The battle was over. Near the entrance to the residential compound, severed limbs and all manner of scattered remains littered the ground, while the stench of blood was so thick it seemed impossible to disperse.
Standing on the rain canopy, Nathan Cole looked at the scene, which resembled the depths of hell, and felt his stomach churn violently.
After forcing himself to endure for a few seconds, he abruptly tore off his mask, staggered to the edge of the canopy, bent over, and began vomiting violently.
Having been born in peaceful times, he had never seen anything like this.
Before this, the most he had encountered were disgusting scenes in bloody horror films such as Wrong Turn.
But those were movies. He knew they were fake, and they were separated from him by a screen. How could their impact compare to the real thing?
Several minutes passed. Only after Nathan had vomited up every scrap of food in his stomach and nearly brought up bile did he feel a little better.
He casually wiped his mouth with his tactical glove, forcibly suppressed his discomfort, and called over the radio channel, "All units, attention. The zombies inside the compound have been cleared. Continue the clearing operation according to the original plan!"
"First Squad, acknowledged!"
"Second Squad, acknowledged!"
After giving the order, Nathan looked at the piles of zombie corpses outside the building. His brow was tightly furrowed, his expression conflicted.
This compound was filthy now. It was no good anymore!
With zombie remains packed densely inside and outside the buildings, he simply lacked the manpower to clean them up.
Besides, he did not even know where he could dispose of them.
Burning them was naturally the best option, but he could not exactly start fires inside the compound.
The compound stored a large quantity of water, a vital lifeline for survival in the apocalypse.
Once the water supply stopped, that water would become their hope of staying alive.
After considering it from every angle, Nathan decisively chose to relocate their base.
The town government building across from the compound was empty at the moment and would not need to be laboriously cleared.
It had plenty of rooms, and the staff dormitories could serve perfectly well as living quarters.
As for water, once he saved enough reinforcement points, it would not be difficult to deploy several trucks and transport part of the water from here.
Hauling water was easier than moving corpses, after all. Besides, they could supplement it with bottled water collected from nearby supermarkets.
Having made up his mind, Nathan directly opened the interface and checked the gains from the battle just now.
At that moment, the points displayed prominently above the reinforcement menu read 818.
That meant they had killed a total of 283 zombies in the two battles just now.
Of course, the ones that had fallen to their deaths did not provide reinforcement points.
Seeing that he had enough points, Nathan decided to deploy another infantry squad and speed up the clearing operation.
After climbing down from the rain canopy and entering the stairwell, Nathan expertly operated the System and deployed an infantry squad.
As soon as the soldiers were deployed, Nathan immediately gave Third Squad Leader Lucas Bennett his orders. "Third Squad Leader, take your squad and clear Unit Two of Building Two. Be extremely careful!"
Not long after Third Squad departed, the System's cold electronic voice sounded beside Nathan's ear.
[It has been detected that the commander's force has reached platoon strength. The System will now undergo an upgrade. Estimated upgrade time: five hours.]
[During the upgrade, existing functions will remain available.]
Hearing that the System was going to upgrade, Nathan was delighted. An upgrade meant new functions would be unlocked.
Since it would not affect their current operations, all he had to do was wait patiently.
Once Third Squad began its operation, Nathan went to find the survivors.
He planned to have Qi Ting look after the little girl, Sophie. Then he and Daniel Ward would take Sophie's father, Marcus Zhang, along with the young shut-in, Liam Liu, to clear the zombie corpses at the compound entrance.
The corpses were stacked layer upon layer. At the very least, they had to clear a path wide enough for vehicles to pass through.
Nathan had already vomited on the canopy, so he was doing relatively well at the compound entrance.
But as soon as Marcus and Liam approached the zombie corpses, their stomachs cramped, and they could not help vomiting.
They vomited so suddenly that they did not have time to take off their masks. Some of the vomit spilled out from beneath the masks and soiled their clothes, while some flowed back into their mouths.
Only after vomiting for quite a while did the two manage to get back up. After tidying themselves up a little, they fought down their nausea and began moving corpses with trembling hands.
It was the apocalypse now. Everyone had to contribute their share, and Nathan would never tolerate a situation where the troops worked while civilians merely watched.
