The residential complex had six buildings, over two thousand apartments, and more than two thousand owners. Although the mutated beings in the garden had been cleaned up, there were surely still original mutated beings like Little Bai’s father and Li Ziqing trapped inside their own apartments, unable to get out.
Also, because everyone was so busy today, some of the bodies in the buildings hadn’t been removed and dealt with yet.
With the temporary owners’ committee all gathered, Jiang Cheng organized a meeting to finalize the details of the issues she had brought up at noon.
She also said, “It would be best if each building has a fixed, dedicated point of contact. That way, residents can reach out to that person, that person can reach out to me, and I can coordinate to ensure communication is relayed promptly.”
No one objected, and they immediately nominated contacts for each building.
Building 4’s contact was Song Jingshuo. Building 2’s contact was Li Jiangbing.
And Jiang Cheng—Jiang Cheng, of course, became the overall contact for the entire complex. No one needed to nominate her; it was a fait accompli that everyone had naturally accepted over the course of the day—Jiang Cheng from Apartment 0306, Building 2. She was now the organizer, manager, and contact for all affairs at the youth apartment complex.
Given the unanimous agreement, Song Jingshuo had no choice but to accept.
Yang Xinyan, experienced with desk work, efficiently compiled everyone’s information from the owners’ forum into a table, printed it using the property management’s printer, and handed out a copy to each person.
The table was organized by building. She thoughtfully placed the contact for each building in the first row of that building’s section.
Jiang Cheng’s name was at the very top.
When Song Jingshuo received the table, he was even more resigned.
Jiang Cheng asked Master Luo, “How many walkie-talkies does the property management have? Any extras we can use?”
Although everyone had each other’s contact information, phone calls only allowed one-to-one communication, which was inefficient. Walkie-talkies allowed one-to-many communication, making them more suitable for the current situation.
“Let me think… Twelve are in use, and there are four backups in the cabinet,” Master Luo said. “We also have 20 new ones that were just purchased but haven’t been distributed yet. The manager was going to hand them out next Monday.”
Jiang Cheng replied succinctly, “How about now?”
Since Jiang Cheng had solved the issue of feeding the property management staff, Master Luo turned around without a word and brought over a cardboard box. “They’re all here.”
Jiang Cheng asked, “Do they run on batteries?”
“Rechargeable,” Master Luo said.
The property manager had originally planned for the staff to charge the new walkie-talkies over the weekend so they could be distributed on Monday.
Conveniently, they were fully charged and ready to be used by the temporary owners’ committee.
Adding the four backups, there were a total of 24 walkie-talkies—both old and new—available for their use.
Each building had seven or eight representatives, and the more than 40 people present had filled the property management lobby. It definitely wasn’t enough, but it was better than nothing.
“Four per building,” Jiang Cheng allocated. “The contact person keeps one. The other three are shared, and the contact person is responsible for assigning them.”
Master Luo, ever perceptive, squeezed one out of the property management’s active inventory and handed it to Jiang Cheng. “You take one too.”
That way, Jiang Cheng wouldn’t have to use Building 2’s share.
Jiang Cheng accepted it. “Great. Will you have enough?”
“We’ll be fine,” Master Luo said. “You keep it.”
This was precisely why Song Jingshuo liked being the one in control.
When you’re the one in charge of a situation, you naturally gain the power to allocate resources, and resources naturally flow toward you.
Even though this was just a matter of a walkie-talkie, the principle still applied.
Everyone learned how to use the walkie-talkies and tested them out.
Jiang Cheng outlined the next steps for everyone and emphasized, “Do not split up. Make sure you have proper protection.”
“If someone gets injured in the process, confine them in their own apartment. Take their keys and lock the door from the outside.”
The door locks in the youth apartments were designed so that if locked from the outside, they couldn’t be opened from the inside.
“Mark the door and notify their neighbors. Observe them at regular intervals. If they mutate, we’ll handle it then.”
Everyone agreed, “Got it!”
Just as they were about to disperse, sounds came from the hallway. The noises were coming from the conference room—screams, cries for help, and the sound of collisions.
