This was probably the heartiest meal all of them had since the apocalypse happened.
Gu Ning’s plant ability came in handy, and the carrot, which was as thick as a small arm, grew as thick as a thigh as soon as it was boosted by Gu Ning’s psychic power.
The various alcoholic beverages brought back were chilled with ice by Jia DaoZhang.
There was no meat, but a hot meal and chilled drinks, not to mention in the post-apocalyptic world, all these were cherished by everyone.
Brother San had made two long tables. The children all ate at the other table, which was obviously much shorter.
During a lively exchange of glasses, a small whimper suddenly sounded.
Everyone glanced over and saw that it was a little boy of eleven or twelve years old, holding a bowl and crying while eating.
Brother San asked with a smile: “Why are you crying when you’re eating well?”
The boy sobbed and wiped tears from his eyes as he replied: “I miss my mum……”
The children, who had just been so happy, all fell silent at these words. All these children were brought back by the soldiers, some were separated from their parents and some became orphaned. Perhaps because they had seen so many terrifying things, they were more well-behaved and obedient than one another. However, they were still children, after all, so they were eating those hot food and probably reminded of the past, which was why they couldn’t hold back their tears.
The soldiers looked at each other and didn’t know how to comfort them.
Mother Gu and Huang MengYao placed down their bowls and went to comfort those teary-eyed children.
Instead, Gu Ning suddenly said to Brother San: “Let them learn how to use knives and guns from tomorrow onwards.”
“Huh?” Brother San didn’t react for a moment.
All the children glanced over at once.
“Really?” A little boy called Wu Sen stood up excitedly.
Gu Ning replied: “Mmm. If you guys performed well enough, I’ll even give you the crystal cores.”
“Wow! So we can become as good as you guys?” Another boy asked nervously and excitedly. They had discussed privately the adults developing their psychic powers and were all full of longing and anticipation for those mysterious crystal cores. Yet they had never thought that Gu Ning would be willing to give it to them!
“What about us?” A little girl around twelve or thirteen with a crooked little ponytail asked. She mustered up all the courage to ask and by us, she naturally meant their little group of girls.
Instead of answering, Gu Ning asked: “Are you willing to learn?”
The little girl stole a glance at Xiang Xu, who was sitting next to Gu Ning, and with a vague look of hope in her eyes, she gathered her courage and nodded: “I am willing.”
She was the oldest of the girls and had always taken the lead. Now that she had taken the lead, the other little girls also plucked up the courage to say yes.
Gu Ning nodded approvingly and said: “Then from tomorrow onwards, you will all follow along too.”
The excitement from the news managed to make the children throw away the sadness which they had just gone felt, and even the little boy who had just been teary joined the guys with their exciting discussion.
“Gu Ning, you’re really good.” Zhang XiaoBai gave a thumbs up to Gu Ning.
Brother San, however, lowered his voice and asked: “Gu Ning, are you serious or are you just coaxing them?”
Gu Ning answered: “Of course I’m serious.”
Brother San stated with some difficulty: “Aren’t they too young for that?” The oldest teenager was only fourteen years old.
Mother Gu was also clearly a bit reluctant: “They are still so young and asking them to learn these things now, I’m afraid that it will be detrimental to their future growth.”
“The prerequisite is that they can grow up.” Gu Ning explained solemnly: “I don’t require them to be able to follow us out to kill the zombies, but at the very least, they can escape from the mouths of the zombies when we have no time to take care of them.”
“I think Gu Ning is right.” Zhuang Chen chimed in approvingly: “And don’t underestimate children, I could already take on more than one adult when I was ten.”
Xiang Xu spoke like an adult: “Although they are not as smart as I am…… I can still teach them how to become a little smarter.”
After having their dinner, it was already after six o’clock and it was completely dark. Zhuang Chen left and went back to Bai Lang’s sector.
Huang MengYao threw a few fireballs to illuminate the backyard.
Under the light of the fireballs, everyone gathered around and began to count the crystal cores which they had obtained during the day. The colourful and transparent crystal cores were glimmering brightly.
