Chapter 59 - Recognition
The rooms W County secure base arranged for Nie Yi and Qi Jingchen could be considered gorgeous, and were tidied up very cleanly. But after Nie Yi entered, he still switched the original bedsheet with their usual bedsheet. Then, he walked around with a detector.
“What are you holding?” Qi Jingchen leaned on the bed and looked at Nie Yi curiously.
“A device to check if there’s anything in this room that shouldn’t be here,” Nie Yi said. During the latter stage of the apocalypse, there was absolutely no meaning in installing wiretaps or surveillance cameras, so he had almost forgotten about them. Fortunately, he had remembered…
Qi Jingchen had long forgotten this as well, and he knew nothing about these devices. Now, as he watched Nie Yi work, he looked around with great interest.
Nie Yi didn’t discover anything amiss and sighed in relief and then began to cook for Qi Jingchen.
A few days ago, they had passed by a farm and discovered a few people still living there, tending to many plants. They ended up exchanging for a vegetable plant and planted it on their car roof, so Nie Yi now had a lot more ingredients to use.
Unfortunately, there were still many dishes he couldn’t make, but a dish like tomato egg drop soup, where he only needed to put tomatoes and eggs into the water, was absolutely no problem.
Qi Jingchen didn’t dislike it and ended up eating until his belly was as round as a ball. After eating, he laid in bed. “Nie Yi, I don’t mind what happened that year.”
He recognised the secure base chief who had welcomed them. The chief was a rather capable ordinary person who had been able to rope in a large number of ability users. In Qi Jingchen’s last life, after he was captured by the people of W County secure base, he was delivered before this person.
This person first experimented on his flesh. After confirming that his flesh had effects, he began to eat it…
The secure base chief used his flesh to reward the ability users, and even the ordinary people of the secure base, allowing them to kill zombies. Then, he relied on these people’s protection to live an incomparably content life in the apocalyptic world where people often starved to death. Of course, he also had some aspects he was dissatisfied with; namely, that he wasn’t an ability user.
For a period of time, this person often came to see him, wanting to awaken an ability by eating his flesh. However, it was completely useless. This person later abruptly exploded in anger and beat him up.
Qi Jingchen blinked. That was his most painful memory, but in his recollections, it already felt like a lifetime ago… And it really was a lifetime ago.
In truth, right after he discovered his own peculiarity, Qi Jingchen had once thought over whether he should speak up, allowing others to research a way to resist zombies using his body. If it could save people, he was willing to offer some flesh. It was just like how when he was in school and saw a blood collecting vehicle, he would often go donate his blood. Unfortunately, this person gave him a great blow, making him realise he was too naive.
Later, he summoned many zombies and wanted to escape, but this person chose to abandon all the civilians in the secure base rather than abandon him, insisting on bringing him, who had been enclosed in a metal cage, along…
As the zombies around them increased, the secure base’s high-level ability users fled for survival. At that time, he finally personally witnessed this person get torn to shreds by zombies. Then, Nie Yi came.
His enemies… He had already gotten revenge in his last life, so he didn’t have to be unhappy from their actions in this life.
“How could you not mind…” Nie Yi caught Qi Jingchen’s hand and kissed his fingers. Qi Jingchen was a very good person, yet those people hurt him so badly.
“In any case, they’ll all die.” Qi Jingchen smiled and shifted his attention to his kissed hand.
In the past, he was physically unwell and only felt that Nie Yi’s intimacy was very bothersome. Honestly, he wanted to sleep, but someone was next to him, kissing and rubbing against him nonstop… It would be strange if he felt good!
But it wasn’t the same now. Nie Yi kissed his hand and it now felt tingly and numb. This feeling travelled from his fingertips to his heart, and was incredibly nice.
Because they’d all die, there wasn’t a need for revenge? Nie Yi’s face darkened and he looked at the hand he had grabbed, recalling Qi Jingchen’s hands in the past, which were withered like a dried corpse.
At the time, he had only wanted to envelop that hand in his embrace and obliterate all those who had hurt him… Now, he still wanted to do just that.
