CH 43

The broken and old car left Jiang City without a hassle. It passed through the Nanjiang Highway then through the Nanjiang city – a county-level city of Jiang City – and soon entered the boundary of Xinghua City, a neighboring city of Jiang City.

Because the road is not very congested, although they have encountered many zombies on the way, there was still no danger at the end of the day.

Xinghua City is a small city of hilly terrain surrounded by mountains. Its development is a bit lagging behind Jiang City but because of its topography and economic constraints that made it vast and sparse population.

Although the area is the largest in the province, the population is only 2.65 million – which is the third lowest in the province’s permanent population.

One of the more important reasons for the sparse population is that it is the hometown of foreign Chinese individuals hoping to open a market. There are more than 5 million people of foreign Chinese in Europe and America and more than 3 million settled in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Because of this, after Hao Jian and the others stepped inside, they encountered far fewer zombies compared to elsewhere. However, based from the road conditions, there have been many traffic accidents here, mainly because many people feel that Xinghua City is hidden ang mountainous – which is very suitable for avoiding zombies. So it didn’t matter whether they live there or not, they all flocked to the city.

The only national highway available is not accessible and there is only one highway connecting it to the city. Because there are mountains everywhere, it is difficult to build a road and there is not much traffic on weekdays, so the construction of public transportation on the area is far less than in the big cities.

Although these places may seem backward, Lian Ru Ning and the others were still fascinated by the surrounding scenery, as if they had forgotten that zombies are destroying everything.

“The green mountains and water here are goof for the health. The surroundings are good and there’s fresh air!”

Hao Jian looked at the map in Lian Ru Ning’s phone and said, “This place is indeed suitable for the health and a tourist spot. There is the Cha Shan tourist area in the front. To the right is the ecological tourist resort. There are several reservoirs, the air quality is also said to be one of the best in the province. . . There are main towns and other urban areas in Xinghua City 56 kilometers west from here.”

The distribution map of the main towns and urban areas in Xinghua City looks very much look like the sole of a foot from the map while being surrounded by hills. Except for the only highway and national highway that crosses the densely populated area from east to west, the entrances and exits of the remaining provincial and county roads are basically concentrated in the urban area.

“If you go through the major towns and cities using the national highway, about 30 kilometers, you can enter the boundary of Chengxiang. The terrain there is open, and after that will be Xiangshi.”

Xiangshi and Focheng are the first and second tier cities close to Southern City. It has a resident population of more than eight million and is no less dangerous than Southern City.

After Hao Jian finished, Peng Mao and Xin Ting both looked at Lian Ru Ning. After all, Hao Jian said that she listens to Lian Ru Ning.

Lian Ru Ning, who was driving, is also a little worried. Should they venture across Xinghua City or should they stay closer?

It would save them time if they crossed Xinghua City, but would they have a way to break through out densely populated urban areas?

If they take the long detour, they will definitely be delayed even longer on the road. It would have taken them two hours to get to Chengxiang from their current location, even by highway. And if they needed to stop and rest on the way, it might take a day to Chengxiang.

Lian Ru Ning couldn’t give an answer yet, but Peng Mao stared at the object in Hao Jian’s hand to see, “That solar charger, where did you get it? There are also binoculars and two machetes. . .”

Hao Jian took out her level rewards with the addition of two machetes she bought in the weapon special section in the mall.

They didn’t pay attention with the things inside their backpacks until Lian Ru Ning’s phone ran out of battery when Hao Jian was using her phone for an offline map and Hao Jian took out the solar charger.

As for the binoculars, she has been letting Lian Ru Ning help observe the road ahead while Hao Jian drives. She is then in charge of reconnaissance when Lian Ru Ning drives.

She and Lian Ru Ning each had a machete. A crowbar was given to Peng Mao and the axe was given Xin Ting.

Hao Jian’s face didn’t change her face, “Yi Gao gave them, otherwise where do you think it came from? Can it appear out of thin air?”

Under Hao Jian’s poker face, Lain Ru Ning and the others would naturally not be suspicious. It also wasn’t surprising for the solar chargers and binoculars were given by the guards.

