Stock Up For Natural Disasters And Cubs Survive – CH72

Chapter 72

Right after the screech of brakes came to an abrupt stop, fierce gunfire suddenly erupted in the pitch-black night.

Two groups were in a firefight!

Could it be that they were after this small fuel tanker too?

After a thought crossed his mind, Wei Cheng’s expression turned serious. He immediately rushed to carry out Guanguan, who had been sleeping in the safe house.

And in perfect sync, Yi Qi reached out and took the heavy little watermelon child into his arms.

Seeing that, Wei Cheng quickly summoned the twist car and said urgently, “Uncle Yi, get in the car!”

Once he saw Yi Qi successfully settle into a seat with Guanguan in his arms, he calmly activated invisibility, defense, and the other functions one by one.

At that exact moment, chaotic, panicked footsteps closed in, and bullets poured down over those people like rain.

The gunfire linked together into a wall of flame, blood mist exploded into the air, and the few people trying to flee were riddled alive into sieves of flesh.

Yi Qi instinctively covered Guanguan’s ears with his hand.

Then his eyes suddenly went wide!

He realized that the bullets flying at the tank-shaped little car landed on it like bits of cotton earplugs, then lightly dropped to the ground.

Wei Cheng said in a low voice, “Uncle Yi, hold Guanguan tight and sit steady. We’re leaving.”

Yi Qi suppressed his shock. “Okay!”

Ever since becoming one of Guanguan’s “contract companions,” this was the first time he had truly witnessed the terrifying strength of this little car.

The dark, low-built car backed up swiftly like a nimble hunting leopard.

In the blink of an eye, it had retreated several meters, leaving not the slightest trace in this empty fish-and-shrimp farm.

“They found the fuel truck!”

“No, something’s wrong with this truck!”

The dark-faced man opened the control box, and after one glance, he swore bitterly, “Someone siphoned off the fuel before we got here!”

These men were all broad-shouldered and big-framed, wearing helmets and black bulletproof vests. They were the second squad of Guardwatch Community, a team that specialized in collecting valuable fuel resources like gasoline and diesel.

One of the men said, “Captain, then who could it have been? Someone from the Thirteenth Union Cannery, or people from High Ground Shelter?”

“The cannery wouldn’t send two teams out to a godforsaken place like this, and the ones who blocked our way just now were people from the cannery. They call themselves cultured people and don’t like fighting and killing. They only trade supplies for supplies. I heard Zheng Hui used gasoline to trade food with the cannery before.”

One of the men was still unwilling to let it go. “We have to take that fuel back! We can’t waste our bullets for nothing!”

The others chimed in, “Exactly! It sucks when prey that’s already in your hands flies away. Captain, let’s search along the road—we’ll definitely find these people!”

The dark-faced man stretched lazily. “Are you all sick in the head or what? Why are you trying so hard? Since March until now, we’ve been out here searching for fuel nonstop. We already exceeded the mission quota ages ago. Don’t you want to go back and live in peace? You may not—but I do!”

The men behind him exchanged glances. “Captain, that’s not like you at all. Before, if anyone dared cut in on your haul, you’d dig up their ancestors’ graves!”

The man called captain burst out laughing, swinging his gun casually as he swaggered forward. “Enough already. We’re heading back to Wuzhou City right now. We’ve still got a big job to do. If we pull this off, from now on you guys will be eating and drinking in comfort with me every day at the base!”

The men all looked at each other. They all knew exactly what this “big job” was.

The deputy leader’s son, Red Hair, had disappeared without a trace.

Red Hair had been a complete piece of trash. He claimed he was going out on missions, but only he himself knew what he was really up to.

He roamed around doing evil with his dog-meat buddies, bringing lots of gasoline and canned food supplies with them.

Because he had a leader for a father, the hunters from the base had even had to stay close and protect him.

Now, with communication so inconvenient, no one knew where exactly he had disappeared—or whether he was even still in Yu City at all.

Many teams had been sent out to look for him, but nothing had turned up.

Last month, a few men saw the missing-person notice and claimed they knew the details of Red Hair’s death. They also wanted to join Guardwatch Community.

After a round of “sugar-coated shells,” the base learned the place where Red Hair died and the rough characteristics of the killer from them.

