Armed Train in the Apocalypse

Hu Shuo shook his head. ”I prefer writing things down, but photos are good too. Can they be developed?”

”If there’s a printer, sure.”

”Can you give me a copy of tonight’s photos?”

”Of course. I also took a lot from before.”

”You took photos every time we had a gathering?”

A faint light flashed in Hu Shuo’s eyes.

”Maybe I missed one or two, but I should have most of them.”

A smile appeared on Hu Shuo’s face. ”Sorry to trouble you.”

...

Su Huan didn’t break his subordinates’ little comfy corner. Instead, he and Director Xu stood around Professor Ma, who was holding the Basic Data just calculated by the supercomputer. Beside them stood Old Jiang, Wang Duoyu, and several other newly boarded talents.

Unlike the old hands, they needed to show their faces more in front of the conductor to deepen his impression.

Director Xu said, ”This data is quite a bit off from my estimate.”

Wang Duoyu said, ”The formula doesn’t seem wrong, but I can’t be sure in this field. Any thoughts, everyone?”

Professor Ma said, ”We’re still short on people, especially in some basic disciplines, but the formula should be fine. What do you think, Conductor?”

Su Huan picked up the stack of papers in his hand, frowned, and said, ”Why is this all symbols, not a single Chinese character?”

”Ahem, that’s the test sheet. The data’s underneath.”

Flipping to the next page, Su Huan scanned it twice, put the file down, and said seriously, ”Alright, give me a concise overview.”

The scholars: ”...You didn’t understand it, did you?”

Of course, they didn’t dare say that out loud—everyone said the conductor held grudges.

Director Xu explained, ”By comparing the data, I found that for each type of Evolver, there is a relatively balanced profession—for example, the ’Fighting Master’ among ’Defenders.’ We then use that profession’s Basic Attributes as a base and run comprehensive calculations.”

”We then get Level 1 Strength, Level 1 Speed, Level 1 Defense... these Basic Attribute values. Using those as a basis for derivation, we obtain each person’s current Basic Attributes.”

”The conversion method between ranks is the same as for Skill Level.”

With that explanation, the underlying principle clicked for Su Huan.

He then picked up a Basic Attributes report about himself. ”So my stats are: Level 7 Strength, Level 8 Speed, Level 5 Defense, Level 6 Endurance, Level 6 Constitution. Which means my Speed is close to Tier Three, my Defense is below Tier Two, and the others are a bit above Tier Two, stuck right on the standard line?”

Director Xu nodded. ”Using three levels per tier as conversion, that’s right.”

”Then I follow you so far.” Su Huan pointed at the question mark after Total Energy. ”What does this mean?”

Director Xu said helplessly, ”That’s why I said my estimate was way off. The projected value is too high, so I’m not sure whether the calculation is wrong.”

”So what did you get in the end?”

”Level 13.”

At that total, Su Huan should be a Tier Four Evolver—and not just newly stepped into Tier Four.

This isn’t an arithmetic progression. The gap between each level is huge; the difference between Level 12 and Level 13 could be worth hundreds of Tier Three Evolvers.

That’s why Director Xu kept muttering that the data might be wrong.

Su Huan pondered for a moment. ”It’s probably not wrong. My profession isn’t a standard ’Power Supplier’—it’s a path that specializes in extreme growth of total energy. Having a number like this isn’t strange.”

The scholars all nodded—this was currently the only plausible explanation.

”By the way, didn’t we previously speculate that profession advancement is related to the basic data? Can we use these test results as a reference?”

”Theoretically yes, but we still need experiments. We might have to waste some resources on those Chongying People.”

Director Xu said.

The ”Chongying People” he meant were the Pan-Asian Alliance Evolvers that Lin Xi had scooped up in one go. They were still working in Director Xu’s lab, contributing their light and heat to the train.

”Once things stabilize, we still have to clean up north of Zhijin City. The train won’t be short on resources for a while—go all out.”

”Mm.”

...

”July 11th, no wind.”

