Chapter 45 — Boundaries Between Give and Take
Luo Xun frowned slightly. When they’d gone downstairs, he’d only checked the iron-plated elevator entrance and saw nothing unusual, forgetting there were two elevators and one stairwell on their floor.
The officer shook his head helplessly. “Don’t you still have an empty room on your floor? Quite a few people have arrived at the base these past few days. We were planning to assign them there, but when we went upstairs, we found that the entire floor was sealed off. So, we had to arrange their housing somewhere else for now.”
Li Tie and the others let out a sigh of relief and quickly smiled flatteringly, trying to build a rapport.
“Well, you see, we blocked that hallway because we’d piled up too much stuff there—it wasn’t safe, so it was only temporary. When you’re ready to assign people, just knock on our door! We’ll be waiting at home every day!”
Wang Duo grinned obsequiously. “Say, can you maybe assign a few girls to live there?”
The officer gave him an irritated glare. “As it happens, the ones moving in today are all girls—and quite pretty, too! I originally thought of putting them with you guys since you’re all young and might get along. But it’s too late now! Next batch’s all men.”
Wang Duo’s face instantly fell into a bitter grimace, his expression full of grief as he turned toward the two men in the truck. Yan Fei’s face remained blank, showing not a shred of sympathy, and Luo Xun didn’t even glance at him— Want girls? Go flirt outside. Why are you looking at me, a gay guy?
Li Tie, however, didn’t care whether it was men or women moving in. “As long as there aren’t too many people and they’re not troublesome, that’s fine…”
“Alright, enough whining. These are orders from above,” the officer said. “We’ll probably come by again tomorrow morning around eight or nine. Oh, and you guys—don’t wander outside for the next few days. The base isn’t entirely safe right now, and your work assignments should be coming soon. Within three to five days, you’ll have to report for duty.”
“Yes, sir! We’ll obey all orders from above!”
At the mention of getting jobs and earning points, Li Tie and the others perked up immediately, saluting in an exaggerated, comical way.
After bidding farewell to the officer, they finally sauntered back downstairs to their building.
“Ahh… the girls… so close, and now they’re gone…”
“Enough about the girls.” Han Li smacked him on the back of the head.
Wu Xin quickly said, “They said people are coming tomorrow morning. Shouldn’t we tidy up the hallway a bit?”
Luo Xun, who was just parking the truck, replied, “Yeah, we should. Move the small and light stuff into the side rooms first. The big or heavy things we can’t move—just leave them in the hallway for now.”
As for what kind of people the new residents would be—well, they’d see tomorrow. They were probably new arrivals to the base anyway; what kind of personalities they had would just depend on luck.
Meanwhile, the officer who had spoken to them earlier went to report to his superior.
“So, at least one of them must be a strength-type ability user,” the higher-ranking officer said upon hearing that they had used metal plates to block the door. He wasn’t surprised—if Li Tie’s group hadn’t reported any powers when registering, it could mean they didn’t want to reveal it for safety reasons, or they simply hadn’t realized it yet.
That wasn’t unusual. Many ability users didn’t discover their powers right away, and others hid them, afraid the military would see them as a threat.
“Quite possible,” the subordinate said. “I already told them we’d be assigning people to room 1602 tomorrow morning.”
“Hmm… in that case,” the officer said, his eyes lighting up, “since there’s an ability user among them—let’s assign another ability user to that unit too!”
“You mean…”
“Yes! That doctor! Let him move in!”
The subordinate broke out in a cold sweat and nodded quickly. “His injuries are almost healed, it’s about time to assign him a place.”
That man was supposed to be a doctor, yet he had none of the gentleness one would expect from a “white angel.” During his hospital stay alone, he’d injured three people. If they hadn’t quickly put him in a private room and assigned the most patient nurses and doctors to handle him carefully, who knew if he might have started another bloodbath right in the hospital?
As for who would be responsible for moving him tomorrow? Ahem, let someone else do it. His colleagues could take one for the team—he was far too busy, after all. And as for Wang Duo’s dream of living next to pretty girls? Serves them right! If only they’d been home earlier, they could’ve been neighbors already!
Down at Building 7, Yan Fei opened the container truck and gathered all the steel plates together, lifting the entire pile as if it were a single solid mass.
Even though Luo Xun knew Yan Fei could easily handle it alone, he still instinctively helped, pretending to lift the other end as they entered the stairwell.
