Chapter 155

Several people at Mr. Xu’s company knew how to cook. Since they all lived on the same floor, they got together to prepare a meal.

The rice they had been allocated was rationed by headcount, enough for one day. Everyone took out a portion to cook porridge. They rummaged through the refrigerators in several vacant, ownerless apartments and found things like salted duck eggs, fermented tofu, and pickled vegetables. There was meat, eggs, and fresh produce, too. Though the vegetables had been kept in refrigerators, too much time had passed, and they had already wilted.

No one mentioned the supplies in those apartments. Everyone simply took it for granted that they now belonged to the people who had moved in.

While they were cooking the porridge, Mr. Xu and the director went downstairs for a stroll.

“We’ll be eating potatoes every day from now on,” Mr. Xu said. “That won’t do.”

“It should be the basic level of support,” the director said. “But surely not everyone is being treated the same way. I don’t believe the people in the upper echelons are eating like this, too.”

Mr. Xu said, “The Youth Apartment complex is probably on an entirely different level from this place.”

All the refugees had been sent here to live, while not a single person remained over there. It was entirely occupied by “their own people.”

The middle school students yearned to go there.

The old people said that all the wood-element users who grew vegetables were working there.

These bits of information were already crystal clear.

That morning, when they turned on the television, S City’s municipal station was repeatedly broadcasting a speech by a young woman named Jiang Cheng. She had said, “Led by the Youth Apartment.” Did they understand? Led by the Youth Apartment.

That was why Mr. Xu and the director had come downstairs for a stroll: they wanted to go over there and take a look.

When doing business, clients had to be won over through one’s own efforts. Even as refugees, they had to fight for better treatment themselves.

Who could just sit at home and wait for good things to fall from the sky?

As the two men wandered around, they spotted Xiao Dan in the residential complex.

Xiao Dan was quite busy. Several hundred people had suddenly moved in, and all sorts of problems had cropped up after just one night.

Some wanted to change apartments. Some complained that they felt unwell. Others made all kinds of demands.

Xiao Dan had just sent one group away after another. She had barely finished dealing with a few people asking whether vehicles could be provided so they could return home when two middle-aged men approached her.

Mr. Xu was exceptionally polite, with a cosmopolitan air about him. “Hello, ma’am. We’d like to ask what people with superpowers can do for this community.”

Xiao Dan’s eyes lit up. “What kind of superpowers do you have?”

“I’m a metal-element user, and he’s an electricity-element user.”

Xiao Dan’s eyes lit up even more. She said enthusiastically, “Welcome, welcome! Our community welcomes all superpowered individuals!”

Mr. Xu asked, “What do we need to do?”

“There’s nothing at the moment,” Xiao Dan said. “You should rest first. Which building and room are you staying in? I’ll make a note of it.”

Mr. Xu did not tell her. Instead, he said, “We already registered yesterday.”

Xiao Dan paused. “That’s all right. I’ll record it again.”

Mr. Xu smiled. “There’s no need to trouble yourself. If anything comes up, just use the information from the registration to find us.”

The director said, “Then we’ll go get some rest. We really are feeling awful. We hid out at the company for seven days, and now we feel weak all over. Four of our colleagues turned into zombies. Sigh, we’d worked together for years, but we had no choice except to put them down. Sigh. You go ahead and take care of your business. We’ll just walk around for a bit. Go on, go on.”

After hearing that, Xiao Dan could hardly insist on keeping them there. She could only nod. “You two should rest properly for a couple of days. I’ll notify you when there’s an assignment.”

Mr. Xu said, “Thank you for your hard work. Thank you.”

The two men turned and slowly wandered off. They were in no hurry, strolling along at an easy pace as if they were simply out for a walk.

One was a metal-element user, and the other was an electricity-element user. Both were powerful offensive abilities. Xiao Dan thought that she would have a good talk with Zhou Wang later and find a way to keep these two superpowered individuals here. Then Jixiang Garden would have a force capable of standing on its own.

Mr. Xu and the director strolled side by side toward the west gate of Jixiang Garden.

“She has no operational authority,” Mr. Xu said.

When he had asked what arrangements would be made for them, she had only said that they should rest first. She could not say anything else. In other words, she simply was not the one making the decisions.

“She doesn’t have personnel authority, either,” the director said.

