By the time Wen Le had adjusted his mood, the soldiers outside had already begun to eat. Bai Yang had asked Liu Yikun to bring over the food for Xiao Wen and the others.
Watching as Liu Yikun placed a pot of porridge, a dozen steamed buns, and a large pot of stewed cabbage onto the car, Wen Le pursed his lips and picked up a steamed bun, stuffing it into his mouth.
“Um… don’t you guys have lunch boxes?” Liu Yikun scratched his head, looking a little embarrassed as he looked at Han Ya. Everyone in the army had their own lunch box, including Bai Yang and their strict teacher, so they had forgotten that Xiao Wen and the others were not part of the army and didn’t have lunch boxes.
“It’s okay, we have disposable lunch boxes in the car.” Han Ya waved his hand, letting Liu Yikun off the hook.
Wen Le quickly bent down and reached under the seat, using the seat as cover, and took out eight unused disposable lunch boxes from the space.
Liu Yikun’s eyes widened as he stared at the stack of white lunch boxes in Wen Le’s hand.
…
“Why do they collect lunch boxes? And why do they carry them with them in the car?”
“Well, we can’t use these for porridge, can we?!”
“We have paper cups~” Upon hearing Liu Yikun’s words, Qi Rui also followed Wen Le’s actions and reached under the seat, pulling out a stack of paper cups.
It wasn’t that he also had space abilities, but that the paper cups were originally placed under the seat. Before they arrived at the rescue station, they used these cups to drink from the large water tank. After all, the number of bottled mineral water was limited, so Wen Le had used the water from the tank to fill up everyone’s cups in the space. If they could avoid using extra resources, they would.
…
Liu Yikun was speechless, silently withdrew his foot from the car and walked away.
The people in the car were also speechless.
They took out the food containers to avoid putting Liu Yikun in a difficult position, so why not take out the paper cups as well?! Who would pack disposable products instead of food and clothing when they were escaping for their lives?
“Forget it, let’s just take them out and have lunch,” Han Ya sighed.
Qi Rui looked at the others inexplicably.
What’s the problem with the paper cups?
Everyone at the table silently ate the same food as the soldiers: small, hard corn buns, watery rice porridge, and cabbage without any visible oil. At this moment, everyone deeply felt the struggle for survival in the apocalypse.
Normally, Qi Rui and Zhao Xiaogang would have appreciated the advantage of having Wen Le as a mobile warehouse, but they remained silent and focused on eating the army-issued food.
“Departure in ten minutes,” a strange soldier knocked on the car window and informed them.
Qi Rui and Zhao Xiaogang cleaned their meal boxes and disposable cups and joined a soldier outside to deliver the empty dishes and pots to a designated area.
“Stay alert. We may encounter danger as soon as we enter the city. Take care of yourselves and don’t cause any trouble. Chen Ye, Qi Rui, and Zhao Xiaogang, you three are the main force. Don’t be too nervous, just follow what I taught you,” Mo Yan started the car, and Han Ya couldn’t help but remind them again.
“OK.”
“Okay, we got it,” the three boys tightened their grip on their guns and responded.
Compared to their tension, the lead driver Mo Yan and the tail driver Yin Chengyang also focused and prepared to help if the three couldn’t handle it.
Wen Le also spread out his mental energy, paying attention to any movements around them.
The team led by Bai Yang took the lead and entered X City. As the vanguard, Bai Yang arranged all the main forces at the front.
All vehicles were parked side by side and traveled closely. At the front were two road clearing vehicles with sturdy and tall bodies and large shovels that could easily shovel away any abandoned vehicles blocking the road.
Four machine guns were mounted on the roof of the clearing vehicles, two on each side, with gunners lying beside the machine guns and using windshields to protect themselves.
Behind the clearing vehicles were two heavy tanks, which could directly shell any major obstacles after the clearing vehicles moved aside.
Behind the tanks were six open-top military vehicles, each carrying ten ability users. They were arranged in front of the infantry based on different ability types and combinations.
The infantry convoy followed behind, mixed with vehicles from the artillery battalion.