Although the number of zombies they had killed was at least several hundred, there were still relatively only a few evolved zombies. Thus, there were only five coloured crystal cores and thirteen transparent crystal cores in total. One of these four crystal cores went to Hong Jie while the other was split with the other soldiers who didn’t get a turn with the crystal cores last time. The crystal core that had been dug out from the head of the mutated zombie, Brother San gave it to Gu Ning. However, what was surprising was that none of the five people, including Hong Jie, had developed their powers this time. Compared to the high probability before, the result this time was a bit unacceptable.
Those failed soldiers were obviously very disappointed. Even though Hong Jie was a little disappointed, she didn’t put much emphasis on it: “I’m a handful of years old anyway, so I’ll be in charge of managing all your logistics from now on.”
Jia DaoZhang’s heart couldn’t help but be a little thankful for their luck.
At night, Gu Ning placed the beds she got from the Haining Department Store into the rooms, one for Father Gu and Mother Gu, one for Hong Jie and Huang MengYao and the other was for the youngest children.
The other rooms, although they did not have beds, they were also covered with thick quilts from Gu Ning.
The soldiers felt satisfied as they lay on the soft quilts insulating them from the coldness of the floor.
The children burrowed into the soft warmth of their blankets and went to sleep with happy smiles on their faces, except for a few little boys who were still whispering excitedly at the thought of tomorrow’s training were too excited to sleep.
Gu Ning made a floor bed next to Father Gu and Mother Gu’s bed.
Father Gu asked as he lay in bed: “NingNing, what are your plans for the future?”
Gu Ning froze for a moment after hearing Father Gu’s question, then placed her hand behind her head and started thinking that she hadn’t been chatting much with her parents recently. She had inevitably neglected her parents’ feelings by being busy with various things these days. Thinking of this, Gu Ning felt a bit apologetic, she stared at the ceiling and then answered honestly: “I don’t know.”
Gu Ning was now a little confused and lost.
The reason she refused Zhang Chen’s invitation was that she couldn’t leave behind her companion with no special abilities and the capital was too big with lots of complicated forces. Gu Ning subconsciously felt that Zhuang Chen’s background was very complicated and she really didn’t want to be involved in some unnecessary power and political struggle.
She had remained in the post-apocalyptic world at the beginning for a sole reason that was to protect her parents. Yet, now she had more people to protect and more goals, one of which was to use the resources on this side of the world to provide her parents in the peaceful world a better life as well.
She knew very well that this colony would not last long, especially after Bai Lang and the others had gone too. However, she didn’t know where she could go if she left here.
Gu SiYuan was not a father in the traditional sense, he was happy to communicate with his child and listen to Gu Ning’s confusion. Under his guidance, Gu Ning would always go to Gu SiYuan to chat about any of the confusion or worry she had since she was a child. In a sense, Gu SiYuan was probably the person in the world who knows her the best apart from Gu Ning herself and even more than Mother Gu.
With just a simple sentence of not knowing, he already understood how at a loss Gu Ning was at this moment.
He started counselling her: “We can’t predict the event in the future, so let’s just solve the immediate issue first and as for those things we can’t see, there are always ways to deal with them when the time comes.”
Gu Ning’s tightened eyebrows were slightly relaxed. Although she knew that her father was trying to counsel her, what Father Gu said was not without any reason. She couldn’t be sure how long this colony could hold, then there was not much point for her to worry about here and there. It was better to settle the matter at hand first.
The next day at breakfast, Gu Ning told the others: “I think it’s time to spread the news of the crystal cores.”
“Huh?” Everyone else was a little surprised by this news.
Brother San replied with approval: “Well, now that all of us have completed our first round of evolution and are more skilled at manipulating our powers, there’s no use in hiding this information anymore. Now that the zombies are evolving so quickly, it would be better to disseminate this information earlier, so that more special abilities users would appear to kill more zombies. That would do us more good than harm.”
When Brother San explained this, the rest who hadn’t understood, finally agreed to it.
Thus, that day they spread the news.
The news was that there were crystal cores in the brains of the zombies and that if they ate those cores, they could also develop their special abilities. This news spread quickly within an hour in the colony of more than two thousand people like wings attached to it.
The fireballs that Yan Yu sent out at the entrance of the colony attracted a lot of attention, and the killing power of those fireballs to the zombies was also appalling. Afterward, some people had been exploring how Yan Yu had conjured out those fireballs, but they didn’t get an answer and after this information was spread, their doubts were immediately explained.
