Chapter 142 The Last Piece of Land

Diving hundreds of kilometers away and finding the exact direction in the intricate and dark water currents deep underground is something that other ships simply cannot do, but her raft can.

She only needs to set the destination on the water map. If the route and drifting time appear on it afterwards, it means that this underground river can be traversed smoothly.

Otherwise, it means that this underground waterway is not feasible, and she will have to find another way, such as finding other rivers, or traveling by land to bypass this primitive mountain range.

Lu Zheng didn't say anything, and carefully checked the water route planned by Shu Fu from beginning to end again. If everything went well, according to the drifting speed of Shu Fu's raft, even with the land section, they would be able to complete the trip in a very short time.

Going by water is much faster than going ashore from the waters near Gongmang County!

"Are you really sure you want to go? Maybe there's just a temporary signal problem on their end?" Lu Zheng didn't object, but Shu Fu had just sent them a message during dinner, and it wasn't even midnight yet, only a few hours had passed.

Currently, the land signal in Xizhou Province is affected by the weather and is very unstable. It is normal for calls to not go through or for messages to be received with delay.

When they were still in Cham County, the information exchange with Shu Fu was often not immediate. Sometimes it took several hours, and sometimes even more than ten hours.

It's not just the signal that causes slow message response, for example there may be sudden emergencies on their side, such as extreme natural disasters.

Because of the slow response to news in such a short period of time, she immediately made a plan to go upstream and go deep into the hinterland of Xizhou Province to find them. What if she had just set out and Chen Fa had just left Zhashui County?

Wouldn't it be a direct miss?

Because in Shu Fu's plan, the river that can directly cut into the plateau land is at the southern border, and the water area where they were originally scheduled to meet is in Gongmang County, which is east of Xizhou Province.

If she rashly changed her plans now, wouldn't she miss the other party?

"Chen Fa wouldn't set off without any news." It was difficult for Shu Fu to explain how she felt at the moment, because Lu Zheng had not experienced the intercom failure in Wei County.

She knew that what Lu Zheng said made sense. The other party was afraid that she would be too busy, only to find out that she was overthinking and was busy for nothing.

But - what if?

Just think that she was overthinking and overdoing things. There was no loss. After all, the raft drifted very fast and did not consume fuel. If she was really wrong, she could just return the same way.

In the end, Shu Fu decided to follow his intuition and set the estuary of the river in the southern border area of ​​Fengshang Plateau as the destination, set off immediately, and arrive at the fastest speed.

The distance from the east to the south of this stretch of water is about 900 kilometers, which means we won't arrive until tomorrow morning.

By then, the other friends will have woken up, and she can call everyone to hold another meeting to listen to other people's suggestions. This period of time can also be used as a buffer period to wait for Chen Fa's reply.

If there is still no news from Chen Fa by tomorrow morning, she will go directly from the sea into the river, upstream, cut into the plateau land, and go to find them!

**

9 hours later, in the waters south of Fengshang Plateau.

Shu Fu temporarily changed the house on the drifting island into a villa. The glass balcony here is larger, and her raft can be equipped with an internet card to access the Internet at any time. So she issued a text notice before going to bed last night, asking everyone to come to the emergency meeting after getting up. She would also prepare breakfast and eat it at her place.

Although we don't have to go to work now, everyone is full of enthusiasm for infrastructure construction and basically gets up early. Even though there are only two positions for employees at present, everyone will go to help when they are free during the day.

To them, this is their own home. Although the accounts must be kept clear, there is no need to be too fussy about some tasks. Everyone will spontaneously lend a hand when they see it.

Therefore, at about eight o'clock, everyone had gathered on the balcony of Shufu Villa.

After she equipped the satellite network card, Lanlan squatted in front of the tablet again and swiped it, and then some new news related to Sand City came out.

——A strange dark yellow smoke appeared in the suburbs of Sand City, which would not dissipate easily in the rain.

——A large-scale circuit failure occurred in the counties surrounding Shacheng, resulting in signal interruption in the entire area.

These messages only appeared briefly on the Internet, and disappeared shortly after being uploaded to the Internet.

…

Others were also worried about Chen Fa's safety, especially since he was still out of contact at this moment. Coupled with the new information Lan Lan had received, everyone quickly decided to implement the countercurrent plan!

By the time the raft reached the river estuary on the southern border at a drifting speed of 100, everyone had hurriedly finished a simple breakfast and checked and improved the upstream plan. The method was very simple. Everyone raised questions based on their own ideas and Shu Fu answered them.

