Chapter 143

The vehicles made their way into the city. Outside the Fifth Ring Road, there were very few zombies.

Once they entered the area inside the Fifth Ring, the number of zombies gradually increased.

The 535s performed far better than ordinary buses. Once the accelerator was pressed, they shot forward like the wind.

The convoy did not stop to deal with the zombies along the road. Their main purpose in coming into the city today was simply to take “a look” at the municipal government offices.

The municipal government was located in the old city within the Second Ring Road.

The convoy planned to drive straight into the city center via Radiation Road.

After entering the Fourth Ring Road, there were noticeably more vehicles on the streets.

These vehicles from the Technology New District had been modified by metal-element superpowered users. Their front ends were especially reinforced against collisions. As long as they did not run into a large truck, they simply rammed forward, shoving smaller cars aside.

Even so, their speed clearly began to drop.

The zombies on the road were drawn to the commotion.

The people inside the vehicles felt a little horrified. Several of the middle school students had gone pale.

There were simply too many of them.

Even the schools and district government offices in the Technology New District had never seen zombies this densely packed.

After all, S City was a major metropolis with a population of twenty million.

The blades on the blade cars shot out and retracted in rapid succession, at an extremely high frequency. Even so, zombies still managed to slip through from time to time.

Su Yu stood up. “How about I take care of them? The four vehicles would need to drive closer together, though.”

The vehicles were too large, and with the gaps between them, she could only cover all of them if they moved closer.

“Wait for now,” Jiang Cheng said.

She pressed herself against the window and observed for a while. Then she picked up the radio.

“All vehicles, pay attention. Try fixing the blades in place so they extend from both sides of the vehicles like wings. The front as well. Adjust the height as appropriate.”

“I was thinking the same thing!” Cui Haiyang said.

He had only just come up with the idea himself, and Jiang Cheng had said it first.

The blade cars stopped constantly shooting their blades out and pulling them back in. Instead, they grew a ring of “little skirts,” as though the vehicles had been fitted with bladed trim.

The “skirts” were half a meter wide. Their outer edges were as thin as cicada wings and razor-sharp.

This was something they had to thank Security Guard Little Wang for.

Before Young Wang had accidentally taken the wrong path while following Cao Jiacai, he had actually worked very well with the other metal-element superpowered users.

He had come from the countryside and made a living as a craftsman. He was a genuine blacksmith. His affinity with iron was even stronger than Cui Haiyang’s. In his hands, metal was truly as pliable as modeling clay.

Perhaps he could not create moving joints and connections like Cui Haiyang, but when the two of them sharpened weapons together, Young Wang’s edges were far keener.

Cui Haiyang had humbly asked him for advice.

Young Wang was just a young rural man who had come to the city to find work. Being treated like a teacher by a university student from the city left him both flattered and proud. He did not keep anything to himself and shared his feelings about using his superpowers.

The other metal-element users worked with iron every day, kneading it as if it were modeling clay. With Young Wang’s guidance, they quickly grasped the finer points.

Everyone’s precision and control improved considerably.

Now, all four 535 buses had grown rings of blades around them, and they were incredibly sharp.

The ones chasing the vehicles were all fast second-generation zombies. They sprinted after the buses and lunged forward...

Only to have their heads sliced off.

The superpowered users inside the buses did not even need to exert themselves. The zombies were decapitated by the speed and force of their own leaps.

One short zombie lost only half its head. A taller zombie had its neck and shoulder sliced off along with its head.

The roads behind the buses were drenched in dark-brown fluid.

This was not quite like the heroic scenes the middle school students had imagined, where someone hacked off a zombie’s head or burned one to death.

Several of the students were beginning to lose it. Some stared at the ceiling, some at the floor, and some closed their eyes and muttered under their breath.

Only Little Huang remained completely calm. Sitting by the window, he watched the zombies throw themselves to their deaths like moths flying into flames, as though he were admiring the scenery.

Then Little Huang suddenly turned his head.

“Watch out.”

Two seconds after he spoke, a zombie smacked against the window.

It happened to be the window beside Xu En, who let out a terrified screech.

It was clearly a third-generation zombie. It had observed how the blades around the vehicle worked and leaped directly onto them, using the blades like steps.

It gripped the metal bars outside the window with its hands. Its pitch-black eyes stared at the living flesh inside the bus.

A flash of white light surrounded Su Yu. Her protective barrier expanded in an instant, then contracted again.

The third-generation zombie was flung away.

The middle school students had seen this protective barrier before, but even now, they still thought it was unbelievably cool.

Jiang Cheng picked up the radio.

“Add another ring higher up.”

