Chapter 33: A Dead End

After chatting for a while, the two gradually calmed down, their initial terror fading. Qin Zhong dove back underwater to check the walls of the room for another exit. After swimming halfway along the perimeter, he discovered a door.

His heart leaped with joy—it was truly there! However, since these two rooms were not marked on the visitor’s map, Qin Zhong had no idea what lay beyond this second door.

After surfacing to inform Xiao Yingyong, they prepared themselves and dove back in. Passing through the door, they found a corridor. As they swam through and surfaced at the other end, they were both immediately startled. Less than a foot away from them floated the corpse of a woman. Simultaneously, the sound of zombies groaning echoed through the area—a muffled, reverberating cacophony. Their headlamps couldn't pierce far, but it was clear they were in a vast, spacious hall.

The woman’s eyes were tightly shut, and she wore a swimsuit. Her skin was bloated, white, and wrinkled from the water, her black hair drifting listlessly. Suddenly, her eyes snapped open, and Xiao Yingyong couldn't help but let out a sharp scream.

The next moment, they frantically kicked away, retreating several meters. Seeing that the corpse did not pursue them, their tension eased slightly.

"That scared me to death!" Xiao Yingyong gasped, clutching her chest. Looking around, she suddenly realized, "Ah, I know where this is! My mom brought me here—it’s the water park! This is the deepest part of the aquarium."

Hearing the constant groaning of the zombies all around, they knew the place must be infested. Not daring to take risks, they consulted each other and decided to dive back the way they came to see if the crocodiles had left. If they had, they could use the staff passage to make a quick escape. As they swam through the corridor again, Qin Zhong’s headlamp revealed a small door on the wall marked "Diving Equipment Room."

"Diving equipment?" Seeing the sign, Qin Zhong felt a spark of hope. He tapped Xiao Yingyong and pointed to the door, and the two dove into the equipment room.

Inside, the room was filled with large iron lockers. They surfaced to catch their breath and dove back down. Most of the lockers were locked, but three or four were left ajar. Searching through them, they pulled out various pieces of gear: wetsuits, respirators, oxygen tanks, diving knives, and air cylinders.

Surfacing to breathe, the two exchanged looks of pure delight. With this equipment, their chances of escaping the terrifying aquarium were much higher.

"Brother Qin," Xiao Yingyong sighed, "you were right. There really is always a way out."

Qin Zhong smiled without saying much, though he knew that despite the well-stocked room, neither of them had any experience with scuba diving. They spent the next twenty minutes surfacing and diving several times, helping each other strap on the tanks, masks, and fins, and learning how to breathe using the regulators.

Once ready, they slung their crossbows over their backs, took their diving knives, and swam back to the first room. Qin Zhong cautiously cracked the security door and peered out with his diving light. The crocodiles were gone. "Did those damn beasts eat their fill and wander off?" he muttered.

After observing for a while and confirming it was safe, he signaled to Xiao Yingyong and led the way out.

The diving lights were bright, cutting through the darkness of the deep water. They swam for seven or eight minutes until they reached the second corner of the passage. Though the path didn't wind much, it was incredibly long.

Just as they rounded the corner, a dark shadow lunged toward them with terrifying speed—a shark! Before they could react, the shark rolled over, revealing its pale grey belly, and drifted dead in the water.

Staring at the dead shark, Qin Zhong and Xiao Yingyong looked at each other, confused. It soon dawned on Qin Zhong: sharks were marine creatures and could not survive long in freshwater. He felt a sudden, strange sympathy for the creature—once a predator of the deep, now trapped in a small aquarium, unable to roam free.

As he mused, Xiao Yingyong suddenly tapped his shoulder, her face anxious as she pointed behind them. Qin Zhong turned to see four or five massive crocodiles swimming out from around the corner. His heart sank; one was enough to handle, but four or five?

Terrified, Qin Zhong signaled for her to swim as fast as she could. Xiao Yingyong understood and kicked forward with all her might.

After swimming a distance, they didn't see the crocodiles pursuing them, though they could feel the water churning behind them. The crocodiles were likely engaged in a "death roll," fighting over the shark carcass. Qin Zhong didn't dare shine his light back to check; if the light attracted the man-eating monsters, it would be suicide.

They swam another thirty or forty meters, but the end of the staff passage was nowhere in sight. It was an agonizingly long tunnel. Qin Zhong accidentally tilted his light upward and saw that the water level was rising near the ceiling. He was shocked—why was the water rising? Was it raining outside?

He felt a wave of relief that they had found the diving gear; without the oxygen tanks, they would have drowned. He looked at Xiao Yingyong, who was following half a meter behind, pale and exhausted. This girl had been through hell tonight.

They swam another ten meters when Qin Zhong’s light hit the end of the path. A chill ran from his head to his toes: the end of the staff passage was a cold, impenetrable solid wall!

After all that effort, the passage was a dead end!

"Damn it!" Qin Zhong roared in his mind. "They blocked off the way to the fire exit! Those damn capitalists!"

It turned out this wasn't a real staff passage at all. It had likely been sealed off before the apocalypse, perhaps during renovations to turn the area into an underwater park. This structural change had become a fatal trap for them.

In an instant, Qin Zhong was overwhelmed by shock, rage, and despair. His chest felt as if it would burst, and behind him, Xiao Yingyong, seeing the dead end, stood paralyzed, her face deathly pale.