Standing on top of a small mountain filled with green bamboos, one could see over a hundred people bustling about at the gorge. Zhang Xiaoqiang was dressed in military attire as he stood in the pavilion at the top of the mountain and looked down. Yuan Yi sat indolently on a bamboo chair, enjoying the feeling of the wind blowing past his face. Yang Ke-er and the little girl sat opposite each other, holding bamboo pipes of different thickness in their hands and blowing into them like whistles. The bamboo whistles were made by Zhang Xiaoqiang for them, by chopping off a thin bamboo pipe and shaving off the sharp tip, leaving a knot on the bamboo, and the side that did not have a knot had a cut of a third of its length, allowing the two girls to hold it in their mouths and blow into it.
Officer Qiao Yun was also there, she hugged the Garand Rifle in her arms and looked into the distance, the wind gently lifted her hair, causing it to flutter gracefully. No one knew what she was thinking about, but the relationship between her and Zhang Xiaoqiang had returned to its original state, he was still him, and she was still herself, as though the mutual consolation in the infirmary was a dream, and when they woke up, they would not remember anything.
Many of the construction workers that Zhang Xiaoqiang brought back were real engineers, and they completely overturned Old Frank's plans and accused him of wasting materials. Old Frank did not get angry even when he was scolded, instead, he promoted the few people who scolded him to become his assistants. Old Frank had never even gone to junior high school, and did not know how to first decide on a construction plan. What masonry, steel reinforcement, concrete, steel construction, he did not understand any of it, he always thought that it was just digging a hole, burying some steel reinforcement, pouring some cement and sand, and that was it.
Old Frank knew his own weakness, and thus, he respected those with high skills. He listened to everyone's opinions, and worked together with them to formulate the "Construction Arrangements", dividing all the tasks into blocks, and then to each of them. If there were any problems, they could just look for the person in charge, and even more so, they would draw up a construction schedule for Zhang Xiaoqiang to look through. Zhang Xiaoqiang's attitude was to let Old Frank make the decisions, how to plan, how to carry out the construction, and how to arrange it were all up to Old Frank. The only thing that he brought up was to not be afraid of wastage, as long as it was sturdy, it would be best to build a permanent fortification similar to the fortresses in World War II, one that could even defend against large caliber artillery shells.
"Rumble …." A loud sound came from the foot of the mountain in the distance, the earth shook, and Zhang Xiaoqiang almost lost his footing. Yang Ke-er was grumbling by the side, while Zhang Xiaoqiang looked at the cloud of sand and dust floating in the distance. It was Lu Ren Yi and Wang Chong leading a group of people to blow up the foot of the mountain. Zhang Xiaoqiang wanted to turn the hot spring into a base, but he wanted it to be an impregnable fortress. Previously, they had found a warehouse of explosives, so Zhang Xiaoqiang found two construction workers who understood explosives to follow Lu Ren Yi and the rest to flatten both sides of the mountain, creating a 90 degree angle to create an artificial cliff, and then use cement to level it. At that time, not to mention an S2, even a monkey would not be able to climb up.
A long motorcade drove over from afar. The one at the front was a Beijing Jeep with a heavy machine gunner wearing sunglasses and a cigarette in his mouth, looking around with a murderous aura. Behind it were a few large trucks, followed by two large buses, and behind them were many other vans of various models. A fuel truck was at the very back, and four off-road vehicles filled with combat team members were on the left and right sides of the motorcade, escorting the motorcade.
Seeing the fleet of vehicles in the distance, Zhang Xiaoqiang knew that Three had returned. Through the survivor camp that he had found previously, Zhang Xiaoqiang knew that there should be quite a number of survivors along the highway. He got Three to bring his men to wander around the highway to see if they could find any survivors. In addition, he also wanted to scoop up all the supplies that were stored for the highway. Zhang Xiaoqiang decided that after the outer walls were repaired, he would empty the two hills and turn them into warehouses. At that time, he would be able to store all the supplies, it was the golden period for his development.
When the fleet of vehicles arrived, Zhang Xiaoqiang had already reached the bottom of the hill. Three jumped down from the Jeep and greeted Zhang Xiaoqiang, before turning around and shouting at the fleet of vehicles behind him. The fleet of vehicles slowly came to a stop, and the first to alight were the combat team members. They were fully armed and stood on high ground nearby, raising their rifles to guard their surroundings. The heavy machine gunners aimed their guns at the bus, and as the bus doors opened, a few men and women came down one after another.
The men were all dressed in rags. Their sleeves and the hem of their clothes were shredded into strips of cloth. Some of them even had a large hole in their clothes, which they had tied up with two nylon ropes. They looked worse than beggars. The men were about the same. Other than their clothes being a little dirty and torn, there were no other problems. Other than the fact that they dodged a little when the combat team pointed their guns at them, their complexions were not bad, and their bodies were very strong. One look and anyone could tell that they had not been starving.
The women were different, their clothes were still neat and tidy, unlike the men whose clothes were tattered and torn. However, they were all very weak, holding onto their belongings and swaying on the ground. Every woman's cheeks were sunken in, their skin was yellowish and dry, and did not have the luster of Yang Ke-er's face. They looked as though they had aged prematurely, but they were not as afraid as the men. They only hugged onto their belongings and looked at the empty space in front of them, waiting for arrangements.
Zhang Xiaoqiang looked at the silent women, he knew that the women in the apocalypse were not any less miserable than the men, and if they met a tyrannical man, it would be even worse. Zhang Xiaoqiang did not want to care so much, he could not care about others, he could only manage his own subordinates, so that the women who worked for him could have a little more self-respect.
Zhang Xiaoqiang brought a few of his subordinates and appeared. Although he had exploded once, after the battle, he returned to his original state. He still loved to brag, loved to talk about his relationship with Zhang Xiaoqiang, and still loved to snitch in front of Zhang Xiaoqiang. With close to 200 strong men, Zhang Huai An did not need to be a laborer like before, he brought his subordinates to maintain the base, helping He Wen Bin to look after the extra 200 people. He had not been a police officer for so many years in vain, taking care of a few hundred people was really nothing to him, any kind of person that appeared in front of him, he would be able to accurately identify them. A few days ago, he had even found a former murderer among the construction workers, that person's companions did not know that after working with him for so many years, he had also killed a ruthless person. Of course, that murderer was not executed, He Wen Bin had called him over to ask a few questions before allowing him to join the combat team.
Actually, this man was not an extremely vicious person, after retiring from the army, he saw his uncle who had raised him and sent him to the army, because a few mu of land was sold by the village to a developer at a low price, he was so angry that he breathed his last. The village reported that he had died of an illness, and after his neighbors secretly told him about it, he could not take it anymore and slaughtered the village chief that night. He took the hundreds of thousands of black money from the village chief's house and fled to the ends of the earth. Now, the reason why Zhang Xiaoqiang's combat team knew how to be alert and know how to occupy the terrain was all because of this murderer.
When Zhang Huai An saw Zhang Xiaoqiang, he hurriedly ran over to greet Zhang Xiaoqiang, and then started to snitch to Zhang Xiaoqiang. Zhang Xiaoqiang only listened silently and did not speak, only nodding his head to indicate that he understood after Zhang Huai An had finished. Satisfied and refreshed, Zhang Huai An brought his 4 subordinates to count the survivors they found today, and made preparations to accept them.