The deadly dullness of the colony was instantly abuzz! To be precise, it was the people living in the colony who were overwhelmed. They exchanged stories about the credibility of the news and finally received confirmation from Zhong Xu, Zhang XiaoBai who was in charge of spreading out the information.
Except for the children and the elderly and some of the women, people were forming groups and headed out the door of the colony, where they had been afraid to go, to do what? To hunt zombies and get crystal cores, of course!
After receiving the news, Yin Sang’s face was very gloomy: “It was Gu Ning’s gang who spread the news of the crystal cores.”
Zhuang Chen didn’t know where she got a file to sharpen her nails and kept her head down as she focused on sharping, not even lifting her eyes when she heard the news.
Bai Lang’s reaction was also very cold.
Yin Sang was very dissatisfied with their reaction and said in annoyance: “Now all those people are running out like crazy to kill the zombies.”
As if she could hardly withstand Yin Sang’s whining and rebut: “Isn’t this a good thing?”
Yin Sang’s eyebrows knitted: “A good thing?! Those people killed all the zombies, then what is left for us to kill? The crystal cores have all been dug away, and the more special abilities users there are, the worse it will be for us.”
Zhuang Chen spread her fingers to carefully check where else her fingernails were not repaired, not even bothered to pay any more attention to Yin Sang.
Yin Qi replied: “Gu Ning is actually willing to spread the crystal cores information to those people to grab, what a surprise.”
“You guys’ thoughts are for the present, yet she’s thinking about the future. At least for now our biggest enemy is still the evolving zombies out there.” Bai Lang continued: “Since she had already spread the news, there’s no need for us to delay and stay here any longer.” He paused briefly as he spoke, then turned to Zhuang Chen and asked: “Are you sure Gu Ning not coming with us?”
Recalling the smile on Gu Ning’s face and her reply last night, Zhuang Chen let out a slight sigh and then answered: “That Gu Ning is good at everything but she is too soft-hearted.”
Bai Lang’s gaze flickered slightly as he stated: “Such a person is most likely to die.”
Zhuang Chen glanced at him and rebut him with some dissatisfaction: “I know you don’t like Gu Ning, but you shouldn’t curse her to death.”
Bai Lang, however, gave Zhuang Chen a side glance then stood up and walked away while replying in a light tone: “Who said I don’t like her?”
……
Due to Bai Lang’s impromptu decision, they decided to depart for the capital today.
When Zhuang Chen went to bid goodbye to Gu Ning, Gu Ning had already driven out to hunt so she could only inform Father Gu and Mother Gu about it.
Compared to the past, Gu Ning met quite a few people from the colony, all in groups, with at least ten people moving together.
Several places could be seen with the scene of several dozen people besieging the zombies.
At Gu Ning’s request, they didn’t go over to help, as if they saw their group of special abilities users, they would only immediately try to suck up to them.
They did not stay at the edge of the downtown area but went straight into it. It was a bit regrettable that they did not encounter the two mutated zombies, since Gu Ning, a plant ability user with a perverted number of psychic abilities, they were hoping to meet and fight again with those mutated zombies to wash away their previous battle shames. The journey could be described as peaceful, even if there were hordes of zombies, they were small waves of no more than twenty, and most of them were ordinary zombies. The only thing that made them feel happy was that Gu Ning took them to sweep the whole shopping street of shops. They were all a little surprised when Gu Ning even raided a large gold jewellery shop.
Gu Ning explained very calmly: “Maybe we’ll need it later.” In her mind, she had already calculated who she was going to find to sell the loots for her.
Although they hadn’t harvested many crystal cores, they still had gained enough supplies to make them very happy.
However, this happy mood only lasted until they’ve entered the door back at their base.
After entering, the smiles on the faces of the people who entered first froze after staring at those people sitting on the sofa in the hall. Then they all looked over at Gu Ning in unison.
Gu Ning was the last to enter the building and was a little confused when she saw everyone’s gazes, then she shifted her gaze, and the smile in her eyes instantly froze as she saw Jiang YueZhou, Jiang Yu, Lin MeiFeng’s family sitting on the sofa in the hall. Mother Gu and Father Gu who was sitting on the opposite sofa and looking at her, all were at a loss for words.
