Chapter 56: Forced Assault

Zhang Yi sat at home, quietly waiting for his unhinged neighbors to arrive. His expression was dead serious, and a vast array of weapons was laid out neatly before him.

At that moment, he received a message from Uncle Yu, the security guard.

"Xiao Zhang, you need to run! They're all coming after you with weapons."

A faint warmth bloomed in Zhang Yi's chest. In this day and age, it was rare to find a good person.

He smiled and replied, "Uncle Yu, don't worry, I can handle it."

Uncle Yu fell silent for a moment, seemingly realizing that there was nowhere to run even if he tried. Resistance was the only option.

He typed back, "Xiao Zhang, I hope you can survive. I'm sorry... I probably won't be able to help you this time."

Uncle Yu felt deeply ashamed. In truth, he owed his life to Zhang Yi's kindness. Back then, it was Zhang Yi who had reminded him to stock up on supplies, which was why he had managed to stash away plenty of instant noodles, ham sausages, and other necessities in his home. His standard of living was still quite decent now. Yet, watching helplessly as Zhang Yi was about to be besieged by so many people, his hands were tied.

Zhang Yi replied indifferently, "The fact that you chose not to join them already proves your goodness. Don't worry, you don't need to stress over my end."

Uncle Yu's choice was the most sensible one. Rushing over to help Zhang Yi now would likely get him hacked to pieces by over a hundred angry property owners.

After a brief exchange with Uncle Yu, Zhang Yi remained cautious and revealed no details about his home. Vigilance is the shield of the living; no matter who the other party was, he would never place absolute trust in anyone!

Shortly after, Zhang Yi felt a faint vibration beneath his feet. A low, rumbling sound echoed from outside.

"They're here," Zhang Yi said calmly.

He knew that was the sound of over a hundred people surging up the stairwell. Yet, Zhang Yi lived on the 24th floor! With the elevators out of power, these bastards running up the stairs must have been exhausted to the bone.

Of course, the arrivals weren't just coming from downstairs. At the very least, through the large monitor in his living room displaying the entire apartment building's feed, Zhang Yi spotted his next-door neighbors from 2402 stepping out into the hallway, clutching a kitchen knife and a wrench.

The neighbors were a young couple. The woman held a kitchen knife tightly, cowering behind the man. Their eyes burned with a sickly, greenish hue as they stared balefully at Zhang Yi's front door. No doubt, upon learning that their neighbor had been living a life of paradise for the past half month, jealousy had utterly consumed them!

The crowd swarmed in, blocking the corridor outside Zhang Yi's door so tightly not even water could trickle through. Several people held open umbrellas over their heads—a precaution against Zhang Yi pouring freezing water down on them.

Before long, someone lost patience and began hammering on the door.

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

"Zhang Yi, get your ass out here! If you don't want to die, this is your last chance!"

"Don't wait for us to break in, or it'll be too late for regrets!"

Scanning the monitor, Zhang Yi didn't spot Sun Zhichao and his gang, nor did he see Chen Zhenghao. Their frantic door-bashing confirmed one thing to him: Sun Zhichao and Chen Zhenghao hadn't told anyone the actual reality of his defenses.

In other words, their goal was to use the other neighbors as cannon fodder, letting them absorb the initial onslaught of Zhang Yi's crossbow bolts and high-voltage electricity.

Zhang Yi had no intention of holding back. Since his energy reserves were practically infinite, he didn't care about wasting a bit of electricity. With a flick of his wrist, he activated the high-voltage electrical grid switch.

The young man who had been furiously pounding on the door was instantly seized by a violent current, his face contorting into a horrific mask of agony!

The most terrifying part was that, with over a hundred people crammed shoulder-to-shoulder in the narrow hallway, the entire corridor formed a human chain of conductivity. The moment he was electrocuted, a massive wave of people behind him shared the current!

"Ah!!"

"It's high-voltage! Get back!"

The people in the back recoiled as if bitten by a venomous beast, hastily letting go. If not for the thick layers of winter clothing cushioning them, they might never have broken free. Every single one of them had been jolted by the current, their muscles spasming in excruciating pain.

The door-bocker and the seven or eight individuals closest to him suffered the worst fate. Unable to escape in time, they were charred completely black from head to toe. The remaining crowd stared at them in terror, yet not a single person dared to step forward and help.

After a dozen agonizing seconds, Zhang Yi cut off the power. Thin wisps of smoke rose from the nine bodies, filling the air with the sickening stench of burning flesh and scorched fabric.

