Oil City.

Over the past few days, with the help of those Survivors, the repair work on Oil City's walls had been progressing quite fast.

At this rate, in another two days the repairs on the walls would be finished.

During these days of repair, the height of the walls hadn't changed much, merely going from the original 4.5 meters up to 6 meters.

But the airtightness had made a qualitative leap; originally the walls of Oil City were piled up from shipping containers, and there were inevitably gaps between containers. These past few days they'd all been sealed up with concrete.

Third Uncle watched the busy crowd on the distant walls, fished a Vitamin tablet out of his pocket, tossed it into his mouth, then took two swigs of water.

"Jackals said they're coming over today, they should arrive around three in the afternoon." Old Qin sat beside Third Uncle and spoke.

"Mm, they'd better hurry. Once they're here, we can pretty much head back to Big Camphor Tree Base." Third Uncle said.

They'd been out for this stretch of time—wasn't exactly long, but they'd run into so many things it gave people the illusion that a long time had passed.

Watching the walls slowly being repaired into something more and more solid, a faint composure spread across Third Uncle's face.

....

Whooo—

After the helicopter left Big Camphor Tree Base, it flew straight toward Oil City.

Zuo Ruxue and the others on the helicopter looked quite tense, clutching their luggage tightly.

Li Yu gazed out the window, quietly lost in thought.

Doomsday had already been going on for more than two years; in a few months it would be three years.

After so long, some of the things from his previous-life memories should just about be surfacing.

Although this trip back to Big Camphor Tree Base had relaxed him a lot.

There was still a string taut in his heart, constantly reminding him he couldn't let his guard down.

Because he knew this was still far from the toughest time.

But after all the preparations he'd made, and with Big Camphor Tree Base having developed to where it was now, at least they had some capacity to resist.

Just as he was thinking.

Suddenly, Li Tie grabbed Li Yu's shoulder and shook him a couple of times.

Then Li Tie shouted something at Li Yu, but the noise in the helicopter was too loud and the window was open, so Li Yu could only see his mouth moving and couldn't hear what he said.

Li Yu pointed at the headset hanging around Li Tie's neck, signaling him to speak into the mic.

Seeing this, Li Tie hurriedly put on the headset and shouted into the mic, "Big Bro, look over there."

As he spoke, he pointed off to the lower right.

Hearing that, Li Yu curiously looked that way.

Since everyone could hear the channel Li Tie was using, Jackals and the others all turned to look at the ground off the front-right as well.

They saw that the clearing ahead on the right was densely packed with who-knew-what standing there.

Li Yu quickly picked up the telescope and looked that way.

He saw below them, crammed together, black-and-white, hairless, bare Zombie Lao Shu, with very long teeth, two fangs protruding from their mouths.

"Fuck... what the hell are those?" Dapao beside him cried out in horror at the sight.

Facing that horde of Zombie Lao Shu was another dense mass, bodies pure white, two ears sticking straight up, eyes blood-red and veined with scarlet.

Zombie rabbits!

Li Yu's heart clenched.

As early as a year ago, they'd discovered Zombie dogs and Zombie tigers; he hadn't expected that now he'd finally see Zombie Lao Shu.

Compared to Zombie mice and Zombie tigers, although a single Zombie tiger had stronger attack power, the Zombie mouse's reproductive capacity was extremely strong, and the threat it posed to humans far surpassed that of the Zombie tiger.

The natural disaster over these two years had dealt a huge blow to many animals.

The extreme heat and severe cold had wiped out many animals.

And those Zombies had evolved to adapt to the extreme environment; even those Zombie mice, once they adapted, began to reproduce rapidly.

After the natural disaster, the past few months had been lush with grass and birdsong, vegetation growing very vigorously, providing plenty for these Zombie mice and Zombie rabbits to gnaw on.

In Li Yu's memory, most mammals could potentially be infected by the Zombie Virus.

And Zombie mice and Zombie rabbits were undoubtedly among the most terrifying species.

For no other reason, just one.

Insanely high reproductive capacity.

Especially rabbits—so long as food was plentiful, two rabbits could produce two to three hundred rabbits in a year.

Li Yu stared fixedly at the scene below. He saw the Zombie mice charge at the Zombie rabbits, their sharp squeals chilling to hear. 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

An entire street, each side occupying one end.

Zombie mice and Zombie rabbits clashed in battle.

These Zombie animals didn't seem much different from Zombies; likewise, only having their heads bitten off would kill them for good.

The dense masses on both sides made one's heart pound just looking at them.

The numbers of Zombie mice and Zombie rabbits were about the same; Zombie rabbits were generally larger than Zombie mice, but it was obvious the Zombie rabbits weren't a match for the mice.

After all, the attack speed and offensive power of the Zombie mice were both stronger than those of the rabbits.

Seeing this, Li Tie seemed to think of something.

His hands trembled uncontrollably as he said to Li Yu, "Big Bro, Zombie mice have appeared, this... what do we do?"

Li Tie's nervousness did have its reasons.

The Zombie mice were small, and there were so many of them—how terrifying was that?

Li Yu's heart sank.

He had actually long anticipated the appearance of Zombie mice, otherwise he wouldn't have had people dig the foundation so deep when building Big Camphor Tree Base.

And he'd had it poured with concrete—an almost ten-meter-deep foundation, with steel plates inside the concrete, seven meters thick; no matter how the Zombie mice dug, they couldn't get in.

Even so, seeing Zombie mice with his own eyes still made him feel troubled.

For no other reason—exterminating mice was far too time-consuming and laborious.

"Uncle Jackal, lower the helicopter a bit, let's take a closer look." Li Yu said heavily to Jackals.

Jackals didn't say anything more at that.

He piloted the helicopter down toward the front-right.

Soon, they were hovering above the street.

Some of the Zombie mice seemed to be attracted by the helicopter overhead, roaring as they opened their mouths wide at it.

Their long fangs looked quite terrifying.

But very soon those Zombie mice turned their attention back to the Zombie rabbits not far away.

The Zombie rabbits weren't pushovers either; they were also tearing into the Zombie mice in front of them.

The two sides slaughtered each other, and in the midst of the fighting, Zombie mice and Zombie rabbits kept dying, then being eaten by their companions or by the enemy.

The street was like Hell itself.

Whenever a companion fell, the first thing they did wasn't to keep fighting, but to stand where they were and eat the corpse.

Likewise, as soon as they killed an enemy, these beasts would eat the enemy's corpse.

They completely ignored the environment they were in, which meant some of the Zombie mice or Zombie rabbits that were feeding were suddenly ambushed.

Then they kept eating, kept getting killed.

Watching this nauseating scene, everyone on the helicopter sank into despair.

Li Yu slowly let out a breath, his heart relaxing just a little.

At least these Zombie mice had no consciousness, only one instinct, and that was to keep eating.

That made them relatively easier to deal with.

.....