When Qi Rui and Zhao Xiaogang returned after delivering the supplies, they carefully observed that their car and Bai Yang’s command vehicle were parked side by side, about fourteen or fifteen rows back.
Behind them was the infantry convoy, and according to Liu Yikun, the remaining esper and artillery soldiers in the regiment were dispersed and arranged in the vehicles behind, ensuring that each vehicle had evenly distributed firepower.
Behind their regiment was the 173rd regiment, and the commander of their 703rd division, Yan Weiguo, and his staff were sandwiched in between the 173rd regiment. Bringing up the rear was the 141st regiment, whose firepower was distributed opposite to Bai Yang’s vanguard, with their combat strength mainly concentrated in the rear to pave the way for the entire team in case they need to turn around.
Xiao Wen and the others didn’t have any ideas about the arrangement of the entire team, only Han Ya carefully drew the distribution of firepower and the team layout, studying it carefully.
“Why is it so quiet?” Wen Le looked at his watch. It had been almost ten minutes since they entered X City. Although there were no anti-slip measures on the road since entering the city, the speed of the vehicles was very slow, but it didn’t make sense that there was not a single person calling for help!
Even if it snowed for a month, it was impossible for all the survivors here to freeze or starve to death.
“We haven’t even seen a single zombie.” Xiao Wen squinted and looked to the right side of the car.
The dilapidated buildings, deserted streets, even if they opened the car windows, they could only hear the sound of the military approaching.
Qi Rui’s hand holding the gun began to tremble.
This quiet environment made them more easily nervous and even fearful.
Without thinking about their plan to train Chen Ye and the others, Han Ya instructed everyone to pick up their guns. Yin Chengyang and Zhao Xiaogang swapped positions, with Yin in the back-right seat, next to Bai Yang’s command vehicle, which was relatively safer, and Zhao in the far back-right, facing the danger first.
Wen Le asked Chen Ye to put the backrest down and the two switched places. Mo Yan still had to drive, and might not have time to attend to Chen Ye in the front seat, so Wen Le took the lead.
Xiao Wen sat behind Wen Le, and together with Chen Ye who swapped with him, sandwiched Han Ya in the middle.
“Xiao Wen, keep an eye on the surroundings,” Wen Le said to Xiao Wen without turning his head, then withdrew his mental power, abandoning the front, back, and left sides of the convoy, and focused his mental power on the right side of the convoy. Taking advantage of the slow movement of the vehicle, he locked onto the nearest residential building with his mental power and instantly extended it to the maximum.
“What’s going on…” Wen Le suddenly took a deep breath, shocked by the building covered by his mental power.
“What’s wrong?” Han Ya asked anxiously when he heard Wen Le’s exclamation.
This excessively quiet environment made them uneasy.
Wen Le suppressed his shock and ignored Han Ya’s question, transferring his mental power to another nearby building.
The situation was the same!
“Wen Le?” Xiao Wen leaned forward and placed a hand on Wen Le’s shoulder, startling him out of his thoughts.
“All the zombies are inside the building,” Wen Le told the others what he had observed. “Chen Ye, open the car window and notify the vehicle next to us!”
Chen Ye quickly rolled down the window and waved to the adjacent vehicle.
“What’s going on?” The staff officer next to Bai Yang asked.
“Notify everyone that the zombies are all inside the building,” Chen Ye relayed Wen Le’s message.
“Are you sure?” Bai Yang asked, while pulling open the car window and asking his staff officer Li Ran, who had just spoken with Chen Ye.
“Positive! We have a psychic ability here, and we only realized something was wrong just now,” Han Ya cut in, pulling Chen Ye over to face Bai Yang directly.
Bai Yang quickly had his co-pilot Liu Yikun use the car’s intercom to notify the other vehicles. If all the zombies were inside the building, it would explain why the road had been so quiet, but it posed a significant threat to their rescue and resource-gathering operations.
While Bai Yang was worried about the situation, Wen Le was still in shock at the behavior of the zombies.
At the beginning of the apocalypse, zombies did not have the ability to think, nor did they have the ability to seek advantages and avoid disadvantages. It wasn’t until the second mutation, which occurred around half a year into the apocalypse, that zombies evolved some instincts, such as pursuit, avoidance of abilities, and—avoiding the cold.