Lian Ru Ning was just looking through the binoculars when she could clearly see someone standing on the roof of a residential building four or five kilometers away. With this kind of quality, this binoculars are definitely not something one can casually pick up on the street.

Based on the relationship between Hao Jian and Yi Gao, giving her so many good things is only logical.

Thinking of this, they remembered that Hao Jian giving someone a letter of thanks and Peng Mao couldn’t help but sigh again, “You’re really good. How about you changing your name in ‘Hao Pao’. Although it also makes you adulterous, but. . .”

Hao Jian glanced at Peng Mao through the rearview mirror with warning in her eyes. Peng Mao resentfully retracted his neck and turned his gaze out the window.

The fresh breeze poured in through the car window and they finally felt a hint of coolness from nature in this hot summer day.

Before coming here, even if there was wind pouring in through the window, it would only be hot wind, making their faces sticky. Whereas here, the mountains and clear water are beautiful and the sounds of birds that can’t be heard elsewhere can also be heard here.

Hao Jian confirmed the roads around them using the system map. She withdrew her attention on her system map and said, “Let’s take the county road Y555!”

Lian Ru Ning’s mind was attentive and agreed.

Peng Mao and Xin Ting didn’t know how Hao Jian intended to go, so they asked, “Where does Y555 lead to?”

“It leads to the national highway.”

Peng Mao and Xin Ting understood that Hao Jian was planning to cross the city.

Hao Jian picked up the binoculars to observe the surroundings and said, “Just now, after looking at the map carefully, the location of the towns here in relation to the city seems to be radial, scattered, and not very dense. But there is one thing those towns don’t have a lot of county roads, and unlike the busy city, these county roads are not exactly lined with residential buildings. They’re all farmland, what does this mean?”

“It means that we can completely avoid the densely populated villages or towns before entering the urban section.” Lian Ru Ning’s expression relaxed a lot.

“Yeah, and it might be worth considering the population here along with the geography. For a mountainous city surrounded by mountains from all sides, mountains are a natural barrier! Apart from the various highways that are directly accessible to the zombies, the only way for the zombies to enter through other means is to go over the mountains and that can take up to a year and a half.”

“Right, then wouldn’t this place become a refuge base for millions of people to hide?!” Peng Mao felt his blood surging upon imagining the sight of this place after it was built into a large refuge base.

However, it is not easy to clean up the zombies here, unless the entire escort force is concentrated on building, otherwise it is difficult to achieve.

They remembered what An Minghui said that the country is so big and there are only a few hundred members of the escort team assigned to each city to perform rescue tasks, and the small cities may only have a hundred or so people. Each city has people who need their protection, so how could they possibly spare the manpower to build a base here?

Thinking about this, Peng Mao sighed again.

Xin Ting didn’t think as far ahead as Peng Mao so she asked, “Does that mean that such a geographical environment will reduce the number of foreign zombies. And without the threat of so many foreign walkers, all we have to face are the walkers that exist in city. . . and the people?”

“Think of it this way. Looking at it optimistically, the population here is only about two million and the initial wave of returning home was after the news of the zombies spreading widely on the internet. The traffic was almost paralyzed at that time, right, so even if a lot of people get lucky before then, as long as the news here is not so closed, then the zombie virus will not be transmitted too fast. Of course, if you look at the bad side, 70% of the people have turned into zombies, but there are only a million and a half, or 600,000, right?”

“It’s true that the population here is less than in Jiang City. . .” Peng Mao counted and stared, “But that’s still a lot!”

“You have to think of the good view. These zombies are scattered because there are still a lot of living people elsewhere so the zombies will not just circle around a place. For a place with a land area of 1.6 million square kilometers. There are at least one zombie for every ten kilometers, making at least 16,000 zombies in terms of area. If you exclude the mountainous region, then the presence of zombies is not very dense.”

Through Hao Jian analysis, they are indeed optimistic. No matter how many zombies there are, there won’t be more zombies than in Jiang City, right?

Seeing that the two sides of the national highway are becoming less and less mountainous and the houses are gradually increasing, they knew that they’re approaching the flat terrain of Xinghua City.