Nie Yi held Qi Jingchen’s palm and pressed it against his heart. “I will definitely kill them. But you don’t have to worry, I’ll do it in secret. No one will know.”
Qi Jingchen was taken aback, then nodded. “Sure, but there’s no need to implicate the innocent.” He had killed many innocent people. For example, back when Yu Shuo had come to bother them, they killed his possibly innocent subordinates. But if he could, he didn’t plan on hurting the innocent ones.
Some people would feel superior after becoming an ability user, and some ability users would even think that regular people didn’t deserve to survive with them. Qi Jingchen, however, had once been a regular person with no freedom, and had to flee countless times after being imprisoned. He didn’t have that mindset.
As long as they didn’t provoke him, he wouldn’t attack other people.
“I’m not so leisurely as to go around massacring people!” Nie Yi said. He was too lazy to deal with a group of regular people.
“Since we’re here, tomorrow you should go look for Qi An. No, perhaps you won’t have to look before Qi An comes himself,” Qi Jingchen said. Qi An was just a child now, and his space ability wasn’t omnipotent. In truth, if W County secure base wasn’t in a life or death crisis and had some time to pay attention to him, perhaps they would have already set up a trap and captured him.
So it was better to find this child quickly.
Nie Yi’s grip on Qi Jingchen’s hand tightened, and he nodded. Previously, if he hadn’t come to Qi Jingchen’s door, Qi Jingchen had no plans to look for him. Now, he wanted to look for Qi An. This undoubtedly made him somewhat depressed, even though he himself knew that he was being troublesome for no reason.
Qi Jingchen’s hand was pressed against Nie Yi’s chest, and feeling the hard muscles under his hand, he couldn’t help kneading them a few times… Muscles ah… They were always something he could only dream of, and he didn’t know when he would have some.
He quite liked muscles, it was just that he somewhat disliked it when Nie Yi wanted to place his muscular arm under his neck for a pillow when they slept at night— He honestly didn’t like very hard pillows!
Nie Yi was groped in the chest by the person he liked, and couldn’t help but be excited. But seeing that Qi Jingchen seemed to only be curious and not lustful, and recalling that Qi Jingchen had never gotten hard, he couldn’t help but sigh… Of course, he didn’t reveal anything on the surface, simply saying, “My abs are also pretty good.”
As a gay person, he took care of his figure before the apocalypse; now, he had to exercise constantly. As a result, he wasn’t lacking pectoral muscles or abdominal muscles.
Qi Jingchen unbuttoned Nie Yi’s shirt and poked the muscles with his finger, then stroked up and down...
Nie Yi sat upright, letting Qi Jingchen touch his abdominal muscles. He internally decided to work out properly in the future.
He had hoped Qi Jingchen would see a certain change in him, but Qi Jingchen didn’t look at all, and didn’t have any intentions of being shamed into anger. Instead, he continued to calmly press the muscles… Of course, he firmly believed that it was groping!
Qi Jingchen groped and groped, then suddenly stopped…
At the same time, Nie Yi grabbed to the side in a habitual manner, and caught a child.
An eight-year-old boy wasn’t large, but wasn’t small either. He was quite strong, but his strength was nothing compared to Nie Yi’s. After all, in the past two months, Nie Yi had always ‘trained his strength’ by constantly carrying a man!
Qi An was grabbed by Nie Yi but couldn’t struggle free, and his face reddened. “Let me go!” Like he’d thought, seeing Nie Yi definitely was no good! Nie Yi once again was doing things that would leave him with a psychological shadow!
Nie Yi stood up and lifted Qi An by the shirt. “Who are you?”
“I’m…” Just when Qi An was about to lie, he felt that something was wrong… Nie Yi’s method of catching him was too accurate! It was the exact same as every time he was caught in the past!
Right now, space ability users were hidden, and there were only two space ability users in the world who, like him, could teleport. It didn’t make sense that Nie Yi could find him upon their first meeting… He definitely hadn’t bumped into Nie Yi just now!
