Chapter Ninety-Three: A Moment of Calm Before the Storm

That afternoon, news suddenly swept through the major groups of Dawnlight City: three days later, a horde of zombies would attack the city.

The message spread through all of Dawnlight City in the blink of an eye.

At the same time, the elite members of every major team were dispatched at once to maintain order within the city.

Fang Xia did not receive the news, because he was taking a nap.

However, Liu Rui represented him in this operation.

This was no longer a matter of any one person; it concerned the life and death of all humanity in Dawnlight City.

Only by uniting every force that could be united would they be able to weather this storm.

"Everything okay back in the team?"

On the second floor, Liu Rui sat opposite the little girl.

"Sister Rui, don't worry. Since they didn't announce the fifth-tier zombies, everyone is actually pretty optimistic."

That was not just true of Fang Xia's team; in fact, the whole of Dawnlight City felt much the same.

Far from descending into chaos, many people had even begun to look forward to it.

A zombie attack on the city? Wasn't that just a few more zombies? There were plenty falling from the sky every day anyway—there had to be at least over a hundred thousand of them by now, and everyone was already used to killing them.

There were even plenty of people hoping for it. If they wanted to level up, they needed a lot of upgrade crystals; if this assault brought too few zombies, there probably would not be enough to go around.

This was also one of the misconceptions Fang Xia had fallen into.

In his previous life, the zombie assault on the city had begun at three hundred thousand, but back then the total population of Dawnlight City had only been a few hundred thousand.

In this life, for various reasons, not only was everyone leveling faster, but far more survivors had lived through it.

So this zombie siege would completely exceed Fang Xia's expectations, perhaps even reaching a scale of a million.

At seven in the evening, Liu Rui was counting today's harvest with the little girl, while Jing Yi was also carefully calculating the recent situation in the trade market.

Doctor Jiang was giving Li Xiaochun an examination to see how well she had recovered.

Jing Ru sat hugging a comic book, reading it with great delight.

"I'm so hungry. The leader said he wanted to test whether that military cot really works as well as the description says, but how long is it going to take? I'm starving."

Jing Ru closed the comic book. It was fun enough, but it did not fill the stomach.

Yesterday she had gotten nothing at all, and had been forced to eat a rice ball, leaving her with almost no taste in her mouth for the whole day.

When Jing Ru cried out like that, everyone else started to feel hungry too.

They were not like the others.

Most people ate a single rice ball first thing in the morning and basically never felt hungry again for the rest of the day.

But they ate meal by meal, not much different from before the apocalypse—only their appetites had grown considerably.

"Still, Bai Xing is really something. She's been in there with the leader for so long; looks like that military cot really does work."

Every gaze turned toward her in an instant, and Jing Ru promptly shut her mouth.

A woman's jealousy was no joke. If she annoyed Liu Rui, she might end up living on a single rice ball again today.

At last, the door to the room opened, and Fang Xia came out looking refreshed and invigorated, with Bai Xing following behind him in unsteady steps.

"Time to eat."

At the command, Jing Ru immediately sprang into action, enthusiastically helping set the bowls and chopsticks, even thoughtfully arranging a cushion for Bai Xing.

"Sister Rui, dinner's ready."

Once everything had been arranged, Jing Ru blinked her big eyes at Liu Rui.

Although dinner had to wait for Fang Xia, the one who decided what they would eat tonight was the chief steward, Liu Rui.

"I've got something good today. Wait a moment, all of you."

Liu Rui smiled mysteriously, then took a few cans of drink from her space and handed them out.

Before long, the fragrance of cooked food drifted up from downstairs, and everyone who had not eaten stir-fried dishes in a long time could not help feeling their mouths water.

Even Fang Xia found it a little strange. At a time like this, they could still get hold of vegetables that could actually be eaten?

More than ten minutes later, two young women came upstairs carrying basins.

All eyes were instantly drawn to what they were holding.

Shredded potatoes with vinegar and chili, scrambled eggs with tomatoes, fish-flavored eggplant, and water spinach.

Though they were all ordinary home-style dishes, this was the apocalypse.

Eggs were one thing—Fang Xia had stored plenty of those—but the other ingredients were now nearly impossible to find.

"Where did these come from?"

Before anyone else could speak, Fang Xia asked the question himself.

"These were specially delivered by Dawnlight City today. They said they wanted to thank you for the information. All of these were grown recently."

Because Fang Xia had been sleeping that afternoon, everything had been placed in Liu Rui's hands, giving them a surprise.

Growing them? Fang Xia knew about that. Those seeds really could produce these things, but the cycle was supposed to be a month, wasn't it?

He had those seeds too, and once the earthquake was over, he certainly planned to start farming as well.

Dawnlight City did not know about the earthquake, so planting them early made sense enough. But if the growing cycle was one month, how had they already produced a harvest after so little time?

"In Dawnlight City, one person awakened a special plant-based ability that can speed up the growth of plants and shorten the maturity cycle."

"These vegetables were only just harvested, and they immediately sent some over for us to try."

Liu Rui had been puzzled as well, but this was no secret in Dawnlight City, so the visitor had told her openly.

"Could they be poisoned, and are using us as test subjects? If nothing happens to us, then they'll eat it themselves."

Jing Ru truly lived up to her reputation as an excellent apocalypse survivor; she did not mind at all assuming the worst of others.

"Then don't eat today. Go on and keep eating rice balls."

Liu Rui glared at her. Such a pretty girl, wasted on that mouth.

"Don't, Sister Rui, I was wrong."

Jing Ru, in all other respects, was nimble enough to know the time and circumstances; she hugged Liu Rui in an instant and rubbed her head against her as though she were a daughter acting spoiled before her mother.

"Then you'll be the first to eat later. If you don't die, then the rest of us will eat."

Jing Ru's expression changed several times, and in the end she seemed to make up her mind about something.

"Fine."

With that, she picked up a pair of chopsticks and tremulously reached toward the shredded potatoes with vinegar and chili.

Mm. This taste was good.

As expected of a professional chef—it tasted far better than that little restaurant near the school gate ever had.

One more bite.

In the blink of an eye, Jing Ru had forgotten all about testing for poison. She kept taking bite after bite, sampling every dish in turn.

"All right, let's eat too."

The others had long since lost patience. Piping-hot stir-fried dishes and fresh greens—who could resist such temptation?

"Brother Fang, after the zombie assault ends, will we be able to grow our own food too?"

Everyone looked at Fang Xia expectantly. If they could have four dishes and a soup every day, this life would be paradise.

Fang Xia hesitated for a moment, then nodded.

Once the zombie assault was over, he would take them out for a while; after the earthquake ended, they could come back. By then, they really would be able to start farming themselves.