This was probably the heartiest meal all of them had since the apocalypse happened.
Gu Ning’s plant ability came in handy, and the carrot, which was as thick as a small arm, grew as thick as a thigh as soon as it was boosted by Gu Ning’s psychic power.
The various alcoholic beverages brought back were chilled with ice by Jia DaoZhang.
There was no meat, but a hot meal and chilled drinks, not to mention in the post-apocalyptic world, all these were cherished by everyone.
Brother San had made two long tables. The children all ate at the other table, which was obviously much shorter.
During a lively exchange of glasses, a small whimper suddenly sounded.
Everyone glanced over and saw that it was a little boy of eleven or twelve years old, holding a bowl and crying while eating.
Brother San asked with a smile: “Why are you crying when you’re eating well?”
The boy sobbed and wiped tears from his eyes as he replied: “I miss my mum……”
The children, who had just been so happy, all fell silent at these words. All these children were brought back by the soldiers, some were separated from their parents and some became orphaned. Perhaps because they had seen so many terrifying things, they were more well-behaved and obedient than one another. However, they were still children, after all, so they were eating those hot food and probably reminded of the past, which was why they couldn’t hold back their tears.
The soldiers looked at each other and didn’t know how to comfort them.
Mother Gu and Huang MengYao placed down their bowls and went to comfort those teary-eyed children.
Instead, Gu Ning suddenly said to Brother San: “Let them learn how to use knives and guns from tomorrow onwards.”
“Huh?” Brother San didn’t react for a moment.
All the children glanced over at once.
“Really?” A little boy called Wu Sen stood up excitedly.
Gu Ning replied: “Mmm. If you guys performed well enough, I’ll even give you the crystal cores.”
“Wow! So we can become as good as you guys?” Another boy asked nervously and excitedly. They had discussed privately the adults developing their psychic powers and were all full of longing and anticipation for those mysterious crystal cores. Yet they had never thought that Gu Ning would be willing to give it to them!
“What about us?” A little girl around twelve or thirteen with a crooked little ponytail asked. She mustered up all the courage to ask and by us, she naturally meant their little group of girls.
Instead of answering, Gu Ning asked: “Are you willing to learn?”
The little girl stole a glance at Xiang Xu, who was sitting next to Gu Ning, and with a vague look of hope in her eyes, she gathered her courage and nodded: “I am willing.”
She was the oldest of the girls and had always taken the lead. Now that she had taken the lead, the other little girls also plucked up the courage to say yes.
Gu Ning nodded approvingly and said: “Then from tomorrow onwards, you will all follow along too.”
The excitement from the news managed to make the children throw away the sadness which they had just gone felt, and even the little boy who had just been teary joined the guys with their exciting discussion.
“Gu Ning, you’re really good.” Zhang XiaoBai gave a thumbs up to Gu Ning.
Brother San, however, lowered his voice and asked: “Gu Ning, are you serious or are you just coaxing them?”
Gu Ning answered: “Of course I’m serious.”
Brother San stated with some difficulty: “Aren’t they too young for that?” The oldest teenager was only fourteen years old.
Mother Gu was also clearly a bit reluctant: “They are still so young and asking them to learn these things now, I’m afraid that it will be detrimental to their future growth.”
“The prerequisite is that they can grow up.” Gu Ning explained solemnly: “I don’t require them to be able to follow us out to kill the zombies, but at the very least, they can escape from the mouths of the zombies when we have no time to take care of them.”
“I think Gu Ning is right.” Zhuang Chen chimed in approvingly: “And don’t underestimate children, I could already take on more than one adult when I was ten.”
Xiang Xu spoke like an adult: “Although they are not as smart as I am…… I can still teach them how to become a little smarter.”
After having their dinner, it was already after six o’clock and it was completely dark. Zhuang Chen left and went back to Bai Lang’s sector.
Huang MengYao threw a few fireballs to illuminate the backyard.
Under the light of the fireballs, everyone gathered around and began to count the crystal cores which they had obtained during the day. The colourful and transparent crystal cores were glimmering brightly.