Everyone has different ideas, and Shu Fu cannot cover everything. It is possible that the questions raised by others are exactly the parts she has missed.

"...So, actually, it's not clear whether we can cross the underground river, because we still have to walk a section of land in the middle. We can only know after we get to the lake and put the raft back into the water, right?" Jiang Dai was very clear, "Does the car have enough fuel?"

"Yes..." Shu Fu nodded. When she was about to continue speaking, she heard her cell phone ringing. It was her satellite phone.

She picked up the number and was stunned. She answered it immediately: "Fei Fei?"

The others who were originally checking news online or studying maps suddenly stopped what they were doing and looked at Shu Fu.

"It's me." Chen Fa's voice came from the other end of the phone.

Her voice was calm, and there was nothing unusual in her voice. She said that she called to tell her that they would have to stay in Zhashui County for a few more days and probably would not be able to meet up with them in Gongmang County so quickly.

Shu Fu listened quietly and asked again: "That's it? Don't you have anything else to tell me, Fafa?"

She emphasized the word "FaFa". Shu Fu did not wait for her to answer and continued, "Your satellite phone has been in a no-signal state since dinner time yesterday. Also, this is Zheng Feifei's number. This phone is not a satellite phone, but an ordinary phone. It was in a no-signal state just like your phone last night. Why can her phone suddenly get through now? Why are you talking to me with her phone? What are you trying to hide from me?"

Shu Fu asked one question after another, and Chen Fa sighed softly on the other end: "You are so smart, how can we hide it from you?"

"What happened? Everyone is here. Don't think we won't worry if you don't tell us."

"In fact, until now we ourselves don't know what happened. Don't worry, just listen to me slowly. We are all together and safe now." Chen Fa's voice was still calm and steady.

She told Shu Fu that all signals in Zhashui County were indeed cut off, and even satellite phones could not make calls.

The reason why she can now use Zheng Feifei's mobile phone to call her is because Zheng Feifei has a special prop that can ignore all external conditions and allow the bound mobile phone to make calls and send messages normally.

No matter if the person holding the mobile phone is in the desert, on the other side of the planet, or even in space.

In addition, props can also enable the mobile phone to use the Internet normally. However, using the Internet is different from making calls. There will be some time restrictions, that is, there will be CD time.

Under normal circumstances, this item seems a bit useless compared to Chen Fa's grab, but under special circumstances, the incredible effect of this item is revealed.

Before making this call, they had used this phone to check the outside news online, but perhaps because the Internet was cut off at the place where the accident happened, even if they could get online, they would not be able to get more information from the Internet.

But the six of them have been trapped in the short-term rental house for fifteen hours, and what happened outside during these fifteen hours has given them some understanding of their current situation.

Since Shu Fu wanted to hear the truth, Chen Fa no longer concealed anything.

**

"Xiao Fu, the situation is very bad. It should be the organization that blocked the north of Youcheng before, taking advantage of the recent turmoil... I don't know how many counties they have blocked, nor do I know the situation in the urban area of ​​Shacheng. Is there anyone outside who knows about it, and is there anyone planning a rescue...

At present, Zhashui County is completely blocked, but not in the traditional way... During the day, they release a dark yellow smoke, which will cause normal people to go crazy in a short time after inhaling it. Their minds will be confused, they will lose their self-awareness, and their emotions will go into a manic state, and they will rush up to attack anyone they see. It looks a bit like the state of ichthyosis patients entering the aggressive stage. We guess that the yellow smoke should have some kind of nerve stimulating effect, and it is very likely extracted from ichthyosis patients...

When it got dark last night, a large number of patients with advanced ichthyosis poured into Zhashui County. They were more aggressive than the ones we saw in Youcheng at that time. Their skin had turned into a light gray stratum corneum. Normal people were no match for them at all... We saw many people who tried to break out at night being killed.

What's worse is that before dawn today, the first group of people who inhaled the yellow smoke began to show changes. Their skin quickly cracked and bled. The smoke not only irritated their nerves, but also seemed to cause them to suffer from ichthyosis, and the whole disease process was accelerated several times...

After dawn today, the thugs who created panic in the streets and buildings yesterday evening came again. This time, they drove cars and dumped the food and water materials collected from all over the county on the street, allowing those with ichthyosis to eat. More food was piled up in the shops along the street and set on fire. Fortunately, it rained heavily today, so the fire did not spread to the upper floors of the buildings. But obviously, they wanted to destroy the rations of us survivors hiding in various places in the buildings, and let us die here...

