Building a Base

Fu Lie heard that Ye Zhao had been wandering around the base after dinner, but she had only looked around and done nothing extra. She had not even touched anything. It looked like she was simply taking a walk to aid digestion.

"After Ye Zhao finished looking around, she returned to her hospital room. She took her medicine and never left again. Apparently, she's been watching TV the whole time."

To be honest, Fu Lie really could not figure Ye Zhao out.

"Keep a close eye on her."

"Yes!"

Fu Lie had plenty of official duties to handle, and even more work would need his arrangements in the future. His position did not appear particularly high, but because the base commander was his father, his responsibilities were especially heavy.

The most important issue now was how to settle the massive number of survivors about to flood into the Safe Zone. Although they had expanded the Safe Zone as much as possible and worked day and night to construct Prefabricated Houses for temporary shelter, it was still not enough. Far from enough!

Xia Kingdom had more than a billion people. Even with other safe bases, they could not possibly meet such enormous demand.

Ye Zhao watched a zombie movie, then scrolled through the news online for a while before finally falling into a deep sleep.

In the middle of the night, she was once again awakened by screams.

Ye Zhao pushed open the window and saw a corpse lying on the ground below, blood spreading everywhere. Soon, well-trained soldiers carried away the body that had jumped from upstairs.

"Another suicide. Which one is this?"

"Sigh, I know why. She received a final message from her son in C City. Apparently, her son hid inside an iron barrel, but the zombie rats bit straight through it. Her son was torn to pieces."

"That's so awful..."

"Get online, quick! C City was really attacked by mutated rats. It's all gone!"

"The Wronged Ghost's prophecy was real!"

"My God, those mutated rats are terrifying! Their teeth can even bite through iron doors? Then is the wire fence outside our base even useful?"

"I really want to chop up the idiot who created the zombie virus!"

"..."

Ye Zhao opened Weibo on her phone. There was no need to search. C City was dominating every trending topic.

It was obviously impossible to evacuate all the survivors within a single day. Especially since it was a prophecy from a Weibo account with no profile, no followers, and no posts, most people did not believe it. Aside from the official rescue operations, only a small number of people were willing to risk leaving.

Those who remained in C City all became food for the zombie rats. The scattered lights that symbolized hope slowly went dark...

In the aerial footage, C City was completely swallowed by darkness.

C City had fallen.

The survivors who escaped C City felt only relief, lingering fear, and a terror they could not shake. Many of them went to leave comments beneath Ye Zhao's Weibo posts.

[Thank goodness I've always been following online gossip. I followed the blogger back when the account was still sending automatic replies. The moment I heard C City was going to fall, I dragged my neighbors away with me. Otherwise, we'd all be dead now!]

[Wuwuwu, why did this happen? If the blogger can really foresee the future, can you tell us whether humanity can truly defeat the zombies? If not, I'll jump first.]

[There are not only zombies now, but zombie animals too. Humanity, once the ruler of all things, has become food. Where exactly is humanity's way out?]

[Blogger, can you talk about supernatural abilities? Other apocalypse novels all have supernatural abilities. Why don't we have any? Can we get supernatural abilities??]

[...]

There was really nothing Ye Zhao could do.

She sighed helplessly and turned off her phone.

At the same time, another Player, Nie Yun, was also browsing the news online. When he saw that C City had been destroyed overnight, he dropped to his knees in terror, pressed his hands together, and kowtowed devoutly toward the sky. "Gods and Buddhas of all heavens, Jade Emperor, Jesus, God, great Game, bless me! There are only two days left. Please let me survive until the end!"

"Thank you, thank you! If I make it out alive, I'll definitely burn lots of paper money for all of you!"

Actually, Nie Yun felt rather guilty too. The people in this world had treated him well and had never harmed him. He had tried to tell them the truth, but the damn Game simply would not allow him to reveal the existence of the Black Hole Game. There was nothing he could do.

The ninth day after entering the Game.

Ye Zhao's Constitution had finally risen to 100.

Not only that, she spent six hundred Creation Points to raise her Strength to 10 as well.

[Name: Ye Zhao]

[Constitution: 100 (without equipment effects)]

[Strength: 10 (without equipment effects)]

[Speed: 0+47 (equipment effects)]

Even so, she still had 1,200 Creation Points left for free allocation.