The previous night, while assigning apartments, someone had registered everyone’s superpowers. Clearly, there was a unified system for coordinating and managing them. Xiao Dan had also asked which building and floor they lived in, intending to record it. That meant the registration information was not in her hands.

“She was quite enthusiastic,” Mr. Xu said.

When she heard that they were metal- and electricity-element users, her eyes had lit up, and her attitude had grown noticeably warmer.

“That means she needs them,” the director said.

“She can’t do a damn thing for us. Come on, let’s go take a look over there.”

With neither operational nor personnel authority, she probably could not decide anything about their treatment, either.

If they wanted better treatment, they had to find the person who actually had the power to make decisions.

The two men wandered out through Jixiang Garden’s west gate and crossed Jixiang West Street. Directly opposite stood the east gate of the Youth Apartment.

The gate was closed. A sheet of paper had been pasted onto one of the gateposts:

Strict management. All entry and exit must be registered. For assistance, contact security. →

An arrow pointed toward the security booth.

The two exchanged a glance.

See? This side actually had management.

The gate was locked, which meant there was something valuable inside that needed to be kept separate from unrelated people.

The two men poked their heads around and saw a security guard sitting in the booth, holding a stainless-steel basin and eating oversized steamed buns.

The guard looked only nineteen or twenty. He had quite an appetite; the buns were stacked high in his basin.

Mr. Xu and the director fell silent.

Both men could not help smacking their lips.

They looked delicious.

It was all right. Once they went back, they would have plain porridge to drink, too.

Yes. That was pretty good as well.

Looking in through the gate, they could see only a straight, paved path. The surrounding buildings completely blocked the view of the rest of the complex.

The two looked around.

“Over there. Let’s go take a look over there.”

They headed south. After passing the building, they could finally see into the complex through the gap between the buildings.

But first, they spotted someone familiar on the strip of landscaping between the building and the outer fence.

“Master Luo! Master Luo!”

The two grabbed the iron bars and squeezed their faces through them as they called out.

They looked like prisoners behind bars who had just seen a beloved relative.

The area between the buildings and the outer fence consisted entirely of landscaped greenery. The original shrubs and flowers had now been pulled out and piled to one side. The gardener who had come to the Technology New District with Mr. Xu and the others—the new Master Luo—was crouching on the freshly turned soil with another young man, working on something.

Hearing the voices, Master Luo looked up. When he saw the two men, he stood and came over to speak with them.

“Oh, it’s you two.”

Mr. Xu asked, “Master Luo, what are you doing here?”

“There aren’t many wood-element users, so we all have to work,” Master Luo said. “So many people are waiting to be fed. I’m in charge of planting peanuts now.”

Master Luo was full of emotion as well. “Superpowers are really convenient. You don’t even need a hoe to turn the soil anymore. A soil-element user can do it directly for you. And he’s a university student, too.”

The soil-element user was a resident of the Youth Apartment. He was also quite young, in his twenties. Hearing that, he said helplessly, “Don’t remind me. I finally escaped the countryside and started living the life I’d always wanted. Then heaven saw fit to give me a soil-element superpower.”

It seemed the heavens had seen right through his origins.

The director felt terribly sorry for him. “Master Luo, you’ve worked hard. You’ve really worked hard.”

Mr. Xu felt sorry for him, too. “Once you’re done here, hurry back and eat. We’ve got porridge cooking at home, and there are salted duck eggs, too. We saved some for you. Ah~”

He even added an especially heartfelt “Ah~.”

Master Luo wasn’t moved in the slightest.

He had been taking care of the greenery at Mr. Xu’s company for three years, and this was the first time he’d ever spoken to Mr. Xu.

Before this, Mr. Xu had never even noticed him.

Maybe Master Luo had some kind of invisibility superpower back then. Who knew?

Master Luo ruthlessly poured cold water on the two of them. “I’ve already eaten here. I had steamed buns. I’m not going back. They’ve assigned me a room here, so I’m staying here tonight.”

Mr. Xu and the director’s hearts went ice-cold. “You’re not coming with us?”

Their food supply was gone.

Master Luo could see how disappointed they were. He didn’t have much of a relationship with them—just the small bond forged through seven days of sharing hardships.

For the sake of that tiny bond, he gave them some advice. “Go find the guard at the east gate and tell him you’re superpowered. All the superpowered people here have work. The food’s good, too.”

