In the front passenger seat, a boy in a blue jacket held a filthy four- or five-year-old child on his lap. They shared a seat belt, and the child mischievously tugged it back and forth, smiling from time to time, while the boy stared blankly out the window.
"Are there really other people in this world besides us?"
The burly driver kept one hand on the wheel and patted the boy's and the child's heads with the other. Smiling, he said, "There must be. Since we can pick up the broadcast, that means someone must have come. They should be waiting for us in the city right now..."
"Don't be so pessimistic, you lot!"
"Here, light a cigarette for your uncle first."
"Come on, cut back on the smoking..."
The convoy pressed on, finally entering the urban area after half an hour.
The group stopped to get their bearings.
"How much farther is it to the Mutual Aid Society base they mentioned on the radio?"
"No idea. We haven't found the landmark they talked about."
"Forget it. Let's drive along the main road through the city and try our luck. We can pick up some supplies to take back while we're at it. If we can't find them, we'll just leave the city in the afternoon."
"Huh? We're still going back? Everyone came out with us."
"If you can't find anyone, what are you going to do instead of going back? Stay in the city and feed those damned things?"
"Wait, look up ahead. Aren't there a lot of things on the road?" The boy in the blue jacket ran over and soon returned with a small stack of something.
"They're flyers!"
Everyone in the vehicles grew excited. Men and women alike climbed out to gather around, and there were only just enough flyers in the boy's hands for every two people to share one.
"They really are flyers!"
"They can even print flyers now?"
"These are pretty good quality, too. Have they restored production? That would be wonderful!"
"Could be. Didn't they say they had doctors?"
Everyone huddled together in high spirits, smiles spreading across their faces.
Suddenly, the sound of vomiting came from one of the vehicles.
Everyone hurried back.
"A He, are you all right?"
"Sister He..."
"I'm fine. Don't worry about me." Inside the vehicle was a pale-faced
woman, one hand gently stroking her swollen belly.
"Ah." The burly driver from earlier came over too, an unlit cigarette between his lips, looking at the woman with some pity.
"Everyone, get back in the vehicles. We need to find those people quickly. You can afford to wait, but A He can't."
In the city.
"I've found a gas station here. Fuel pumping team, come take a look. Is the fuel inside still usable?"
"We've got a shopping mall here. Darkseekers seem to have searched it. There's still quite a bit of rice, snacks, and canned food, but the cured meat and vacuum-packed meat are all gone. Those Darkseekers have probably become entirely carnivorous..."
"Don't concern yourselves with that. Stay safe. We're short on manpower, so we won't be organizing research on the Darkseekers. Our only responsibility is to eliminate them..."
In the city, the vanguard team members split up to search a small area, carrying flashlights and wearing full protective suits, keeping in contact with one another by radio.
Zhang Tianyuan also left the command vehicle to search a shopping mall.
Instructor Yin followed nervously behind him like a bodyguard.
Originally, Instructor Yin had opposed Zhang Tianyuan joining their operation. He felt that someone as important as Zhang Tianyuan should stay safely in the rear.
But Zhang Tianyuan knew he could not be a flower raised in a greenhouse.
Looking across world history, which of those who had opened up heaven and earth had not led by personal example?
If he obediently stayed in the command vehicle now, he could only obediently stay in the command vehicle in the future.
Besides, with the threat of the virus removed, a world like I Am Legend was already quite safe as apocalyptic worlds went.
Weren't they just Darkseekers?
With a flashlight, a stab-resistant suit, and a riot helmet, he could both attack and defend against Darkseekers.
What was so frightening about something that died when light shone on it?
As Zhang Tianyuan searched the mall, Bai Xu was also working nearby with the machine gunner and several other vanguard members.
But they were not responsible for gathering supplies.
Bai Xu and the others were tasked with collecting the human remains inside the building.
Zhang Tianyuan and the others had not noticed while they were on the street. Only after entering the building did they discover that bones littered the place.
And they were bones that had been torn apart.
A thighbone here, a forearm bone there. Deep tooth marks could even be seen on many of the bones. Who knew how many corpses had been dragged in here by Darkseekers at night, then torn apart with their hands and gaping mouths and scattered across the floor.
The walls were covered in mottled, discolored bloodstains, and the floor looked as though it had been coated in thick red paint. Scrape away the thick, sticky, bloody red on the surface, and the flooring exposed beneath had rotted black and
yellow.
The air was stale and bloody, so moldy it made them want to vomit. Zhang Tianyuan and the others had smashed all the mall's glass from outside to ventilate it, then waited another half hour before daring to enter.
Ten months ago, this place must have been a vision of hell.
Faced with such a horrific sight, neither Bai Xu nor the other vanguard members could stand by and do nothing.
They could not collect all the bones in the entire city.
But they could at least gather the bones wherever they went.
Bai Xu was now dragging a wheeled case, wearing gloves, starting at the entrance and solemnly placing every set of remains he found into the case, one by one.
And the more remains Bai Xu collected, the heavier his heart grew.
The remains before him seemed endless. He bent down, picked them up, put them in the case, then bent down again...
It felt as though he had repeated the motion countless times, but when he and his companions looked up again, the remains before them seemed not to have diminished at all...
Huff!
Huff!
Huff...
Bai Xu breathed rapidly, feeling light-headed.
As a former criminal investigator, he had a basic understanding of the human skeleton and could easily recognize what category of person each bone had belonged to in life.
This was a child's pelvis, that one belonged to a woman, and the one at his feet belonged to an infant...
At that moment, he would rather not have known any of it.
"So this is the apocalypse?" Stooping to cradle the infant's bones, Bai Xu gained an accurate understanding of the apocalypse Zhang Tianyuan spoke of for the first time.
Before, the apocalypse had been the addition and subtraction of seven billion lives in his mind.
Now, the apocalypse in his mind was blood and bones, with no flesh left.
"Team Leader Bai..." the machine gunner suddenly called from behind him.
"Hmm?" Bai Xu turned and gently placed the remains in his hands into the case. "What is it?"
The machine gunner's mouth opened and closed before he squeezed out, "Our world mustn't end up like this too!"
Looking at this scene, he was frightened too.
Zhang Tianyuan had said that seven billion people would die in their future!
Wouldn't that be a replica of this world?
Bai Xu turned around to face the countless bones. Bracing a hand on the large case behind him, he murmured, "Not just our world. No world should become like this..."
"Humanity shouldn't be like this."
Bai Xu reached into his pocket and took out a slip of paper. He held it up to the light and gazed at it like a pilgrim before a holy site.
He was profoundly grateful that he had written the correct phone number on it that night.
"Fortunately, our world still has a chance."