Chapter 22.3: Water Well and Meat
The captain of the “Rush Rush Rush Squad” was much more accustomed to it. Blue Sea had always been like this.
Back in wartime, there had even been merchants crossing battle zones to do business.
“The prices are acceptable,” he said.
Though a bit expensive, compared to the potential gain of hunted cattle and sheep, it was negligible.
But… the captain glanced at the merchant’s backpack.
“You don’t actually have the goods with you. When will they be delivered?”
“The goods are behind us. Our caravan rented vehicles specifically to transport them, but the roads are difficult. I’m just the advance scout responsible for taking orders. If you place your order now, you get a 10% discount. The goods will arrive by tomorrow morning at the latest.”
The captain thought for a moment.
“Can you swear to our god that the goods are real?”
The merchant patted his chest.
“I can!”
“And since there’s no network here for transfers, are you willing to swear by your resident ID that you will pay the full amount immediately upon returning to the safe city?”
The captain also patted his chest.
“I can!”
And so, the deal was concluded.
The merchant handed them a small token as proof, then continued walking with the crowd, promoting the [Everywhere-Is-A-Trade Team]’s goods to others along the way.
The “Rush Rush Rush Squad” stayed behind, waiting for the supply truck.
For Yun Yu, a local resident, this was the first time seeing business done like this. He opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it again—unsure whether to speak.
But thinking back to the divine blessing he had once felt, he felt that this kind of oath actually carried a certain sincerity.
If gods truly existed, then oaths would naturally become contracts.
And somehow, Yun Yu decided this way of doing things didn’t seem so bad after all.
Yun Yu was still young and not very good at spotting lies. Before the apocalypse, he had worked part-time jobs and had even had wages withheld by employers who refused to pay him.
Now things were different. With oaths made under the watch of a real god, at least he no longer had to worry about being cheated.
As Yun Yu was happily thinking about this, the captain walked over carrying a bag of flatbreads.
“Here, here, everyone have some while they’re still warm. They’ve even got sesame seeds on top.”
Yun Yu blinked.
“? Where did these flatbreads come from?”
The captain pointed.
“Over there! That tricycle is selling flatbreads and soy milk. Extra spicy costs another 10 points. I figured none of us like spicy food, so I didn’t order it.”
Yun Yu looked in that direction and, sure enough, saw someone running a food stall.
Once again, he was speechless.
“…Even though there are more people around now, this still counts as a dangerous area, doesn’t it?”
The captain took a bite of his flatbread.
“It’s fine. Back when Blue Sea was at war, people set up stalls on battlefields too. The higher the risk, the bigger the profit.”
Yun Yu: “…”
Alright then. Apparently he still didn’t understand Blue Sea deeply enough.
The captain sounded a little envious.
“I’m telling you, that vendor just told me that they used to sell flatbreads near the edge of the safe city’s cleared zone. At first they carried all their equipment themselves. But lots of residents from other safe cities were willing to pay with nucleus crystals—sometimes several times the normal price—and happily bought the food because they said they couldn’t get enough to eat in their own cities.”
“Maybe when we get back, we should set up a stall too. Look at that guy—it’s only been a few days, and he’s already earned enough points to rent a vehicle.”
Yun Yu took a bite of the delicious, crispy flatbread. The warmth of freshly cooked food, something he hadn’t enjoyed in a long time, filled him with happiness.
“I think setting up a stall is a good idea. But Captain… can you actually make flatbreads?”
One of the teammates burst out laughing.
“The captain cooked for me once. I’d rather skip a meal than eat that again. In the end, he had to eat it himself.”
Yun Yu looked surprised.
“Is it really that bad?”
“It’s awful,” the teammate said. “The captain dumped in a ton of seasonings and it still tasted terrible. Total waste of ingredients. After that, he never cooked again. If he wants food, he just goes to the cafeteria.”
The captain’s face turned red.
“Ahem, don’t exaggerate. I only added a little too much seasoning.”
Trying to salvage his dignity, he argued:
“It was just a tiny bit bad. Not that bad.”
—
In the Yunyang Underground Base, a woman wearing glasses ate a bowl of mush-like food.
The taste made her frown involuntarily, but she still held her breath and forced herself to finish it in one go.
She had no choice.
If she didn’t consume enough nutrition, her immune system would quickly weaken.
And once her immunity dropped, she would soon fall ill in this crude underground shelter—a former frozen-meat warehouse that had been hastily converted into a survival base.
Getting sick was disastrous.
There were no medicines, no medical equipment, and barely any hot water. Recovery depended almost entirely on the body’s natural healing ability.
More than a hundred people in this shelter had already died from illness.
Before the apocalypse, many of these conditions would have required nothing more than a visit to a clinic for some medication or an injection.
Some illnesses would have healed on their own after a few days of rest.
But after the apocalypse, food was scarce, water was often contaminated, survivors lived under immense psychological stress, and everyone carried constant anxiety about survival.
Any one of those factors could leave the body without the resources it needed to recover from disease.
Minor aches and illnesses that had once been insignificant had now become life-threatening.
People died from infected wounds after being bitten by ants or rats.
