Chapter 237: Bridge Completed
Falling into water felt too real.
Water inhaled into the lungs was extremely uncomfortable.
“Take it.” Team One never questioned Lu Weiyi’s unreasonable demands, even if it meant rushing straight at zombies. But this silent resistance lessened Lu Weiyi’s interest in watching.
His features were naturally cool; when calm, even colder. After a year of fighting, his body unconsciously carried a sharp edge, his every move emitting a faint pressure.
His tone was flat, not demanding—just two plain words, as if it didn’t matter whether accepted or not.
Seeing the awkward atmosphere, Li Qing was about to say something to ease the mood but was tugged by Lin Yimu, who shook his head slightly.
Silence filled the air.
Qi Lin slowly took the blindfold, looking deeply humiliated, and put it on.
Lu Weiyi nodded toward the sea. Li Qing grabbed Qi Lin’s hand and walked toward the shoreline.
“50 meters, I’ll save you; less than that, swim back yourself.”
At Li Qing’s command, Qi Lin hesitated then dashed at full speed toward the sea surface.
This time, he was noticeably faster.
3 meters.
8 meters.
15 meters.
30 meters.
…
Everyone around was stunned, holding their breath and eyes fixed on him. His form was blurry, almost invisible.
Suddenly, he seemed to lose strength and fell into the water.
Lu Weiyi flicked his hand. A green vine instantly wrapped around the drowning man. With a tug, Qi Lin quickly returned to the beach.
The onlookers didn’t understand what happened yet, looking around for reasons. Li Qing already removed the blindfold and patted Qi Lin’s shoulder excitedly, “At least ninety meters. I’ve never seen you this fast.”
“He really is walking on water.”
“Like lightness skill in martial arts.”
Several people chatted excitedly around Qi Lin. After a while, Qi Lin came back to himself, “Really?”
“Couldn’t be truer. Have you used up your ability? Want to try again?”
“I’m done,” Qi Lin rubbed his head; he had given his all.
Lu Weiyi tossed him a packet of crystal cores. “Keep going, 100 meters.”
The brief joy on Qi Lin’s face vanished immediately.
He took the cores, recovered, and stepped back onto the shore.
He repeated this over and over, pushing his limits further each time until he couldn’t get up again. Each distance was farther than the last—the results were obvious.
“Break your own limits,” Lu Weiyi told everyone around. “You all should understand better—starting tomorrow, everyone will do the same.”
He watched Li Qing lead the exhausted Qi Lin away and reminded, “Record the crystal cores.” His cores weren’t to be wasted.
Whether it worked was unclear for now, but the torment was obvious.
People from Teams Three and Four were grabbing several members of Team One, questioning them about how their abilities had improved.
“Be grateful. We’re fighting zombies directly—any delay means getting seriously injured. Have you ever felt zombie energy enter your body, then be expelled, then enter again and again?” Ning Yuan’s face turned cold when he saw Qi Lin silently resisting. “Starting tomorrow, anyone who dares to slack off or resist will be sent to fight zombies on land. If you survive, that’s your ability. If you don’t, you deserve it. No slackers allowed here.”
A circle of onlookers all snapped to attention and gave a thunderous “Yes!”
Zhuang Ai Yi, who had been collecting shells on Middle Island, was startled and dashed a few steps into the water, shouting loudly, “Uncle Lu—”
His young voice carried hundreds of meters but dwindled to just a faint sound. If Lu Weiyi hadn’t kept an eye on him, he wouldn’t have heard a thing.
He reached out his hand and extended the green vine, tightly binding Zhuang Ai Yi and then pulling him over.
“Ah—!” Zhuang Ai Yi’s shriek was heard. Before Zhuang Mingxu could remind him not to tease children like that, the brat was already laughing hysterically beside Lu Weiyi, clinging to his leg, begging to play again.
“Ai Yi, aren’t you scared?” Zhuang Mingxu thought this was not something a kid should be playing with.
“Teng Teng often plays with Ai Yi, and Ai Yi likes it,” Zhuang Ai Yi said, referring to Teng Teng—the mutated ivy of Gu Qingji.
Now that Gu Qingji had also upgraded to A-rank, his mind was clearer though his actions were still childlike. When Gu Qingji occasionally brought Zhuang Ai Yi along, they would play together.
Zhuang Mingxu twitched at the corner of his mouth. “Both are reckless.”
After giving some instructions to the mental-type ability users, Lu Weiyi sat comfortably on a newly moved lounge chair, enjoying the sea breeze. Zhuang Mingxu was on the side reviewing report documents, while on the beach Meng Xi was flying a kite with Zhuang Ai Yi. From time to time, their giggles could be heard—carefree and without worries, embodying everyone’s hope for the future.
*
After ten days of intensive training, the island’s ability users had all improved significantly. The lowest rank was now B, with five more having reached A. Everyone was caught in a mix of exhaustion and excitement.
With their abilities improving, and all manpower invested in building the ship passage, the temporary channel was quickly completed and opened.
