Jiang Cheng had never imagined that even she would encounter something that left her utterly dumbfounded.
Among the distress messages they received, there were reports about mutant zombies. These mutant zombies now fell under Jiang Cheng’s jurisdiction.
Zhou Wang, Xiao Huang, and Brother Dong—due to the unique nature of their superpowers—all followed Jiang Cheng’s team to hunt mutant zombies.
They’d taken down one in the morning, rushed to another location at noon to deal with a second, and had just finished in the afternoon when Yang Xinyan called to say that someone in Guangxiu District had established a provisional government and wanted to get in touch with them.
Jiang Cheng called the number back.
The person on the other end had a rather deep male voice—though he sounded a bit impatient and not very steady, just from the tone you couldn’t tell his age at all.
Jiang Cheng arranged to meet them at the TV station. Through the phone, she could hear some cheering in the background—both male and female voices, mixed with some young, childish ones.
After hanging up, Jiang Cheng frowned.
Zhou Wang asked: “What’s wrong?”
Jiang Cheng said: “They seem to have children with them.”
Zhou Wang: “Why would they bring children?”
That was exactly why Jiang Cheng was frowning.
If they didn’t even have a safe base where children could stay, what were they using to establish a government? The responsibilities a government had to shoulder couldn’t just be talked about.
“We’ll see when they get here,” she said.
In the past, under normal conditions, it would have been an hour-and-a-half drive. Now, with no traffic jams and no red lights, it usually took twenty to thirty minutes.
They arrived before the other group did.
Jiang Cheng and her core members waited on the first floor of the TV station. The drivers took the vehicles to cruise around the neighborhood—they’d been to the TV station several times now, and each time they’d drive around the nearby streets to clear out zombies.
By now, you’d have to go four blocks away to find any zombies near the TV station.
After half an hour of waiting, the vehicles had returned, but the other group still hadn’t shown up.
Jiang Cheng called them back: “Where are you?”
The wind was howling through the phone on the other end, and a voice shouted loudly: “I don’t know where this is! Where are we? Liu Gang, go check that street sign!”
They were genuinely shouting at the top of their lungs.
Jiang Cheng: “…”
“Oh—it’s called Zuoliang South Road. Do you know this road?”
Jiang Cheng: “…”
Even harder to evaluate.
Jiang Cheng: “You’re only there? At this rate, it’ll be at least another half hour.”
“Yeah, yeah, about that. Wait for us, okay? We’ll definitely make it!”
That last line sounded more like they were psyching themselves up.
After hanging up, Jiang Cheng said to the others: “There’s a problem.”
It felt extremely unreliable.
Everyone else had heard it too and exchanged bewildered looks.
While they waited, they went into a nearby building and cleared a few floors of zombies.
They didn’t go any higher—in case the other group arrived while they were inside. After clearing a few floors, they came back down and waited at the TV station entrance.
Fortunately, Jiang Cheng always carried plenty of supplies with her. She brought out drinks for everyone.
With the sun shining and drinks in hand, it was a rare moment of leisure.
The other group finally arrived, more than ten minutes later than expected.
From afar, they saw a large force appearing on the road.
A magical iron cage, covering a magical multi-person pedal-powered vehicle.
With so many people and all that metal, it actually created the illusion of a rolling cavalry charge.
Until they pedaled, huffing and puffing, up to the TV station entrance.
Everyone: “…”
The students were truly exhausted.
That iron cage was no lightweight. They’d ridden a long way early in the morning to reach the district government building on Huairou Road.
They’d spent the morning killing zombies—a huge drain on their energy.
At noon, they’d gnawed on toasted steamed buns with tap water.
They’d found some ham sausages, crackers, chocolate, and other things in the district government offices—the first zombie disaster had instilled a hoarding habit in the entire population. Many people had survived this time in their office buildings thanks to the instant noodles, cookies, chocolate, crackers, and even compressed biscuits that coworkers had stashed in the office.
Then they’d gone on a phone-collecting spree.
The kids didn’t have phones, so they’d grabbed a bunch from the district government building. Now everyone had one.
No one wanted the black and silver-gray high-end business phones. Everyone fought over the ones with bright, cool-looking colors.
The ones with camera and music functions were especially hot items.
They’d even had to settle ownership by rock-paper-scissors and odds-and-evens.
Then they’d ridden their bikes from the Guangxiu District government building all the way to the TV station.
Guangxiu District was up north! It was only after looking at a map that they realized the TV station was on the West Second Ring Road!
A car could maintain speed—even floor it and tear down the road—but bicycles hauling a heavy iron cage only got slower and slower.
After all, human strength had its limits. By the end of the day, they were just about spent.
Especially the fire-type and metal-type superpower users—they looked especially drained.
Because they’d had to kill zombies along the way too.
The electric-types were in better shape, but since the iron cage conducted electricity, they hadn’t dared to use their powers—afraid they’d accidentally electrocute their classmates.
In short, by the time they pedaled their caged bicycle convoy all the way to the TV station on the West Second Ring Road, the students were completely exhausted.
Xiao Huang couldn’t quite believe his eyes.
It wasn’t until this motley crew “opened up” their iron cage and stumbled out, one by one, listless, that he could confirm: “No. 14 High School?!”
The students had actually scored a bunch of clothes from Hong’an Market, but they all wore their school uniforms when heading out as a group—it looked sharper and boosted morale.
A little boy who looked like an elementary schooler burst out: “Senior Huang Xuetao!”
Several others ran over too: “Huang Xuetao!”
They all hugged Xiao Huang, crying and laughing.
