Li Jiangbing led a group of several dozen people pushing several dozen shopping carts, heading straight for Mai Duoduo again.
The small street outside the east gate was already very clean, completely free of zombies. Turning the corner onto the main road, they could see from a distance two more wandering original zombies that had drifted over from somewhere.
The group charged straight at them with their shopping carts, knocked them to the ground, and smashed their skulls in a few strikes.
When they arrived at Mai Duoduo’s entrance, the spot where the glass door had been shattered earlier was now empty, and the broken glass had been cleaned up.
The supermarket staff had set up a table across the opening, with sandbags stacked on and under it, blocking the doorless entrance.
The group pushed the sandbags aside, moved the table away, and entered the space between the two sets of doors.
The inner glass door didn’t have a floor lock, but a chain lock had been fastened around the handles.
Li Jiangbing bellowed at the top of his lungs: “Hey—! Someone come out—! If no one shows up, we’re smashing the glass!”
Hearing the commotion, Brother Dong rushed out with his employees, furious: “You’re back again! There’s no rice or flour left! No noodles! No canned goods, no salted duck eggs, no fermented bean curd—nothing! It’s all gone! What more do you want?”
Li Jiangbing: “We’re here for other stuff. Can you talk nicely or not?”
Robbers complaining that their victims weren’t being polite enough—was there no justice anymore? Brother Dong was so mad his nose almost went crooked.
But reality was against him. Compared to the previous two times, this group was much smaller, but still two or three times larger than their own.
And worst of all, they were from the youth apartments—the people Brother Dong hated most.
The people from Jixiang Jiayuan had been crowding at the door arguing for ages and still hadn’t dared to smash anything.
But that girl from the youth apartments had shown up and, without a word, swung an axe at the glass door.
That damned apartment complex was full of young, able-bodied men. In peacetime, Brother Dong was more afraid of elderly folks causing trouble, but in this chaotic situation, the elderly had all become paper tigers.
It was the organized, disciplined young people from the youth apartments that were truly intimidating.
“I won’t waste words. You figure it out yourself.” Li Jiangbing towered over Brother Dong and his people, looking down at them.
Brother Dong gritted his teeth and swallowed his pride. After cursing under his breath, he unlocked the door.
Li Jiangbing led his people rushing in.
They hadn’t been the last to leave yesterday, so they hadn’t seen how things ended up.
Today, they saw that many shelves were empty. Even for a large supermarket, without daily restocking, two communities could easily clear out the shelves.
Those elderly folks had apparently been fighting over everything, leaving a huge mess—many items knocked over.
Clearly, the supermarket staff didn’t see the point in cleaning up, so they’d left it as is. Now, at a glance, it was complete chaos—exactly what a place looked like after being looted.
Li Jiangbing led everyone straight to the household chemicals section. They loaded big barrels of disinfectant and bleach onto the carts.
“Hand sanitizer and soap too!”
“Don’t forget the insecticide!”
“There’s alcohol here! Want some?”
“Yes! That’s useful! Everyone, don’t be too rigid—if you think it’s useful, grab it!”
“Oh! Oh!”
“Then I need a new pot too.”
Brother Dong stood with his arms crossed, watching coldly from the side for a long time, until he finally couldn’t help asking: “What are you guys planning to do?”
Though everyone was busy, some were talkative, and while hauling supplies, they explained the garbage disposal plan their community had arranged.
Brother Dong was silent for a moment, then asked: “What about the other communities?”
Then: “Did you burn the bodies in your community?”
The youth apartment residents answered: “We burned them. Do you have bodies here? How are you handling them?”
Brother Dong’s gaze flickered for a moment, but he still answered: “We put them in the cold storage.”
Everyone paused.
“Holy shit! You mean the cold storage where they keep the meat?”
“I grabbed some frozen meat the day before yesterday! Were they already in there by then?”
Brother Dong chuckled darkly: “We put them in there first thing Sunday morning.”
That day, the employees hadn’t known what to do. As luck would have it, he’d shown up—the only manager around. At the time, he’d still been thinking about “later,” when the police would come to handle things, so he’d directed them to store the bodies in the cold storage for the time being.
Everyone let out a collective groan.
Brother Dong steered the conversation back: “I’m asking you—what about the other communities?”
Everyone was now pissed off just looking at him. They rolled their eyes: “What do other communities have to do with us? We can’t save everyone! Look at those people from Jixiang Jiayuan—we risked our necks yesterday morning to go over and help them clear out zombies. Apart from a few leaders who had some decency, did any of the others even say thank you? Damn it.”
Brother Dong asked: “Have the other communities burned their bodies?”
” How would we know?” someone said.
Another said: “Jixiang Jiayuan burned theirs—we helped with that. Don’t know about the rest.”
Brother Dong was worried.
He now deeply regretted that on Sunday morning, he’d been so single-mindedly determined to come to work.
His family had originally been suburban farmers. They’d since bought property in the city, but they still kept their house out in the countryside. If he’d been thinking clearly on Sunday, he’d have just run straight to the countryside.
His parents, wife, and kids were all out there.
A lot of people from the surrounding villages had moved into the city, leaving many yards empty. With much lower population density, there would naturally be far fewer zombies.
Now he was trapped here, surrounded by several large communities with ultra-high population density, and he didn’t dare risk going home. He couldn’t express how bitter he felt.
As someone who worked in a large supermarket, he had a very clear understanding of “scale” and “quantity.” Just thinking about how much trash these several large communities generated every day made his vision go dark.
