Chapter 12 | The Crazy Persona Must Not Collapse

“Bang—!”

At that moment, the mop handle wedged against the door finally snapped, and the doors burst wide open.

“Crash—!”

A torrential rush of footsteps pounded as countless rotting corpses with putrid, oozing faces swarmed through the entrance in a dense, unending wave.

Excited, guttural rasps rumbled in their throats as they threw themselves like wild beasts into the pool, thrashing frantically and sending water splashing in every direction...

Soon, a sickening, horrifying sound of chewing echoed from below...

Ye Li paid no attention to the chaos beneath her, lying flat on the steel truss and gasping for breath.

That final move had drained nearly all of her strength, and now dull, throbbing aches from strained muscles flared all over her body.

She had to admit, this body was truly useless!

The pouring tide of rotting corpses quickly jammed the natatorium to maximum capacity. There was not even room to stand inside the pool, and water had long since sloshed over the deck, flooding everywhere.

Ye Li tilted her head to glance down, only to see peeling, decayed faces gazing up at her in unison. Like ravenous ghosts emerging from hell, their thirsty, bloodthirsty stares made her skin crawl.

Countless mangled hands, their flesh rotting down to the bone, reached high, yearning to violently tear apart her flesh, limbs, and entrails...

Even Ye Li felt her scalp tingle at such a horrifying spectacle, barely able to bear looking at it.

She couldn't help but curl her lips, thinking that it was fortunate she had been the one to stay behind. Had it been that fellow Le Jun, he probably would have been scared to death right on the spot.

Watching more and more rotting corpses gather below, Ye Li steadied her breathing, rolled over, and began crawling on all fours toward the center of the steel framework.

There were still a little over ten minutes until midnight. She had to find a way to hold out as long as possible.

She had a hunch that something would definitely happen once midnight passed.

Ye Li kept as close to the wall as possible, moving slowly and cautiously. Even so, the aging steel frame creaked incessantly, sounding as though it might collapse at any second.

Below her, the rotting corpses surged along with her movements, the scene falling into a bizarre, disorderly order.

Fortunately, luck was on Ye Li's side, and she managed to crawl to the very center of the suspended steel ceiling.

Directly beneath her was the swimming pool. From the ceiling to the pool bottom, the drop was at least eight or nine meters.

Rotting corpses continued to pour in relentlessly, but because the natatorium entrance had limited height and width, the corpses packing the doorway actually jammed it up, slowing their rate of entry.

Minutes and seconds ticked away. Ye Li lay agonizingly flat on the steel frame, watching the mound of piled corpses steadily rise below.

The taste of waiting was truly maddening.

Especially this kind of race against the clock, where no one knew whether death or hope would arrive first—it was the most agonizing wait of all!

11:55 PM.

With only five minutes left until midnight, a rotting hand grabbed the steel frame beneath Ye Li. The mountain of corpses had reached her feet.

Fortunately, the steel framework was half a meter high with closely spaced welds, making it difficult to squeeze through. Combined with the stiff joints of the rotting corpses, which were far less agile than the living, the monster rasped and clawed for a long time only to poke its head through.

Ye Li could no longer care whether the steel frame was sturdy or not; she raised her foot and kicked the rotten head with all her might.

With a sharp crack, the corpse’s head snapped sideways, wedged into the frame and going motionless.

However, more and more rotting hands latched onto the steel trusses, and a horde of monsters began desperately forcing their way up into the framework. In their scramble, they impeded one another, climbing slower and getting wedged tighter.

The corpses unable to climb grabbed the steel frame and pulled with all their might, shaking the entire suspended ceiling violently amid screeching groans.

Ye Li didn't stay where she was. She scrambled on hands and knees toward the other end, back toward the doors.

11:58 PM.

“Screeech—crack—”

The severely deteriorated steel ceiling finally couldn't bear the strain. The section where Ye Li had been earlier was torn from the roof, ripping free from the wall and collapsing.

The entire frame tilted and crashed onto the mound of corpses as if slamming into a cushion of flesh. Ye Li, having already reached the center, was largely unharmed, while quite a few corpses wedged halfway into the frame were snapped in two.

Yet even more corpses crawled up through the gap, scrambling toward Ye Li like starving ghouls.

With time almost up, Ye Li had nowhere left to hide.

She managed to wrench off a forearm-length iron rod from the frame and began fighting back with everything she had, determined to endure the final two minutes.

Fortunately, the frame was awkward to climb, preventing the corpses from swarming her all at once.

Ye Li was nimble and skilled. Gripping the iron rod, she stabbed and struck left and right, killing and knocking back the corpses closest to her.

Still, more and more monsters climbed up, and decaying hands reached through from beneath the frame from time to time to trip her. Caught off guard, Ye Li was soon wounded, and the scent of fresh blood whipped the famished monsters into an even greater frenzy.

Finally, in a slip of vigilance, a rotten hand from below clamped around her ankle and yanked her downward with tremendous force.

Alarmed, she reacted instantly, planting her other foot against a crossbar to brace against the downward pull.

If she were dragged down, she would be picked clean to the bone by the swarm in mere moments.

At the same time, two corpses scrambled up and lunged at her simultaneously from both sides.

With one leg trapped, Ye Li couldn't dodge freely. In that split second of crisis, she only had time to drive the iron rod into the throat of one monster. Before she could pull it back, the other corpse slammed heavily into her, pinning her to the steel frame.

The rotting maw atop Ye Li gaped open, sinking its teeth viciously into her shoulder, while several decayed hands clawed frantically at her back from beneath the frame.

A searing agony of tearing flesh tore through her. Ye Li's eyes reddened with pain as a pained grunt escaped her lips, but she was completely out of strength to fight back.

Seeing several more corpses lurch forward with bloodthirsty maws gaping inches away, she was staring death in the face...

Suddenly, just as Ye Li prepared herself for death, everything fell dead silent within the span of a single breath. As if by magic, every single thrashing corpse vanished without a trace in an instant.

“Screeech—!” A piercing screech of twisting metal rang out.

Before Ye Li could process what had happened, her body began to tilt downward. Instinctively, she clamped both hands around the steel frame beneath her.

Without the cushion of corpses underneath, the entire steel truss ceiling collapsed diagonally, crashing onto the deck and into the pool with a deafening clang.

A violent tremor rocked Ye Li as a brutal impact slammed into her back.

In an instant, agonizing pain crushed her internal organs, and her bones felt as though they had shattered to pieces.

A sweet metallic taste rushed up her throat along with a surge of blood. Waves of dizziness flooded her head, and her vision blurred for a brief moment.

Ye Li muffled a groan, swallowing the coppery blood pooling in her throat. She gritted her teeth and forced her eyes open, clinging to consciousness through sheer willpower.