The place they chose to camp was next to the highway. From the time they left Xingcheng until now, they had seen many people carrying luggage and packages, walking in groups of three or five on the roads in all directions. They were all trying to get away from the city where the plague was about to break out, and to go to the sparsely populated countryside and mountains to find new life.

Si Nan and his companions brought a lot of supplies. In order to avoid being constantly intercepted when leaving the city like today, and to avoid places with many ruins and corpses, they chose to walk along the highway towards the stone mountain, which could greatly reduce unnecessary trouble.

After the high temperature started, there were basically no vehicles driving on the highway. The highway to Shishan was empty. Although many sections of the road were broken by the earthquake, it was better to take a detour than to squeeze with the crowds.

When they rode and pushed tricycles here before, they saw many undealt with corpses scattered among the ruins, emitting a strong and foul odor of decay.

Countless flies and mosquitoes were biting the corpses, and there were also groups of carnivores such as rats and wild dogs interspersed among them.

After eating and drinking, they run around with their bodies full of bacteria and viruses. Once you encounter them, it is difficult not to be infected with the plague virus.

Therefore, along the way, Cheng Suming asked everyone to wear masks and gloves, put on the disposable cloth shoe covers he gave them, and tie the trouser legs to the shoes tightly with ropes.

By doing this, if you see mice while moving and don't have time to kill them, you can kick them away with your feet and then throw away the shoe covers you used to kick them to avoid being infected with the plague virus.

Second, many parts of the highway are built on mountains, rivers, and viaducts. In order to avoid those dangerous sections, they have to take detours and walk through the wilderness, fields, and trails under the highway.

These places had been soaked in stagnant water for a long time, with no one taking care of them and garbage everywhere.

Today, almost a month after the water receded, many tenacious vegetation and grass have grown up, some of which have grown as high as the calves. Many unknown insects are hidden in them. Wearing shoe covers is also to prevent those insects and leeches from drilling into the pants and biting, causing bacterial infection.

Thick darkness enveloped the earth. The trees in the grove were shaken to and fro by the earthquake. Except for a few insects hiding in the grass and chirping occasionally, the whole forest was relatively quiet.

A group of people arrived here before dark. Sinan first released two geese into the forest to investigate and see if there were any large wild animals or groups of snakes and rats hiding in the woods.

If there is one, the whitebait will cry to warn people, and this place is no longer suitable for camping.

Fortunately, the two geese circled the woods and found nothing unusual. They were happily eating the newly grown green weeds in the forest. Then they decided to camp here.

Before they set out from the Cheng family's annex, Si Nan lied that she and Cheng Su Ming had found several tents in a ruin, and gave one set to Cheng Wei and Yang Wentao, and one set to Sheng Youqing's family. When they pushed the tricycle to a position in the forest where the trees were not completely tilted and could cover the location of their tents, everyone set up camp in a triangle according to Cheng Su Ming's instructions.

The three tents were set up in a triangle, mainly to make the tents closer together so that if something happened during sleep at night, they could wake up at the first moment and help each other.

After the earthquake, more than half of the people across the country died. Now the national government and the army are busy with rescue and relief work. All places have lost control, and various dark forces are gradually rising.

People's hearts are gradually becoming distorted. In order to survive, many people can break the moral bottom line and do things that they would never dare to think of before.

In this situation, it is very dangerous for them to camp in the wild, especially in these desolate mountains and ridges. It would be very dangerous if they were targeted by someone with ulterior motives.

They can only be careful and hide their tracks to avoid being targeted by certain dark gangs.

After setting up the tent, Sheng's mother took Sheng Youqing and Sheng Youbin to search the woods for dry branches. They returned to the tent, lit a bonfire, and prepared to cook their food.

Seeing this, Cheng Suming frowned and said, "Aunt Sheng, put out the fire. The fire will attract many light-repellent creatures and bring dangerous germs. We have homemade steamed buns and dry food. Try not to use fire at night. If you want to eat warm food, do it tomorrow morning when the view is clear."