The murderer had ample gun and ammunition resources.

There were four people in total: two adult men between twenty-five and twenty-eight; one boy between eight and ten who was much taller than other children his age—and this boy was the most terrifying one. He acted with practiced ruthlessness, was deeply scheming, and the key point was that this child could actually use a gun!

As for the last child, his characteristics were even more obvious.

All of the survivors’ statements matched: the child was only three years old, extraordinarily pretty, and looked like a chubby little white penguin.

At the same time, they had also learned that Red Hair had died in Wuqing City!

Wuqing City itself wasn’t big, but there were many large and small cities around it. Besides that, the mountain ranges in this area stretched endlessly, and the forest coverage was extremely high. Finding someone there was terribly difficult.

In order not to alert the enemy, all the hunters from Guardwatch Community had been called back.

It seemed that the deputy leader’s desperate love for his son was understandable—but the always profit-driven chief leader was likely eyeing the “gun and ammunition resources” in the hands of this group of killers.

After all, how could ordinary people possibly have guns?

Where had they gotten their guns and bullets from?

—

The sky had only just begun to lighten when the escape door in the farm wall was knocked on three times.

Sun Dali and Shen Zheng had taken turns guarding there all night. Hearing the signal, they quickly moved away the cement and timber covering it.

The little steel plate creaked open, and the first one to squeeze out was a chubby little dumpling.

“Uncles! Look!”

Shen Zheng had been worried a moment ago, but the second he saw Guanguan’s hair sticking up in all directions like a chicken nest from sleep, he couldn’t help laughing. “What’s this?”

Still half-asleep, Guanguan held up a little grasshopper woven from grass. “Uncle made it!”

Wei Cheng and Yi Qi came out right after him.

Sun Dali quickly covered the door again.

Shen Zheng raised a brow slightly. “Where’s the car?”

Yi Qi said, “Something happened, so we temporarily left the car down the mountain.” In reality, they hadn’t driven that car back at all.

To avoid that group, they had taken a long detour before finally circling back to the mountain forest around the farm.

Without transportation, they had no choice but to carry Guanguan in their arms all the way back.

The moment Sun Dali heard that something had happened, he grew nervous. “Then the fuel?”

Yi Qi shook his head. “Someone beat us to it.”

Since they hadn’t brought the car back, they obviously couldn’t tell anyone that they had actually found fuel.

Shen Zheng, however, understood exactly what was going on, and only said, “It’s enough that everyone made it back safe. We still have some fuel left. After we finish building the watchtower, we can go out and look again.”

Sun Dali also hurried to offer some comforting words.

As the group walked back, Wei Cheng, who had been quiet all this time, suddenly spoke. “Starting today, we have to give it everything we’ve got and finish the watchtower within half a month. Other than Guanguan, everyone—adults, children, women, elderly—needs to spend one hour every day practicing with guns and crossbows.”

Everyone turned to look at Wei Cheng.

That urgent?

Wei Cheng said calmly, “Guardwatch Community is coming soon.”

He had seen the leader’s face last night.

That man was Wu Qiang, captain of Guardwatch Community’s resource-gathering squad.

Fifteen-year-old Wei Cheng had once worked under him.

He knew that this man was vindictive to the extreme and would never tolerate anyone stealing food out of a tiger’s mouth.

Last night, Wei Cheng had deliberately driven the invisible twist car in a loop where they were. Yet instead of chasing them, those people had headed toward the road leading to Wuzhou City.

There had to be some even greater prize drawing Wu Qiang away.

Wei Cheng racked his memory for major events that had happened in Guardwatch Community in his previous life, but none of them matched this.

Whenever any hunter or squad captain from Guardwatch Community accomplished something big, the base leader would reward them generously, and even the people in the base would get an extra piece of potato or dried bread.

That had made many immature children idolize the so-called “glory” on the hunters.

Of course, Wei Cheng had always been the exception.

As he drove and thought it over from every angle, he finally came to a conclusion.

Perhaps this major prize was Full-Belly Farm itself.

Considering the distance from Wuzhou City to Wuqing City, and how difficult the search area was, he ultimately gave everyone the absolute limit of half a month.

