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The team's things had been brought back to their rooms, they spent an afternoon organizing the basement crops. After dinner they had a good rest in their room. Tomorrow morning they would take advantage of their energy and good weather to collect things.

When they returned to the room, they picked up the large crystal core and decided to give it to Puppy first – it would be a few years until their baby was ready to use cores.

Unfortunately, Puppy pressed her nose against the core for a smell before scrunching her nose and turning away. She walked over to Luo Xun tail wagging.

The pair exchanged helpless looks, "Fine, we'll leave it for the baby when he understands how to use it." The dog did not want it so they could only leave it for the small bun.

After packing up what they brought back, the couple rolled onto the bed for lovemaking. Luo Xun vented out all his depression from their home getting destroyed in the southwest base. He laid on the bed looking at the ceiling.

"What do you think?" Yan Fei hugged him and let Luo Xun use his arm as a pillow. Seeing the latter in a daze, he gently shook the other's arm.

"I wanted to turn the two floors into sand before we left."

"Ah." Yan Fei had no opinion, although Luo Xun was not the only angry one. Everyone in the Otaku squad was angry since they had spent a lot of time there since the apocalypse started.

"But thinking about it, " Luo Xun helplessly shrugged, "The base has earth ability users, even with just sand left, the base could recycle the material and have people live there anyways."

Their home had been the penthouses and were very bright. With the base's solar energy situation, that golden spot would not be short of prospective tenants.

Yan Fei smiled and kissed Luo Xun's forehead. "I took half the metal from the wall before I elft."

"Huh?" Luo Xun looked at him in confusion.

Yan Fei lowered his head and kissed his lover again. "That house has no problems but the foundation is not strong..." He was not kind enough to leave the house without danger and the invaders to live without issue. Do not forget that two houses in the building were under their names, if the base gave those places out, do not blame them for their bad luck.

The next morning after a good night's sleep everyone woke up to wash, have breakfast and prepare food along with weapons and such. They went into the car and drove into the tunnel.

Everyone looked around before going forward, since the two wolves were not in sight, it should be safe enough.

A line of cars drove down a secret road. Luo Xun had chosen a new route for the team follow.

Luo Xun's choice was still on the way to the highway, but there was a concentration of buildings in the middle. When they came back yesterday they checked the photos and confirmed that there were few signs of zombie activity in the area.

At the same time however, they also confirmed that there was a small wave of undead lying in the south east coastal area. Although they were moving towards the coastline, it was not certain that they would not turn towards A-city. Therefore they must collect all their needed supplies and return to their small base before danger comes.

The convoy drove for four hours instead of stopping, they followed the road all the way downtown. He had previously found an electric truck near the map.

Luo Xun held up the map while checking the dilapidated buildings and identified some store signs. "That is a dry cleaner, let me see...continue! It's next to a 24-hour convenience store!"

They drove over and the team looked around for a while. Regrettably they did not find a new energy vehicle nearby.

"Go into the shop and see if there is anything to collect." Luo Xun stood in front of the car and told the team.

He had just finished speaking when a few zombies ran out from the shadows. The level two and three zombies stayed away and threw spheres of water, fire and even ice arrows!

Yan Fei created a metal wall. After blocking the attacks, he waved his hand and turned the wall into a spear to return fire!

In their current situation, there were no large scale attacks, but there were quite a few scattered attacks from scavenging zombies.

A part came out to clean up the corpses, while the others went to the car sale room. The store was not to big for a business building next to the highway. There did not seem to be any cars inside and the back was missing the door.

The room was slightly messy, the glass in the door had been broken. Unfortunately there was nothing to take away. The water dispenser was gone, the drawers were opened and turned inside out.

After confirming that there were no zombies inside, the people carefully searched. Song Lingling found a pile of keys in the drawer. "Are these car keys?"

Luo Xun came over to look, "Probably, there are number plates on them but...where are the cars?" How could there be keys but no car?

They decided to hold onto the key in case they find the matching car.

After confirming that there was nothing to find, the group of people hurried out and went straight to the convenience store next door. Li Tie and Zhang Yi were responsible for keeping watch in case the noise or scents attract some zombies.

Part of the group went into the store and made sure there were no zombies before quickly collecting supplies. The shop had long been looted, there was almost no food left and even some things were scattered on the ground and lost their original appearance.

Luo Xun's goal was not the shelf goods, after the apocalypse and since the base had set up so many collection missions, they already knew there was nothing left. So they targeted the small warehouse behind the store.

However after a round inside, the group of people walked out empty-handed.

"It seems that we can only go to the wholesale market and warehouses and so on to see the situation." Luo Xun said helplessly, although it was expected, it was said to find that the warehouse was completely empty was sad.

"No problem, we checked all the nearby wholesale markets and warehouses. There were several logistic companies that were marked. I'm sure we'll find something we can use." Li Tie comforted after returning empty handed.

Not far away, a couple of zombies were excitedly 'screaming' as it ran over. Zhang Yi shot several wind blades and beheaded them. The headless zombies still ran a few steps forward before falling to the ground.