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't think it through." Mother Sheng wanted to do more within her ability to repay Sinan and the others for their help and care. Hearing what Cheng Suming said, she acted like a child who had done something wrong and hurried to put out the fire.

There is a ditch nearby, filled with sewage that has flowed down from somewhere unknown.

Si Nan saw her holding a large basin and trying to fetch water from the ditch to put out the fire, so he hurriedly stopped her and said, "Aunt Sheng, just grab a shovel and scoop up some dirt nearby to put out the fire, no need to fetch water. The water there is so polluted that even Dabai and Xiaobai, who love to bathe in it, don't want to get close to it. It must be contaminated by corpse water and bacteria, so you'd better not get close. Besides, if you put out the fire with water, it will leave thick smoke in the air, exposing us here, which is far less than covering the fire with dirt."

"Xiao Nan, you are right. I have lived for so many years, but I don't know as much as you young people. I am really ashamed for causing you trouble everywhere." Mother Sheng said with a guilty look on her face.

"Aunt Sheng, don't say that. Everyone has their own strengths and weaknesses. We understand this aspect, but maybe we are not as good as you in other aspects. There is no need to cause any trouble."

Si Nan took out an ordnance shovel from his tricycle. Cheng Su Ming took it and shoveled dirt near the fire. She helped beside him and turned to Sheng's mother and said, "Speaking of which, Aunt Sheng, I have to thank you for helping me take care of Da Bai and the others. On the first day when we arrived at the Cheng family's annex building, I casually mentioned that Da Bai and the others like to play in the water. You got up early the next morning and carried them downstairs to the artificial lake to let them play in the lake. It just happened to miss the time when the Ge family went upstairs. Otherwise, Da Bai and his wife would have been caught and stewed by the Ge family's gang that day."

Mother Sheng was also helping to dig the soil and build the fire. She smiled gently and said, "Dabai and Xiaobai can be regarded as our family's saviors. Dabai is so smart and obedient, he is not picky about food and doesn't bite people randomly. No matter what I cook for them, they eat it with relish, as well-behaved as a child. I like it very much. Of course, I try my best to satisfy them with whatever they like. You don't need to thank me."

Just at this time, Dabai came back with Xiaobai who had eaten their fill of tender grass. Seeing them shoveling soil and building a fire, Dabai ran over with its big webbed feet, stretched its goose neck and looked towards the middle, making quacking sounds in its mouth, as if asking them what they were doing.

Mother Sheng reached out and touched the white feathers on its back, and whispered softly, "Dabai, we are covering the fire with soil. Fire is very dangerous. You can't get close to the fire, understand?"

"Ga!" It turns out he was playing with fire, so he stayed away from it.

Dabai actually took two steps back.

"See, I told you that Dabai is very intelligent and can understand what I say." Mother Sheng proudly poured a large bowl of boiled water from their tricycle, which she was reluctant to drink during the whole journey, and placed it in front of Dabai and his wife: "Dabai, Xiaobai, come and drink more water. After you finish, grandma will accompany you to sleep."

It was completely the tone of coaxing a child.

The key point is that the two big geese really stretched their necks to drink water obediently, and after drinking, they let Mother Sheng take a clean towel and wipe the water droplets on their heads and necks clean. Even their backs, chests and webbed feet were picked up by Mother Sheng and wiped clean. Then they were put into an abandoned wooden box that Mother Sheng had used as a nest for them two days ago when she had nothing to do. She padded it with some dry hay that she had found herself, and put them outside the Sinan tent to sleep.

In the morning, Si Nan told Sheng's mother that no matter how much she loved her beloved Dabai and his wife, as long as they were in the wild, Dabai and his wife had to sleep outside and act as police dogs to keep watch for everyone.

Once there is any danger, the white bird with sensitive hearing will make a loud cry to remind everyone to avoid danger.

With this couple around, they can camp in the wild without having to send someone to take turns to stand guard.

Their biological mother was worried that they would get cold sleeping outside, so she thoughtfully placed an umbrella over the wooden box where the Dabai couple slept. This not only prevented the rain from wetting their nest, but also blocked the cold wind at night.