Xiao Huang had lost his father on the very first day of the first zombie disaster. Since then, everyone had treated him like an adult.
It had been so long that he’d gotten used to it.
Only now—seeing Xiao Huang huddled with a bunch of kids of all sizes, weeping with emotion—did everyone suddenly realize: he’s still just a child.
And not just one child—not even just a few.
They were all kids.
Older ones whose voices had already changed, and younger ones whose voices hadn’t.
The youngest among them looked like they were barely elementary school age.
Jiang Cheng: “…”
Everyone fell silent.
Jiang Cheng stepped forward, hands clasped behind her back. She swept her gaze across them before asking: “You’re the ones who want to establish the Guangxiu District Provisional Government?”
The students all recognized her.
Every time this auntie appeared on TV, she was in silver armor, holding a crescent-blade shovel. When she spoke, her eyes seemed to pierce through the screen and look straight at each person.
They all thought she was really cool and had been looking forward to meeting her in person.
But it wasn’t until they actually faced her that they realized just how much pressure she could exert.
When those dark eyes swept over them, no one dared meet her gaze.
“Leader”—the concept naturally flashed through everyone’s minds.
So this is what it takes to lead others.
“Y-yes, th-that’s us,” a tall, burly boy stammered.
He still had a thick layer of dark fuzz above his lip.
Everyone else was staring at the drink cans in the adults’ hands or tossed on the ground, secretly swallowing their saliva.
They’d hauled that heavy iron cage and pedaled for a whole hour—all their water was gone, and their throats were parched!
Jiang Cheng nodded. Instead of pressing further, she said gently: “That was a long ride—you must be tired. Have some drinks first.”
She pointed, and everyone stepped aside. In the center of the plaza in front of the TV station sat an inflatable kiddie pool—bright and covered in cartoon prints.
Large chunks of ice floated inside, drifting slowly. And all kinds of drinks bobbed along with the ice.
The youth apartment crew had practically emptied Duoduoduo.
They’d taken massive freezers and even commercial ice makers.
The fish from the seafood section had been fished out first; the tanks—water and all—went straight into Jiang Cheng’s spatial storage, along with purifiers and circulation oxygenators, all moved to the youth apartments.
They’d taken anything remotely useful.
Now there were people dedicated to raising fish.
That morning, they’d loaded up the pool with huge blocks of ice.
Jiang Cheng’s spatial storage couldn’t stop heat loss, but it slowed it down more than normal. Even now, there were still plenty of ice chunks in the icy water, glittering in the sunlight.
The students, whose throats were practically smoking, stared with wide eyes.
They were guided to get drinks. Though they were all parched, they lined up properly and waited their turn. When they got their drinks, they passed them back to those behind them first.
The boys gave to the girls first; the older students gave to the younger ones.
Everyone who received one said thank you.
Polite and orderly.
The adults watching could see—these were good kids.
After all, they were all top students from a key middle school. Not only was the school strict and well-disciplined, but the students themselves had already been selected from a huge pool of applicants.
Only after the kids had chugged down their iced drinks and seemed to come back to life did Jiang Cheng speak to the student leader: “Do you have a safe base?”
“Yes—we live at the school.”
“Do you have food?”
“Yes—we emptied out a nearby market.”
“Do you have a wood-type superpower user to provide a sustainable food supply?”
“…Uh, no.”
“How do you manage supplies? How do you prevent corruption in inventory management? How do you handle theft and embezzlement?”
“Huh?”
“How do you coordinate resource distribution between refugees and original residents? How do you balance distribution between combatants and non-combatants?”
“Huh?”
“How do you encourage and attract refugees to participate in collective activities and labor? What do you offer them as compensation?”
“Huh? Nothing—they… they just stay there… we’re the ones doing all the work…”
Not surprising at all.
Jiang Cheng nodded and asked: “So, do you still want to be this provisional government?”
The students fell silent.
Actually, halfway through the bike ride, many of them had already started having second thoughts.
What was even stranger was that back at school, facing a few teachers and parents—even the survivors they’d rescued—they’d never felt like kids. Instead, they’d thought, “We’re pretty awesome.”
But here at the TV station, face to face with Jiang Cheng, the feeling that “she’s an adult and we’re kids” was overwhelming.
The bold spirit that had swelled in them that morning had mostly dissipated by the afternoon.
No one spoke.
Jiang Cheng began by affirming them: “Everything you’ve done so far is amazing. You’ve already gone far beyond what kids your age should have to shoulder.”
At the praise, the students finally lifted their chests a little, their morale recovering slightly.
“But a government has too much responsibility to bear and too many problems to face,” Jiang Cheng said, shifting gears.
By this point, the students weren’t especially disappointed anymore. After everything that had happened today, by the time they reached the TV station, they’d already started reassessing themselves.
“Is there really no adult at all at the school?” Jiang Cheng asked. “Not counting the refugees.”
“There are—three teachers and nine parents.”
Jiang Cheng cut to the heart of it: “You snuck out, didn’t you? The adults didn’t agree?”
The students looked at the sky, looked at the ground, scratched their heads, and cleared their throats.
Jiang Cheng smiled.
They were still kids after all. Unless someone had truly been ground down by society, even if they were physically adults, their thinking was still that of children.
Jiang Cheng extended an olive branch: “Come back to the Tech District with us.”
But the kids exchanged glances, communicated silently, and still refused.
“We still want to stay in Guangxiu District. Even if we can’t be the government, our school is big—there are plenty of empty classrooms. We have lots of clothes and blankets—we can still take in many more people.”
“We’ll do our best to rescue people.”
“Auntie Jiang, is that okay?”
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