Luo Xun continued to drive forward while digging out cores and collecting metal left and right. After a while and confirming that there are no cars nearby, they prepared to turn back. As they drove past an intersection, Wu Xin's voice came from the radio. "Luo Xun, isn't the road covered in cars?"

The team hurriedly stopped the car and checked. It looked like a restaurant front yard but the glass door had been half torn off and the hotel's sign was half gone. Luo Xun guessed that with the end of the world it was closed and used for living space. But there was a huge tarpaulin in the corner of the yard.

They exited the car and went to check the vehicles. Zhang Yi used some wind to blow off the cover to reveal two rows of neatly parked new energy vehicles.

After checking the cars and finding nothing wrong, Luo Xun's eyes lit up. These were the new energy cars recently getting promoted. Although they could not hold as much as a truck, the car ran on electricity!

Normally unlike solar cars, they could not charge while driving since they used electricity. However they could attach a few solar panels, part would charge the car along with a few batteries in case of emergency.

"Leader, we are lucky!"

"Electric car, we finally don't have to look everywhere for gasoline!"

Each time they had gone out, as if suffering from OCD, they would check if each car they passed had any gasoline. Unfortunately those cars were almost all empty and the gas stations had no electricity in order to swipe and get gasoline.

Of course it would not have been that much of a problem since Yu Xinran could eventually get oil directly from the pipe. However they had not been able to find a gas station with a lot of gasoline.

202

With their hands full, the group of people circled the group of cars twice. After careful observation they found that some of the cars had some bumps on the roof along with some debris scattered around. They were not sure what got smashed or what had fallen on the car.

But there was Yan Fei among their ranks and these small issues were no problem.

Two rows of cars added up to a total of fourteen cars. Naturally they could not use so many cars. After so long after the end, the storage equipment was long gone, but these extras could be used as replacements. Fortunately when they came out, Luo Xun also drove the truck. Each car pulled one or two cars and the rest were stuffed into the truck compartment. With Yan Fei's ability, they could put down a roof and the cars would be dragged along, in the end fourteen cars were taken back at once.

Because they found electric cars this time, Luo Xun did not go to other places to search for supplies. Otherwise they got a few freezers from a roadside shop. By the time everyone returned to base, the sky was completely dark.

The lush mutant plant farmland surrounded the cars, Luo Xun only dared to drive in the center of the road in case these mutant plants stretched their vines and grabbed the car.

Before they reached their destination, the team heard the sound of wolves howling at the moon in the distance.

Luo Xun subconsciously stepped on the gas pedal while voices came from the other people.

"Leader, it won't be those two again?"

"Maybe, let's wait and see where they go." Although the last encounter did not hurt anyone, they still had to be careful. After all they had grabbed the rest of the pigs, if these wolves went looking for meat? They did not understand wolf language.

The dog who was sleeping in the back also swung up and looked around curiously.

Before long they found the trail of the wolves who were rolling around in a green field and cheerily jumping around towards the mountains.

After determining that the wolves were not hunting, Luo Xun whispered into the radio telling everyone to hurry home and they drove back.

The harvest of this outing – fourteen new vehicles, five freezers and two ice boxes and two metal balls. On top of that they searched an abandoned car on the road. This was good so everyone, next time they could bring some frozen meat and veggies instead of dry rations.

All these things were transported into the tunnel in turns and they had a headache when they looked at the messy pile. "There is not enough space..."

Yes, there was not enough space, unless they used all the floor space, where were all these cars going? There were so many freezers in their home that they had cleared all the classrooms on the second floor. They had filled a room with the freezers they had brought back along with a room dedicated to solar panels and batteries outside.

But some of those classrooms still had chairs and benches. They had no need for it right now so they would gather everything for the moment.

"Luo Xun, should we dig the basement tomorrow? Anyway we need to bring back a bunch of things and go find other supplies right?" Lie Tie quickly proposed a course of action.

"We should do that first, dig the basement tomorrow. Move all the stuff into the two basements and then go to the glass factory you found on the map." There were also a lot of houses in the city with intact glass, but it was too scattered. They would have to gather up slowly at least until they had more free time.

As for anything else...they would set it aside for the moment.

After working for a while, Luo Xun came home to pick up their things and went to bed. The next morning after washing and having breakfast, the team of people returned to the basement to start the day's work. A group carried the freezers and threw them into a classroom on the second floor.

"The design plan just changed, add a parking room here, divided into two levels. Build a tunnel next and then each time we come back we line up cars. This side was connected to the original foundation of the planting rooms. Each one was about an acre. The planting rack can be connected as well so that we don't have to move the machine every time to harvest."

Luo Xun explained his drawings to the crowd, "Build a planting room in these two directions, also about an acre. One will specialize in mutant rice and wheat. The second layer will grow corn, peanuts and soybeans, crops for oil. The underground layers will be extended for leafy vegetables. As for things like fruit, we can grow them in the ground."

With that he added, "We planted watermelon, lemon and sunflower in our home this year at the beginning of spring. We'll harvest and then grow something else." These crops would not grow much and even if it did, they could not eat much.