Although the number of zombies they had killed was at least several hundred, there were still relatively only a few evolved zombies. Thus, there were only five coloured crystal cores and thirteen transparent crystal cores in total. One of these four crystal cores went to Hong Jie while the other was split with the other soldiers who didn’t get a turn with the crystal cores last time. The crystal core that had been dug out from the head of the mutated zombie, Brother San gave it to Gu Ning. However, what was surprising was that none of the five people, including Hong Jie, had developed their powers this time. Compared to the high probability before, the result this time was a bit unacceptable.
Those failed soldiers were obviously very disappointed. Even though Hong Jie was a little disappointed, she didn’t put much emphasis on it: “I’m a handful of years old anyway, so I’ll be in charge of managing all your logistics from now on.”
Jia DaoZhang’s heart couldn’t help but be a little thankful for their luck.
At night, Gu Ning placed the beds she got from the Haining Department Store into the rooms, one for Father Gu and Mother Gu, one for Hong Jie and Huang MengYao and the other was for the youngest children.
The other rooms, although they did not have beds, they were also covered with thick quilts from Gu Ning.
The soldiers felt satisfied as they lay on the soft quilts insulating them from the coldness of the floor.
The children burrowed into the soft warmth of their blankets and went to sleep with happy smiles on their faces, except for a few little boys who were still whispering excitedly at the thought of tomorrow’s training were too excited to sleep.
Gu Ning made a floor bed next to Father Gu and Mother Gu’s bed.
Father Gu asked as he lay in bed: “NingNing, what are your plans for the future?”
Gu Ning froze for a moment after hearing Father Gu’s question, then placed her hand behind her head and started thinking that she hadn’t been chatting much with her parents recently. She had inevitably neglected her parents’ feelings by being busy with various things these days. Thinking of this, Gu Ning felt a bit apologetic, she stared at the ceiling and then answered honestly: “I don’t know.”
Gu Ning was now a little confused and lost.
The reason she refused Zhang Chen’s invitation was that she couldn’t leave behind her companion with no special abilities and the capital was too big with lots of complicated forces. Gu Ning subconsciously felt that Zhuang Chen’s background was very complicated and she really didn’t want to be involved in some unnecessary power and political struggle.
She had remained in the post-apocalyptic world at the beginning for a sole reason that was to protect her parents. Yet, now she had more people to protect and more goals, one of which was to use the resources on this side of the world to provide her parents in the peaceful world a better life as well.
She knew very well that this colony would not last long, especially after Bai Lang and the others had gone too. However, she didn’t know where she could go if she left here.
Gu SiYuan was not a father in the traditional sense, he was happy to communicate with his child and listen to Gu Ning’s confusion. Under his guidance, Gu Ning would always go to Gu SiYuan to chat about any of the confusion or worry she had since she was a child. In a sense, Gu SiYuan was probably the person in the world who knows her the best apart from Gu Ning herself and even more than Mother Gu.
With just a simple sentence of not knowing, he already understood how at a loss Gu Ning was at this moment.
He started counselling her: “We can’t predict the event in the future, so let’s just solve the immediate issue first and as for those things we can’t see, there are always ways to deal with them when the time comes.”
Gu Ning’s tightened eyebrows were slightly relaxed. Although she knew that her father was trying to counsel her, what Father Gu said was not without any reason. She couldn’t be sure how long this colony could hold, then there was not much point for her to worry about here and there. It was better to settle the matter at hand first.
The next day at breakfast, Gu Ning told the others: “I think it’s time to spread the news of the crystal cores.”
“Huh?” Everyone else was a little surprised by this news.
Brother San replied with approval: “Well, now that all of us have completed our first round of evolution and are more skilled at manipulating our powers, there’s no use in hiding this information anymore. Now that the zombies are evolving so quickly, it would be better to disseminate this information earlier, so that more special abilities users would appear to kill more zombies. That would do us more good than harm.”
When Brother San explained this, the rest who hadn’t understood, finally agreed to it.
Thus, that day they spread the news.
The news was that there were crystal cores in the brains of the zombies and that if they ate those cores, they could also develop their special abilities. This news spread quickly within an hour in the colony of more than two thousand people like wings attached to it.
The fireballs that Yan Yu sent out at the entrance of the colony attracted a lot of attention, and the killing power of those fireballs to the zombies was also appalling. Afterward, some people had been exploring how Yan Yu had conjured out those fireballs, but they didn’t get an answer and after this information was spread, their doubts were immediately explained.