The lobby suddenly fell silent as everyone listened. Moments later, the screams and collisions in the conference room stopped. But then came the sound of someone pounding on a door, crying, “Let me out, let me out!” along with someone else cursing, “I’ll f*** your mother!”
Clearly, the conference room had lost another person.
Utterly hopeless, weren’t they? Completely hopeless now.
For every person who mutated, it further proved the high probability and irresistibility of infection and mutation.
The wailing cries were painful to hear.
“Let’s leave it at that,” Jiang Cheng said. “Everyone, hurry up and eat. Recruit as many volunteers as possible on the forum. The more people, the safer we’ll be.”
“Dismissed.”
Amid the crying from the conference room, the dozens of people from the temporary owners’ committee dispersed, filing out of the property management center.
It was nearly six in the evening, dusk. The sky wasn’t as bright as it had been in the afternoon; the sunlight had shifted from white to gold. People’s shadows grew longer.
A strange smell hung in the air—the odor of bodies being cremated in the square. It had permeated the entire complex and showed no sign of dissipating.
Everyone’s nostrils felt gritty and unclean.
“See you.”
“Going back now.”
“Stay safe.”
Having fought together, although the dozens of people couldn’t necessarily name everyone, they had all become familiar with each other’s faces. They exchanged greetings, split into six groups, and headed toward their respective buildings.
Jiang Cheng and the others from Building 2 got into the elevator. She and Li Jiangbing lived on the third floor, the first to get off.
They said to the others, “Keep an eye on the forum and group messages later.”
“Will do.”
As the elevator doors closed, Li Jiangbing glanced at Jiang Cheng and asked, “Are you going to keep carrying that cat around?”
Jiang Cheng replied, “It doesn’t really get in my way.”
True enough—on the way to the supermarket, even with a bulky lump against her chest, she had still swung her axe quite deftly.
What Li Jiangbing really wanted to say was, “With things the way they are, why are you still worrying about a cat?” But the cat hadn’t hindered Jiang Cheng from splitting open a mutator’s head with her axe, nor had it stopped her from thinking clearly and taking charge of things methodically.
Li Jiangbing smacked his lips and decided not to say anything unpleasant.
Jiang Cheng reminded him, “You’re responsible for posting the volunteer recruitment thread for our building.”
One person can’t do everything themselves, especially the one in charge. If she did all the work herself, she’d run herself into the ground.
Li Jiangbing was Building 2’s contact person. These tasks were his to handle.
Li Jiangbing made a gesture. “Don’t worry.”
Jiang Cheng returned to her apartment, hung up her keys, and lifted her clothes.
Mo Li had been nestled against her chest for hours. His body was now warm, as if he was slowly recovering. That was good.
Because of what had happened in the conference room, the supplies from the supermarket were still unpacked.
She put him back on the bed, first pulled out the new hot water bottle she’d bought that afternoon, filled it with hot water, wrapped it in a towel, and let Mo Li hug it with all four limbs. Then she covered him with a cotton blanket.
After that, Jiang Cheng rinsed some rice and put it in the rice cooker, sliced up some cured sausage and laid it over the rice, added two vegetables, closed the lid, and pressed the cook button.
Only after getting the rice started did she dry her hands and begin unpacking and organizing.
The handcart had limited space. She had crammed two bags of rice into it.
People can’t live without staples. Feeling it wasn’t enough, she also stuffed another bag into her hiking backpack. In total, she had bought three bags—15 kilograms of rice.
Then came the canned goods: 30 cans of various meats—spam, tuna, and others. Two large packs of pickled vegetables, containing numerous smaller packs inside. There was also fermented bean curd, which is high in salt and great for eating with rice.
30 salted duck eggs.
Compared to fresh eggs, salted duck eggs were clearly easier to preserve. Storage conditions were an important factor in her choice of food.
She still had plenty of toilet paper at home, so she hadn’t grabbed any this time—it took up too much space. But she did stock up on sanitary pads, soap, shampoo, and other fast-moving daily chemical products. These were running out at home, so she had no choice.
