When Chen Ye arrived at the mall entrance, he found the parking lot cluttered with vehicles.

There were modified off-road trucks, sedans, and even a heavy bus. He recognized them instantly; these belonged to the convoy.

In the apocalypse, maintaining a vehicle was a logistical nightmare. Whether electric or combustion, sourcing fuel or power was a constant struggle. He had just watched two of the lead off-road vehicles peel away, likely heading deeper into the town to hunt for a gas station.

Since escaping Jiang City, Chen Ye had passed countless abandoned luxury cars—models he had only ever seen on the internet—left to rot by the roadside.

Early on, survivors had tried to claim them. But reality wasn’t a movie. Most had been abandoned because their tanks were dry, turning them into useless metal coffins. That was why so many in the convoy, like him, had reverted to bicycles.

Ordinary people simply couldn’t gather the resources to keep an engine running.

Chen Ye spotted his own tricycle parked near the supermarket’s sliding doors.

His belongings were still scattered in the cargo bed. When he had emptied his backpack earlier to loot the grocery store, he had dumped everything out. Now, his life’s possessions lay exposed.

It seemed the despicable couple—Jiajia and Qiangzi—had also entered the supermarket.

The mall was massive. The four o’clock sun illuminated a small patch of the entrance, but beyond the glass, the interior was a cavernous maw of darkness.

So many people had gone inside. It should have been noisy, chaotic. At the very least, there should have been the sounds of scavenging.

But it was unnervingly quiet.

Chen Ye made up his mind. He would skirt the entrance, test his luck, and see if he could gather supplies from the periphery. In this world, you either took risks or you starved.

As for Jiajia and Qiangzi, he wouldn’t let them leave this place alive. But revenge could wait. Survival came first.

The Convoy’s Second Iron Rule: Gather as many supplies as possible.

In the apocalypse, supplies were god.

He emptied his backpack again, strapping the lightened load to his shoulders. Crouching low, Chen Ye approached the entrance, his Hand Crossbow raised and ready. His eyes darted left and right, scanning for movement. At the first sign of trouble, he would run.

As he ventured deeper, he realized his plan had a flaw.

The supermarket was enormous, far larger than he had anticipated. And the shelves near the entrance had been picked clean. Only the aisles deeper in the gloom still held goods.

Not far away, two figures moved between the shelves, frantically stuffing items into bags. Chen Ye raised his crossbow but lowered it a moment later. They weren’t his targets. They weren’t a threat. There was plenty for everyone; killing them would just be a waste of a bolt.

He slowed his pace, creeping toward the food section.

He spotted several figures huddled near the shelves. When they saw him, they didn’t wave or call out. instead, they frantically pressed fingers to their lips in a universal “shush” gesture.

Before Chen Ye could react, a familiar, chilling sensation washed over him. The hair on his arms stood straight up.

This feeling again.

Ahead, a figure wandered between the aisles, murmuring softly.

Standard supermarket shelves were about 2.2 meters high. But this figure… she stood half a body length taller than the top shelf.

She had to be over three meters tall.

No human grew that large.

There was only one possibility.

Anomaly.

She wore a soiled white dress, her long, disheveled hair completely obscuring her face. Her body swayed unnaturally as she walked, disjointed like a marionette.

In her hands, the giant girl held a massive pair of rusted shears.

Snip. Snip.

The blades opened and closed rhythmically, the sound sharp and grating in the silence.

“Where are you?~~~”

“Where are you?~~~~ Come out, let’s play together!”

Her voice was drawn-out, eerie, like a child singing a nursery rhyme in a grave. It sounded as if she were talking to herself, or perhaps whispering to mice hiding in the dark.

Chen Ye understood why the other survivors were terrified into silence. A drop of cold sweat slid down his temple.

He had just escaped the Weeping Paper Effigy, only to walk straight into the domain of the White-Dress Scissor Lady.

His heart hammered against his ribs.

The Scissor Lady turned a corner, her body pivoting slowly, mechanically.

Chen Ye crouched lower, mirroring her movement on the other side of the aisle to stay out of her line of sight.

From this new angle, he realized the food section was crowded.

He didn’t see Jiajia or Qiangzi, but he did spot the giant man from the convoy. The massive brute was comically trying to curl his bulk into a ball behind a display of chips, his face a mask of terror.

No way! Chen Ye thought. You’re a giant yourself, and you’re scared?

Suddenly, the Scissor Lady stopped.

Her head, a curtain of black hair, snapped toward Chen Ye’s direction.

Two points of crimson light burned through the veil of hair.

Everyone froze.

It was as if time had solidified. The air grew heavy, suffocating. Cold sweat broke out on every forehead.

Seconds stretched into years. If she saw them, they were dead. All of them.

Finally, the Scissor Lady moved again, resuming her mechanical patrol.

A collective, silent exhale rippled through the survivors. They began to move again, playing a deadly game of hide-and-seek with the monster.

Chen Ye knew this wasn’t sustainable. He reached out and quietly grabbed a bucket of beef noodles, stuffing it into his bag.

Seeing this, the others followed suit. Woven bags, backpacks, pockets—everyone began looting with desperate, silent efficiency, their eyes glued to the wandering giantess.

Chen Ye trailed behind a small group, using them as a buffer.

Just as he was getting into a rhythm, he bumped into the back of the survivor in front of him.

The group had stopped dead.

Chen Ye looked past them.

Blocking the aisle was a child, maybe seven or eight years old.

Its skin was the pale gray of a corpse three days dead. Two circles of rouge burned abnormally bright on its cheeks. Its eyes were pools of pure resentment.

The Weeping Paper Effigy.

It had followed him.

“Ah~~~~!”

A scream shattered the silence of the supermarket.

The sound was a dinner bell for the things in the dark.

The three-meter-tall White-Dress Scissor Lady stiffened. Her head snapped toward them with a crack of vertebrae.

An overwhelming chill blasted through the aisle, numbing Chen Ye’s fingers.

Snip snip!~~~

The sound of metal shearing metal echoed.

“Hehe… So you’re here! Want to play together?”

The Scissor Lady strode toward them, crashing through displays, shelves toppling in her wake.

“Oh my god!”

“Run! I don’t want to die!”

Chen Ye grabbed his backpack and spun to flee.

But before he could take a step, a massive shadow eclipsed the aisle.

SNIP!

The giant shears snapped shut.

Two survivors in front of him were bisected instantly. Their upper bodies hit the floor with a wet thud, hands still clawing at the tiles, dragging trailing entrails through a widening pool of blood. They didn’t even seem to realize they were dead.

“Hehe… So good, so fun!”

“I want to play more!”

The shears raised again, dripping crimson.

SNIP!

Another survivor, a man in a suit and gold-rimmed glasses, was cut in half at the waist.

“Damn it! Fight!”

A furious roar erupted from the side.

The air in the supermarket suddenly grew heavy, charged with an explosive pressure.

Chen Ye watched, stunned, as the cowardly two-meter giant from the convoy began to expand. Like a balloon being inflated, his muscles swelled, his bones cracked and lengthened. In the blink of an eye, he transformed into a titan, standing three meters tall, his skin turning the color of iron.

His aura surged, matching—perhaps even surpassing—the Scissor Lady’s terrifying presence.

This… Chen Ye thought, awe striking him amidst the carnage. This is a Sequence Beyonder?