Wen Le once again dispersed his psychic power around their vehicle, lowered his head, and covered his head with both hands.
He was trying to recall, to remember what the zombies were like during the previous apocalypse he had experienced. One month after that apocalypse began, what was the state of the zombies?
No matter how hard he tried to remember, no matter how he searched for details, his previous memories told him: something was wrong, it was completely different from now! After the snowstorm, when they passed through the town, the zombies were frozen stiff in the snow. Except for the few zombies that were indoors before the snowfall, all the other zombies were frozen in place, with slow movements.
“Wen Le!” Xiao Wen crouched at the back of Wen Le’s seat, worriedly grabbing Wen Le’s hand that was knocking on his head, despite the car being in motion.
Wen Le gasped for breath, trying to relax himself.
It’s okay, it’s okay! Even if it’s different from his memories, it doesn’t matter. He was reborn, and nothing is impossible. At least they are living much better than the last time.
Even if the zombies learn to seek advantages and avoid disadvantages, so what?!
Even if the zombies evolve ahead of schedule…
“Xiao Wen, listen to me! The zombies may be evolving earlier!” Wen Le recovered his breath and tried to speak calmly and steadily to Xiao Wen.
Xiao Wen was shocked. In fact, anyone who was previously informed by Wen Le that the virus would mutate again in six months would be surprised.
“But didn’t you say there were still six months left?” Han Ya asked.
Wen Le smiled wryly. His experience told him that there were still six months left, but now it was clearly different from what he had experienced before.
“As I said before, there should indeed be six months left, but the sign of zombie mutation is that they start to learn to seek advantages and avoid disadvantages. Look, these zombies know how to shelter from the cold inside the building, isn’t this the sign of mutation?”
As for the issue of the second mutation, even Han Ya had no idea how to explain it, and could only prepare for it based on Wen Le’s reminder. Now Wen Le tells him that the mutation is coming earlier and much earlier, and he is helpless.
“Can you estimate how long it will be until the second mutation starts?” Han Ya asked calmly.
Wen Le shook his head. He did know that the second mutation would occur in about a month after the zombies started to learn to seek advantages and avoid disadvantages, but he had no idea when these zombies started seeking shelter inside the building. Without the starting time, how could he estimate?!
“I can only say that it won’t be more than a month. Understanding the instinct to avoid danger means that they have already begun their second evolution. However, the official evolution requires the Red Moon… Oh, right! The second mutation of the virus is accompanied by three consecutive nights of the Red Moon. The moon turns blood red, and if survivors are exposed to the Red Moon for a long time, it will increase the likelihood of becoming a zombie. During the three consecutive days of the Red Moon, zombies and animals will not actively attack humans. But after these three days, evolved zombies will appear among the zombies, and we call them second-level zombies. Second-level zombies will have abilities similar to those of human ability users, with a degree of ability similar to Chen Ye and Han Yifeng when they first appeared.”
As soon as Wen Le finished speaking, everyone in the car fell silent. No one noticed the peculiar phrase “we call them second-level zombies” that Wen Le casually revealed, whether it was the meticulous Han Ya or the attentive Xiao Wen who focused on Wen Le.
“Do humans still have a chance to survive?!” After a long silence, Yin Chengyang burst out.
Wen Le thought for a moment, and began to share his experience.
“This time mutation, more than half of the surviving humans will turn into zombies. In other words, the rescue stations are very dangerous! However, with this mutation, there will still be a certain proportion of survivors who become ability users, and those who have already unlocked their abilities will not turn into zombies as long as they are not bitten or scratched by zombies. Among the ability users, some will evolve their abilities again, perhaps upgrading their original abilities or obtaining a second ability.”
I really hate evolving zombies 😭 and with plants and animals (RATS of all creatures) turning too, the odds always make me nauseous. I read a story once with zombie insects. At that point I’d just end it. IMMEDIATELY no. Immediately no.
Poor Wen Le must be desperate despite his previous knowledge even though they continue to give him bad news 😫
Thanks for the update!! 🤗 🤗