Chapter Forty-Seven: The Army

Once the crows had dispersed, anyone still on the bridge was plainly beyond hope. Shen Lie and the others could only accept the fact that fewer than forty people had made it out. After counting, there were thirty-six in all, with a dozen or so injured, and only about twenty completely unscathed.

Of the four great powers that had once ruled the town, only Du Lili remained now. It was enough to make one sigh at the fickleness of fate.

"Are you Li Xue?"

Shen Lie suddenly noticed a somewhat familiar face. It was the woman from the inn, the daughter of the big black cat's owner, the girl he had rescued from the underground room beneath Xiao Gang's place. If he remembered correctly, she had been assigned by Li Cheng to the Qi Family supermarket. When they evacuated, she had not been with him. He had not expected her not only to reach the migration convoy from the supermarket, but to make it all the way here unharmed. Perhaps her mother had been protecting her from beyond the world.

"You're hurt?" Shen Lie noticed fresh blood on Li Xue's leg and asked casually.

"Mhm."

Li Xue kept her head lowered. The hardships of the end times had left her deeply scarred, and even now she remained sealed within herself, wary of everyone. Yet she held no defenses against Shen Lie; when she looked at him, gratitude still showed in her eyes from time to time.

"I still have some medicine here. Use it first. After that, stay by my side," Shen Lie said, feeling that he and this little girl had some sort of fate between them. So he decided to help her a little. He could not do much, but at least he could make sure she had food to eat.

"Mhm, thank you, brother." Li Xue nodded with her head still lowered, but Shen Lie could still see the tautness in her nerves beginning to ease.

"Professor, what should we do next?" After tallying the condition of all the survivors, Yang Weiguo turned to Professor Liu for guidance. From beginning to end, the soldier had followed the professor's orders.

Shen Lie and Du Lili both looked at him expectantly as well. After all, the professor was a awakened with analytical and deductive abilities; the route he pointed out would surely be better than anything they could find on their own.

"Heh, no need to worry about it. Look over there." Professor Liu was holding a pair of binoculars and looking out into the distance. Hearing the question, he chuckled, his tone full of excitement.

"What is that?" Everyone followed the direction of his gesture and saw several off-road vehicles speeding toward them from afar, immediately letting out cries of surprise and delight.

People!

They had not expected to encounter humans so soon after emerging from the red fog. It was, without question, an excellent omen. Yet none of them let down their guard. Whether Shen Lie, Du Lili, or even the ordinary survivors, all were excited and wary at once. In this age, even one's own kind was not necessarily safe. Sometimes people were more dangerous than monsters.

"People ahead, listen up. We are an infantry division evacuated from Black Province. Whoever is in charge, come forward and speak!"

The three off-road vehicles stopped more than twenty meters in front of Shen Lie and the others. More than ten men in military uniforms got out, likewise cautious, and did not approach rashly.

"Professor, it's the army!" No one else had much reaction, but Yang Weiguo was instantly seized by intense emotion, his face alight with the joy of finding an organization to belong to.

"I am a soldier from the Qing Shan Provincial Military Region, Yang Weiguo. Beside me are the survivors here...." Yang Weiguo introduced their side without hesitation, and the two groups soon merged together.

After exchanging information, Shen Lie's sense of the brutality of the apocalypse deepened once more. At the same time, his concern over the present situation grew. According to the information provided by the other side, food had now reached the point of being unsustainable, because almost all plants had mutated to varying degrees. No one knew which ones were poisonous, and no one dared eat them casually.

Moreover, almost all the animals were dead as well. The few that remained had basically mutated too, making them impossible to hunt; at times, one even had to give them a wide berth.

All the way here, they had mostly survived on their initial stockpiles and the grain they gathered afterward. Every time they set up camp, they had to scour the surroundings for something to eat.