“You’re reborn too?!” Qi An immediately said, his expression dark.
Yu Xuguang didn’t know Nie Yi very well, and spent most of his energy on ‘saving the world’, so he didn’t realise Nie Yi had been reborn. However, Qi An was very familiar with Nie Yi, and it wasn’t possible for him not to notice.
After Nie Yi had subconsciously caught Qi An, he knew that he most likely couldn’t conceal it, and straightforwardly decided not to— In the future, he would most likely have to bring Qi An along. Then, he would definitely use combat methods and such that had been created in their past life… He immediately smiled. “That’s right, what a coincidence ah.”
After Qi An saw Nie Yi, he had always pondered over Nie Yi’s affairs. At first, he hoped that Nie Yi could stay with his lover, and not fight for the title of number one subordinate. But after thinking about it, he felt that this wasn’t possible.
Nie Yi was very strong; if he didn’t follow his boss and instead went against him, wouldn’t his boss be endangered?
He thought and thought about it, but couldn’t come up with a resolution, which was why he secretly came to take a look at Nie Yi. Yet, he never imagined that Nie Yi was actually reborn as well!
“Since you’re reborn, why didn’t you go look for Boss instead of staying with this pretty boy? Have you forgotten about Boss?” Qi An looked at Nie Yi angrily. If it weren’t for Boss, he would’ve starved to death, and Nie Yi wouldn’t have survived either. How could Nie Yi be so ungrateful?
Thinking of this, Qi An, who was still being lifted by Nie Yi, glared at Qi Jingchen fiercely.
When he came by, he clearly saw this fellow groping Nie Yi… In broad daylight, this person had actually seduced Nie Yi, making him forget all about his boss. Truly, he was too vile!
“…” Nie Yi looked at Qi Jingchen, then said, “My loyalty towards my lord is something the whole world knows. If I’m not good to the lord, if I am disloyal in the slightest, may the heavens punish me with a strike of lightning.” With such an opportunity, of course he had to declare his feelings.
“What does this oath matter? Fighting against lightning abilities, who hasn’t been struck by lightning?” Qi An promptly said, then looked at Qi Jingchen, suddenly recalling a matter. “Hey, this guy knows about us. Since you’re so devoted and loyal to the lord, shouldn’t he be killed? Otherwise, what will happen if he becomes detrimental to the lord, or divulges information?”
They, the followers of Nie Yi, had started out by calling Qi Jingchen Boss. Later, as Qi Jingchen gathered more and more zombies, and spread this ‘dark lord’ title, they began to call him lord… Actually, Qi An shouted this title most happily. After all, he happened to be someone with eighth-grader syndrome back then, and even liked to look for various martial arts novels to read.
“…” Nie Yi somewhat regretted his preconditioned reflex to grab Qi An. This fellow actually wanted to have Qi Jingchen executed. “He’s mine!”
“So what if he’s yours? Even if you don’t kill him, I’ll find an opportunity to get rid of him for Boss!” Qi An coldly snorted.
“You’re not worried I’ll get rid of you first?” Nie Yi was speechless, then explained, “Don’t worry, he knows all about me. He won’t talk about it, and he’s not the one who betrayed me in our last life.”
“You dare?!” When Qi An heard Nie Yi’s first sentence, he promptly shouted even as he trembled internally. In the past, when Boss was present, even if Nie Yi didn’t like him, at most, he would grab him or throw him around. Now that Boss wasn’t here, perhaps Nie Yi really would kill him. Then he wouldn’t get to see Boss again… Thinking so, Qi An decided to surrender first. “Fine, I was just talking trash. Since he’s yours, if you can keep him in line, then I’ll cut him some slack…”
“If something happens to him, I’ll crush your bones and turn you into dust!”
