"How dare you talk back!"

Unable to find answers from Li Wei and unwilling to sit around waiting for death, David and the others found a spot to discuss countermeasures and plan their own survival.

But those monsters had tentacles larger than any of them; could a fragile supermarket really hold them back?

The supermarket manager looked toward the glass facade of the main entrance and said, "We can use dog food to block the glass, and we can use duct tape on the broken parts. I hope this works..."

None of them held much hope for this method, but they were unwilling to just sit there and wait to die, so they all agreed to the proposal.

"Maybe we can go ask those soldiers. Didn't that Asian guy say this was some mess created by the military base?" A hippie wearing a blue bandana tilted his head in a certain direction.

Everyone looked that way instinctively. Their field of vision only showed shelves, but they could already "see through" them to the three soldiers who had come out for leave.

Brent clenched his fists. Remembering Li Wei from earlier, he felt a bit awkward and raised his hand instead. "I agree."

David and Ollie naturally felt this wasn't a great idea, but if they wanted to come up with a useful plan, information was key.

Dan and the others didn't express an opinion, and the scene fell into silence.

They looked at each other, but no one was the first to speak.

"Hey, guys, are you discussing something?" Just then, a female voice cut into their circle.

The group was startled and looked over in unison, seeing the plain-looking Amanda, which made them breathe a sigh of relief.

This wasn't exactly a secret, so they simply included Amanda in their discussion.

When Amanda learned of their idea, she wore a puzzled expression. "Why not just go ask? It's just... a very simple question. They are trapped too. Only by uniting can we escape this place, right?"

Why not just go ask?

"That's a good question!" Brent straightened up, his back leaving the shelf, and looked at this somewhat naive woman with an angry expression. He said, word for word, "If it were really as simple as asking them to tell us about the bullshit secret experiments the federal government is conducting, we wouldn't be struggling here, do you understand?"

"To ask them questions, we might need a gun." A middle-aged man with a mustache also looked at Amanda and shook his head slightly. "I don't trust their discipline; they must have guns on them!"

The supermarket manager unbuttoned the top button of his shirt, suddenly feeling that the atmosphere here was a bit oppressive.

The silent David also nodded quietly. The place they lived in wasn't a big city, so they could still keep their heads and not truly believe the nonsense spouted by those politicians.

No one with any sense would trust those soldiers. Aside from Wayne, who was a local and could be trusted a little, the other two were outside garrison troops, and neither could be trusted.

"A gun?" Amanda said.

Everyone nodded in confirmation. The mustachioed man looked at the mist outside and said, "I have a shotgun, but it's in the trunk of my car outside."

The others felt their spirits deflate upon hearing this; that was as good as saying nothing.

But at this moment, Amanda pulled out exactly what they were desperately hoping for from the leather bag at her waist: a silver revolver.

"I have one... because I was going out, my husband gave it to me for self-defense."

Seeing the gun, everyone jumped up from their spots, looking excitedly at the revolver in Amanda's hand.

With the gun, they only needed a simple plan to capture the two outside garrison soldiers, interrogate them, and force them to reveal information about the military base in the forest!

After finalizing the plan, they began organizing people to stack large bags of dog and cat food against the glass facade to build a low wall, and they set up many lighting devices, turning the supermarket into a slightly better, though still hole-ridden, defensive facility.

Late at night, when all was quiet, Li Wei leaned against a cardboard box and fell into a temporary state of dormancy.

He could keep his mind highly active for a very, very long time, but he chose not to do so, simply to live more like a human being rather than just surviving.

He had plenty of time now and didn't need to worry about his lifespan at all; how to arrange such a long time was a true test of his imagination.

Before he could think of an answer, Li Wei would continue to use his familiar mode of living.

Half an hour after he entered dormancy, a strange sound began to linger around him. At first, it sounded chaotic, but if one focused their mind to distinguish it, one could hear the cries of many creatures.

The chirping of sparrows, the roar of a lion, the hissing of a viper... and the messy, incessant chatter of humans.

These sounds mixed together, forming no sense of art, but rather a buzzing that felt like it would shatter one's brain.

Even after subconsciously shielding his auditory system, Li Wei was still forcibly subjected to these eerie sounds that seemed to come from the void.

It wasn't until he transformed the mucus-secreting organ he had obtained from devouring the monsters in the mist into a normal human organ, and released the manufactured mucus outside his body, that the sounds gradually disappeared from his consciousness.

Opening his eyes, which flashed with red light in the darkness, he felt that things were starting to get interesting!

A small patch of ground was being eroded by the mucus, emitting white smoke. Li Wei had no intention of resting for the moment and prepared to go outside to find more monsters to study.

But just as he sat up, the corner of his eye caught a few figures walking toward the storage room.

Catching the scent of gossip in the air, and out of curiosity about those people, Li Wei quietly followed.

It was the first night in the supermarket, and many people couldn't sleep. Although they saw those people heading toward the storage room, no one had any interest in being a busybody.

Just like that, the figures walked past some of the people and entered the soundproof storage room.

A moment later, Li Wei emerged from the side of the shelves in Aisle 4, stepped over a man reeking of alcohol on the floor, and walked toward the storage room.

Pushing open a door, his auditory system captured the slightly heated conversation inside.

"Tie them up!"

"Tell us what exactly you are researching at the base in the mountains!"

"Watch out for the gun, give it to someone more reliable! I'll talk! We'll both talk!"

"Confess honestly, is this mist here something you created!"

"Yes! We are conducting an experiment..."

Upon hearing that it was actually internal information regarding the U.S. military base pointed to by the key arrow, Li Wei stopped hiding himself and stepped into the second room, where the lights were still on.

"If there's something good going on, count me in!"

"Ah!!!" *9

The sudden voice startled everyone in the room, but once they saw it was Li Wei, they slowly let out a sigh of relief.

The supermarket manager saw him and hurriedly pointed to the three people tied to the shelves, saying, "Uh, we are interrogating them, trying to find out how the mist outside appeared."

David, Brent, and the others nodded in agreement, though their expressions were inexplicably tense.

Li Wei's expression was playful; he narrowed his eyes and stared at the people present, watching them grow uneasy before he finally revealed a look of realization. "So that's how it is! You should have said so earlier; if you had, I would have joined in!"

After saying this, he strode forward and gave each of the three people tied to the shelves a heavy slap across the face, then shouted fiercely, "Are you going to talk or not!"

"I was just about to talk!"

"It was you who interrupted me!"

"Fuck, why did you hit me!"

"You dare to talk back!"

Quack, quack, quack!