At a pace that was almost day and night, five days later, Xiao Wen and Wen Le led a significantly smaller army to the gate of the base, but still with a substantial number compared to the base.
Before approaching the base, when they were close enough, Wen Le informed Han Ya inside the base via the walkie-talkie. By now, there were a bunch of people gathered at the gate watching them approach.
“Dad!”
After receiving the notification, Han Ya immediately found Bai Yun and told him the news of Bai Yang’s imminent arrival. This great surprise almost stunned Bai Yun, and he pulled Han Yi Feng and rushed to the gate, eagerly anticipating it.
As soon as Bai Yang got out of the car, he saw his daughter rushing towards him, laughing and lifting her up and spinning her around.
After the excitement, Bai Yun lifted his head from Bai Yang’s arms and met Yan Wei Guo’s amused gaze. Bai Yun felt a little shy and rubbed against Yan Wei Guo’s side.
“Hello, Uncle Yan!” Bai Yang grew up under Yan Wei Guo’s leadership and Bai Yun had met him at the rescue station before.
“Not bad, you’ve gotten fatter since I last saw you,” Yan Wei Guo patted Bai Yun’s head.
Unlike their previous life filled with fear and anxiety, they were now well-fed and taken care of, and their weight and health had improved significantly since coming here.
But looking at Bai Yang and Yan Wei Guo, who were originally firm and upright, now thin and almost unrecognizable, Bai Yun couldn’t help but feel sad and tears welled up in his eyes.
“Alright, alright, we finally reunited after such a long time. We should be happy! Besides, the weight you lost from falling, aren’t you afraid that Wen Shao won’t be able to make it up for you?” Han Ya stepped forward and said with a smile, then looked at Yan Wei Guo.
“Hello, Captain Yan. I’m Han Ya. It’s nice to meet you. I didn’t get to visit you at the rescue station before due to various reasons. Please forgive me.”
Unlike Xiao Wen’s indifference and Wen Le’s habitual obedience, Han Ya couldn’t hide his versatile nature with just a few words.
“Hello, I’m Yan Wei Guo, the Captain of the 703rd Division. On the way here, Bai Yang often mentioned you. He said even ten of his staff couldn’t match up to you. With you here, I believe the future development of the base will be better.” Yan Wei Guo reached out and shook hands with Han Ya, smiling.
Han Ya also smiled, “You’re overestimating me. We have Boss Xiao in charge of the big picture and Wen Shao providing logistical support. I’m just a butler dealing with trivial matters every day. Let’s not stand outside and talk. Let’s go into the base.” Han Ya made a slight gesture of invitation. Yan Wei Guo declined and entered the base with Xiao Wen.
Upon entering the base, Yan Wei Guo and Bai Yang were stunned. The overall view of the base was not as visually stunning from a distance. However, upon entering, they realized that the base was not as small as they had imagined. The dense houses, strange roofs, tall chimneys in the distance, and several large buildings behind the housing made it hard to believe that it had only been less than five months since they separated in X City, minus the time spent on the road. In just a few months, they had built such a base.
Bai Yang remembered that when they left, there were only about forty people. Although there were quite a few people in the base now, most of them were dressed as Tibetan people, probably those who joined later. This means that the foundation of this base was entirely built by the initial forty people!
“Please come in.” After they were amazed, Han Ya continued to lead the way.
Bai Yang took a step back and let Li Ran arrange the soldiers. Since Han Ya knew in advance of their arrival, he must have arranged for people to settle the large group of soldiers who came with them.
As soon as Bai Yang finished explaining to Li Ran, Mo Yan walked over to his side and led him to settle the huge caravan outside the base.
After entering the conference room, he took a deep breath only after Yan Wei Guo and several higher-ranking military officers behind him had sat down.
“Your base is really impressive!” Bai Yang said with a bitter smile.
Xiao Wen and Wen Le had emphasized before that the base was very small and not yet completed, making him think that the base was only the size of a football field, with most of it being a foundation waiting to be built!
Now, looking at it, where is it not built?! It’s a miracle that it was built like this in just a few months!
Han Ya smiled and said, “If you had come a month earlier, you would have only seen an empty base. Most of it was built after the Tibetan people joined. It took us almost a month just to build a wall with our initial group of people!”
Bai Yang still smiled bitterly, shaking his head and not saying anything.
Their standards for the completion of the base were different. When Han Ya and the others thought it was complete, it was probably already a fortress!
“We’ve traveled a long way, so everyone should rest well during this time. Let’s talk about everything after we’re well-rested.” Xiao Wen said to Yan Wei Guo.
Yan Wei Guo nodded and said, “I am old now. If you need anything, just go directly to Bai Yang. He has the authority to make decisions. On behalf of my soldiers, thank you for taking us in!” With that, Yan Wei Guo stood up and bowed slowly to Xiao Wen.
Xiao Wen was surprised and used his ability to flash to Yan Wei Guo’s side, holding up the old man who was about to bend over.
“Captain Yan, you’re killing us!” Han Ya also stood up in shock. Fortunately, Xiao Wen supported Yan Wei Guo quickly. If the old man had bowed to them, they would not be able to face the soldiers outside in the future.
Yan Wei Guo tried to push Xiao Wen away, but he was cleverly held down in the chair.
“Captain Yan, even if we ignore your status, you are still our elder. If we accept your thanks in this way, how will we be able to hold our heads up in the future?” Wen Le looked at Yan Wei Guo with a serious expression on her delicate face.