They could not add another layer on the ground since passerby might notice, so he was ready to temporarily plant less. Besides they also had the main building on the ground floor which could also grow something.

"Okay, no problem!"

"Today we can watch Yu Xinran and the baby."

Luo Xun thought for a moment and said, "The basement needs to be finished, if we don't have enough manpower I will see the situation. I might have a few people with Zhang Yi go out to collect glass, the rest will dig the basement."

The main force of the basement was sand power Yu Xinran and metal Yan Fei along with people to help transfer the ground for drying. There was not much manpower needed, Luo Xun would certainly go out. He was not assured, but it was reasonable.

"Look at the situation to see if you are too busy to go."

Hearing Yan Fei say so, Luo Xun understood what he meant and knocked the table. "That's it..."

"Leader, leader! The quail has mutated!" Luo Xun heard Xu Mei and Song Lingling along with Yu Xinran and Puppy alongside.

"Quail? Mutation?!" Luo Xun stared and sped to where they were placed.

The birds were temporarily placed in the second floor. Yan Fei created a separate room and placed the lighting and ventilation equipment.

Luo Xun helplessly looked Xu Mei and the others with the younger two running around. He stretched his head and looked at the fluttering wings.

"...Is this a mole?"

"The body is bigger than a sparrow? About the size of a chicken?"

"Almost, but a bit smaller than average, but this is not easy...How much do they eat for a meal?"

Luo Xun silently put down the quail, who was frightened and clumped together...Did they suddenly get bigger and even scare themselves?

"...We still have to set up rooms." Luo Xun was not sure if these suddenly mutated quails would have an ability, but looking at them, even if they had a great power, wouldn't they be too afraid to use them? They would be the first to be scared, no doubt about it.

With the sudden mutation the group had to change their tasks again. Luo Xun quickly emptied a large classroom which would be converted into a suitable room for the quails to live in. Fortunately only one-third of the quails mutated, the rest were still normal. But according to the current momentum, the remaining would also change any day which would leave them without enough space. Luo Xun worried that the original room would get too crowded.

The new room was quickly built with a layer of underfloor heating. The walls also had a layer of metal, hung a row of fluorescent lights. Finally they dried the ground and placed some soil for some vegetables and an artificial river for water. The whole room was made like a small eco-park.

Yu Xinran and Puppy were excited and looked forward to playing in here with the quails.

Unfortunately they had not bothered looking for pebbles and things like that so they arranged a metal path around the room. After some work they could give the young girl a separate garden to visit to raise insects and such would be good as well.

203

After completing this somewhat troublesome room which took a half day and welcoming the group of mutated quails, they dragged their tired bodies back to the first floor kitchen to eat.

"Luo Xun, didn't you say we had to plant the fruit trees outside? Should we put them in the room just now? Make a small garden?" Wang Duo had a flash of inspiration, how beautiful it would be to walk hand-in-hand with his lover in the peaceful garden.

Luo Xun's chopsticks paused and then he nodded. "Okay, after we get the glass, I'll draw a design."

"Great! You have to make a hill! Full of peach trees!"

"It's okay to plant pear trees."

"And cherry trees!"

"It's better to make a few more small hills each with a tree."

"And a little bridge with flowing water..."

"Roadside shrubs can be replaced with lemon trees."

"I remember Luo Xun brought star anise right? Is there any pepper?"

"The roads can be beautified with leeks, coriander and others..."

"Aren't all vegetables grown in the basement? Right! When we go collect supplies again, we need to see if the plants haven't changed."

"Don't forget to set aside a place to specialize in sunflowers and watermelons."

"That's good, we need to plant the watermelons into drier soil since it's not sweet if there is too much water."

During safety, everyone began to make life as enjoyable as possible. Luo Xun and Yan Fei smiled at the bowl. "The ground layer is good for now, build a path in the garden but we have to think carefully about everyone's room. Then draw a design and we'll slowly renovate."

After hearing his words, the team was excited again, He Qiankun said that he remembered his previous data had some interior design plans. He wanted to find it and then work according those design drawings.

The group of people spoke animatedly and went back to the basement to move soil in the afternoon.

Yan Fei removed the metal from the wall, Yu Xinran started using her sand powers for non-stop desertification. The sand was then carted out in a metal box, Luo Xun and the others took turns using the elevator to carry the earth.

Yu Xinran with Puppy went to see the baby while learning to write. Xu Mei and Song Lingling finished dealing with work on the second floor. Harvest vegetables, feed the meal worms in the boxes, separate the two kinds of quails, there were quite a few jobs left.

The digging continued for two full days and within that time no one found anything else. Until the basement had enough space, they had used up eight percent of their metal and enough mutant plants for the earth.

"...It seems destined for us to work simultaneously." Luo Xun sighed helplessly. "It's fine and safe, we'll go out early tomorrow."

The others had no problems, after the first basement, the team had to organize the planting racks, deal with the second underground planting space, after expanding they had to plant and grow other crops.

The electric car at home was now fully charged through using the battery and after a test to make sure there weren't any problems, everyone happily decided to go out and use it. They just ft as well.