Qi An was increasingly dissatisfied with the fact that Nie Yi treated this outsider better than his boss, but on second thought, he thought that this wasn’t bad either. “Don’t worry, I won’t do anything to him. With this person by your side, you won’t have time to fight against me for Boss! When the time comes, I want to live with Boss, and you can’t force your way in either. In the future, you must stay with this person!” This was just a regular person. It seemed that he was only able to survive by relying on Nie Yi, so he truly wasn’t much of a concern, and was even beneficial to Qi An.
Qi Jingchen, Nie Yi: “…”
“But there’s still a problem… Nie Yi, between Boss and this person, who’s more important to you?” Qi An asked, his cheeks puffing. He could accept this person, but he still needed to confirm that the boss was first for Nie Yi.
“Boss will forever be my most important person,” Nie Yi once again took this chance to declare his feelings.
Hearing this sentence, Qi An was exceptionally pleased, looking at Qi Jingchen proudly— Since this person heard that he wasn’t comparable to another person in Nie Yi’s heart, he definitely must be sad, right? It’d be best if he got into an argument with Nie Yi!
“Nie Yi, put me down,” Qi An said. When Nie Yi put him down, he asked, “That’s right, do you know where the boss is now? Did you come here to wait for him? I’ve waited for a long time, but unfortunately, he’s still not here.” As he spoke, he became dejected.
Nie Yi didn’t retort in a rare fashion. If he couldn’t find Qi Jingchen after his rebirth, Nie Yi must also be very sad…
Qi An had assumed that Nie Yi didn’t speak because he was sad too. After all, Nie Yi had treated his boss very well. Even if there was now an additional lover, Nie Yi still cared more about the boss. “Nie Yi, you didn’t die when I did, right? How did you live after that? What about the boss?”
“I didn’t live much longer,” Nie Yi said.
“That’s how it should be. If we die, we can leave all the food to the boss!” Qi An nodded seriously, very satisfied with Nie Yi’s performance.
“How much food did you think was left?” Nie Yi glared at Qi An.
“Boss planted many things…” Qi An said.
“When Yu Xuguang saw Boss, he immediately self-destructed and broke the Boss’s domain,” Nie Yi scoffed. At that time, in order to protect the plants in the domain, Qi Jingchen hadn’t avoided the attack. However, the plants still died…
“If I had known, I would’ve held him and self-destructed!” Qi An’s face became icy. He gritted his teeth, of which two were missing. “I must kill him! Not only did this guy kill me, he actually doomed the Boss to death!”
Qi An had died in Yu Xuguang’s hands, but he hadn’t taken this seriously in the first place. At the time, they had very little food. Nie Yi’s water ability was very useful, but he could only waste food; dying was already a relief.
Back then, he was always unwilling to eat, and starved until he was weak; he didn’t really want to live either, so he simply died in Yu Xuguang’s hands… At first, he had even thought that, since he died, Boss and Nie Yi definitely would be able to live longer. He never imagined that it became like this…
“Yu Xuguang was reborn too. You can go kill him,” Nie Yi promptly said.
“Where is he?” Qi An was itching to immediately kill him, and practically was about to leap up.
Qi Jingchen sighed, suddenly saying, “Xiao Qi, don’t you recognise me?”
Qi An looked at Qi Jingchen, his face filled with confusion.
Qi Jingchen continued, “When I just picked you up, you were so hungry that you wanted to imitate the books you had read about cooking leather belts to eat during a long journey, but forgot that there wasn’t genuine leather in our times…” He had thought that he shouldn’t let Qi An recognise him, but this child was so concerned… In the end, Qi Jingchen still had sentiments.
“Boss?” Qi An immediately froze. He felt that the story of him cooking leather belts was very humiliating, and so his Boss had never divulged it to anyone, not even Nie Yi!
So this person was his Boss?
He had always thought that his Boss was extremely mighty and imperious. He never imagined that he was a young man…
No, his Boss was still very imperious! When he just entered, wasn’t his Boss groping Nie Yi? Even groping down there? Obviously, he was about to push Nie Yi down ah!
Being able to eat up Nie Yi, he truly deserved to be his boss!
Baobao Notes
Extra Kofi chapter! thanks to Ciel <3