The deadly dullness of the colony was instantly abuzz! To be precise, it was the people living in the colony who were overwhelmed. They exchanged stories about the credibility of the news and finally received confirmation from Zhong Xu, Zhang XiaoBai who was in charge of spreading out the information.
Except for the children and the elderly and some of the women, people were forming groups and headed out the door of the colony, where they had been afraid to go, to do what? To hunt zombies and get crystal cores, of course!
After receiving the news, Yin Sang’s face was very gloomy: “It was Gu Ning’s gang who spread the news of the crystal cores.”
Zhuang Chen didn’t know where she got a file to sharpen her nails and kept her head down as she focused on sharping, not even lifting her eyes when she heard the news.
Bai Lang’s reaction was also very cold.
Yin Sang was very dissatisfied with their reaction and said in annoyance: “Now all those people are running out like crazy to kill the zombies.”
As if she could hardly withstand Yin Sang’s whining and rebut: “Isn’t this a good thing?”
Yin Sang’s eyebrows knitted: “A good thing?! Those people killed all the zombies, then what is left for us to kill? The crystal cores have all been dug away, and the more special abilities users there are, the worse it will be for us.”
Zhuang Chen spread her fingers to carefully check where else her fingernails were not repaired, not even bothered to pay any more attention to Yin Sang.
Yin Qi replied: “Gu Ning is actually willing to spread the crystal cores information to those people to grab, what a surprise.”
“You guys’ thoughts are for the present, yet she’s thinking about the future. At least for now our biggest enemy is still the evolving zombies out there.” Bai Lang continued: “Since she had already spread the news, there’s no need for us to delay and stay here any longer.” He paused briefly as he spoke, then turned to Zhuang Chen and asked: “Are you sure Gu Ning not coming with us?”
Recalling the smile on Gu Ning’s face and her reply last night, Zhuang Chen let out a slight sigh and then answered: “That Gu Ning is good at everything but she is too soft-hearted.”
Bai Lang’s gaze flickered slightly as he stated: “Such a person is most likely to die.”
Zhuang Chen glanced at him and rebut him with some dissatisfaction: “I know you don’t like Gu Ning, but you shouldn’t curse her to death.”
Bai Lang, however, gave Zhuang Chen a side glance then stood up and walked away while replying in a light tone: “Who said I don’t like her?”
……
Due to Bai Lang’s impromptu decision, they decided to depart for the capital today.
When Zhuang Chen went to bid goodbye to Gu Ning, Gu Ning had already driven out to hunt so she could only inform Father Gu and Mother Gu about it.
Compared to the past, Gu Ning met quite a few people from the colony, all in groups, with at least ten people moving together.
Several places could be seen with the scene of several dozen people besieging the zombies.
At Gu Ning’s request, they didn’t go over to help, as if they saw their group of special abilities users, they would only immediately try to suck up to them.
They did not stay at the edge of the downtown area but went straight into it. It was a bit regrettable that they did not encounter the two mutated zombies, since Gu Ning, a plant ability user with a perverted number of psychic abilities, they were hoping to meet and fight again with those mutated zombies to wash away their previous battle shames. The journey could be described as peaceful, even if there were hordes of zombies, they were small waves of no more than twenty, and most of them were ordinary zombies. The only thing that made them feel happy was that Gu Ning took them to sweep the whole shopping street of shops. They were all a little surprised when Gu Ning even raided a large gold jewellery shop.
Gu Ning explained very calmly: “Maybe we’ll need it later.” In her mind, she had already calculated who she was going to find to sell the loots for her.
Although they hadn’t harvested many crystal cores, they still had gained enough supplies to make them very happy.
However, this happy mood only lasted until they’ve entered the door back at their base.
After entering, the smiles on the faces of the people who entered first froze after staring at those people sitting on the sofa in the hall. Then they all looked over at Gu Ning in unison.
Gu Ning was the last to enter the building and was a little confused when she saw everyone’s gazes, then she shifted her gaze, and the smile in her eyes instantly froze as she saw Jiang YueZhou, Jiang Yu, Lin MeiFeng’s family sitting on the sofa in the hall. Mother Gu and Father Gu who was sitting on the opposite sofa and looking at her, all were at a loss for words.
