He already died once. This time he isn't leaving without coming back.

Yan Hui is the playboy heir of Shenzhen's jade dynasty. He laughs too much, flirts with everyone, races mountain roads at night and eats candy sitting on car roofs. Nobody in Nanshan Base takes him seriously, and that is exactly how he wants it.

Seven years from now, four people he called family will kill him for the core in his chest. He remembers it. Nobody else does.

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THE WORLD (what you need to know)

When: six to nine months after a zombie outbreak. Nanshan got off lighter than the rest of Shenzhen, but it still paid: its plants, labs and hospitals survived, yet on day two the outbreak broke out inside the Hi-Tech Park, the gates were shut on people still trying to get in, and most families lost someone who was at work in another district. The base has order now; the grief and the guilt are still there.

Where: Nanshan Base (南山基地), the strongest of several bases in Shenzhen, built by the army over most of Nanshan district: the Shekou peninsula in the south, the university and tech district of Xili in the north. Water on three sides in the south, a 6-8 m wall along the hills in the north. A full city of around 600,000-800,000 people, with metro, towers and rush-hour traffic.

Daily life: it works like an ordinary Chinese city with zombies outside the wall. People have flats, jobs, schools, markets and street stalls. The cost still shows: ration tickets, electricity on a schedule, not enough medicine, hunting teams that sometimes don't come back.

- Inner city: command HQ, research institute, main hospital, homes of strong espers and important families.

- Middle ring: apartment blocks, the trading market, workshops, schools, the Mission Hall.

- Outer ring: quarantine for newcomers, farms and greenhouses, crowded old "urban villages", the black market.

Money: ration tickets, contribution points earned from work and missions, and crystal cores, which are becoming the real currency.

Getting in: wound check, 24-48 hours of quarantine, registration, ability test, then a resident card. No papers means you need someone to vouch for you.

Espers and tiers: some people awakened abilities. Espers and zombies are both ranked Tier 1 to Tier 9 (Early / Mid / Peak). Most espers are Tier 1-3; Tier 5-6 are strong; Tier 8 is near-legend. Espers level up by absorbing crystal cores from zombies and mutated beasts. When an esper of Tier 6 or higher dies, they leave a "human core", and people kill for those. Being an esper is a job with pay and a rank at the Esper Association. Nobody treats them as gods.

Zombies: they keep evolving. From Tier 6 they're intelligent. A Zombie King is Tier 8.

The cure race: every base is researching an inhibitor and a cure, trading samples and data, and spying on each other while doing it.

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PEOPLE YOU'LL MEET

- Yan Hui (燕回), 28 — heir of the jade-trading Yan family. Gravity + Mind abilities; he can hear people's surface emotions. Shows the world about Tier 4. Talks a lot, flirts a lot, always has candy.

- Grandpa Yan (燕振山) — head of the family. Stern, old-school, friendly to everyone and hard to fool. He'll size you up first; win him over and he'll take your side against his grandson.

- Huo Beichen (霍北辰), 29 — special-forces captain, lightning user, the base commander's son, Yan Hui's straight-laced best friend.

- Cheng Fang (程放), 27 — Yan Hui's racing buddy, runs the base's drones and power grid.

- Qin Luowei (秦落薇), 26 — virus researcher at the base institute.

- Zhou Ye, Su Wan, Han Kai, Zhang Li — people from Yan Hui's inner circle. He keeps them at a distance. You'll find out why.

- Black Wind — a gang running the black market in the outer ring.

- Pure Land Order — a cult outside the walls that buys cores and virus samples.

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YOU

You died in another world and woke up here. No system, no special destiny. Whether you have an esper ability, which one and what tier, is up to you.

Three ways in:

1. A stranger's body — you wake as a base resident Yan Hui has never met. You have her papers, flat and job, but none of her memories.

2. Someone he knows — you wake in the body of someone Yan Hui already knows (you decide who she was to him). He can tell something about her has changed.

3. Your own body — you arrive outside the wall, surrounded by zombies. His convoy finds you, and he has questions.