Chapter 104: A real disaster
Translator: Legge Editor: Legge
Ren Xiaosu once posed a question while chatting with Yan Liuyuan. What would happen if the walls that protected the humans collapsed?
At the time, Ren Xiaosu didn’t really pay much attention even though he was the one who raised the question. After all, they would just rebuild the walls if they collapsed. The important people in the stronghold would still be important, and the refugees in town would still remain refugees.
But it was different this time. The walls could collapse at any other time but now. There were wolves waiting outside of the walls; wild animals and poisonous insects were also escaping out of the Jing Mountain range. There were face bugs and the Experimentals!
The tectonic plate movement that caused the earthquake was like a black swan1 that flapped its wings and brought a disaster upon the stronghold.
This stronghold seemed like it was situated right on two fault lines. With the violent movement of the plates, they tore it apart.
But that was not the only disaster brought on by the earthquake. The houses in the stronghold also crumbled, and countless people were buried alive under the buildings!
Ren Xiaosu was watching all this unfold from a faraway hilltop. The walls that had protected the residents of the stronghold for decades, or even over a century, was crumbling piece by piece like a melting glacier. In the end, the entire place was reduced to ruins.
This was perhaps the most shocking and insane sight Ren Xiaosu had ever witnessed in his life. The private troops atop the walls did not even have time to withdraw and fell to the ground along with the walls. Their bodies were all crushed!
These walls were at least 50 meters tall. A normal person who fell off would die for sure.
The wave of face bugs that couldn’t get past the walls started swarming into the city within the stronghold. Those “important people” in the city who were unable to recover in time from their panic caused by the collapsed buildings were eaten by the face bugs.
Wang Fugui and the others also stopped in their tracks and turned around to watch this sight with deep fear in their eyes.
“Xiaosu, will the people in the city survive?” Xiaoyu asked under her breath.
Ren Xiaosu turned around and continued heading in the direction of Stronghold 109. “It’s enough that we survive.”
In Ren Xiaosu’s opinion, there would still be a portion of the stronghold’s residents who could make it out alive. With a population of several hundred thousand, it was impossible that there weren’t any smart people in the stronghold’s city. Moreover, the Qing Consortium’s combat troops were still in there.
But all of that didn’t have anything to do with him. In this era, if it was of no concern to you, you didn’t have to care about it. In the past, none of the important people ever cared about the life and death of the refugees. As such, no one would care about their lives now.
Besides, it wasn’t like anyone could do anything about this disaster.
Suddenly, someone said, “Look, there seems to be some kind of strange light in the stronghold.”
The next moment, Ren Xiaosu turned around and was surprised to see a gigantic bubble drifting towards the face bugs. Shortly after, the bubble burst, and it forcibly pushed the swarm of bugs back by dozens of meters. Furthermore, the bugs closest to the front looked like they had been killed by the blast.
The others might not know what that was, but Ren Xiaosu immediately thought of the person who had been caught and sent into the stronghold, Zhang Baogen.
This bubble was also larger than the one he had seen, but its appearance and effect were exactly the same.
Ren Xiaosu was uncertain. It looked like Zhang Baogen wasn’t dead yet. In fact, his power had grown even stronger.
“It’s a supernatural being!” Someone exclaimed, “A supernatural being in the stronghold has made their move!”
“What the hell is that bubble?”
Ren Xiaosu looked at the surprised people and thought, “If I say that it’s a saliva bubble blown by Zhang Baogen, none of you will believe me....’
Wang Fugui’s son, Wang Dalong, muttered, “How I wish I were also a supernatural being.”
When the stronghold arrested the supernatural beings, everyone distanced themselves at the mention of the words “supernatural being.” They were all afraid they would get implicated due to these two words.
But if they were honest with themselves, who wouldn’t want to have extraordinary superpowers? Even someone who had already entered middle age, Wang Fugui, had also fantasized about it.
This was the ultimate desire human beings wanted from this world.
However, supernatural beings were rare. From the looks of it, there were probably only a dozen or so among several hundred thousand people. Ren Xiaosu knew there must still be other hidden supernatural beings in the stronghold, but their number would definitely not be too high.
“How does one become a supernatural being?” Wang Dalong asked his father.
Wang Fugui said in a speechless manner, “I don’t know either.”
Yan Liuyuan remarked, “There are probably some conditions, like luck or bloodline, things like that?”
Wang Dalong became dejected. “Well, my dad is no supernatural being either.”
Yan Liuyuan consoled, “Don’t despair, maybe he’s not your biological father?”
Wang Dalong was confused. While he was making his escape, Wang Dalong did not even cry over his lost love. But with this, he started wailing.
“Ren Xiaosu, you and your brother have such potty mouths.” Wang Fugui was nearly cursing. “That Zhang Baogen is a supernatural being, but does his father look like he has any supernatural bloodline in him?”
By this time, Zhang Baogen had spat out about five saliva bubbles and forced the bugs back, helping quite a few people finally get a chance to catch a breather. They immediately made use of this window to escape out of the stronghold. They were heading for exactly where Ren Xiaosu and the others were.
The walls of the stronghold that had crumbled formed large obstacles on the path that made it difficult for the people on the inside to get out. But luckily for them, there was an opening large enough to let several people through at once in the direction of Ren Xiaosu.
In times of distress, people would tend to blindly follow others. The people who had been caught in this disaster had lost their ability to think normally and could only run to wherever the others ran to.
When one person ran towards this opening, the other lucky survivors followed. The number of escaping survivors started to snowball.
Wang Fugui could only make a rough estimation of the numbers. There were probably at least upwards of several thousand people making their escape right now, and it was only going to get higher.
They couldn’t wait anymore. The face bugs were probably not going to give up on so much food, and neither would those wolves.
The sound of sporadic gunfire was getting weaker and weaker. Ren Xiaosu had thought the Qing Consortium’s combat troops would be very effective here. But surprisingly, he didn’t even see the combat brigade joining the battle.
Could it be that the military base was too far away?
Eventually, some people from the stronghold tried escaping into the river to avoid the face bugs. Normally, bugs were afraid of water.
But just as some people jumped into the river, something in the murky water suddenly opened its mouth and swallowed them. Right after, a dense trail of blood appeared under the murky waters.
The entire stronghold city was filled with smoke and the scent of blood. Ren Xiaosu had never seen such a savage sight before. Even he felt that this was too cruel.
He frowned and said, “Let’s get out of here. Those people who escaped from the stronghold might attract danger.”
Many of the refugees around them were so tired they didn’t want to move anymore. When they were felling from the town, they didn’t feel it. But now that they had stopped, they could feel all the muscles in their bodies aching.
Much more physical energy is consumed when running at full speed compared to jogging.
Wang Fugui, Wang Dalong, Yan Liuyuan, and Xiaoyu were all not as physically fit as Ren Xiaosu. But when Ren Xiaosu called for them to continue, none of them said a word in protest.
They would only survive if they listened to Ren Xiaosu.
Xiaoyu and the others clenched their teeth and caught up with Ren Xiaosu’s pace. Ren Xiaosu said softly, “A lot of lactic acid will accumulate in the body after an intense workout. You must keep going, or else you’ll aching even more if you rest any longer.”
When the other refugees saw Ren and company leaving, some of them followed. But others thought that since the face bugs hadn’t noticed them here, there was no hurry for them to leave. It wasn’t that they didn’t want to go, but that they wanted to rest for a few more minutes.
No matter the situation, there were always people who counted on their luck too much.
Suddenly, Xiaoyu and Yan Liuyuan realized that of all those who were here, Ren Xiaosu looked the most relaxed. It was as though he didn’t feel tired at all.