The breezy wind and sunny sky slowly gathered dark clouds and the sky looked gloomy as if the scene of the ends of a natural disaster.

“It’s raining soon.” Xin Ting worriedly glanced at the driver’s side of the car window. There are no windows, once it rains, it will come in and the driver’s seat is bound to become soup.

“It won’t rain for a while. Let’s get out of here first and then find a relatively safe place to escape the rain.” Hao Jian siad.

After speaking, she once again picked up the telescope to observe the environment several kilometers away.

Suddenly, she said, “Wait, there’s a county road on the right, go there.”

“What’s the situation ahead?”

“Well, the provincial road in front is blocked by a large number of junk cars. Even the farmland on both sides of the road is also blocked by many cars.”

Lian Ru Ning frowned, “What’s going on here?”

“If the map is not wrong, behind those cars are villages. It seems that this is an artificial roadblock and the purpose is probably to stop outsiders or zombies from entering.”

The reason why they can set up roadblocks is because of the terrain here. With rolling hills on both sides and only one national highway passable in the middle. If it were ancient times, marching and fighting, this place would be an easy place to defend and difficult to attack.

The good thing is that there are also some mountain roads built along the foot of the mountain that can be detoured, but even Hao Jian can’t tell using the system map whether there are also roadblocks on the rural roads.

After turning into the county road, Hao Jian asked Lian Ru Ning to stop and switch drivers, Because she has the system map, they will be faster than giving directions to Lian Ru Ning.

The original arrangements were the four of them taking turns in driving, but given that Peng Mao always missed the road Hao Jian pointed out, Hao Jian simply took turns with Lian Ru Ning.

Xin Ting was implicated by Peng Mao and could only sit in the back to develop survival strategies according to Hao Jian’s requirements. She listed all the supplies they needed, followed by delineating where each city had the potential to establish a refuge base, and finally to consider various contingencies.

“I have to pee, I’m going to go to relieve myself first. I’ll be back soon!” Peng Mao said and went to the side of the overgrown forest.

“In that case, let’s go rest for a while. I’ll find something to seal this car window first so that the rain doesn’t come in.” Lian Ru Ning said.

“But we don’t have any glass!” Xin Ting said.

Lian Ru Ning thought about it for a while and took off her sunscreen clothing, “This jacket is an effective waterproof. Let’s use it instead. Just leave a small gap for observing the left rearview mirror.”

As soon as she fixed her clothes on the car window, she suddenly heard Peng Mao’s cry, “Damn, there are zombies, help!”

Peng Mao rushed back towards them that he didn’t even have time to tie his belt. Behind him were two zombies that were following.

Hao Jian glanced at his seemingly wet pants and held back a laugh. She lifted her machete with Lian Ru Ning and walked towards his rear.

Peng Mao hurriedly fastened his belt and went back to the car to take out his crowbar to prepare to help Hao Jian and the girls, but by the time he had rushed over there, the two zombies had already been dealt with by Hao Jian and Lian Ru Ning.

“Phew. These two guys suddenly appeared sneakily and scared me to the point that my urine went back in!” Peng Mao said.

“Is that the reason why you peed in your pants?” Hao Jian asked.

Her words attracted the attention of Lian Ru Ning and Xin Ting. The two of them subconsciously looked at Peng Mao’s pants. Peng Mao covered his crotch and scolded, “You three big girls staring at others here, are you not ashamed?!”

“You are a big man that’s too scared to pee alone. Are you not ashamed?” Hao Jian asked rhetorically.

Lian Ru Ning was suffocating a smile, while Xin Ting lowered her head and smirked. When Peng Mao saw this, his face turned red and hot like a tomato.

Seeing that the heavy rain was coming, Hao Jian wiped the blood off the machete and returned to the car.

Just when she solved one of the zombies just now, a prompt from the system suddenly popped up in her mind, “Congratulations to the host for killing a total of 100 zombies, gaining the title of ‘Warrior’, achievements and can participate in a lottery. I hope the host will keep up the good work!”

At this point, she calmly asked, “‘Achievements’ are out, and I have an illusion that I’m playing games more and more. System, this world, is it real?”