”The four seasons are out of order, the twenty-four solar terms broken and intermittent. The world is left only with twelve types of natural disasters, divided by region.”

Whether when they first arrived in May, or now in July, the Storm Zone either had endless sandstorms or a blazing sun hanging high, with only a few extremely brief showers.

The only reason the dehumidifiers could still pull water from the air was probably because they were close to the Flood Zone, so this land wouldn’t dry out completely and die.

Because of Pan Energy, zombie corpses rotted extremely slowly. Even after sitting for a long time, the bodies still looked lifelike, frozen at the moment of death—only the muscles had shriveled a bit, and the blood was dark and dried.

But in temperatures over thirty degrees, the stench they gave off was enough to make an ordinary person seriously ill from a single whiff.

Qi Zhenbang adjusted the mask on his face, hoisted his spear and crowbar, and walked toward his ”battlefield.”

As one of the few ”outsiders” on the train, he wasn’t treated harshly; his work standards were fully aligned with a Level 1 Flight Attendant.

At first he was a little unaccustomed, worried about the Iron Mountain Shelter, anxious about whether he could find the army. But after living a while with a regular schedule—on duty at set times, off duty at set times—Qi Zhenbang’s mindset actually settled down.

He no longer had to stress over all the messy issues of the shelter, and even his evolution speed had increased quite a bit.

He was already one step away from a breakthrough.

”We’re cleaning this short street today. Don’t go into alleys, and don’t enter buildings. If anything happens, shout immediately. Got it?”

At a brutally devastated crossroads, the team leader from Manufacturing Group briefed the few of them.

If they hadn’t been doing this for several days already, just explaining all the rules would’ve taken half an hour.

Qi Zhenbang felt pretty good about it. He even had a sense of being back in the army—everything laid out for you, you just had to follow orders and get it done. Even the work itself was similar to his peacekeeping days.

And zombies didn’t lose control of their bowels when they died, so the smell wasn’t quite as disgusting.

Skirting a half-melted Tier One Butcher, Qi Zhenbang walked up to a pile of corpses. The ferocious zombies had been shredded by heavy machine-gun fire and piled together in a bizarre entanglement—you in me, me in you.

First he jabbed the corpses a few times with his spear. After confirming none of them were still ”alive,” he stabbed hard into the belly of each intact body, making sure the thrust went through. Only after letting out all the residual gas inside did he move on.

He laid out two huge black bags on the ground, then dragged the intact bodies onto them.

The severed legs and arms could wait.

Some bodies were badly chewed up by machine-gun fire, making them hard to drag, but they were relatively complete and could yield a lot of material during processing. Those had to be carried over in a princess carry.

Once all the intact corpses were dealt with, he took up a shovel and spade, scraping off viscera stuck to the ground and some unidentifiable filth. In the blistering heat, that stuff was glued on tighter than any glue.

Those scraps and the limbs that had lost their Pan Energy were bagged together in the other sack.

Someone would come haul them away later.

Every now and then, members of the combat group in Power Armor would patrol past, guarding against potential dangers.

After a busy morning, the squad had cleared several dozen meters of ground, approaching the big crater up ahead.

They’d already seen many such giant pits over the last two days. The biggest one was in front of Chenxi Square, all left by the conductor.

These craters were the hardest to deal with. They didn’t just have to clean the battlefield; they also had to repair the ”wounds” left by the war. A big pit in the middle of the road like this involved city wiring, sewers, and other key infrastructure, all of which had to be carefully cleared.

Otherwise, if they just filled it in now, they’d have to dig it back up later, which would be an even bigger headache.

The squad leader walked over carrying a set of gear. ”Old Qi, take a breather. You and I will go down and handle this crater. Let’s try to finish it today, or when the sand starts blowing in a couple days, it’ll be even worse.”

The two of them were the strongest in the squad, so naturally they had to take on more dangerous jobs.

Qi Zhenbang unhooked the canteen at his waist, took a few small sips, and squinted up at the sky.

”Let’s go down now. I’ve got a feeling the wind’s going to pick up soon.”