"You...you let go...you bitch, I'll kill you!"

Liu Peng frantically clawed at the rope around his neck with both hands, and soon fell into a state of dizziness caused by suffocation.

After replicating the Bone Spike Zombie's abilities, he could only use them for two minutes, after which he would be relatively weak for 24 hours. However, Liu Peng used Zhao Fan's fear to wager a psychological war, betting that Zhao Fan would keep his secret out of fear.

The fact that Xu Jing was allowed to get on the bus shows that the driver completely disregarded this seemingly poor and powerless single mother and wanted to get a free ride.

Unexpectedly, this seemingly gentle and weak woman actually wanted to kill him!

Xu Jing remained calm, her grip tightening until the veins on the back of her hand bulged. She glanced at Zhao Fan, who was utterly terrified, and said, "What are you all standing there for? Are you waiting for him to come to his senses and kill us both?"

"Oh...oh, I'll help."

Zhao Fan was assigned to the driver's seat by Liu Peng. She hurriedly stopped the car, paused for a moment, and then immediately came over to help Xu Jing tighten the rope.

"Please...please...I'll go back and transfer you to the core area..."

Liu Peng's brain was beginning to suffer from oxygen deprivation, and his life flashed before his eyes. Seeing that threats were ineffective, he resolutely lowered himself and begged like a dog, "I'll make sure you get everything, including your daughter! Spare my life!"

When her daughter was mentioned, Xu Jing's expression changed slightly, but she tightened her grip on her hands.

When Lu Sheng and his men opened the car door, what they saw was Xu Jing and Zhao Fan strangling Liu Peng to death, each holding one end of a rope.

A small mountain of supplies appeared out of nowhere above the corpse, with the top layer consisting of documents and medicines that had just been collected from the research institute.

Supplies were being distributed on site; anyone who saw this scene would be confused.

"Holy crap." Zhang Xiaojuan was startled when she saw the corpse in the car, which had swelled up to the size of a purple eggplant. Her gaze towards the two women held a strange look. "Alright, sis, he's dead. If you had pushed any harder, his head would have been blown off."

The two of them then came to their senses, let go of each other's hands, and slumped into their seats, panting heavily.

Lu Sheng glanced at the two outstretched palms.

The surface of the hemp rope has many fine, rough fibers; a person with delicate skin would get several fibers stuck in their skin after squeezing it a few times. The palms of the two people in front of me were covered in scratches and blisters, their skin stung by the fine fibers.

You can imagine how much effort it took.

"Du Ze and the others were all killed by Liu Peng. If we hadn't killed him, it's hard to say whether we would even be able to return to the Deep Space Base alive." Xu Jing slumped in her chair, panting heavily, large beads of sweat rolling down her neck.

People are instinctively nervous when they do something for the first time, let alone something like murder.

Although I've become almost numb from clearing out zombies in the apocalypse, this is the first time I've ever killed a living person with my own hands.

Sun Tiantian frowned slightly, "How do you know it was Liu Peng who killed him? Why didn't you say so inside?"

“Exactly, you came all alone to kill Liu Peng. What if you get killed instead?” Sun Lu felt sorry for Xu Jing, a single mother. She bent down to check the palms of Xu Jing and Zhao Fan, asked her subordinate for a pair of tweezers, and carefully removed the tiny fibers stuck in their skin.

Xu Jing winced slightly in pain, "I'm afraid you won't believe me if I tell you, and what if Liu Peng makes the first move if I waste time?"

“But… how could that good-for-nothing Liu Peng kill so many people at once?” Sun Lu asked doubtfully, turning her gaze to Zhao Fan, who had been present the whole time.

"Liu Peng did kill them all! He threatened me and told me not to tell anyone!" Zhao Fan broke down in tears, describing the events of the scene to Lu Sheng and the others in detail.

Xu Jing staggered off the car, her steps unsteady. She leaned against the door, breathing in the fresh air. "Liu Peng thought he had done something perfect, but he probably wouldn't even notice someone like me from the bottom of society."

The passive skill of a sonic ability user is a hundredfold increase in hearing, and this passive skill can be freely turned on and off by the ability user.

At that moment, Xu Jing had just escaped through the ventilation duct and was at her most alert, with her hearing heightened to an extremely high level. She heard every single word of Liu Peng and Du Ze's conversation.

Fearing that Liu Peng would kill the rest of them to claim all the credit, Xu Jing, in a moment of crisis, decided to strike first.

The remaining cars had already driven far ahead. Sun Lu weighed Liu Peng's body in her hand, then simply dragged him out of the car and dumped him on the side of the road, saying, "Don't take up space meant for good people."

Lu Sheng put all the supplies that Liu Peng had revealed into his spatial storage, then turned to Sun Lu and said meaningfully, "Miss Zhao was frightened while acting as a guide, so it would be better to send her to her companions."

Sun Lu quickly understood and took Xu Jing back to the bus, arranging for the deputy captain, Li Jingjing, to drive Liu Peng's remaining car to take Zhao Fan to the front vehicle.

The saying goes, "Every man for himself." While it's not entirely wrong for Zhao Fan to help Liu Peng cover up his crimes in order to protect himself, it's always unsettling to have someone like that around.

After driving back to the deep space base, Lu Sheng picked out a few unimportant documents from the literature and had Sun Lu take them back to hand in, while the rest were given to Xu Yi.

The remaining survivors at Qingshan Base were all assigned to the research institute by the Deep Space Base management. Lu Sheng and her group also successfully obtained enough contribution points to enter the core area.

As for the deaths of Du Ze, Liu Peng, and others, no one cared at all.

In the apocalypse, dozens, if not more, die every day; everyone has long been used to it.

"Contribution rankings will be recalculated monthly, with a bottom-ranking elimination system. Starting now, each of you will have 5,000 points added to your ID card for the next month, which can be used for shopping and spending. The points will be cleared at the end of the month, so don't be stingy. Eat and drink as you please. Good days don't come every day."

My dear reader, there's more to this chapter! Please click the next page to continue reading—even more exciting content awaits!