Chapter 42: The Operation Begins
The group returned to the small village to regroup with Zhao Bing and the others, relaying the information they had gathered about the military camp’s external defenses.
Zhao Bing and his men found several pencils and some sheets of paper scattered around one of the houses and sketched out the internal layout and routes of the camp. They planned to combine this with the external defensive structure Zhan Yun had scouted to find a point of breakthrough.
Zhao Bing initially wanted to persuade Zhan Yun and the others to leave as soon as possible. He didn’t want to drag them into such a dangerous situation. But Zhan Yun and his companions had already made up their minds to lend a hand, and naturally insisted on staying to help. Left with no choice, Zhao Bing had to agree.
The two sides discussed the plan for nearly an hour before finally settling on a workable approach.
“There’s no time to waste. We move out immediately.”
This operation was different from the previous ones. The severely injured soldiers and Yu Dongdong were left behind. Zhan Yun, Su Ruizhe, Song Chengshu, Zheng Jiahe, Wu Jing, Zhang Shuoliang, and the others all took part in the mission.
They didn’t drive to the camp. Taking advantage of the late hour and the quiet of night, they traveled light on foot, making it less likely they would be discovered.
Things went exactly as they had expected. They reached the camp on foot and carefully circled around to the rear. Although the camp had watchtowers, without electricity they could only rely on torches for lighting, which greatly limited visibility. As a result, their approach went completely unnoticed.
Zhao Bing and his men were very familiar with the camp and knew exactly which areas wouldn’t attract attention. At the spot Zhao Bing indicated, Su Ruizhe released the Tomb-Eater Vine. In just ten minutes, it silently opened a hole in the wall large enough for them to pass through.
Everyone entered the camp smoothly. Unexpectedly, there were hardly any patrols inside. After walking some distance, they finally spotted a few people playing cards by torchlight at the entrance of a warehouse, several guns lying at their feet.
This warehouse had been specially marked by Zhao Bing. They all agreed that these survivors wouldn’t allow the soldiers any freedom of movement, nor would they arrange proper dormitories for them. Instead, it was far more likely they had gathered them in one place and imprisoned them, and the people playing cards were probably the guards assigned to watch over the soldiers.
In the past, something like this would have been unthinkable. But now the camp was controlled by a group of untrained survivors. Expecting them to observe military discipline or faithfully stand guard was unrealistic.
There were four of them. Taking out all four at once without attracting attention would be troublesome.
“It’d be best to quietly lure one of them over and get some information about what’s inside.”
“How do we lure one out?”
Zhan Yun smiled faintly and pointed at Wu Jing.
Wu Jing had already washed her face clean. With that pretty face of hers, seducing a guard would be easy enough. With thousands of survivors in the camp, it was entirely possible these people had never seen her before. In any case, they would never imagine that someone could sneak into the camp without anyone noticing.
However, the men playing cards were completely absorbed in their game. Wu Jing had already come within ten steps, yet they still hadn’t noticed her. Left with no choice, she coughed lightly.
“Who’s there?!” The men jumped in surprise. When they looked up and saw a curvy beauty standing before them, their eyes all lit up.
“Excuse me, where’s the toilet? It’s too dark, and I seem to have gotten lost,” Wu Jing said as she slowly approached. She stopped only when they were close enough to clearly see her face, lightly brushing back her long hair to reveal her delicate, beautiful features.
They were all momentarily stunned. Immediately, they jumped to their feet, clamoring over one another.
“I know the way! I’ll take you!”
“I know it too!”
“I’ll go! I’ll go!”
Blinded by her beauty, none of them realized how unusual it was for a clean, beautiful woman to appear in such a post-apocalyptic world. Such lax vigilance would only exist in the early days of the apocalypse. With time, they would eventually realize that any beautiful woman who managed to survive in this world was definitely not simple—either she had a powerful backer, or she possessed formidable strength herself.
In the end, Wu Jing led away three of the overly eager men, leaving behind just one guard who stayed on duty unwillingly.
As the three men escorted Wu Jing toward the direction of the toilets, several figures suddenly emerged from a dark corner. In an instant, two of the men were knocked unconscious, while the third had a dagger pressed tightly against his carotid artery.
“Don’t make a sound, or I’ll stab you to death.”
The man was so frightened his legs nearly gave out. He clamped his mouth shut at once.
“I’m asking you—where are the two ability users?” Zhao Bing asked in a low voice.
Ability users would be more troublesome to deal with than ordinary people, so it was best to first ascertain their whereabouts.
