Manager Wang was just guessing—projecting his own mindset onto others.
Zeng Qiang had called Song Jingshuo aside purely to talk about fertilizer.
From a distance, the three of them watched. First, Zeng Qiang said something, and then Song Jingshuo’s face was full of shock.
Sister Pan: “Huh?”
Although Song Jingshuo had been a bit grumpy and sharp-tongued lately, overall he was the type who kept his emotions in check.
The kind who was always composed and rarely lost his cool.
Sister Pan was genuinely suspicious: “Surely he’s not actually asking for girls?”
Under the shade of the tree, Song Jingshuo said: “You… how could you…”
Zeng Qiang had anticipated his reaction.
It was a normal reaction.
He said: “The amount of fertilizer you’ll need in the future is enormous. If I’ve observed correctly, your superpower only accelerates the plant’s development process, but the nutrients the plant needs can’t be reduced one bit—in fact, it consumes even more than normal plant growth.”
“If you can’t accept this plan, then you’ll have to accept the other one,” he said.
Song Jingshuo didn’t know how much nutrients normal plants consumed, but the plants he accelerated did indeed absorb nutrients ferociously.
After one round of acceleration on a plot, Sister Pan would touch the soil and say it was spent.
Zeng Qiang was right.
Song Jingshuo calmed down and said: “What’s the other plan? Let’s hear it.”
He’d already decided that he would choose the other plan no matter what.
Zeng Qiang said: “We need to start collecting feces—everyone’s. And then process it into manure for you to use.”
Song Jingshuo cracked.
If he weren’t a wood-type ability user, if he weren’t the one specifically in charge of growing vegetables, then collecting human waste and making manure wouldn’t really be a big deal.
It wasn’t like he was being asked to eat shit.
But he was the one in charge of growing vegetables.
What difference was there between that and asking him to eat shit?!
Song Jingshuo: “Isn’t there—”
Zeng Qiang anticipated his question and answered directly: “No.”
Final and absolute.
He said: “You can choose disgusting, or you can choose even more disgusting.”
There was a bit of a mischievous streak in it.
Everyone liked to say that men are boys forever, or that men become friends so easily.
Few mentioned that male competitive rivalry could be quite intense.
Song Jingshuo—high-earning, handsome—was public enemy number one among men.
Zeng Qiang was enjoying watching him lose his composure.
Song Jingshuo stood with his hands on his hips for a long time, then finally said: “Let’s go tell Jiang Cheng.”
If it were human waste, he probably wouldn’t need to—Song Jingshuo could decide on his own.
Zeng Qiang guessed which option Song Jingshuo had chosen.
Song Jingshuo brought Zeng Qiang to Jiang Cheng. There were people nearby, so Song Jingshuo leaned in and whispered the situation in her ear.
Jiang Cheng also showed a look of surprise.
She thought for a moment and asked: “What about the risk of virus transmission?”
Zeng Qiang said: “I’ve observed. When zombies are alive, their bodies are indeed altered. But after they die, they decompose just like humans. We’ve all seen wild cats, dogs, flies, and crows eating zombie flesh. But so far, there haven’t been any zombie cats, zombie dogs, zombie flies, or zombie birds.”
“Your cat has also bitten zombies to death—his mouth has come into direct contact with zombie bodily fluids—and he hasn’t mutated either.”
“Before, when we burned zombie corpses, if there were viruses, they would have spread through aerosols. But that didn’t happen.”
“So I believe that zombie corpses can be used as safe material for producing animal-derived organic fertilizer.”
Yes—buried in the soil inside the foam box Zeng Qiang was carrying were zombie body parts he’d secretly picked up and brought home back in July.
He had several more boxes like that at home.
He just wanted to try it out. But then the zombie outbreak had ended.
It hadn’t decomposed enough yet, but it didn’t matter leaving it there. Unexpectedly, the second outbreak came, and the finance guy started growing vegetables.
It almost felt like fate.
Jiang Cheng didn’t speak—she just looked at him.
Everyone knew that Jiang Cheng was a tough-minded person. If she weren’t, she wouldn’t have led everyone through the last crisis.
But it was only when that hardness was directed at you that you truly understood what kind of person Jiang Cheng was.
After a few seconds of eye contact with Jiang Cheng, Zeng Qiang suddenly understood.
He nodded: “The property management still has a few bags of chemical fertilizer—enough for Jingshuo to use for a few days. During that time, let him grow some vegetables for me, and I’ll eat them first.”
Song Jingshuo glanced at him.
A live experiment.
But Jiang Cheng hadn’t forced Zeng Qiang—he was volunteering.
If he wanted others to eat it, he’d have to lead by example.
That was only fair.
Song Jingshuo and Zeng Qiang left together.
Song Jingshuo said nothing.
Zeng Qiang comforted him: “It’s all the same, really.”
He said: “Everything in this world eventually returns to dust. Tombstones, grave mounds—those are just things for the living to cling to. Underground, it’s all the same. Sooner or later, it all goes back to nature, absorbed by plants. Then eaten by living creatures, and eventually excreted as human or animal waste.”
“There are plenty of animal-derived organic fertilizers on the market too.”
“Using animals, humans, or zombies—essentially, there’s no difference.”
“It’s all the same—you eat it, and in the end, it’s all shit.”
Zeng Qiang was deeply philosophical.
“And besides, you wouldn’t even be able to taste it.”
Song Jingshuo’s mouth twitched.
Ever since the zombie outbreak, a lot of people had become philosophers.
Li Jiangbing was right—they were all crazy anyway.
Zeng Qiang walked away with his foam box.