People who had bones broken by cattle had no choice but to endure the pain and hope for the best.
A single heavy rainstorm could trigger an outbreak of disease.
Coughing echoed everywhere, but the cold-storage warehouse was only so large. There were neither the materials nor the space needed to isolate the sick.
Darkness.
Oppression.
Suffering.
Everyone lived crammed together in the same space—eating, drinking, sleeping, and relieving themselves side by side. They endured constant hunger while their bodies sounded alarm after alarm, and yet there was nothing they could do about it.
Over the past few days, several more people had taken their own lives.
It wasn’t that they didn’t want to live.
They simply couldn’t bear this kind of life anymore.
This was the apocalypse.
People could escape the zombies and hide underground, but they couldn’t escape disease, loneliness, pain, or despair.
The woman tilted her head back and looked at the gloomy ceiling above.
“Dr. Yu, we’re running out of food. At the latest, the day after tomorrow, we’ll have to risk leaving the base and hunting cattle and sheep outside.”
The person who had established this base was named Zeng Tian.
Originally, their base had been located in a high-rise building. At its peak, there had been more than three thousand survivors.
Everyone gathered together, working to rebuild a home. They cleared the zombies around the building, sealed off the lower floors below the third story, and used ladders to travel up and down.
At first, the Yunyang Base developed quite well.
Living high above the ground meant they didn’t have to worry much about zombies. Teams regularly ventured out to scavenge supplies. There was enough food, and water could be obtained from a nearby small water treatment plant.
They believed that if they continued developing steadily, they would eventually see hope.
They scattered flyers everywhere, hoping more survivors would join them.
Then that zombie appeared.
Its enormous body and terrifying strength destroyed the entire Yunyang Base—including all the food, medicine, and supplies they had painstakingly gathered over the course of six months.
Fortunately, although the ruins had destroyed their home, they had also blocked the pursuit of ordinary zombies.
The giant zombie itself wasn’t particularly fast. The survivors of Yunyang Base scattered in all directions to escape. Some sacrificed themselves, while others were led westward in vehicles.
Thankfully, the giant zombie drew away most of the regular zombies, allowing them to get away successfully.
This area had once been a ranch. Beneath it were numerous cold-storage facilities, and one of the survivors happened to be the child of a cold-storage owner and knew where the keys were kept.
Out of more than three thousand people, only a little over five hundred remained.
Those survivors took refuge inside one of the cold-storage warehouses.
The meat stored inside had long since spoiled without electricity. Everyone endured the stench and spent a long time cleaning the place out.
Then began an even harsher struggle for survival than they had faced in the city.
At first things seemed manageable.
But it didn’t take long for the survivors of Yunyang Base to realize that this was the territory of cattle and sheep—and of the predators attracted by them.
When the giant zombie first appeared, it had frightened off the local animals, giving the survivors an opportunity to slip into the underground cold storage.
A few days later, however, the animals realized the danger was gone and gradually returned.
At first, the survivors were delighted.
They thought food was practically delivering itself to their doorstep.
Reality soon hit them hard.
A little-known fact: herbivores can be extremely dangerous.
Before the apocalypse, ranch workers had tools such as electric prods and other equipment to control livestock.
After the apocalypse, there were no such tools.
The survivors had fled in a hurry and possessed very few weapons—not even enough basic ones.
Ordinary humans, empty-handed and weakened by hunger, are no match for a sheep weighing around 100 kilograms that can charge and ram enemies with its horns.
Not to mention cattle, which can weigh over a thousand kilograms.
The survivors of Yunyang Base not only couldn’t defeat the herds of cattle and sheep that constantly roamed around in groups, they couldn’t even leave the cold-storage warehouse to find another place to live.
The moment they showed themselves, any herd that noticed these “weaker creatures” trespassing on its territory would immediately charge over and attack.
They had tried fighting back as a group, but whenever they gathered together, the cattle and sheep outnumbered them by an even greater margin. In the end, several survivors were killed, and the sheep they had finally managed to bring down was dragged away by a pack of wild wolves.
Reluctantly, everyone could only retreat once more.
The remaining survivors of Yunyang Base were trapped inside this underground cold-storage facility that had virtually nothing left.
The only reason they had survived this long was the food that had originally been stored there. But with scarce medicine, inadequate medical care, and the harsh environment, people were dying every few days.
Now, even their food reserves were running out.
Yu Zhitian looked at Zeng Tian.
“Fine. While everyone still has enough strength left to move, let’s make one last stand.”
“Either we all go out together and risk our lives to bring back a kill, or we all get trampled to death by the sheep and cattle outside.”
Zeng Tian immediately objected.
“You can’t go out. If the rest of us die, then we die. But if you die, there truly won’t be even the slightest hope left of ending this disaster.”
Yu Zhitian gave a bitter smile.
“I don’t have any lab equipment anymore, no tools, no virus samples. Staying here doesn’t help at all—it’d be better if I went out with you.”
“We’ll have them again later. We’re only temporarily trapped. Once we find a chance, we can gather the equipment again.”