"Thud!!"

All nine bodies collapsed simultaneously, pitch-black and motionless, leaving everyone guessing whether they were dead or alive. Yet deep down, everyone knew that even if a faint breath lingered in them, they were already dead men walking under the current circumstances.

The crowd stared wide-eyed, horrified by the gruesome spectacle unfolding right before them. They had never imagined so many people would die so suddenly, and right in front of their eyes. The victims of the electrocution wore grotesquely distorted expressions, their eyes bulging out of their sockets.

Several women in the crowd finally broke, letting out piercing screams before doubling over to retch violently. Sadly, with their stomachs completely empty, they could only heave up bitter, burning stomach acid.

A wave of panic rippled through the crowd, and a few individuals tried to flee. But upon reaching the stairwell, they discovered the exit had been tightly blocked by Chen Zhenghao and his thugs.

"Where do you think you're going? Get back there!" Chen Zhenghao growled menacingly, leveling a firearm at them.

The stairwell was their only path of retreat, and by sealing it off, Chen Zhenghao intended to force everyone to fight Zhang Yi to the death. The more of them that died, the easier it would be for Chen Zhenghao to rightfully seize their remaining resources.

Sun Zhichao and his cronies, still dragging their sickly bodies, were also present at the scene. They gazed at the nine corpses with utter indifference. Clearly, they and Chen Zhenghao shared the exact same malicious agenda.

Noticing the pervasive terror rippling through the crowd, Sun Zhichao shouted at the top of his lungs, "That damned Zhang Yi is nothing more than a beast! He actually murdered his own neighbors!"

"Brothers and sisters, we have to kill Zhang Yi and avenge them!"

"Don't be afraid! Use a log to ram the door, just don't touch the metal directly!"

"He's out of tricks! He's at his wit's end!"

"Once we breach this door, waiting for us inside are comfortable heaters and endless food!"

Sun Zhichao's rallying cry managed to ignite the bloodshot eyes of the desperate mob once more. Having endured over half a month of freezing cold and gnawing hunger, they were willing to trade anything for a bite of food and a moment of warmth!

Immediately, someone dragged over a heavy wooden beam, apparently stripped from a large wardrobe or a bed frame.

"Brothers, ram it! Open that door and crush that bastard Zhang Yi!"

A group of men hoisted the wooden beam, aligning it with Zhang Yi's front door, and began slamming it furiously.

"Bang!"

"Bang!"

"Bang!"

The violent impacts made the water glass on Zhang Yi's coffee table tremble. Yet Zhang Yi felt far from entertained.

He retrieved a large Sennheiser Bluetooth speaker from his spatial dimension, connected it to his phone, and blasted his favorite upbeat track.

While the people outside battered the door in a frenzy, classic high-energy music blared from within, driving the intruders even further into a blind rage.

You arrogant piece of shit, we're going to slaughter you!"

"You're dead today! You're going to pay for my brother's life!"

They gripped the wooden pillar, putting even more muscle into their blows. Yet after dozens of bone-rattling impacts, to their dismay, the door hadn't budged a single millimeter.

Over a dozen grown men exerting force together possessed a combined strength of over a thousand pounds. Yet all they had managed to produce on that heavy black steel door were a few faint white scuffs and an almost imperceptible dent.

The neighbors' hearts sank into an abyss of despair.

"What kind of door is this? Why is it so damn solid?"

"At this rate, when the hell are we ever going to break through?"

Everyone was gasping for breath. They were laboring in temperatures plummeting past minus seventy degrees Celsius, and starved of proper nutrition, they possessed very little stamina to begin with. After just a few rounds of ramming, many of their legs turned to jelly, forcing them to cycle out with others.

Yet at their current progress, everyone would drop dead from exhaustion before making a dent.

At that moment, a man stepped forward, stared intently at the doorframe for a long moment, and then shrieked in horror: "This... this is a bank vault security door!"

The man worked at a bank; upon closer inspection, he had recognized the telltale design.

Hearing this, the surrounding crowd felt their last glimmer of hope extinguish.

"Then this thing can't be smashed open at all?"

The bank employee shook his head bitterly. "Forget about using a wooden log; even if you used explosives, you wouldn't blow up a top-tier security door like this!"

"Without the key, only the world's top safecracking experts would stand even a sliver of a chance of opening it."

Just then, holding a heavy crossbow, Zhang Yi stepped up to the firing port.