They installed loudspeakers on their cars and paraded through the streets of the county, broadcasting messages over and over again, advocating evolution and symbiosis, criticizing the superpowers as aliens who were fighting for the land of our planet. They said that evolution was the only way out, because soon the last piece of land on this planet would be submerged, even in Xizhou Province.

Xiaofu, I can’t understand their motives for doing these things, but obviously, they want more ordinary people to be infected with ichthyosis…”

Everything that happened in Zhashui County from yesterday evening to today was too crazy and scary, even for Chen Fa, who had experienced the most among them.

Shu Fu was silent for a long time before she spoke: "Since you have this prop, why didn't you call me last night?"

"Xiao Fu..." Chen Fa sighed. This person always gets the point right away.

"Have you tried calling the police and SOS?"

"It's no use. The line is not working."

"What about spreading the news online?"

"We tried to ask for help through text messages, but the post disappeared very quickly. Fortunately, the IP address of the post using that prop could not be found. We did not dare to post photos, fearing that someone would find us based on the buildings and streets in the photos..."

"The situation is so bad, and you lied to me at the beginning and said you had to stay for a few more days?" Shu Fu was a little angry. While speaking, he quickly took out the map panel and set up the first upstream route on it.

From the current location of the raft, go upstream along the river that meets the water area, pass the remaining land of the countries adjacent to Hua State, continue westward after the river enters the territory of Hua State on Fengshang Plateau, and finally land on the shore before the river changes course to the north again.

This section of waterway is the longest but also the smoothest of the entire journey, because the river is very wide and basically no problems will occur.

Sure enough, after the destination was set, the route came out quickly. It was more than 500 kilometers and would reach the shore in about 5 hours.

"Now that you know everything, I won't hide it from you. Xiaofu, you know me. Grandma and I won't sit still and wait for death. We will find a way to break out."

"Are you planning to leave Zhashui County on your own?"

"Yes, Zheng Feifei has checked the streets and routes of Zhashui County before. It's about twelve kilometers away from the nearest river that can be left. As long as we can successfully walk these twelve kilometers and enter the water, we will be safe." What Chen Fa said was right. Currently, there were six people in their group and they had three rafts. Except for Wu Shaoshan, everyone else only needed to take out the raft and hide in the raft hut that outsiders could not enter.

Wu Shaoshan can take her raft. She has weapons, so it should be no problem for her to protect Wu Shaoshan.

The river meanders for more than 200 kilometers. As long as they can successfully reach the water's edge and drift along the river, they can escape.

Hearing this, Shu Fu's expression brightened.

She was originally thinking about how to accommodate the other people who could not stay on the raft temporarily after they arrived near Zhashui County while she was on the way to Zhashui County to rescue people.

Now, if Chen Fa and the others can successfully complete the twelve kilometers, they will be able to reunite with them. They can be placed in a hotel with a 100% safety factor, and she will lead them to leave smoothly.

However, when Chen Fa heard that Shu Fu was going to tow two rafts to Zhashui County, he immediately felt something was not good.

"Stop it. There are so many people there, and Zhashui County is in the inland of the plateau, more than 1,200 kilometers away from the two sides! How are you going to get here?" When Chen Fa said this, Shu Fu heard other people's voices on the other end of the phone, and they all seemed to be shocked by the news.

"We are already on the way. Don't worry, we have a plan. Even if you want to break out, you have to wait until after dark. The sun sets late in Zhashui County. Conservatively speaking, you will have to wait until around 10 pm before setting off. By that time, if everything goes well, we will have already arrived in Zhashui County."

There was a rustling sound on the other end of the phone, and it seemed that someone had changed. Soon, Zheng Feifei's voice came: "Shu Fu! I asked Chen Fa to make this call today, not to let you take the risk to save us!"

"I know you just want to delay the meeting so that we won't worry."

"Shu Fu, we can save ourselves!"

"I know, so we won't go into the county town. You have to come to the river on your own."

"Shu Fu..."

"Fei Fei, I promised you that if you really reach a point where you can't retreat, I will find a way to get here no matter how far away you are. You should know in your heart that reaching the water does not mean you are safe. Twelve kilometers is not long, and it is still within the scope of Zhashui County. If they really want to trap you, they can't miss the waterway. Your raft is too conspicuous. It is obviously the raft of a superpower. You will become a target and you won't be able to go far..." Shu Fu paused, his voice slow and firm, "Fei Fei, tell Chen Fa and others that I will definitely arrive in Zhashui County before dark!"