The young earth-type man behind him came over as well. “You two are superpowered too? What kind of abilities do you have?”

After learning that one of them was metal-type and the other was electric-type, the young man asked, “How are you two feeling now? If you still haven’t recovered, rest for a while. If you’ve recovered enough, get to work. There’s plenty to do. Whether you join logistics or the combat team, everyone who works eats on our side.”

The director squeezed his face between two bars of the gate and asked, “Are there any steamed buns left?”

Mr. Xu gave him a hard kick. How utterly shameful!

The earth-type young man laughed. He pulled a walkie-talkie from the small of his back. “I’ve got two superpowered people here—one metal-type and one electric-type. They want to work in exchange for food.”

A voice came through the walkie-talkie. “Send them to the east gate. I’ll have someone pick them up.”

The earth-type young man asked, “Are there any buns left? They haven’t eaten yet.”

There was a pause on the other end.

“There are. They’re still hot. Hurry and bring them in to eat.”

Mr. Xu and the director jogged over to the east gate. The guard had already opened it, and he still had half a steamed bun hanging from his mouth.

The closer they got, the better it smelled.

There had been too many people yesterday. They remembered this young guard, but the guard didn’t remember them. Biting into his bun, he said, “Come in, come in. There’re people inside.”

The two of them entered, and the guard, Little Fang, closed the gate again.

As Mr. Xu and the director walked farther in, they met a young man and woman coming toward them. The woman was holding a folder, while the man carried some kind of device—a small case in one hand and a pen-shaped object in the other, connected by a wire.

“You two are the newcomers, right?” the woman asked. “Which one of you is metal-type?”

Mr. Xu stepped forward. “I am.”

“Metal-type abilities can be used either in the combat team or in logistics,” the woman explained. “Though people in the combat team often have to help with logistics too. Metal-types have it relatively hard. The more capable you are, the more work you’ll have to do.”

Mr. Xu said, “We just got here and aren’t familiar with anything yet. I’ll start with logistics.”

“Sure.”

The young man turned to the director. “You’re electric-type, right? Then you’ll have to join the combat team.”

If an electric-type superpowered person only worked in logistics, they were basically no different from an ordinary person. At present, there was no logistical work that required the use of electric-type abilities.

The director was still hesitating when the young man raised the electric pen in his hand. “Here, let’s test you. Give it everything you’ve got. Don’t hold back.”

Mr. Xu reminded him, “Give it everything you’ve got.”

Their treatment depended on this. There was no point hiding his strength now.

The director gave it his all—but his all amounted to only so much.

The young man looked at the reading on the device and seemed a little speechless. “That’s such a tiny current. Did you really give it your all?”

The director truly had, but that really was all he could manage.

Seeing the young man’s faintly disdainful expression, he grew worried that he wouldn’t even get any steamed buns. He hurriedly said, “I’ll try again. Let me try one more time.”

This time, he squeezed out every last bit of strength he had. The result was only slightly stronger than before.

The young man frowned. “This won’t do. To provide auxiliary support, you need to produce at least fifty milliamps of current and maintain it for more than ten seconds. If you can’t do that, you won’t even be able to use the slowing assist. To kill a zombie outright, you need a current of at least one hundred and fifty milliamps. At your level, it’d be like scratching a zombie’s itch.”

Fifty milliamps of alternating current was already enough to kill a living person. But zombies could take far more punishment than living humans, so that level of current was only enough to activate the control skill—Slow.

To directly electrocute and destroy a zombie’s brain, they needed one hundred and fifty milliamps.

These figures had all been personally tested by Gao Yuxuan, who had fought his way into groups of zombies to gather real combat data. They also had to take into account a superpowered person’s total energy reserves and stamina. That was why he had concluded that electric-types were more cost-effective as control support than as direct attackers.

The young man said, “Judging from your endurance and total energy pool, you don’t seem to be doing very well in those areas either. At this level, you can’t join the combat team.”

The director was deeply disappointed. “So... does that mean I don’t get any steamed buns?”

His unwavering devotion to steamed buns made the woman burst out laughing.

Mr. Xu felt like he had completely lost face.

The young man laughed too. When he was done, he said, “You can’t join the combat team for now. You’ll need to train first. Forget it—let’s take you to breakfast. After you eat, I’ll take you to training.”

The director’s eyes lit up. “Really?”