At the first-floor corner, the oversized steel plate suddenly bent like a noodle to make the turn—
The men behind them winced at the sight. “That’s such a cheat move…”
“I can stop cheating and let you help me carry it,” Yan Fei said, smiling over his shoulder.
The five men’s heads shook so fast they left afterimages.
They climbed, floor after floor—unlucky enough that the elevator was out of service again.
If it weren’t for the fact that the cargo was metal and Yan Fei could mold it like clay, they never would’ve managed to haul it up sixteen flights of stairs.
By the time they reached the sixteenth floor, even the seven men who had spent three days building a wall felt stronger than before—except for He Qiankun, who still looked half-dead.
The iron sheet sealing off their corridor had no notice posted on it; maybe the army was low on paper. Or perhaps the notice was stuck to the elevator doors instead.
Yan Fei, still “supporting” the iron slab with one hand, lifted the other. The metal blocking their corridor split open just enough for them to enter.
Once everything was inside and the door resealed, Luo Xun noticed Yan Fei quietly wiping sweat from his forehead— So, even he got tired after keeping that heavy metal suspended for so long.
“Let’s eat lunch and rest a bit before cleaning the hallway,” Luo Xun suggested. The others cheered—they were all tired after their morning of errands and scavenging.
After entering through the unsealed metal door back into their apartment, Yan Fei flopped onto the sofa, completely limp.
“Want to shower first?” Luo Xun asked while washing his hands to start cooking.
“No need. We’ll still be moving stuff this afternoon. I’ll shower tonight.”
The little dog heard his voice, ran over, and, after a few hesitant glances, leapt up onto the sofa, climbed over Yan Fei’s legs, and plopped right onto his stomach.
Man and dog—two faces, one big-eyed, one sharp and spirited—stared right into each other.
When Luo Xun came out of the kitchen carrying a bowl and saw them, he couldn’t help but laugh. Both of them turned their heads toward him at the same time.
“You’re letting it lie on your stomach?” he said. He’d often scolded the dog for being undisciplined—but truth be told, he’d never actually trained it. And now look: the dog had never done this with him before.
Yan Fei gave him a lazy sideways glance, poking the dog’s forehead with a finger. The pup tilted its head side to side, baring tiny teeth as if pretending to bite. “I’m too tired right now. I’ll throw it off later.”
Luo Xun, who had never once seen Yan Fei actually throw the dog off, just laughed and went back to the kitchen to fetch the rest of the dishes.
When he returned, Yan Fei was still poking the dog, who now pawed and twisted playfully—until, with a little thud, it rolled right off Yan Fei’s stomach and got wedged between him and the sofa back, four paws flailing in the air like an overturned turtle.
Yan Fei pressed his lips together, shaking with laughter. He’d never seen such a stupid dog before—supposed to be a smart German Shepherd, yet it acted like a total husky.
Luo Xun couldn’t stop laughing either. No wonder the pup only chewed on Yan Fei’s slippers and never touched his own—even when it dragged his shoes around, they somehow stayed spotless. Who knows what kind of “lessons” Yan Fei gave it while he was out building that wall!
After lunch, Yan Fei leaned back on the couch, regaining his strength. Luo Xun sighed softly. “You take a long time to recover, huh? If only we had some crystal cores right now.”
Yan Fei opened his eyes and looked at him. “What do you think those things inside zombie heads can do besides restoring mental energy?”
Luo Xun didn’t think too hard. “They can level up your ability, right?”
Using crystal cores to upgrade powers was common knowledge in the late apocalypse. Low-level ones were so abundant that they’d practically become currency—hardly useful for advanced users but widely traded.
The base discouraged bartering with them officially, insisting on using contribution points as money. But crystal cores were like gold—universal hard currency that held its value anywhere.
Even ordinary people found them useful for trading food, clothes, and supplies—more stable than points and never devalued.
Yan Fei nodded slightly, narrowing his eyes as if in thought. “But zombies with cores are still rare. If we don’t leave the base, we can’t get any for now.”
Luo Xun shrugged. “Then we’ll keep an eye out—maybe someone in the base sells them. We can trade for a few.”
Standing up, Yan Fei stretched lazily, the black sweater outlining his lean build so clearly that Luo Xun instinctively looked away, flustered.
“Come on,” Yan Fei said as he walked past him. “They’ve probably finished eating too. Let’s go move the stuff in the hallway.” As he passed, he ruffled Luo Xun’s hair casually.
Luo Xun froze on the spot, cheeks burning red. This guy’s been getting way too handsy lately! Shoulder pats, arm pulls, waist grabs—and now touching his hair?! Didn’t he know that even between men, that’s too much?!