After Shu Fu hung up the phone, she found that the other friends were looking at her. Some of them, like Yao Ruoyun, looked confident and full of fighting spirit. Anyway, she had never doubted anything she said.

Some people also thought of the unknown underground river route, and asked her with concern: "Can it succeed?"

"Yes." Shu Fu nodded. Even if there was a problem with the water route of the underground river and they had to take a detour through the mountain, she had a way to buy back time from other places.

**

Four hours later, the raft reached the shore an hour ahead of schedule.

Not long after the voyage began, Shu Fu asked everyone else to return to the raft, and then replaced his villa with a small primitive house.

Afterwards, she issued a voice announcement to the entire raft, and a few minutes later, she used the first "temporary acceleration card". The raft's already fast speed increased again, and under the protection of the protective shield, it rushed past at a high speed like a high-speed train on water.

It only took her half an hour to gain back some time, and she arrived at the landing point more than an hour earlier than planned.

The second part of the journey is by land, which takes about 100 kilometers to reach the lake in the heart of the mountains. However, this part of the road is all provincial roads, so as long as you are not particularly unlucky and encounter extreme weather during the journey, there should be no problem.

The raft docked near the foot of the mountain, where there are few people living nearby. It is far away from the border and more than 3,000 meters above sea level. However, due to the quality of the surrounding soil, it is not suitable for planting, and there are no county towns or villages within a hundred miles.

In the future, when the government has developed all other cities and counties, big and small, in Xizhou Province, perhaps all these barren lands will be included in the scope of construction.

Shu Fu did not close the protective shield. He asked everyone to carry a backpack, put on a mask and a hat, and put on a raincoat on the outside. After making all the preparations, they got off the raft directly.

After everyone got off the raft, she took out three cars, her own SUV and the two that Lu Zheng and his friends drove when they came. Yao Ruoyun and her family just happened to sit with her.

Her car had been inspected when she was bored, and it was not only in very good condition, but the fuel tank was also full. She took out some fuel and asked Lu Zheng and others to refill it.

Just as Lu Zheng was about to say that they also had fuel, Shu Fu had already opened the lid, taken out the hose, and used the siphon principle to add fuel to them. After that, he turned back to look at Lu Zheng and asked, "What did you just say?"

"..." Lu Zheng silently put his fuel back, "It's okay."

Shu Fu's car still led the way on land. She had a map downloaded on her phone. She had already saved the route she wanted to take, so she could just open the navigation and use it.

Before getting in the car, she found three walkie-talkies, tuned the channels, and gave the other two to the other party to facilitate communication on the road.

The journey was not peaceful. When the three cars were halfway through the journey, the rain outside began to get heavier, with heavy rain accompanied by lightning and thunder.

Shu Fu picked up the intercom and said, "Attention, the weather forecast predicts that in the next few days, Xizhou Province will experience the longest and most extensive thunderstorm, which should be the one now. Everyone check your car and make sure all the windows are closed. Also, don't use your cell phone. It's best to put your cell phone away and try not to get close to the car door."

"Got it!" Lu Zheng's voice came from the second car.

"Got it!" It was Xu Jiechu's voice from the third car.

His voice sounded a little excited and thrilled. Somehow, they had left the safety of the raft hotel and were driving through the barren mountains to carry out a rescue mission that they were not sure whether would be successful.

But from the time Shu Fu announced that the raft should speed up until now, he has been in an extremely excited state.

He was a coward, he admitted it, in his life, he was always in a state of being rescued, he also knew that he was a useless person. After the peaceful world collapsed, if his elder brother hadn't been dragging him, he would have died countless times.

But this time, he, like everyone else, actually participated in the rescue operation that involved trekking through mountains and wading through rivers!

He was not afraid at all, probably because Shu Fu was so confident when she described her plan. It was an impossible task for anyone else, but for her, all the impossibilities became possible!

For no reason, he felt a sense of pride in his heart. Even though he was just passively following the team, all this made him excited.

There was a continuous heavy rain outside the car. Looking out from the car window, the outside had become a world of water and the car seemed to be driving in the middle of a waterfall.

Thunder rolled in the sky, occasionally exploding and deafening, but fortunately, when the rainstorm began, they were already halfway there, but due to the limited visibility, the car speed slowed down a lot.

After two hours of arduous trek, they finally reached the lake between the mountains before the thunderstorm broke out.