Oh, Uncle

As time went by,

the two of them slowly grew up,

and for some reason, they grew further and further apart.

Later, when they went to college, they headed to different cities.

They stayed in touch even less.

After dwelling on those memories for a while, Li Yu noticed Lai Xiyue teaching the younger children.

She had an oval face and a high ponytail, with an air of youthfulness about her.

Her long, slender legs filled out her jeans, and she held a book in her hands.

She radiated an intellectual air...

As if sensing Li Yu's gaze, Lai Xiyue looked up and met his eyes.

They nodded to each other without saying anything.

During their time living together, nothing had yet happened to expose the uglier side of human nature.

Hunger and thirst tested humanity, but the base's plentiful food kept their moral boundaries intact.

Besides, most of them were relatives, so the atmosphere was harmonious.

The rain kept falling. Li Yu used this time to teach everyone indoors how to deal with zombies.

Almost everyone learned to use crossbows and blades.

Even four-year-old Li Suxin held a dagger and learned how to use it.

In the apocalypse, protecting children did not mean letting them live in a false bubble of innocence.

It meant giving them as much happiness as possible while helping them adapt to the apocalypse.

The torrential rain had continued for ten days straight.

That day, the rain gradually eased.

The roaring downpour turned into a light drizzle.

The sky cleared after the rain, and a rainbow hung above the hillside pond.

It seemed to connect two mountains.

Looking at the sky, where the rain had all but stopped, Li Yu prepared to head out.

Throughout this time, his aunt, his mother, and the others had been worried about his uncle.

There were other family members still outside the base: Second Uncle, Aunt, and Third Uncle's family.

But they were all too far away. With things still so unstable, going to find them would be too dangerous.

Besides, as harsh as it sounded, in this danger-ridden apocalypse, after such a terrible downpour...

Who knew how they were doing now...

But the township where his uncle had responded to a police call was within the county, not far from them.

So Li Yu decided to go look for him.

He also planned to stop by the police station in the county seat and see whether he could get some firearms.

This time, Li Yu intended to bring more people.

His father, Li Hongyuan, had wanted to go too, but Li Yu talked him out of it.

Looking at his son, his father was filled with emotion, but above all, pride.

Li Yu, Li Hang, Fourth Uncle, Uncle Lai, and Xiao Lue.

Li Yu had not originally planned to bring Xiao Lue, fearing he would not be able to take it if something had happened to his father.

But Xiao Lue kept pleading,

and looking into his imploring eyes, Li Yu finally agreed.

Uncle Lai went along on almost every trip outside, and he never complained.

Everyone else was related to Li Yu by blood; only his family was not.

Although they were close, Uncle Lai felt he could not simply eat and live there for free.

Otherwise, his conscience would trouble him, so whenever they were going out, he was the first to volunteer.

Li Yu noticed all this and understood what Uncle Lai was thinking, but he did not say much.

After all, Uncle Lai was a strong fighter, honest and dependable, and willing to follow instructions.

With Uncle Lai along, Li Yu felt more confident.

The five of them took two vehicles.

Before leaving, Li Yu told his father, his second uncle, and the others not to open the gate, no matter what happened or who appeared.

The gate opened. A dozen or so meters outside the base, the corpses had become swollen and foul-smelling from soaking in the water.

Dense swarms of flies hovered over them.

To prevent disease, Li Yu put on gloves, moved the corpses into the woods, and dug a shallow pit to bury them.

As they drove along, devastation lay everywhere.

Some poorly built old houses had half their walls collapsed.

The whole area looked ruined.

"Xiao Lue, your dad went to Old House Village, right?" Li Yu asked Liu Jinglue, who was sitting in the back seat.

"Yes! When he called, that was the place he mentioned."

After hearing this, Li Yu asked Uncle Lai to give directions.

Before his rebirth, Li Yu had spent most of his time away from home, so he was only familiar with the area around his house and the county seat.

Uncle Lai had always stayed locally, delivering culvert pipes with Li Yu's father throughout the county, so he knew the area well.

Uncle Lai checked the paper map several times, then nodded in confirmation. This was the place.

"Go straight first, then..."

Li Yu drove according to Uncle Lai's directions.

A little over ten minutes later, they reached Old House Village.

But as soon as they reached the village entrance, they could go no farther.

The group fell silent at the sight of the flooded village.

Old House Village lay in one of the county's low-lying areas, and it was also where the zombie outbreak had first begun.

Everyone inside was probably dead.

An expanse of water stretched before them. Even the few houses on higher ground had only their roofs showing.

Xiao Lue broke down at once and shouted ahead, "Dad! It's Xiao Lue! Where are you?"

His cries echoed across the low-lying land.

They reverberated through the valley:

Where are you? Where are you? Where are you?...

Hearing him, Li Yu quickly said, "Xiao Lue, stop shouting! You'll draw the zombies over!"

His urgency gave his words a sharp edge.

Just as Li Yu finished speaking, several zombie roars came from a hundred meters away.

Hearing them, Xiao Lue immediately calmed down and gave everyone an embarrassed look.

"I'm sorry. I... I..." Before he could finish, Li Yu patted his shoulder,

and said, "It's okay. I understand, but don't do that again."

The sounds of the surrounding zombies were drawing closer.

Li Yu urged everyone to get into the vehicles and leave.

If all the nearby zombies surrounded them, they would be in trouble.

The five of them would not even be enough to feed them!

Everyone hurried into the vehicles. The roar of the SUVs' engines stirred up the nearby zombies again.

Dozens of zombies came chasing from the right side of the village entrance, with even more dimly visible behind them!

Several even emerged from beneath the water straight ahead!

The SUVs immediately accelerated and sped away.

The zombies that had arrived behind them kept chasing, but after running some distance,

they realized they could not keep up and stood there roaring.

Only after driving over a kilometer did everyone breathe a sigh of relief.

They were still shaken.

The SUVs traveled along the road, while scattered zombies wandered aimlessly beside the national highway.

At the sound of the two vehicles' engines, the zombies chased after them like mad.

Along the way, broken-down cars sat haphazardly on the road.

Scattered debris blocked their passage,

so Li Yu and Uncle Lai got out to clear it while the other three kept watch.

Some of the cars stopped on the national highway even had zombies roaring inside.

Whenever Li Yu and the others found one, they killed it with a single stroke.

The road was truly difficult to navigate. The torrential rain had washed heaps of soil onto it,

leaving it thick with mud.

After much stopping and starting, they finally reached the county seat.