But the main reason her backpack was so heavy was that, besides the bag of rice, she had also packed a large bag of cat food. Those two items were particularly weighty.
She couldn’t ignore Mo Li’s existence. The cat food she’d bought in advance when preparing to own a cat was in small bags. If it became inconvenient to shop going forward, it definitely wouldn’t be enough.
Jiang Cheng put everything away, organizing it neatly, then opened her computer to take a look.
Each building’s contact person had posted a recruitment thread for volunteers to sweep their building. Clicking on any random one, she could see many enthusiastic sign-ups. That was the advantage of a community with many young people—they were passionate and quick to act.
Li Jiangbing had also posted his thread. Already about twenty people had responded. They agreed to meet in the ground floor lobby at 7:30 PM to act together.
Since everyone had gone to the supermarket that afternoon, even those who hadn’t participated in the morning’s garden cleanup now had some experience.
Everyone was passionately discussing how to protect their body’s vital areas in the forum.
Some were even eager to take it further, proposing that the community collectively respond to the government’s second notice and go out to clear the mutators from the surrounding streets.
Jiang Cheng took a look at the owner forums of other nearby residential complexes, and the tone there was immediately nowhere near as enthusiastic or passionate.
Gloom, misery, and grief were the normal, correct responses.
The complex across the street from the east gate of Youth Apartments was the “normal” case—many people were suffering, terrified, lost, and even despairing over the deaths of family members.
Youth Apartments was truly unique. The vast majority of residents were young people living alone, with no family members in sight.
Of course, there were certainly people who couldn’t reach their loved ones right now and were filled with worry. But ultimately, it was still different from the neighboring complex, where people watched their loved ones die horribly downstairs but dared not go to rescue them, or where one family member had mutated and been confined to a room by others who couldn’t bring themselves to deal with the situation.
Completely different circumstances.
Youth Apartments was too unique—one could even say too fortunate.
Jiang Cheng opened the owner forums of several nearby complexes and saw many posts asking for help.
There were also people trying to organize the owners to save themselves. But it was too difficult—the elderly wouldn’t allow it, children were crying in fear and clinging to their parents’ legs shouting “Don’t go!” Everyone was scattered like loose sand; nothing could be organized.
On the neighboring complex’s forum, Jiang Cheng even saw them discussing today’s panic buying at Youth Apartments. Owners from other complexes had seen it from their high-rise windows.
[How did they organize themselves?]
[Are there no more mutators in their complex?]
[I saw them clean up the mutators on the street too. I want to go to Duo Duo Supermarket too—my family is almost out of rice. But there are still so many mutators in our complex, there’s no way to even get downstairs!]
[Their complex is all young people, not like us. Sigh…]
The aroma of clay pot rice began to fill the room.
Jiang Cheng opened a few major well-known forums and saw new content.
[Zombies.]
[Let’s just call them zombies.]
[This is a concept from a foreign sci-fi horror movie. I think the mutators really resemble this.]
It was a new film released overseas this year, a horror movie with very novel content and concepts—practically an original in a new category.
It had just premiered in March, and reportedly China was considering importing the film next year.
Currently, only a very small number of people in China had seen it abroad or watched pirated copies at home. Even the pirated versions had only just arrived, and they were all cam-rips. Based on past patterns, it would take another month for clear DVD copies to become widely available on the streets.
Someone had taken a few seconds of footage from the film, turned it into a GIF, and uploaded it to the forum.
The walking gait, the chasing, the gnawing—the “zombies” in the movie really did resemble the mutators people were facing right now.
The only difference was the skin. The mutators’ skin was cyan. Original mutators were dark cyan; infected mutators were slightly lighter, a grayish cyan.
This post had been made that afternoon. By the time Jiang Cheng saw it, it already had hundreds of pages of replies.
It had also spread to other forums, and everyone seemed to have accepted the term.
Thus, both original mutators and infected mutators now had a unified new name—
[Zombies.]
And what about Mo Li?
What did Mo Li count as?
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