Chapter 15: Pig-Faced Butcher (1)

Volume 1 “Year of Calamity”

Zhou Xiaoxiao’s addition was nothing short of a blessing for the survivors in the Tube-Style Apartment Building! A doctor in this medicine-scarce post-apocalyptic world could increase the survivors’ chances of survival by an unquantifiable margin. Along with Zhou Xiaoxiao, they loaded all usable medical equipment from the clinic. Now it could be said that everything was ready, and they could immediately set off for Yushan.

The gloomy dark clouds had dispersed, and the early morning sunlight accompanied by the dawn glow spilled over the land. Several small birds on the roadside tree branches were preening their feathers, while beneath the trees, a zombie trapped by a seatbelt in an abandoned car struggled weakly, occasionally emitting low growls from its throat.

The city streets no longer had the usual hustle and bustle of traffic, replaced instead by abandoned vehicles, neglected shops, and zombies wandering aimlessly along the roads.

Suddenly, the low rumble of a diesel engine approached from afar, causing the wandering zombies to stop and watch, all roaring toward the direction of the sound.

Bathed in the morning glow, a convoy slowly approached from the distance. All vehicles in the convoy had been reinforced and modified. To the zombies drawn by the noise, each vehicle in the convoy was like a massive mechanical meat grinder, harvesting the mutated lives of the zombies, knocking them down, crushing them until they turned into piles of pulp.

The convoy’s progress wasn’t particularly fast. The abandoned vehicles on the highway and the groups of appearing zombies significantly affected their speed.

“If I’d known, I would’ve gotten a bulldozer to clear the way. This is way too slow. At this rate, we probably won’t reach Yushan until afternoon!” Butcher complained to An Sheng beside him while driving.

He and An Sheng were driving a van at the very back of the convoy. Besides the two of them in the cab, the back compartment carried thirty-two neighbors from the Tube-Style Apartment Building.

An Sheng squinted at the zombies fearlessly throwing themselves at the convoy, feeling nauseous and dry heaving slightly. He didn’t respond – not out of rudeness, but because most of his attention was focused on suppressing his nausea, leaving him with no energy to chat with Butcher.

Seeing An Sheng’s pale face, Butcher laughed heartily and lit a cigarette, handing it over.

“Brother An, have a smoke. Might make you feel better. You were pretty fierce swinging that sledgehammer at zombies before. How come you still haven’t gotten used to it after all this time? Here, have one – Supreme 95. In the past I wouldn’t have dared smoke this stuff, way too expensive. Now though, smoke all you want since nobody’s charging for it anymore, haha.”

An Sheng took the Supreme 95 and took a deep drag, only to choke and cough violently several times. After recovering for about a minute, he complained resentfully to Butcher: “Brother Wang, are you messing with me on purpose? This made me even more nauseous!”

Butcher looked at An Sheng’s miserable expression and laughed even more brightly. To be honest, when he first witnessed An Sheng’s transformed state, he had been quite fearful of this young man. Although Butcher was big and burly himself, he was still just an ordinary person, while this young man after transformation was practically a monster.However, after spending time together during this period, he discovered that An Sheng was actually a simple and honest young man, whose personality somewhat resembled his own. They got along quite well in conversation, and over time, he forgot about An Sheng’s terrifying Demon appearance, often joking with him casually.

“Brother Wang, how can you stay so calm? Don’t you feel nauseous seeing all those bloody scenes!?” After taking a couple of puffs of his cigarette, the nausea had subsided quite a bit. An Sheng looked at the Butcher driving with such composure and couldn’t help but feel surprised.

The Butcher laughed heartily, “Haha, have you forgotten what your Brother Wang does for a living? I’m a pig slaughterer—I deal with this bloody stuff every day. I’m used to it. By the way, let me tell you, the first time I slaughtered a pig, I was so nervous I missed the heart and stabbed the lung instead. Damn! That pig was in so much pain it jumped right up, and three of us couldn’t hold it down.”

Listening to the Butcher reminisce about his embarrassing youthful experiences, An Sheng gradually forgot the hellish scene outside the vehicle and began to lose himself in memories as well.

Suddenly, An Sheng’s heart palpitated, and the hairs all over his body stood on end. He remembered this feeling vividly—it was his body’s warning signal before encountering danger.

He shuddered all over and began to cautiously look around. Aside from ordinary Zombies, there was nothing unusual in the surroundings, but An Sheng knew danger was approaching.

With a loud “boom,” the truck An Sheng was riding in was violently shoved several meters sideways by a tremendous force, immediately losing control. Since they weren’t wearing seatbelts, both the Butcher and An Sheng were thrown from their seats! Before they could even settle back down, the truck roared abruptly, accelerating sharply and crashing directly into an abandoned van.

After landing, the Butcher accidentally stepped on the accelerator. Fortunately, the accelerator of a large truck isn’t very sensitive, so it didn’t accelerate too quickly—otherwise, an accident would have been inevitable.

In the critical moment, the Butcher quickly adjusted his posture and slammed on the brakes, bringing the truck to a halt less than a meter away from the abandoned van. Before either of them could catch their breath, a second impact occurred. The immense force caused the truck to flip over sideways. In the instant of the rollover, An Sheng caught a glimpse of a massive gray figure in the rearview mirror!

What had hit their truck was a nearly five-meter-tall humanoid monster! Its gray skin was extremely rough, with thick limbs covered in bulging, knotted muscles—especially its prominent, corpulent belly.

Most terrifying of all was its enormous head, which wasn’t human at all but a blue-faced, fanged pig head! The monster held a two-meter-long Cleaver in its hand, though compared to the monster’s massive size, the Cleaver seemed insignificant.

When An Sheng crawled out of the cab and saw the monster for the first time, several images flashed through his mind: Zhu Ganglie, the Boar Demon! And then there was that monster from a horror movie that closely resembled this Mutated Creature before him—the Pig-Faced Butcher!

“Hungry~~ Hungry~~” The giant Pig-Faced Butcher waved its Cleaver and roared at the sky. From its blood-dripping maw came clear human speech—though it was only a single word, An Sheng heard it distinctly: “Hungry.”It seems the initial speculation was correct—mutated monsters are extremely sensitive to the scent of living humans. This creature was likely drawn by the human presence inside the vehicle.

The thought that these mutated monsters were once human made An Sheng sigh inwardly. What kind of advanced hormones had they consumed to grow so massive?

Their enormous size granted them tremendous strength. Though the reinforced cargo container was sturdy, it proved utterly fragile against the Pig-Faced Butcher’s monstrous power. Wielding his Cleaver, the pig-faced monster relentlessly assaulted the container. Within mere breaths, a gaping hole was torn open.

Two violent impacts sent the unprotected people inside tumbling in disarray. Before they could regain their bearings, the dark cargo hold was breached, revealing a horrifying, blue-skinned, fanged pig head glaring through the fissure.

The sudden appearance of the monster silenced the previously chaotic compartment, now filled only with the sound of frantic, fear-induced panting. A single thought consumed everyone’s mind: We’re done for!