Chapter 126 - 99: Ruins

Chapter 126: Chapter 99: Ruins

When the two groups met, the other pair sized up Xu Mo and Feng Dayong, their eyes pausing on Xu Mo’s AK-47.

"Who are you guys?" one of them asked. ℯℯ𝘭.𝘤ℴ𝘮

"We’re here to relieve you for the night shift. We’re in charge of ammunition resupply for the C-07 position," Xu Mo replied.

"Oh, it’s you guys." The man visibly relaxed, a weary smile touching his lips. "The relief shift is finally here. Come on, we’ll talk as we go. We’ll show you the route and the whole process."

They turned their cart around and led Xu Mo and Feng Dayong toward the position. The more talkative of the two began to explain as they walked:

"The job sounds simple enough. We just guard the temporary ammunition dump behind the position." He pointed to an area about thirty meters behind the line, a space enclosed by several sandbags. "When the guys up front need ammo, they’ll either radio us or just yell for it. We grab what they need from the dump, load it onto a handcart, and run it over to them. Gotta make sure they never run out."

"There’s one more thing," he paused, his voice dropping. "If one of the guys on the line gets wounded, it’s our job to carry them back to the medical tent on a stretcher. But let me warn you, if they’ve been scratched or bitten by those... things, you have to restrain them with zip ties before you move them. That’s the rule."

He glanced at Xu Mo and Feng Dayong and added in an even lower, conspiratorial whisper, "This gig does have a perk, though. On your runs back and forth, especially near the front line, you can sometimes find spent casings on the ground. Maybe even a few live rounds. Every little bit helps, you know?"

At these words, Feng Dayong’s eyes lit up, clearly interested in this "side hustle." Xu Mo, however, remained noncommittal. He was more concerned with the state of the defensive line itself.

By the time they finished speaking, they had arrived at the C-07 position.

The sight that greeted them made Xu Mo stare, momentarily stunned.

It was a defensive position built upon the remnants of a factory wall and sandbag fortifications, manned by just over twenty combatants. The position’s firepower was formidable: two heavy machine guns were mounted on sandbags, their Black Hole muzzles pointed forward. Nearby lay two rocket launchers and an anti-materiel rifle fitted with a scope. The rest of the combatants were each armed with a standard-issue automatic rifle, an under-barrel grenade launcher attached. They were spread out behind cover, their expressions alert and wary.

But none of that was what truly mattered. What mattered was what lay in front of the position.

It was a vast expanse of ruins, a landscape turned almost entirely to rubble.

As far as the eye could see, there wasn’t a single complete building left. There was nothing but collapsed walls, twisted rebar, shattered blocks of concrete, and charred wreckage.

The entire area looked as if it had been kneaded and crushed over and over by an invisible, giant hand. The ground was pockmarked with craters large and small, some of them filled with murky rainwater. The strange, putrid smell in the air was even more pungent here.

And yet, despite these silent ruins appearing incapable of hiding anything, every combatant on the line was on high alert, their eyes fixed tensely on what lay ahead, as if expecting a massive army to pour out of the rubble at any second.

The survivor who had led them there seemed to notice Xu Mo and Feng Dayong’s confusion. He explained in a low voice, "Weird as hell, right? This place just looks like a normal pile of ruins, but zombies just keep pouring out of it from God knows where. They charge the line in wave after wave. No matter how many you kill, they just keep coming. It’s the strangest damn thing."

’An endless stream of zombies? From a pile of ruins?’

Xu Mo and Feng Dayong exchanged a look, each seeing the gravity and bewilderment in the other’s eyes. It completely defied logic. Ruins might conceal some zombies, but it was impossible for them to generate a "never-ending" assault. There was definitely something wrong here.

With the handover complete, the two day-shift survivors pushed their empty cart and departed. Xu Mo and Feng Dayong first made a trip to the temporary Ammunition Storage in the rear. Following the position commander’s request, they collected several crates of grenades and a few heavy machine-gun ammunition belts, loaded them onto their handcart, and began pushing it back toward the C-07 position.

The two of them were silent on the way back to the line.

Xu Mo’s mind raced, replaying the bizarre phenomenon over and over. ’An endless stream of zombies from a pile of ruins.’ It led him to consider several grim possibilities: an underground facility, a hidden network of tunnels, or... something else entirely, something beyond his comprehension.

Feng Dayong, meanwhile, stared intently at the ruins, his brow furrowed in thought. His lips moved occasionally, as if he were silently cursing this godforsaken world.

Just as Xu Mo and Feng Dayong were pushing the cart, now less than a hundred meters from the position:

THUMP-THUMP-THUMP-THUMP—!

BANG! BANG! BANG! RAT-A-TAT-TAT—!

Ahead at the defensive line, the distinctive, muffled roar of the heavy machine gun was the first to sound off. It was immediately followed by the heavy crack of the anti-materiel rifle, the dense bursts of automatic fire, and the boom of exploding grenades, all erupting at once and weaving together into a fierce symphony of combat.

The battle had erupted again without the slightest warning.

"Go!" Xu Mo and Feng Dayong growled at the same time. With no time for second thoughts, they hunched over and put all their strength into pushing the heavy handcart, racing along the cratered path toward the thunderous gunfire of the C-07 position.