"It seems the situation here is grim. Is that red fog really that dangerous?" Upon entering the temporary camp, Yang Weiguo was received by the division commander, who even promoted Yang Weiguo straight to battalion commander. In the days before the apocalypse, that would have been an enormous piece of good news, but now the value of such a promotion had fallen to almost nothing.

Even so, Shen Lie could see that Yang Weiguo was still thrilled. He strongly invited both Shen Lie and Du Lili to join the military, and the division commander's adjutant also joined in the persuasion.

Shen Lie did not agree, but he did not refuse either. The main reason was that he did not want to be constrained. Still, he stated clearly that he would continue onward with the group and would not stingily with his help when necessary.

Du Lili's decision was basically the same as his. Yang Weiguo felt a little regretful about this, but did not press the issue. Just as that division commander had said, times were different now. Even a normal person with a high rank had very limited authority over an awakened one. Whether one joined the military or not was, in truth, only a matter of form.

With Shen Lie and the others as the first example, that division commander no longer insisted on forcing a passage through the red fog. After some discussion, they ultimately decided to detour toward Hong City. There were more monsters in that direction, but at least the danger could be seen. This red fog was too bizarre, leaving people with no way to resist it.

In truth, after learning the situation, Shen Lie had advocated taking the branch of the Song River. In his view, no matter how strange a river was, there must be some way to cross it, and it would be far better than charging into a mass of monsters. But the people on the other side clearly harbored a deep fear of the Song River, and not a single one of them agreed.

"Rest for two days. At dawn two days from now, set out from here on time. Anyone planning to go out and forage, hurry up. Those who are not back by then will not be waited for!"

There were many people at the meeting. Besides the military officers, there were also the leaders of the survivors. By now, the survivors traveling with them had likewise divided into several small teams, huddling together to increase their chances of survival.

After receiving the precise instructions, the leaders of each survivor group quickly returned to their own teams and began preparing to search for food. Although these red fogs were strange, they did not cover all regions. At the very least, the nearby town of Clear Water was not within the shrouded area.

The reason for the two-day rest was to give everyone time to find food. Even military personnel were sent out in batches, since the army's own reserves were nearly exhausted. Without food, let alone killing monsters, there was likely a risk of disbandment at any moment.

"Professor, you are a nationally protected figure. After discussing it, we've freed up one armored vehicle for you. You can ride inside and move with the convoy, and the remaining seats are yours to arrange as you see fit. Every day, we will allocate rations for three people to you. Right now gasoline, diesel, and food are all in short supply, so this is the best we can do."

The division commander showed Professor Liu great respect and offered generous conditions.

The armored vehicle had seven seats. Professor Liu had Du Lili and Shen Lie remain inside as well, while Yang Weiguo was responsible for driving, leaving three seats still available. Although all the survivors who had come out with them were staring at them eagerly, Shen Lie nonetheless unceremoniously named Zhang Jing, Little Tao Tao, and Li Xue. Of course, he was not occupying these spots for nothing; he declared that if danger arose, he would be the first to act, and that their food would be arranged by himself.

Neither Professor Liu nor Yang Weiguo said anything about it. Shen Lie's performance along the way had been exceptionally formidable, and he had even saved Professor Liu's and Du Lili's lives. At a time like this, there was no way they would speak against him.

Instead, the division commander looked at Shen Lie several times, having sensed that Shen Lie held an unusual position within this small group. Still, he said nothing more. Awakened ones were important, but under his command there were more than twenty of them, and across the whole convoy there were five or six dozen.

Two days later, the convoy set out slowly. Because fuel was tight, the entire group migrated on foot. Only a very small number of people could ride in vehicles, and those were all awakened ones or important military personnel. A few small teams also had their own cars, but this was only temporary. When there was fuel, they could drive; when there was none, they would have to abandon them.

"May I ask whether Professor Liu is here? Gu Chengfang has come to pay a visit!"

The convoy had only just set off when an uninvited guest came to the side of the armored vehicle.

The review meeting had just ended, and another difficult road lay ahead.

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