Chapter 77 - 74: The Calm Before the Storm
A night without event.
Sunshine brightened the morning, and Li Yu rose early from bed, his training regimen within the base was as punctual as ever.
After exercising, breakfast was his next routine.
The new workers, who had known Li Yu's parents before, used to get meals included along with their wages when the base's enclosure wall was being built.
Now they lived within the walls, but their current state of mind was entirely different from before.
Mealtime was always the liveliest moment in the base.
Thin porridge and some steamed buns, along with some pickled vegetables, comprised today's breakfast.
Of course, for the younger ones who were still growing, each would receive an egg.
After breakfast, Li Yu led the base's people to open the gate and then clear the trees in front of the road. Trees could obstruct the view of zombies in the front, so it was necessary to cut some down.
Only a dozen meters or so of trees were felled, which was nearly 30 meters from the base walls to begin with.
You can imagine the newly built Weng City like this:
The base's enclosure wall is a large square that wraps around a plain and two mountains. The wall of the Weng City is like a semicircle placed outside this square, where the square and semicircle meet.
While Li Yu and the others were felling trees outside, someone in the Observation Tower was continuously scanning the surroundings.
Li Hongyuan had a background in construction; building a wall was fairly simple for him. Following Li Hongyuan's plan, the Weng City was constructed outside of the current main gate, which used less land from the base, yet also expanded the base's territory. With the reduction and addition, it amounted to a substantial amount of space.
The new wall being built used the gate as a demarcation, creating a semicircle with a radius of 20 meters. And the width of the wall being built this time reached over 3 meters.
As the trees were almost cleared, many materials left over from the initial wall construction were still stored in the base, including a mixer and a Ruijiang tank truck. This eliminated the need for manual cement mixing, allowing for direct mixing by machine.
Next, after laying the foundation and setting up the rebar cages, concrete could be cast directly, speeding up the process considerably.
The base still had some rebar, but it was certainly not sufficient. So, Li Yu and Li Tie, took time to lead some part-time workers to County outskirts to bring back some additional rebar.
During the rebar transport, everything went smoothly; they encountered no one, and fewer zombies, as if suddenly the number of zombies decreased, giving off the premonitory sensation of an impending storm.
Li Yu keenly sensed this and felt uneasy instead of glad, a situation all too familiar to him. It left Li Yu feeling something wasn't quite right.
The only consolation for Li Yu was that over the days of interaction, the workers showed good performance, which pleased Li Yu greatly. However, he did not let his guard down; instead, he increased his vigilance, observing these people.
Over the next few days, the foundation of the base's enclosure wall was also constructed. During this period, zombies began to appear outside the wall sporadically, becoming fewer and fewer as time went on.
This scene gave Li Yu that strangely familiar feeling. Before his rebirth, many small groups were swept away by Zombie Tides.
Often, before the arrival of a Zombie Tide, the surrounding zombies would gradually diminish, as they began to gather. Once a Zombie Tide formed, it was like locusts scouring the land. Without solid walls to defend, they were bound to be breached by the zombies.
With this feeling of anxiety, Li Yu went to ask his father about the construction schedule. After the foundation is done, pouring the concrete will be quick, but it will still take some time.
Li Hongyuan saw the anxiety on Li Yu's face, so he asked, "Aren't the zombies becoming fewer now? Why the rush to finish the construction?"
After thinking for a moment, Li Yu finally said, "Something feels off to me. Remember the last Zombie Tide? The number of zombies suddenly dropped by a lot. This time, I feel like there's going to be an even bigger Zombie Tide. We must finish building Weng City before it arrives, otherwise we'll be in big trouble!"
Hearing this, Li Hongyuan thought back to the last time the base was besieged by the Zombie Tide and became anxious. He then said, "The foundation has already been laid. Now we just need to pour the concrete for the walls. Mobilize all of our manpower to get everything done. It will take at least five days, plus two to three days for the walls to thoroughly dry."
Hearing this, Li Yu became a bit nervous. Time was tight. Based on his experience, after the surrounding zombies start decreasing, a Zombie Tide would soon follow within three to seven days.
The time was tight, but there was no other option. They had to speed up the construction of Weng City.
He then said, "Let's do it as quickly as possible!"
Li Yu immediately found his Uncle and others, and discussed the situation with them. After hearing about it, his Uncle and the others couldn't sit still.
The decisions Li Yu had made in the past had all turned out to be correct. Once, twice, three times. Time and again, everyone had come to trust Li Yu's judgment deeply, especially since they had also noticed the decreasing number of zombies recently. Thus, no one raised any objections.
After all, the sooner Weng City was built, the sooner everyone could rest easy.
After discussing, they decided to work through the night. From the start, Li Yu had bought many high-powered lights. Under the illumination of six of these lights, the area around the wall was as bright as day.
However, working at night meant everything beyond the wall was pitch black, which was quite unnerving.
Night was very dark.
But around the base, the sound of cement mixers was constantly heard.
Strangely enough, zombies are most active at night and are very sensitive to sounds. But even in such circumstances, not a single zombie was seen tonight.
This made many people let their guard down even more and focus on building the wall.
In the darkness, the wall was built, bit by bit, from one meter, slowly rising to two meters...
Behind the trees, there were two zombies that, for some reason, were not with the majority but were wandering alone at the edge of the national highway.
The loud sound of the mixer truck from the base seemed to attract the two zombies, who gradually moved closer to the base.
However, people at the base hardly saw any zombies today and their vigilance had significantly decreased.
The workers, after having joined the base, had been eating and sleeping well alongside Li Yu and the others. With plenty of food and rest, they had recovered a lot physically and were gradually adjusting mentally.
Now they were working while chatting.
It couldn't be helped, building a wall, despite being simple, was extremely repetitive and could make one drowsy.
But those two zombies were slowly approaching the base, reaching the woods.
They were less than 30 meters away from where everyone was building Weng City!