That was the benefit of leveling up.

Early in the morning, several base officials appeared at the hospital. They came in a hurry, while Ye Zhao had just taken her medicine and was munching on a carrot.

She was not surprised by their arrival at all.

Moreover, she had already used the Prophet Skill and seen the next city that would be attacked by the zombie rat swarm: City F.

When the officials heard the news, their faces immediately turned pale, then green. If this continued, the entire Earth would be finished!

Ye Zhao's abilities were limited. Apart from this prophecy, there was nothing else she could do. The group came and went in a hurry, and the hospital room soon fell quiet again.

She went to the shooting range and spent another day there. When she grew tired of shooting, she wandered around.

The tenth day after entering the Game.

The Game was finally about to end.

Ye Zhao told the guard who had been monitoring her, "Go tell Fu Lie to come find me within an hour."

The guard was briefly puzzled. "Miss Ye, is there something you need? You can tell me, and I'll pass it on to Captain Fu."

"Just tell him. It's very important."

She particularly emphasized the words "very important," hoping Fu Lie would understand.

The guard said, "Please rest assured, I will relay your words to Captain Fu exactly as they are!"

Ye Zhao was very satisfied. Then she jumped straight out the window and left the hospital.

Avoiding the crowds, she used 1 Creation Point to create a military jeep. At the same time, she created Fu Lie's identification documents. The guard at the gate glanced at Ye Zhao suspiciously, since he had never seen this girl before, but because the documents belonged to Fu Lie, he opened the gate and let her through.

As Ye Zhao drove her jeep out of the base, she attracted countless looks. In just a few days, those people's gazes had become clouded, their eyes filled with confusion and pain.

She drove directly beyond the base's outer perimeter. The farther she went, the fewer people there were. There were not many buildings around, not even many trees, only vast stretches of open land.

City B's safe base had probably been built here because it was sufficiently empty and open. Anything could be seen at a glance, so there was no need to worry about being caught off guard.

Ye Zhao did not go too far. She chose a flat, open area.

[Create three-story Prefabricated Houses ×300.]

[Create cafeterias ×300.]

[Create vegetable greenhouses ×50.]

[Create observation posts ×50.]

[Create wire fences ×300.]

Fortunately, the houses she created came with foundations. Otherwise, they would have collapsed the moment they appeared.

By the time Fu Lie received news that Ye Zhao had disappeared, then heard that a woman had used his identification documents to leave the base, his expression changed drastically. He immediately led people out of the base in pursuit. What they saw was a cluster of buildings grand enough to be called spectacular!

"Captain Fu, what is this? Am I hallucinating? How could so many houses suddenly appear? And all these wire fences! There clearly weren't any when I returned to the base yesterday!"

"Damn! Have I gone crazy from wanting houses so badly??"

Fu Lie was equally shocked. The vehicles came to a screeching stop, and the group rushed out. Cautiously and fearfully, they reached out to touch the suddenly appeared houses...

"They're real. They're actually real! It's not an illusion?"

They had all been through countless battles and could face life and death without changing expression. When had they ever lost their composure like this?

Even Fu Lie could not help feeling stirred when he touched the solid, real structure!

He had been worrying that there was too little space to house the civilians, but had that problem not just been solved? There were even the wire fences they desperately needed!

For some reason, faced with such a miracle, the first person he thought of was Ye Zhao. Ye Zhao must have done something. As expected, Ye Zhao had hidden many things from him!

He immediately said, "Where is Ye Zhao? Quickly, see if Ye Zhao is nearby!"

A team immediately spread out to search. Two minutes later, someone approached holding a letter. "Captain, there's a package here addressed to you!"

Fu Lie immediately took it and opened it. Inside was a golden compass. The moment his fingers touched it, a line of small text appeared before his eyes:

[Lucky Compass: It will guide you toward the most correct choice. Uses remaining: 10.]

Beneath the Lucky Compass was a note: Please use it carefully.

A soldier asked, "Captain Fu, were all these buildings created by Ye Zhao... Miss Ye?"

"How did she do it? Could she be an immortal descended to the mortal world?"

Fu Lie suddenly smiled. It seemed that playing the victim had not been entirely useless.