Song Jingshuo went back to planting vegetables.
Sister Pan and Manager Wang had already fertilized the plot. When she saw him return, she said: “Come on.”
As soon as Song Jingshuo started, he noticed the difference.
“Chemical fertilizer?” he asked.
Sister Pan: “Yeah, what else?”
Song Jingshuo didn’t say more and focused on channeling his superpower.
It was different—so much worse.
Plants eating chemical fertilizer was like humans eating compressed biscuits.
You had to eat it, but it was unpleasant.
And that vigorous growth he’d felt earlier, when he’d protected the seedlings’ roots and they’d surged upward—that was completely absent here.
Song Jingshuo knew then that there was no going back.
The corpse fertilizer was better.
At noon, everyone had a good lunch and admired the grape-sized soybeans.
“Can’t wait for soy milk tomorrow,” they all said happily.
After eating and resting, people from Yujing Xiangyuan and Jixiang Jiayuan also arrived. The Science and Technology New District Zombie Elimination Combat Team boarded their vehicles and set out on their first mission.
Today’s targets were two private kindergartens and one private school. One kindergarten and the school were on the same street. The other was elsewhere.
But since they’d decided to reclaim the entire Science and Technology New District, everyone agreed to clear the kindergartens and schools first for peace of mind.
The blade carts led the way, with Mo Li following, and they went on a killing spree.
Today’s special feature was Guo Jun and Gao Yuxuan. Their armor was different from the others—it covered them from head to toe.
During the production of these two suits of armor, it became clear that metal-type superpower users differed from one another.
Everyone had the same ability, yes.
But a few of them had backgrounds in mechanical engineering or related fields, with Cui Haiyang as the prime example.
When he made the full-body armor for Gao Yuxuan, he knew exactly how to handle the joints, how to connect them, and how to design the opening, closing, and locking mechanisms.
But Uncle Eighty couldn’t do it.
If you asked Uncle Eighty to make a replica of the original armor, he could manage it—because there was a sample to copy.
He could also make crescent-shaped shovels, since the shape and structure weren’t complicated.
Or some knives, or even scissors. For example, with scissors, he understood their construction and could replicate them.
But for something as complex as this armor—which needed to open, close, and lock securely to prevent it from coming apart during battle—Uncle Eighty couldn’t pull it off.
Because he had no concept of it in his head.
If you don’t even know what you’re making, of course you can’t make it.
In the end, both Gao Yuxuan and Guo Jun were satisfied with their suits of armor.
Everyone else, however, was annoyed with Gao Yuxuan. Because he kept leaking electricity, and the metal armor conducted it—he kept shocking people in the vehicle.
Gao Yuxuan looked pitiful and shrunk into a corner by himself.
The kindergarten and the private school were on the same street.
Everyone chose to go to the private school first, because they all knew that after visiting the kindergarten, morale would plummet.
The blade carts and Mo Li went on a killing spree in the schoolyard. Gao Yuxuan and Guo Jun, like everyone else, first observed from the vehicles outside.
After the blade carts and Mo Li had done some work, the two iron men got out.
The main reason was that their armor was heavy and less maneuverable. If the zombies in the yard were too dense, they feared the experiment might fail and they’d get trapped inside.
Then they’d have to trouble Mo Li to rescue them.
So they let the blade carts and Mo Li thin the horde first, and once it was less crowded, they went in.
Everyone pressed their faces to the windows to watch the show. The other electricity-types were especially interested.
Although they wore full-body metal armor, it was covered in dense, tightly packed tiny air holes. The smell of humans wafted out to the zombies.
The zombies roared and lunged at them.
Gao Yuxuan had always fought at range and had never before stood still like a pillar and refused to fight back like today.
He closed his eyes, chose to trust Cui Haiyang, and began discharging electricity all over his body.
The experiment was a success.
The zombies that pounced on him stuck to his armor and started shaking like sieves. Without outside help, they couldn’t break free on their own.
More zombies came, piling onto the ones already stuck.
Soon, Gao Yuxuan was completely surrounded by layers upon layers of zombies—he couldn’t move at all.
He controlled the current, keeping it at an optimal cost-to-effect ratio.
Meaning: he output just enough electricity to hold the zombies in place without letting them break free, using the minimum amount.
With just that little bit of current, he could hold so many zombies.
This was practically a control skill from a game!
Li Jiangbing shouted: “Our turn!”
The doors opened, and Li Jiangbing led a team charging out, rushing into the schoolyard. They raised their crescent shovels and started lopping off the heads of the zombies wrapped around Gao Yuxuan.
Some used wooden-handled crescent shovels. The all-metal ones had their handles wrapped in insulating tape.
One shovel, one head.
Very efficient.
Guo Jun, meanwhile, was conducting a different experiment.
He also used electricity to hold a large group of zombies. Once the numbers looked right, he released a powerful surge all at once.
Gao Yuxuan was testing control; Guo Jun wanted to test control plus area-of-effect attack.
Of course, it was all Gao Yuxuan’s idea.
But Guo Jun’s experiment wasn’t entirely successful.
The total electricity needed to hold and kill a large group of zombies together was indeed slightly less than killing them one by one.
Because when Guo Jun fought at range, he shot out a long electric serpent that lost some power along the way.
Area attacks did save some energy loss, but the savings weren’t huge—certainly not as much as Gao Yuxuan saved.
At the same time, releasing enough current to kill so many zombies in an instant nearly drained Guo Jun completely.
Luckily, Li Jiangbing’s team was right there and came over quickly.
Gao Yuxuan was a menace!
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