TDRA Chapter 28

Father Gu was doing surgery in the dormitory, and the noises outside were very loud, such as the adults arguing fiercely and children crying. Yet Gu Ning could hear the sound of Gao Yue whispering to Huang MengYao in the dormitory and even the sound of surgical shears cutting the flesh.

She felt a little uneasy and anxious, and then she unconsciously reached into her pocket and grabbed the green bead. And, without any explanation, as soon as her hand touched the bead, the feeling of being a little restless, instantly melted. It was a very subtle feeling that was difficult to describe.

She couldn’t resist taking it out and spreading it on her palm. Under the sunlight, the bead appeared to be transparent with a refreshing green colour. Also, there seems to be something circulating inside the bead if it was examined closely.

Gu Ning once again had the illusion that this was delicious and she subconsciously brought the bead closer towards her mouth……

When the cool bead touched her tongue, Gu Ning woke up with a jolt and tried to spit it out, but in an instant, the bead had melted into a cold stream of water in her mouth. As if the stream was alive, it flowed down her throat smoothly without the need of swallowing…… Gu Ning could feel the trail of cool water sliding down her throat, as she recalled the bead originated from the puddle of foul-smelling rotten flesh, and she racked herself up to vomit it out——

The commotion made by Gu Ning soon alerted several people, including Jia DaoZhang and Cheng Ming who had all gathered around with concern.

“Gu Ning, are you alright?”

Gu Ning had no time to answer them, she was so full of fear at this point that she was desperately gagging out the stream of water she had just swallowed.

Thinking that Gu Ning was choking with something, Jia DaoZhang reached out his hand and tried to pat on Gu Ning’s back ——

Before the hand could touch Gu Ning’s back, the area which his hand was supposed to pat suddenly fell forward.

Gu Ning’s entire body felt like it had been hit hard and she suddenly fell to the ground, just lying there passively.

Jia DaoZhang’s hand was still mid-air, and in the face of the incomparably shocked gaze cast by Cheng Ming, Xie YuHong, and Zhang Yang, he hurriedly rebutted: “It wasn’t me! I didn’t even touch her!”

Looking at Gu Ning again, her eyes were closed as she lay motionlessly on the ground.

Glaring at them Jia DaoZhang said to these panicked guys: “What are you guys standing there for?! Hurry up and carry her to the bed!”

The few guys hurriedly lifted Gu Ning and carried her back into the dormitory room.

Jia DaoZhang glanced at his hand, greatly perplexed, and could only follow suit to the next dormitory room.

“Jia DaoZhang? What’s wrong with Gu Ning?” Cheng Ming looked at Gu Ning, who was unconscious on the bed, feeling panicked and anxious.

Jia DaoZhang wanted to shout out in frustration, he was a Daoist priest, not a doctor! How would he know what’s wrong if he only knows how to perform transcendence and not about saving people?

“Go next door and call Doctor Gao to take a look.” Jia DaoZhang spoke, thinking about the dry gagging action Gu Ning had just made and said: “Could she be poisoned from eating something?” Looking at Gu Ning who was lying on the bed, her eyes were shut and it didn’t seem like she had suffered any new injuries on her body. She looked like she was just taking a nap.

Zhang Yang hurriedly ran next door to call Gao Yue and it was just right on time as Gao Yue had just finished the operation and come out. Upon hearing that Gu Ning had suddenly fainted, she was shocked and rushed to the dormitory room where Gu Ning got placed. First, she probed Gu Ning’s nose to check her breathing and then took out her stethoscope to listen to Gu Ning’s heartbeat. When she found nothing wrong with it, she lifted Gu Ning’s eyelids to check it. “Huh?” She moved closer in disbelief and noticed a very noticeable circle of green around the edges of Gu Ning’s pupils: “What is this?”

“What’s wrong?” Hearing Gao Yue’s voice in disbelief, Jia DaoZhang hurriedly came over to take a look too, then said in surprise: “Why are her eyes green?!”

This cry caused Cheng Ming, Zhang Yang, and Xie YuHong to gather closer.

The circle of green was not light or faint in colour, but it was an intense emerald green that looked very conspicuous, inexplicably giving off a sense of life. Yet the sudden growth of such a circle of green around a person’s eyes was bizarre.

Zhang Yang held his tongue for a moment and asked: “Glaucoma?”

He was slapped on the head by Jia DaoZhang: “Glaucoma your head.” And then Jia DaoZhang asked Gao Yue instead: “What’s wrong with Gu Ning?”

Gao Yue loosened the tense nerves in her eyes and shook her head in confusion before replying: “I don’t know. I haven’t seen a case like this before.”

Xie YuHong, who had been standing at the outermost edge and had been quiet, suddenly spoke in hesitation: “Is she wearing contact lenses? A lot of girls at our school used to wear that thing, and their eyes changed colour after wearing it……”

“…… that’s also not it.” Gao Yue continued: “For now we can only wait until she finally wakes up and see if she knows what’s going on.”

Zhang Yang asked weakly: “Will she even wake up……”

As soon as the words left his mouth, he received another smack on the head and Jia DaoZhang said: “Kid, can you say something positive with this mouth of yours? If you can’t, then just shut up will you?”

Zhang Yang pursed his lips in aggrievance and kept quiet.