Sun Dali was a little stunned. “What do you mean? You ran into those bastards from Guardwatch Community last night?”

After thinking about it, Shen Zheng told him about how they had killed Red Hair and rescued Director Wang and the two children.

Sun Dali’s mouth fell open in disbelief.

It was obvious that he knew full well how formidable Guardwatch Community was.

Wei Cheng looked at him. “Uncle Sun, the three of you can leave at any time.”

“Leave? We won’t leave!” Sun Dali said firmly. “When the farm was safe, we begged to stay. Now the farm is in danger, and we’re supposed to run away to save our own skins? I, Sun Dali, am not that kind of man! We could stay and enjoy the good with you, so of course we can endure hardship too!”

Wei Cheng smiled. “Good. Uncle Dali, I knew Guanguan wouldn’t misjudge people!”

The child, still playing with the grasshopper, heard his name and quickly raised a little paw. “Baby is here!”

Everyone looked at one another and laughed.

—

The farm became busy again.

But this time everyone’s hearts were aligned, and efficiency was high. In just a few days, the steel-reinforced foundation of the watchtower had already been buried underground.

Now, besides working and training with guns, all they had left in their day was eating and sleeping.

Busy, but happy.

Even little Guanguan wore a yellow safety helmet and pushed his little children’s dump truck back and forth around the watchtower, occasionally dropping a line like, “Work hard, and Guanguan will feed you!”

Yi Qi burst out laughing. “Chengcheng, your little brother really is like some tiny construction foreman.”

Wei Cheng wiped off his sweat and laughed. “Isn’t he though?”

“Brother, don’t move!”

Guanguan ran over, standing on his tiptoes. “Brother, get a little shorter. Baby wants to wipe your sweat!”

The other children could all help with one kind of job or another, but Guanguan was still too small and practically couldn’t do anything.

That had made him anxious to no end. In the end, Wei Cheng had said: then take some wet wipes, and whenever you see one of the uncles sweating, go wipe it for them, okay?

Wei Cheng crouched down and smiled. “Is this short enough?”

“Short enough!”

Guanguan opened his little crossbody bag. Inside were all kinds of colorful wet wipes. “Brother, what fruit do you want?”

When he saw Brother point at the purple packet, Guanguan frantically shook both hands. “That grape one is sour! Brother, don’t use that one.”

Yi Qi laughed. “If you keep fussing any longer, your brother’s sweat is going to dry on its own.”

The second he heard that, Guanguan hurriedly pulled out the strawberry-patterned wet wipe and started wiping Brother’s sweat.

Baby liked strawberries!

Wei Cheng felt cool and refreshed across his forehead, and there was also a faint strawberry scent around his nose. Smiling, he said, “Guanguan, how about you go back inside to play for a while?”

Seeing that Brother and the others were all helping the adults with work, Guanguan bravely shook his head. “Baby wants to stay and work with Brother too!”

It was midsummer now, but the mountain temperatures were still low. The children wore sun hats and shorts and T-shirts, so there was no danger of heatstroke.

Thinking that if Guanguan went back by himself there would be no one to play with him anyway, Wei Cheng rubbed his round little head and stopped trying to persuade him.

At that moment, Sun Dali, shirtless and busily laying up the wall, laughed and said, “Once no one’s bothering us anymore, we’ll take Chengcheng and the kids to play in the mountains. The scenery here is so good—what a perfect place. And us adults, we can go into the city and find some mahjong or poker. By the way, Yi Qi, do you know how to play mahjong?”

Yi Qi laughed. “Just a little.”

Sun Dali said, “As long as you can recognize the tiles, that’s enough.”

Guanguan’s eyes lit up. He obediently raised his hand. “Sesame paste! Guanguan knows sesame paste!”

Shen Zheng happened to walk over at that moment and looked surprised too. “Guanguan even knows mahjong?”

Wei Cheng raised an eyebrow.

Then Guanguan made chopstick motions with his little hand and slurped loudly. “Sesame-paste hotpot is yummy! Guanguan loves it!”

Wei Cheng knew the child was getting greedy again. He said, “Since Director Grandpa’s vegetables are piling up and there are still a few boxes of beef rolls and a few packs of sesame paste at home, then after work tonight, how about we make hotpot?”

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