Before the apocalypse, as someone at the grassroots level himself, he had loathed the common warped phenomenon in society where officials worked while the public watched.
Back then, he had only been a low-level nobody, unable to change anything.
But things were different now. Wherever fell within his authority, he would establish his own rules.
Anyone objected? Fine. They could leave.
But anyone who chose to stay had to obey without conditions. If they dared cause trouble or resist, did they really think Nathan's gun was not lethal?
While they were busy clearing the compound entrance, Ethan Blake and several soldiers from First Squad arrived outside Apartment 702 in Unit Two.
As for the middle-aged man who had caused the incident, Ethan intended to have a serious word with him.
Following standard procedure, Ethan pounded hard on the security door.
When he heard the familiar scratching against the door panel, Ethan skillfully fired several blind shots through the door.
After the door was forced open, a female zombie with one arm missing lunged at them.
Bang. A 5.45mm round drilled through her face, blasting a large hole in the back of her skull and spraying a mixture of red and white matter behind her.
After killing the female zombie, Ethan looked inside and saw that his blind fire had already killed the other zombie.
He and the rifleman cautiously entered, searched the other rooms, then arrived before the tightly shut master-bedroom door.
After clearing his throat, Ethan called out directly, "We are the rescue force. The zombies outside have been cleared. You can come out now."
After hearing Ethan's words, the master-bedroom door slowly opened more than ten seconds later.
The middle-aged man from before cautiously poked his head through the gap. Only after seeing that it truly was the military did he come out.
Ethan looked at him, his teeth grinding audibly, and had just raised his hand to strike him with his rifle butt when—
The middle-aged man let out a howl and scrambled toward the entryway corridor.
He dropped to his knees, gathered up the teenage corpse with only half a skull remaining, and wept with heart-wrenching grief.
Seeing this, Ethan let out an almost imperceptible sigh and left Apartment 702 with his soldiers.
Nathan's group of four did not clear the corpses quickly. Daniel naturally had no complaints, but Nathan and the two survivors were simply too weak. After moving only a dozen or so corpses, they would need to rest.
Near noon, the soldiers from all three infantry squads finished clearing the interiors and arrived to help, bringing the eight survivors they had rescued with them.
With everyone working together, they quickly cleared the road.
Seeing this, Nathan arranged for each of the three squads to send a few men to prepare lunch. Then he entered Apartment 102, where the ammunition was stored, and carefully counted the gains from this operation.
The clearing operation across the three units had earned a total of 1,764 reinforcement points. Adding the 118 points remaining after deploying Third Squad, he now had 1,882 reinforcement points on hand.
However, those points still were not enough to deploy three Tigr-M armored vehicles.
If they wanted to go outside and gather water and supplies, they needed combat vehicles.
Otherwise, if they accidentally triggered a zombie horde, they would not even have a way to escape.
Nathan planned to have the soldiers eat lunch and take a short rest, then climb over the wall into the neighboring Runxin Gardens and continue the clearing operation.
Without combat vehicles, he would never casually leave this relatively safe stronghold.
Once lunch was ready, Nathan sat at the dining table, focused on eating.
Suddenly, the refrigerator's hum beside him cut off.
He sprang to his feet and hurried to the kitchen light switch, pressing it several times. The result was exactly as he expected—the power had gone out!
He no longer had any mind to eat. Taking out his phone while there was still a signal, before the communications tower's backup power ran out, he hurriedly called his father.
"Dad, things don't look good. The power's out here. You and Mom must stay at home, lock the doors and windows, and ration your stored food and water. Hold on for a while. I'll come rescue you as soon as I can." Nathan's voice carried a trace of anxiety and worry.
"Son, we still have power here. Don't worry. Just make sure you take good care of yourself!"
After reminding each other of a few things, Nathan hung up on his father.
He then hurriedly sent Martin Hale, director of the local judicial office, a message on WeChat, briefly informing him of the situation here and reminding him to stay safe.
After sending the message, Nathan hurried to the kitchen and turned on the faucet. The stream of water had become extremely thin, clearly because the pressure was insufficient. Under normal circumstances, the water would likely stop altogether before long.
The worst-case scenario had come to pass after all!
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