“Could it be that she just fell asleep?” Huang MengYao spoke: “She hasn’t rested since early in the morning until now, and with so many things happening in between, she might have fallen asleep because she was too tired.”

“Let’s hope so.” Gao Yue stood up and said: “Anyway, if she wakes up, please remind her to send my payment to the school infirmary.” Before anyone could react, she walked away with her medical kit on her back.

“Payment? What payment?” Cheng Ming was still a bit confused as to what Gao Yue meant.

“Of course it’s the payment for healing the sick.” Jia DaoZhang remembered his status and refrained from rolling his eyes as he spoke: “Even if you asked a Daoist priest like me to go around and perform the transcendental service for the dead, I will still collect money. We are not gods, we all have to eat, drink, poop and sleep.” Although he often preaches about being the priest and the immeasurable heavenly dignity, he spoke now without any semblance of a man of the world and was a complete layman instead.

Although Cheng Ming and the others felt a little letdown, they still understood it. In the end, they felt that Gao Yue did not match the image of the healer which they had imagined to be helping the world and saving people without gaining anything.

At this moment, Gu Ning was completely unaware of what was happening around her.

Whereas, they were also completely unaware of the strange changes that were taking place inside Gu Ning’s body.

After Gu Ning subconsciously swallowed the bead into her mouth, the bead instantly turned into water and flowed down her throat smoothly. It didn’t reach her stomach but turned into countless streams that began to course through her limbs and bones while repeatedly circulating from top to bottom and back up again. It didn’t destroy Gu Ning’s original body’s structure but silently nourished it, like the rain in spring, slowly showering the fields.

As time passed, the green streams flowed throughout Gu Ning’s limbs and bones. Whereas in between heaven and earth, countless green dots of light invisible to the human eyes lit up bit by bit from the surroundings. Then those lights came from all directions and flew towards Gu Ning’s body which became the focal point of the gathering lights. Those lights passed through the woods, the grasses, the fences, the walls, and all the bodies of the human as if nothing in the world could be a hindrance to it……

The leaves in the forest rustled as if they were laughing with joy, it was already in the early autumn where the old leaves were beginning to wither and yet the new greens were slowly sprouting out.  The weeds along the roadside that were trampled by passers-by, trembled faintly before it straightened up and stood tall.

Some people noticed the differences and looked up in amazement at the rustling of the trees as if the wind had passed through the forest. When they reached out in bewilderment, they did not feel a single trace of wind on their fingers.
Those green dots of light converged and gathered from all directions were all heading to a single place. It all clustered around Gu Ning who was lying on the iron-framed bed with her eyes tightly closed.

When those dots of light touched Gu Ning’s skin, they passed through her skin just as easily as they had passed through the bodies of the others. However, unlike those people, those green dots of light never came out after they had passed through her skin. Those green dots of light penetrated Gu Ning’s body through her skin in an orderly manner, merged into those green streams, and then continued to circulate throughout Gu Ning’s body in a repeating manner.

Meanwhile, within the mysterious space.

The golden pointer on the Tai Chi compass embedded in the black door, as if sensing the green dots of light, began to tremble slightly and then the trembling gradually sped up. In the end, the golden pointer which previously couldn’t be toggled forward started spinning around wildly!

The moment the golden pointer spun, the blackness on the door slowly began to fade away, revealing a slight green beneath the blackness, and then the green began to spread widely……

Cheng Ming and the others who were standing in the corridor anxiously waiting for Gu Ning to wake up were unable to feel anything even though they were fully surrounded by those invisible green dots of light. However, Jia DaoZhang rubbed his arms underneath his Daoist robe which suddenly had goosebumps appearing on it. He stared at the empty air and strangely felt something weird about it but he couldn’t quite point his fingers what the exact problem was.

At first, those green dots of light simply converged within Gu Ning’s body into a continuous green stream, which then turned into a turbulent river, and then turned into a raging and roaring river that smashes at the shore, before all those rivers finally converged and became an endless but incomparably calm green sea——

If anyone had witnessed this spectacular sight, they would’ve been so gobsmacked that they’ll etch this scene in their minds forever.

However, no matter what kind of mutation had taken place in Gu Ning’s body. To Jia DaoZhang and the others, Gu Ning was simply just lying there unmoving with her eyes closed.

Three hours later, after the ocean returned to its calmness from the merging of the fields of green dots, the remaining dots of light that had not yet entered Gu Ning’s body, slowly dim away and until it could no longer be perceived.

After the last green dot of light that had pooled into that ocean.

Gu Ning’s eyes, which had been tightly shut, abruptly opened.

The circle of emerald green at the outer edge of her pupils slowly faded as if it were discoloured, eventually leaving only an extremely light layer of green. If one did not stare closely enough to look for it, it would be difficult to even discover the subdued circle of light green.

The moment she opened her eyes, Gu Ning felt a layer of green hooded light enveloping her eyes, she blinked and the layer of hooded light was gone

She didn’t know what kind of transformation had taken place in her body after she fell unconscious.

And obviously, she had no idea what this change meant.

It was now in the third month of the post-apocalyptic world.

A dramatic change has quietly taken place in the world, unbeknownst to anyone, and it all began with the death of a zombie dog and a blonde girl.

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(T/N: Sorry for the late update than the usual 12pm. Oh well, here is the chapter =) Thank you for the waiting and reading!)

(Editor: De Vile)