The entire passage was 3,200 meters long, composed of 22 ships of various sizes. Different ship models made the channel’s width uneven—up to over 60 meters at the widest points, and at least 30 meters at the narrowest—looking irregular but forming a large engineering feat when pieced together.
For defense, besides the cannon platform directly above the tunnel on North Island, there was a cruise ship in the middle of the passage. The cruise ship had its lower deck hollowed out, leaving rooms above.
Usually, the lower part was closed, effectively sealing the entire channel. The rooms upstairs formed the first line of defense.
The gate connecting the channel to North Island formed the third line of defense.
On the second day of trial operation, Lu Weiyi led four combat squads to land and hunt zombies.
Before leaving, Lu Weiyi asked Zhuang Mingxu if they needed to collect supplies. “If I collect, they might not get much chance to fight.”
The way he said this was very subtle but obvious. Everyone in Team One knew it was true but remained silent.
“You collect supplies. The others hunt zombies and map the surroundings,” Zhuang Mingxu handed Lu Weiyi a hand-drawn map prepared in advance.
It marked some coastal streets of Pingjin City. It was drawn from an electronic map and information from local soldiers. However, since soldiers were often deployed away from home, many details were unclear. The map wasn’t detailed; factories and such had no markings and had to be explored firsthand.
“Don’t rush. We’re unfamiliar with the area. Safety first,” Zhuang Mingxu reminded.
Lu Weiyi nodded. “You stay safe. I’ll definitely be back within five days.” He had to return to the Capital as scheduled with Zhuang Mingxu.
“I’ll wait for you,” Zhuang Mingxu said, holding Lu Weiyi’s hand tightly in farewell.
Team Four’s ability users drove four vehicles—three SUVs and one truck.
Team One went ahead to scout. Lu Weiyi called Qi Lin over.
In ten days, Qi Lin quickly rose to B-rank. No longer distrustful, he looked at Lu Weiyi with eager eyes, wanting to get closer.
“Paper and pen, draw the entire map of this region,” Lu Weiyi said, handing him another packet of crystal cores. “Energy used for going out comes from the team.”
Even hearing this good news didn’t make Qi Lin happy. He pointed to a large area on the map in disbelief and asked, “Team leader, this area covers thousands of square meters. My ability only lets me run about 300 meters at most. You’re not seriously making me race zombies, are you?”
With his previous life’s knowledge, Lu Weiyi sometimes thought these people were too rigid. Even if they were new to abilities, back in his past life, Zhuang Mingxu was a beginner too. Yet, he could design and plan ability development directions and techniques for the whole team.
Of course, since he was mostly benefiting from others’ work, he often held back from showing his disdain on his face.
“Try it and you’ll see,” Lu Weiyi didn’t explain further but reminded, “Be sure to stop precisely. Inertia might cause you to misstep.”
Qi Lin showed no emotion this time, took the map eagerly, and said, “I’ll do my best.”
Lu Weiyi wanted Qi Lin to keep running partly to maximize speed. Speed-type abilities consume energy mostly through speed—faster speed uses energy faster, which is the best way to improve the ability.
However, when going out, speed didn’t need to be too fast—just faster than zombies. Pausing intermittently gives the ability time to recover and prevents too rapid depletion.
Still, since some were stubborn, Lu Weiyi reminded him, “Just be faster than the zombies. Remember to stop somewhere safe. Going too fast and braking suddenly might cause you to stop off target.”
“Yes, sir!” Qi Lin stood straight and saluted.
Pingjin City had separate safe bases. Recklessly entering unknown areas was risky, especially as zombie levels kept rising while humans, limited by crystal core energy absorption, upgraded slowly.
Luring and killing zombies was no longer as easy as when they were in Qingyuan. Now it was dangerous, but every team needed to practice coordination; only in real combat could they continuously improve their strength.
Upon reaching the designated area, Qi Lin quickly disappeared with paper in hand, while the others got off the vehicles and found their respective posts, beginning the zombie-luring mission.
Lu Weiyi didn’t join any team but wandered among them, scouting and gathering supplies.
A year into the apocalypse, supplies in these remote corners had long been scavenged, and even materials from collapsed sites had been emptied. After wandering around, Lu Weiyi found nothing but bricks and stones.
They were even stingier than himself.
Lu Weiyi felt like checking out the Pingjin City base to see which team was so impressive, wondering if they knew Zhuang Mingxu, otherwise, how could they be so miserly in the same way?
With no supplies to collect, Lu Weiyi started hunting zombies alone. Compared to others’ flashy abilities flying everywhere, Lu Weiyi wielded his small green vine purely as a reaper.
Protected by a mental barrier, he moved among zombies like a ghost in an empty realm. The vine, having no ability signature, went unnoticed by zombies, slipping through eye sockets straight to their crystal cores. Once collected, the zombies collapsed instantly.
The strongest zombies nearby were A-rank, but Lu Weiyi’s abilities were one level higher, effectively like a dimensional crushing attack. This was part of why he was eager to rank up.
“Is this the power of mental abilities?” Xing Zhou, also a mental user, watched excitedly.
“Keep it up, you’ll get there too,” Li Qing timely encouraged with some motivational words.