And then there were the abandoned corpses on the streets outside, already swarming with flies.
Brother Dong clearly foresaw that the environment in this area—no, not just this area, but the entire city—was about to deteriorate sharply.
He had this feeling that things were going to get worse and worse and worse, and there was nothing he could do about it.
At that moment, he envied the youth apartments.
That impressive girl had gathered a few people who all seemed capable and decisive, and they’d taken charge of managing the whole community.
He didn’t know if what they were doing would actually work, but at least it gave people hope.
Here he was, hiding in the supermarket with a few colleagues, with no end in sight.
The more he thought about it, the more agitated he became.
Li Jiangbing and his group of several dozen swept through the nearly empty supermarket once more.
Looking around now, the only food left was mostly snacks that weren’t filling and had no nutritional value. High-calorie emergency items like chocolate were completely gone.
The emptiest shelves were the rice, flour, and cooking oil sections.
The toilet paper shelves were empty too.
The youth apartment residents filled every cart they’d brought, and then jammed miscellaneous odds and ends into every crack and crevice between bottles.
After all, they weren’t going to leave empty-handed.
They wheeled their carts clattering back out.
Li Jiangbing even said goodbye to Brother Dong: “We’re heading off.”
Brother Dong had no fight left in him.
After they left, Brother Dong gathered his employees and told them about the latest arrangements the youth apartments had made. He said: “The youth apartments have some capable people. We haven’t thought of any of this.”
“We’re going to need these disinfectants and supplies too. Let’s go check the storage room now and move everything we need.”
Someone asked: “Brother Dong, why do we need to move things?”
Brother Dong’s expression was grim as he laid it out for them: “The youth apartments, Jixiang Jiayuan, Yujing Xiangyuan, Shanshui Yayuan, Deqing Li, Lekang Jiayuan… So far, only the youth apartments and Jixiang Jiayuan have come. The rest of these communities haven’t shown up yet, and I’m telling you, they will sooner or later.”
When they came, they wouldn’t come empty-handed. Especially for those who hadn’t come yet—the longer they waited, the more depleted their home supplies would be, and the more desperate they’d become.
If the shelves were empty, they wouldn’t just leave willingly. They’d definitely storm the storage room.
There was no law anymore. At least for this period before the government could mount an effective response, there was no law.
The useful supplies had to be moved in advance. They themselves needed to survive too—they had their own consumption.
Everyone understood, and went off to carry out the task with worried expressions.
Li Jiangbing and his group were returning fully loaded. Halfway back, someone suddenly called out: “Brother Li, wait a second!”
Jiang Cheng was small in stature—she called Li Jiangbing directly by his name, “Jiangbing,” and he’d trot along beside her without complaint.
No one else dared to call him that. These past two days, everyone addressed him as “Brother Li.”
Nowadays, who was “brother” and who was “little brother” wasn’t determined by age—height and build decided it.
“Brother Li.” The person who’d called out pointed to a shop on the perimeter of the community. “There’s a hardware store over there. I think we should check it out.”
Around the outside of the community was a circle of small shops, including the convenience pharmacy that Jiang Cheng had led people to break into. This guy had just turned his head and spotted the sign reading “Hardware & Renovation Supplies.”
For a large group of men, did they need a reason to go to a hardware store?
No.
It was like seeing a perfectly straight stick on the road—you just had to take it home. No reason needed.
As soon as he said it, Li Jiangbing agreed immediately: “Let’s go.”
The group of several dozen headed over in a bustling wave.
The hardware store had a roll-up shutter door. The men pried it open easily enough.
Cramming inside, everyone’s eyes lit up: “Wow, so much good stuff!”
Back at the youth apartment community, Yang Xinyan ran into the clubhouse to find Jiang Cheng: “Miss Jiang!”
She was flustered: “They refuse to work anymore!”
Her voice echoed through the pool hall, and everyone turned to look at her.
“Who?” Jiang Cheng asked.
Yang Xinyan had run herself red in the face and was out of breath: “The cleaners!”
“They said, since no one’s paying them a salary, why should they work. So they just stopped.”
“I tried to reason with them, but they wouldn’t listen.”
Jiang Cheng cut straight to the point: “Who’s the ringleader?”
For many things, there always had to be one person who jumped out first before others dared to follow. Without that “first one,” many people would keep complaining and enduring in silence.
Master Luo guessed directly: “Is it Liu Hongwang?”
Yang Xinyan nodded: “Yes! It’s him!”
It figured—this guy was either a troublemaker or a slacker in normal times. Otherwise, Master Luo wouldn’t have guessed it so quickly.
Sure enough, Master Luo said: “He’s never been a good worker—always getting complaints. The manager had told me before that as soon as they hired someone new, they’d fire him. They hadn’t found a replacement yet, and then this happened.”
Then people turned into zombies and everything went haywire. The manager was trapped at home and couldn’t come in either.
Jiang Cheng exchanged glances with Song Jingshuo and a few others.
Jiang Cheng: “Let’s go check it out.”
The interim committee followed her.
People always protect their own interests. In a community this large, with thousands of residents, if the property staff threw up their hands and quit, the environment would deteriorate immediately.
In the end, it would all have to be pushed back onto the residents anyway—everyone would have to pitch in.
For the necessary, unavoidable tasks, people would have no choice but to take them on. But you’re property staff—serving the residents is your job. What gives you the right to refuse?
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