One after another, the four vehicles “grew” another ring of blades at a slightly higher level. This time, even the third-generation zombies could no longer jump onto them.

Xu En let out a long breath and sighed. “Humans really do need to use tools.”

Having a superpower made people feel pretty impressive. Dealing with one or two stray zombies was indeed no problem.

But if they were caught in the middle of this many zombies, their superpowers suddenly did not seem like enough.

They would probably be killed before they even had the chance to exhaust themselves.

Whenever a child said something, the adults laughed.

But after laughing, they felt a certain weight in their hearts. Things really were different now. The adults had been through countless battles, after all.

This was not the first time any of them had faced zombies. During the previous zombie disaster, most of these children had probably been confined to their homes and forbidden from going outside, protected by the adults the whole time.

Their experience was obviously far more limited than the adults’.

The vehicles, now fitted with two rings of blades, drove all the way into the Second Ring Road.

As soon as they entered the Second Ring, they passed several square, symmetrical buildings. Some belonged to bureaus, others to ministries—all government offices.

At last, they arrived in front of the municipal government offices.

Everyone looked through the windows.

“Huh? Why is there such a huge steel gate? I’ve passed by here before. I remember it being the kind that retracts like an accordion.”

“There is one, I think.”

“There is. I once came here with a superior. During registration, I was bored and noticed that the gate slid to both sides during the day and only closed at night.”

“Then why is it closed during the day?”

That question hit the heart of the matter.

“There may be people inside,” Jiang Cheng said.

A spark suddenly appeared in everyone’s eyes.

But it could also have been closed before the people inside died.

Jiang Cheng kept that thought to herself, not wanting to dampen their spirits.

There were plenty of zombies on the road as well. Once the buses stopped, even the original zombies could lunge at them. One came, and a head fell. Another came, and another head fell.

The middle school students had become numb to it.

“Can’t these zombies be a little smarter?”

“Don’t tempt fate,” Li Jiangbing scolded.

Of all things, they had to wish for smarter zombies.

Mo Li had slept through most of the journey. Even when a third-generation zombie clung to the window, he merely glanced at it before going back to sleep.

Sunlight streamed through the window and fell across him. He had been sleeping wonderfully.

Now that they had reached their destination, he finally got up.

At the bus door, he stretched lazily, raising his arms high above his head.

Li Jiangbing watched him and felt that he somewhat resembled Zhou Wang.

The front of the bus was enveloped in Su Yu’s protective barrier.

Su Yu did not make it especially large. It covered only the front of the bus and the front door, creating a bit of space outside the doorway.

Superpowers were like a person’s physical strength: they could run out.

Besides, Gao Yuxuan had always been dedicated to instilling the concept of cost-effectiveness in everyone. At home, it did not matter how much energy they used during practice. Once they exhausted themselves, raising their upper limit was beneficial.

But once they were outside, they had to learn to pursue cost-effectiveness and conserve their strength.

Especially today, things in the city proper were far worse than in the Technology New District. They had to conserve their supplies and use them only where they mattered most.

As soon as the vehicle door opened, a small patch of ground outside was covered by the protective shield, forcing the zombies back.

But the instant the door opened, Mo Li shot out.

Those sitting by the door saw that, at the moment Mo Li leaped into the air, he was still a small kitten. But when they looked out through the window again, a black panther had already pierced through the protective shield and pounced into the dense horde of zombies. By the time he landed, his body had swollen to the size of an elephant.

The middle schoolers pressed themselves against the windows, squealing excitedly.

Mo Li let out a thunderous roar, like the tiger king of the mountains, like the lion king of the grasslands.

Several third-generation zombies instinctively turned and fled.

But the countless primitive and second-generation zombies could do nothing but charge forward.

Mo Li lunged into them. His body spun, his long tail lashed out, and his claws smashed through them. With a single bite, he could crush several heads at once.

In an instant, the area beside the lead vehicle was cleared.

The middle schoolers cried, “Holy crap!”

Su Yu led Cui Haiyang out of the vehicle. Cui Haiyang walked up to the gate and touched it. The huge door rolled open to both sides like an egg roll.

Sure enough, there were many zombies in the courtyard. But before they had a chance to rush out, the buses charged inside!

Anything that touched the blade-edged vehicles died instantly. They were far more efficient than the bladed cars had been at harvesting heads one by one.

There were simply too many zombies outside. The vehicles could not remain in the street.

All four buses filed inside.

Su Yu and Cui Haiyang entered as well. The egg-roll-like gate unfolded again, returning to its original shape and isolating the zombies in the street—and Mo Li—outside.

Mo Li rampaged through the street, killing nearly all the zombies in front of the government compound. Then he turned and leaped onto the wall. By the time he landed on top of it, he had already become a tiny black cat.