Zeng Tian added slowly,
“You are everyone’s hope. If anything happens to you, then the people in the base truly won’t have any way out left. If we don’t make it back, you can come later.”
Yu Zhitian fell silent for a moment.
“Alright. I’ll wait for you here in the base.”
“If you don’t come back… I’ll go find you.”
Half a year. They had barely survived for half a year.
From initial hardship, to struggling just to survive, to glimpses of hope, and then sudden despair.
Yu Zhitian was already fifty-seven years old. She could clearly feel her life, in these unbearably difficult days, rapidly approaching its end.
At times, she even wondered whether, on the entire Velvet Star, only the Yunyang Base survivors were still alive.
At the beginning, there were three thousand people.
When they escaped, there were five hundred.
Now, only a little over three hundred remained.
Yu Zhitian couldn’t help asking herself again and again, deep in her heart:
Does humanity still have hope?
The more she understood the zombie virus, the more despair she felt.
This virus was almost like an irreversible breakdown of genes—was it really something human power could ever stop?
Even if she truly managed to develop a zombie vaccine, after seeing that mutated zombie towering dozens of meters high, with the current human population—could they even still resist such a monster?
Inside the cold-storage facility, everyone remained silent, including toddlers barely one or two years old, who also stayed unusually quiet.
Only Zeng Tian and a few of the base’s leaders were still trying to ease the heavy atmosphere a little.
The day passed quickly. Then another day passed.
On the morning of the third day, everyone lined up to receive food.
This was the last of their supplies. After eating it, they would all have to go out for a final desperate battle.
Yu Zhitian stood there. The seven children in the base were placed beside her.
A mother holding a two-year-old child walked over and handed the child to her. Only after Yu Zhitian took the child did she force out a dry, strained smile.
“Dr. Yu, I’m leaving her in your care.”
“If… if we don’t make it back, please, give her a quick end. Don’t let her suffer.”
Yu Zhitian’s eyes did not redden, and the child’s mother did not cry either.
There was too little water left in everyone’s bodies for tears anymore.
And after half a year of the apocalypse, most people had already grown numb to life and death.
Yu Zhitian simply held the child and nodded solemnly.
“I will take care of her. Don’t worry.”
Everyone stood by the cold storage ladder, and the first person began to climb up.
—BOOM!
—BOOM!
The cold storage suddenly began to shake. Their first reaction was that it was an earthquake, but soon they realized the sound didn’t match.
“Is it… cattle and sheep running?”
“No, it sounds like vehicles passing by?”
“Why do I feel like it’s a lot of people running? I think I even hear voices?”
“I heard someone shouting ‘woo-hoo’… am I hallucinating?”
The survivor on the ladder didn’t guess. He climbed up, carefully cracked open a small gap in the cold storage door, and cautiously peeked outside.
Then, as if struck by lightning, he suddenly pulled his head back in.
Zeng Tian pushed through the crowd.
“Zhang Cui, what’s going on outside? What did you see? What’s making that noise?”
Zhang Cui, still standing on the ladder, didn’t answer. It was as if something outside had completely stunned him.
He slowly opened the gap again and stuck his head out.
Outside—
Herds of cattle and sheep were frantically fleeing at the front, while behind them, a group of people at least 1.8 meters tall and powerfully built were desperately chasing after them.
People. A lot of people.
So many it felt like more than the population of an entire county—dense and endless, stretching as far as the eye could see.
Those sheep and cattle that used to act arrogantly, lowering their heads to charge at the slightest provocation, now looked like helpless chicks in the hands of this group, completely without any ability to resist.
The sheep herd ran past, and the human crowd chased after them.
The cattle herd ran back, and the humans chased them back again.
These people all had extremely long strides, moving so fast they almost left afterimages, while shouting incoherently:
“Woohoo!!!”
“%￥#￥%#￥!!”
Simple, crude lassos were thrown out one after another, landing on the cattle and sheep. The animals tried to escape, but were forcibly yanked back by the humans shouting unintelligible cries.
Some people, while chasing a herd of cattle, dodged a wild bull’s charge, grabbed onto the back of a cow, and actually climbed onto it mid-run—ending up riding it as it sprinted forward.
That man raised his left arm:
“Woohoo!!!”
Zhang Cui’s eyes were vacant. Was this still human strength?
Or was this a hallucination before starvation?
He pulled his head back in.
Then stuck it out again.
Pulled it back again, then stuck it out again.
Zeng Tian watched him going in and out like that without speaking, growing more and more anxious.
“Zhang Cui, just tell us what you saw!”
If you’re not going to speak, at least stop blocking the ladder!
Zhang Cui: “I… I don’t know how to describe it… Director, have you ever read novels?”
Zeng Tian: “?”
Zhang Cui rubbed his face hard, still dazed.
“I think… we might be like in those novels. We’ve crossed over into another world. Like—”
Zeng Tian began to suspect Zhang Cui had finally cracked under pressure. Still, he stepped closer and followed along:
“Like what?”
Zhang Cui wiped his face again, completely stunned.
“‘The apocalypse arrives, and our entire base gets transported into a primitive wilderness world’?”
