Mutation

On the seventh day of the outbreak, the situation had spiraled completely out of control.

Chen Yu was hiding in a temporary safe house—an abandoned industrial park on the outskirts of Pudong New District. This was a secret refuge she and several colleagues had established in advance, equipped with ninety days' worth of supplies, medical resources, and communication equipment.

She wasn't a deserter. She was a fugitive—accused of being one of those responsible for the viral leak. But before anything else, she knew she had to survive, had to uncover the truth.

The news on television had stopped broadcasting. In its place were official reports, updating data every hour:

Infected: 2.45 million

Deaths: 890,000

Cured: 0

That last number was the most devastating of all. No one could survive the PT-7 virus—at least not those who showed symptoms.

But the terrifying aspect of the symptoms lay in their diversity.

On colleague Zhang Jun's laptop, Chen Yu discovered a secretly compiled video archive. The infected were classified into several categories:

Level One Infected: High fever, muscle atrophy, skin ulceration. These patients typically died within seventy-two hours.

Level Two Infected: More severe symptoms—the neurons in their brains were reorganized by the virus in abnormal ways. They lost consciousness, becoming zombie-like entities. But they wouldn't die. They would transform into... another form of life.

Level Three Infected (this classification had only emerged in the past two days): A small number of infected individuals showed some kind of genetic resistance. Though infected, they retained human consciousness, and some even reported dramatically enhanced physical capabilities—strength, speed, and reaction times far exceeding normal human limits.

"This is the monster we created," Chen Yu muttered to the computer screen. "We tried to upgrade humanity and ended up creating something that devours people."

Suddenly, the safe house alarm sounded.

Chen Yu rushed to the surveillance room. The external cameras showed something wandering outside the compound. It had once been human—still wearing torn clothing—but now its skin was a grayish-white, muscles writhing beneath the surface, eyes clouded white.

A Level Two infected.

"We've been discovered," Zhang Jun burst in shouting. "The sensors upstairs are detecting at least twenty heat signatures approaching!"

Chen Yu's heart sank. Over these seven days, she had heard many rumors about these creatures—not only had they lost their humanity, but they had also gained some kind of collective intelligence. They would hunt. They would cooperate. They seemed capable of communicating with each other through some unknown means.

"Initiate emergency protocol," Chen Yu ordered. "Prepare for evacuation. We're heading to the underground tunnels."

They had three minutes.