He stared down at the situation in the courtyard.

Before they got out of the vehicles, Jiang Cheng had already warned him telepathically not to get too close. The new blade-edged vehicles were different from the old ones, and approaching too closely could easily result in accidental injury.

There were quite a lot of zombies in the courtyard. Four large public buses drove in circles around the open ground, linked nose to tail. Su Yu and Cui Haiyang could not get through either, so the two of them crouched by the gate and watched, protected only by a small shield.

One of them said, “Are there any survivors?”

“Probably. Look, someone closed the gate.”

“Then Jiang Cheng was wrong.”

“Wouldn’t that be even better? Jiang Cheng herself hopes she’s wrong.”

As they spoke, the weapons in their hands suddenly extended, killing the zombies that came running out of the guardhouse.

Unfortunately, Jiang Cheng had been right. There were no survivors in the municipal government building.

Just like the Development Zone government office in the Technology New District.

Not a single survivor.

Everyone had left home at seven-thirty in the morning. Clearing the western district had not taken long, and they had set out from the Technology New District for the city proper before noon.

By the time they finished clearing the municipal government complex, it was already three in the afternoon.

Everyone was starving. They truly had not been able to stop for a meal along the way.

They had not worked this hard in days.

Compared with today’s brutal battle at the municipal government, the Technology New District had been far too easy.

This was the city’s central administrative hub. From morning till night, countless people came here every day to handle business, collect and deliver documents, and attend meetings.

It had been an extremely busy place.

Jiang Cheng carried Vice Mayor Zheng’s head downstairs.

“He was an excellent leader,” she said.

She paid her respects to him, then placed his head with the bodies of the other zombies.

The earth-type superpowered individuals would dispose of them all together.

The fire-type users were already heating up the food. The smell of meat pies had begun to spread, and everyone was about to die of hunger.

Gao Yuxuan planted his hands on his hips. “Who closed that gate, anyway? We thought there were survivors. What a disappointment.”

Someone else sighed. “What was the point of closing it?”

Inside the gate were zombies. Outside the gate were zombies too.

Across the broad courtyard, Jiang Cheng gazed from a distance at the imposing steel gates.

“Because they couldn’t see what was happening outside, and they didn’t have time to think about it,” she said softly. “But they could see what was right in front of them, and everything in front of them was zombies.”

“So they closed the gate.”

The office door could not be shut. A zombie’s arm had gotten caught in it, wedging it open. More and more zombies were gathering outside.

Their colleagues desperately braced themselves against the door while Vice Mayor Zheng pressed the intercom number for the guardhouse.

“Close the main gate—”

“I order you to close the main gate!”

“Don’t let the zombies get out!”

But they could not hold it any longer. The office door burst open, and the zombies poured inside.

Zhao Yi was beginning to want to give up thinking altogether.

The more he thought, the more terrified he became.

Jiang Cheng had been right about everything. The municipal government had also been deliberately purged.

Everyone had accepted Jiang Cheng’s prophecy by now.

But how had the targeting been done?

Had more of the virus been released in the municipal government than elsewhere?

Or had some miraculous method been used?

This “targeting” was something one absolutely could not think too deeply about.

But Zhao Yi did not ask Jiang Cheng again.

He had a feeling that she would brush him off as usual.

She would certainly say, “How should I know?”

That would truly be unfair to Jiang Cheng.

She did not know the exact method either.

Just as she did not know how her memories had been locked away, or how she had been sent into this world in the first place.

Everyone began eating lunch.

The meat pies were delicious, but several of the newly arrived middle schoolers could barely eat.

The images of the tall zombies they had cut apart on the way—hearts tumbling out of their chests—would not leave their minds.

It had ruined their appetites.

Jiang Cheng bit into a meat pie, chewed, and swallowed.

“Eat,” she said. “If you can’t eat, then don’t come out with us tomorrow.”

“We still have to fight later. You can’t do that without the strength.”

Everyone stopped and looked at her.

Jiang Cheng glanced at the sky. “It’s still early. Going home now would make this trip a terrible return on investment.”

The moment she said “return on investment,” everyone burst out laughing.

Gao Yuxuan put his hands on his hips and thrust out his chin. “What’s so funny? Think about how much fuel four vehicles burn for one trip! Once it’s gone, it’s gone!”

Jiang Cheng laughed too.

When the laughter subsided, she said, “That’s why we’re going to take back the television station.”

“It isn’t far from here. It’s also within the Second Ring Road.”

Although one was beyond the western section of the Second Ring Road, and the other beyond the eastern section.

Well, all right.