Yan Wei Guo looked at the confused young people in front of him and smiled bitterly. “You are not accepting my gratitude!”
Seeing that Yan Wei Guo was stubbornly standing up, Han Ya also sat down.
“Captain Yan, your gratitude will shorten our lives! We cannot afford it! Moreover, we also need the soldiers you bring with you to settle here. Although it seems peaceful here now, there is no truly calm place in the post-apocalyptic world. Even if the zombies have not moved here in a short time, survivors will continue to gather here for safety. When we arrived here in March, although we didn’t see them, there must have been many survivors who entered the Tibetan area before us. Where there are people, there are conflicts, not to mention the current situation where all resources cannot be replenished. Your joining gives the base a sense of security, so from a benefit perspective, we can say that we are mutually beneficial.”
Wen Le took over Han Ya’s words and continued speaking, “Not to mention the bond we formed when we were fighting for survival at the rescue station. We wouldn’t just sit by and watch you suffer in front of us. It was easy for us to establish a base with just over 40 people, so can’t you nearly 3,000 strong men do the same? For us, building a base was easy, but holding onto our territory is difficult. Your arrival has eased our pressure and allowed us to move forward boldly. From this perspective, we should be thanking you for coming.”
Yan Wei Guo pointed at Han Ya and then at Wen Le, muttering to Bai Yang beside him.
“Look at them, look at them. I only said one sentence and now there’s a group waiting to block me!”
Bai Yang and the others burst into laughter.
“Young people nowadays, you have to go along with what they say, or else they’ll come back to nag you to death! Haha!” A military officer around thirty years old sitting next to Bai Yang laughed and sighed.
The atmosphere in the meeting room suddenly became lively.
Speaking and communicating in a relaxed environment was much easier.
“Let me put it this way, for now, we have received your help, and we appreciate the gesture. But we should all do our part. Don’t hold back where we need to work together. We’re all tough guys here and don’t know much about political maneuvering. If there’s anything that needs to be done, any task, just assign it directly to us. I also noticed that although you have a lot of people, there are also many elderly, weak, sick, and disabled among you. The nearly 3,000 people we brought are all able-bodied and willing to work hard. So if there’s anything that needs to be done, just let us know!” Bai Yang laughed and said, deliberately glancing at Han Ya when he mentioned “political maneuvering.”
Han Ya smiled bitterly as she was being watched, “Yin Chengyang must be really happy now. He likes people who speak their minds. But why does he have to aim his criticism at me?!”
Wen Le couldn’t hold back and chuckled, and even Lin Yan, who had returned with Xiao Wen, was sitting there watching Han Ya’s bitter smile.
“Lin Yan, you can’t escape either. Wen Shao said we’re on the same level. Captain Yan, Big Brother Bai, and the other senior officers present here, take a good look at this face,” he pointed at Lin Yan intentionally, “Treat me and him equally!” Han Ya also laughed, “But as for work, don’t worry, as soon as I heard on the intercom that it was you guys coming, I was waiting for your subordinates to do some work for me! I don’t need soldiers to fight against the enemy right now, but I do need labor to build houses!”
After a few more laughs, Han Ya and Lin Yan took the military officers present to their assigned dormitory. Needless to say, Yan Wei Guo stayed in the spare room of the small courtyard. Originally, Bai Yang wanted to stay with his beloved daughter, but when he heard that Bai Yun already had a roommate, he almost exploded. Wen Le almost swore to the heavens that Bai Yun wasn’t living with Han Yi Feng, and after some persuasion, Bai Yang finally calmed down. In the end, Bai Yang and Yan Wei Guo shared a room in the small courtyard, making communication and decision-making much more convenient.
Although the quality of the food in the army had made a qualitative leap after Wen Le and Xiao Wen joined, no one was willing to stop and have a good meal in order to hurry along. That evening, everyone ate to their heart’s content in the courtyard, gathered around numerous tables.
Compared to the Tibetan people of the nomadic tribe, those in the army were probably more relaxed.
When Xiao Wen said to eat as much as possible and to eat until full and satisfied, all the soldiers who had been drinking rice soup for days completely let loose. One moment, a table’s stewed meat was gone, and the next, a table’s pig trotters were cleaned out. Huang Yao was happily busy with ten or so women bustling around the table. Even the reserved Tibetan people, who had been eating together for a long time, let loose and truly ate until they were full.
Despite their constant busyness, behind the smiling faces of Huang Yao and the Tibetan women who were busy preparing food, there was a slow sadness. Even with the more than five hundred Tibetans who came back with Lin Yan, just the group of young men who arrived today with their ferocious eating habits were enough to make them think of the hardships they had endured before. These Tibetan women had only heard of the situation in the Central Plains, but had not experienced it themselves. However, Huang Yao had experienced it deeply.
The struggle for survival before entering Tibet and the difficulties of lacking food after entering Tibet had caused most of these semi-adults in their twenties to suffer and become thin and emaciated.
Huang Yao was grateful that she and Yan Yan had followed Xiao Wen and Wen Le all the way and, aside from the hardships they had suffered in the village, had not gone hungry or cold.
But before the thought of gratitude could even arise, seeing the soldiers in front of them moved to tears by the food, Huang Yao felt heartbroken and wanted to cry.
What a calamity! Their perfectly good lives had been messed up by this inexplicable apocalypse!
What a calamity!
Thanks for the update! -^^)❤