“T-the two bosses are in the dormitory building at the back. Th-they’re… resting right now…”
“Resting?” Because of the drastic day–night temperature difference, Zhan Yun and the others had all developed inverted sleep schedules. The idea that the two ability users were resting at night struck them as odd.
“N-no, not that kind of rest…”
“What kind of rest? Speak clearly!” Zhao Bing snapped, momentarily failing to catch on.
“They’re… uh… r-rolling in bed…”
Everyone fell silent for a moment. At a time like this, those people still had the mood for that?
“E-everyone’s like that… there’s n-nothing else to do these days…”
“Where are the soldiers being held?” Zhao Bing cut off the topic and pressed him for his comrades’ location.
“In-in the warehouse we were guarding…”
“How many people are on patrol? How many guards are there in total? Where are they positioned?”
With a blade at his neck, the man spilled everything he knew, rattling it off obediently.
These people truly were a rabble. After seizing guns and ammunition, they thought they could rest easy. There were no patrols, no supply runs, no shift rotations. They casually assigned a few people to guard the gates at night, then hid in the dormitory building to drink and indulge themselves. During the day, relying on the high temperatures to deter visitors, they all slept soundly. They had no sense of crisis at all, content to squander their resources!
Yet it was precisely this group of ungrateful fools who had plotted against a regular army—and even dared to open fire on the people who had saved their lives. There was no doubt that if anything went wrong, they wouldn’t care in the slightest about the soldiers’ lives.
According to what the man said, the two ability users were now their leaders. Everyone followed their orders. All the good things in the camp were offered to them first—even women were theirs to choose from. The two ability users had also declared that anyone seeking refuge at the camp in the future would have to hand over a large amount of food to be admitted—no burdens allowed. Only beautiful women would be permitted to enter.
Fortunately, Wu Jing had disguised herself earlier, making herself look dirty and ugly. Otherwise, the guards at the gate might have set their sights on her, and things could have gotten messy.
“Heh, they really think they’re mountain bandits, kings of the hill,” the group muttered angrily.
“Let’s move,” someone said. Against people like this, there was clearly no need to hold back.
After extracting a bit more information, they knocked the man unconscious as well. Then the group headed for the warehouse. However, there was still one guard posted at the entrance. If they approached directly, they would definitely be discovered. They didn’t want to cause too much commotion before rescuing the prisoners.
“I’ll do it,” Wu Jing said as they were discussing how to act.
“But you already went once,” someone objected. If that guard saw Wu Jing alone, he would definitely become suspicious. Alerting him would only complicate things.
“Don’t worry. Nothing will happen.” As she spoke, Wu Jing’s figure slowly began to disperse, turning into a faint mist.
Zhan Yun and the others were fine—they already knew Wu Jing possessed a special mist-transformation ability. But Zhao Bing and his men were utterly shocked. They had never imagined that Wu Jing was also an ability user.
Wu Jing, now a faint wisp of mist, quietly drifted behind the guard while he remained completely unaware. She formed a hand and smashed it hard against the back of his head.
Caught off guard, the man was knocked unconscious on the spot, collapsing to the ground with a thud. Only then did Wu Jing slowly reform her full figure.
Ever since awakening her ability, Wu Jing had been practicing how to use it. She had discovered that, just as Zheng Jiahe had said, it was best suited for sneak attacks. She had simply never had a proper chance to show it off before.
Everyone immediately went over, searched the unconscious guard, found the key to the warehouse door, and opened it.
Inside, the warehouse was pitch-dark. They took torches from the wall and went in, using the firelight to see the situation clearly.
The interior was oppressively hot. All the soldiers had their hands and feet bound, their mouths stuffed with something unknown. One by one, their faces were pale, their minds hazy. Some still had dried blood on them. Their injuries had gone untreated—bullets hadn’t even been removed—and the wounds were visibly swollen.
“Bastards!” Zhao Bing was so furious his eyes nearly split, wishing he could rush out and fight those people to the death.
Zhan Yun quickly grabbed him. “Saving people comes first!”
Zhao Bing calmed down at once and, together with the others, began untying the soldiers. Song Chengshu used his ability to release large amounts of ice, finally lowering the temperature inside the warehouse somewhat.
Some of the soldiers who were in better condition quickly regained their senses. Realizing they were being rescued, they made no sound. Once freed, they immediately stood up and helped rescue their other comrades.
There were over eight hundred people imprisoned in the warehouse. By the time everyone had been untied, half an hour had already passed.
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