He seriously considered just confessing his orientation to make the boundary clear once and for all—but by the time he’d gathered the nerve, Yan Fei was already outside chatting with the others about sorting the supplies.
The renovation materials were roughly divided already, so everyone just needed to bring their smaller items inside and clear the hallway enough for tomorrow’s new arrivals.
Clang! Bang! Clatter!
Their work was anything but quiet. Fortunately, most of the fifteenth-floor residents had long since gone out to earn points through construction work. Otherwise, someone would’ve come upstairs to complain about the noise hours ago.
Moving things was less tiring than using powers — or so Yan Fei said.
Except for hauling that big chunk of steel plates he’d just brought back today—which was quite a hassle—the rest of the work didn’t count as much for him.
Luo Xun and the five college students, on the other hand, were utterly exhausted. Their nice day off had turned into hard labor day, leaving everyone groaning in misery.
When everything was finally moved, no one had the strength for polite chatter. They just waved goodbye and dragged themselves home to rest.
After a long, refreshing shower, Luo Xun went to check the two rooftop water tanks. Because of all the recent physical labor, they’d been using water faster than usual. And with spring planting right after the New Year, he’d need plenty of water for large-scale crops. So, Luo Xun decided to pull out another purification unit later to speed up water storage.
He really had no choice—he had another house to take care of now. Once he finished cleaning up the one next door, he’d have plenty of space there for growing vegetables, which meant he’d need even more water for irrigation.
When he came out of the bathroom, he found Luo Xun rummaging through boxes. Drying his hair, Yan Fei asked, “What are you looking for?”
“The water purifier… Found it!” Luo Xun lifted the spare unit he’d made before the apocalypse and carried it upstairs to the second-floor bathroom—the first floor’s kitchen already had one, so this one would go upstairs.
After setting up the purifier, Luo Xun went back to searching for something else. Before Yan Fei could ask, he’d already pulled out two light tubes and some wiring. “Now what’s this for?”
“Renovating the quail coop,” Luo Xun said, pointing at the large glass case on the balcony. Then he looked at Yan Fei. “Help me move it—don’t leave it on the balcony.”
“Why?” Yan Fei tossed aside his half-dry towel and walked over.
“If you want quails to lay eggs, the temperature needs to be a little higher, and they need longer daylight hours. Otherwise, they won’t lay eggs in winter.” As he spoke, Luo Xun showed him where to place the glass case—somewhere it could catch sunlight all day. “When you’ve recovered your psychic energy tomorrow, add a few steel plates here to block the light at night.”
The base supplied power on schedule, but household solar energy wasn’t yet available. So, after ten o’clock every night, they turned off all the lights on the first floor to avoid suspicion from neighbors.
But the quails needed extra light in the morning and evening, so the only solution was to block any light leaks with metal sheets.
“Let’s do it now. I’ll be back to full strength after one night’s rest.” Following Luo Xun’s instructions, Yan Fei built a portable three-sided metal cover. Luo Xun then hung a piece of black cloth inside to block any escaping light. From the outside, no one would see a thing.
“You sure know a lot about this stuff,” Yan Fei remarked casually. “Gardening, raising quails, modifying the house…” Things completely useless in the modern world.
As he wired the light tubes, Luo Xun gave a dry chuckle. “I always wanted to grow my own vegetables at home… You know how it is—nothing outside feels safe anymore. Who knows how many pesticides or chemicals are on those fruits and vegetables?”
Yan Fei squinted slightly and made a noncommittal “Oh,” giving no clue whether he believed it or not.
Once the wiring and timer switch were set and Luo Xun confirmed the lights worked without leaking outside, he sighed in relief.
They’d already run out of chicken eggs at home. If the quails started laying, each female could lay one egg per day—seven quails meant seven eggs daily, as long as they didn’t die off early.
He’d just keep a few fertilized ones for hatching; the rest would cover both their daily needs. Once the flock expanded, they could sell quail eggs, eat quail meat, and stay well-fed even without hunting or buying meat.
When the work was done, Luo Xun stood straight and looked at the quails nestled together under the glass dome, a natural smile of satisfaction on his face. The kind of peaceful, self-sufficient life he’d longed for in his past life was finally within reach thanks to his rebirth.
Once the neighboring house was fully renovated—and as long as no one came to reclaim it—he could turn it entirely into a planting house. This one would just be for living, maybe with some fruit trees on the balcony.
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