Dale had already spotted Li Changsheng’s car and shouted a warning to Rick and the others when he saw it approaching.
Since encountering a special infected, Rick’s group had remained on high alert. At Dale’s call, everyone gathered together, tense and ready.
When they saw it was Li Changsheng, they all breathed a sigh of relief.
Li Changsheng stepped out of the car and surveyed the group. Rick and the others were smeared with dirt, the men and women alike disheveled and worn.
How had they ended up in such a state?
Had they run into danger?
Curious, Li Changsheng silently counted their numbers.
Rick, Shane, Glenn, Lori, Carl, Dale, Carol, Sophia, Jim, Morgan’s family.
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T-Dog and Jacqui, however, were missing.
“Did something happen to you all?” Li Changsheng asked.
Rick stepped forward and replied, “We ran into a special infected. T-Dog and Jacqui... they didn’t make it.”
A special infected?
Li Changsheng’s mind sharpened.
Just then, Shane came up, eager and impatient, “Hey, how’s it over at the CDC? Any officials left?”
He noted Li Changsheng’s clean clothes and energetic demeanor—he looked as if he’d just been out for a picnic—causing Shane’s mind to race with speculation.
Rick, too, glanced at Li Changsheng, suspicious that he was alone. “Where are Daryl and the others? Didn’t they come with you?”
Li Changsheng shook his head and didn’t answer. “I’ll explain that later. Right now, I’m more curious about what happened to you all. Why are you in such a mess? And that special infected...”
Rick’s face fell. He shook his head and recounted their ordeal at the quarry.
Only then did Li Changsheng learn that T-Dog and Jacqui had been killed by the special infected. But since he didn’t know them well, he felt no particular emotion.
Glenn and the others, however, seemed haunted by the memory. Fear flickered in their eyes.
From Rick’s description, Li Changsheng formed a guess about the special infected.
“That special infected was probably a Jockey,” Li Changsheng said, his face serious. “It’s one of the weaker types. But there are others, even stronger than it. Have you encountered any?”
He recalled the Tank—the man with his own soundtrack from Left 4 Dead...
“Li, you know about it?” Rick was stunned.
“There are other special infected?” The group was shocked.
Before Li Changsheng could answer, Dale’s voice drifted down from the camper roof. “Walker incoming!”
Rick had no time to say more and shouted, “On alert!”
He raised his revolver and moved aside, aiming at the walker’s head.
The others saw the walker too. Their initial fright faded when it became clear it was just a regular one.
There was only a single walker, so they relaxed a little.
But just as Rick was about to fire, Li Changsheng stopped him.
“Wait. Take a closer look.” He pointed to the side.
The others sensed something amiss. Glenn climbed atop a nearby car and peered out.
Behind the walker, a parked car blocked the view, but beyond it, at least a hundred walkers shambled into sight.
“Damn! A horde!” Glenn cried out in alarm.
Seeing this, Rick shot Li Changsheng a grateful look. Thank God he hadn’t fired recklessly, or things would have gotten ugly.
There was no time to think. Rick shouted to Dale, “Dale, start the RV! We have to back out!”
Dale replied under his breath, “Rick, the RV’s out of gas!”
“Damn it!”
Rick swore. Seeing the horde bearing down, he lowered his voice and called to the group, “Hide, everyone!”
The others frantically scrambled for hiding spots.
Dale lay flat atop the camper. The rest hid under nearby vehicles.
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Li Changsheng had intended to jump onto Dale’s camper, but noticed that Sophia and Carl, for some reason, were each hiding alone beneath a truck.
After a moment’s hesitation, he abandoned the idea of climbing up. He crouched low, circled around, and crawled beneath a car behind the truck.
Rick and Carol were hidden together. Both signaled to Carl and Sophia to keep silent.
Shane and Glenn were together, both sweating nervously.
Lori and Morgan’s family hid behind the vehicle where Shane was concealed.
Jim hid alone beneath another truck.
In no time, the walkers, growling low, shuffled past.
No one dared breathe.
Suddenly.
A male walker seemed to catch a scent. It suddenly dropped and crawled beneath a car—the very one where Carl was hiding.
Its rotting face appeared before Carl, its pale eyes staring straight into his.
Carl’s face turned deathly white. He forced himself not to cry out, gripping his dagger with trembling hands as he faced off with the walker.
But a child’s strength was no match for a walker. The walker knocked Carl’s dagger from his hand, and it clattered loudly to the ground.
“Carl!”
Rick’s eyes nearly burst from their sockets. He raised his gun and was about to rush over, but by then, the walker’s hands were almost on Carl.
At that moment—
A sharp whistle cut the air.
A glint of silver flashed; a dagger shot with deadly precision into the walker’s head.
Li Changsheng had thrown it.
“Carl!”
Rick’s emotions whiplashed like a rollercoaster. Seeing Carl safe for the moment, he forced down his urge to act and shot Li Changsheng a look of deep gratitude.
Li Changsheng waved it off—it was nothing.
But the sound of Carl’s dropped dagger had caught the attention of several walkers.
Suddenly, things took a turn for the worse.
Sophia’s terrified scream pierced the air. “No! Stay away!”
Three small, hunched figures had crawled under the car where Sophia was hiding.
Jockeys!
The three Jockeys, having found their prey, let out strange, gleeful chortles.
Damn, three little monkeys!