The temperature at night is much lower than that during the day. It is already February now, and spring will come in another month, but the temperature is still between 0°-10°, which is much lower than in previous years.

There is still a long time before the next natural disaster, and there will be no other weather conditions in the next three months at least. Sinan is not worried about the abnormal weather at this time, and he lets Dabai and his wife sleep outside the tent without any worries.

After a whole day of hard work, everyone was exhausted. After exchanging greetings for a while, everyone returned to their tents, turned on a small flashlight, took out the steamed buns and dried meat that everyone had shared yesterday from their backpacks, and started eating.

Unlike the hard steamed buns they had eaten in the relief rations before, Si Nan secretly took some yeast powder from the space when making the dough and put it in her and Cheng Suming's basins.

The steamed buns look no different from those made by Yang Wentao and Sheng Mu that are fermented in advance, but they are more fluffy in texture and taste softer and sweeter.

It is then marinated with spices such as peppercorns, chili peppers, light soy sauce, salt, MSG, thirteen spices, etc., and then fried in a pan. It is very appetizing to take a bite of steamed bun and a bite of spicy and chewy jerky.

After eating and drinking, Si Nan fastened the tent chain, took out two sleeping bags from the space, and lay comfortably in the warm sleeping bags with Cheng Suming. After chatting for a while, they fell into a deep sleep.

In the middle of the night, with the full moon high in the sky, a not-too-loud cry of a goose woke up everyone in the camp.

Everyone got up, hurriedly put on their coats and walked out of the tent: "What's wrong?"

"Someone is coming." The speaker was Cheng Suming, who was extremely alert. His glasses had night vision function and could see all living creatures within a hundred meters at night.

He looked at the highway not far away and said to everyone, "Take out your weapons. There is a team of at least 150 people on the highway."

After Si Nan showed off his skills in the Cheng family's annex building, everyone realized that the situation now was different from before, and everyone was searching for weapons that suited them among the ruins.

For example, Yang Wentao is good at close combat. He found a set of military tactical gloves from an outdoor equipment store, and wore a set of iron finger gloves inside. He also carried an electric baton with him. As long as he didn't encounter any hot weapons, these three things could enable him to kill any god or Buddha he met.

Cheng Wei, Sheng Youqing and Sheng's mother all witnessed the power of the Sinan Ten, Si Nan Crossbow and Si Nan Crossbow. Before leaving the Cheng family's annex building, Sheng Youqing found a lot of materials for making bows and arrows and asked Yang Wentao to help make them.

Although the materials used are simple, the main materials are trees with strong elasticity such as yew, taku wood, oak, etc., and are matched with nylon ropes or steel wires as bowstrings to make three longbows.

The arrows were made of some thin and long pieces of construction steel and iron materials dug out from the ruins. They were randomly ground on stones for a while, and each person had no more than fifty arrows.

Sheng Youqing and the other two had never shot an arrow before, and their accuracy was terrible, but it was obviously unrealistic for them to engage in close combat. They could use the arrows in their hands to scare the enemy, and it was good enough that they could protect themselves.

Because Sheng Youbin was missing one arm and could not pull the bowstring, he chose the simplest weapon, a machete that was more than one meter long and two fingers wide, and carried it with him for self-defense.

Not to mention Cheng Suming, in his backpack there is a crossbow given by Sinan, and two guns are inserted on the left and right sides of his waist. He also carries a scalpel with him all the time. With his fighting power, he can easily deal with people no matter what weapon he uses.

Si Nan held the crossbow in her hand and had chili powder in her pocket. The electric baton that had appeared in front of Sheng Youbin before was also fully charged when she left the Cheng family's annex building. Now it was placed horizontally between the straps of her backpack. As long as she fought with someone, no matter whether it was a long-range attack or a close combat, she was confident to deal with it.

The atmosphere suddenly became tense. Everyone held weapons and followed Cheng Suming's instructions, hiding behind nearby trees that had not been knocked down. No one was allowed to talk or run without his orders. Everything was left to him and Yang Wentao, who were standing in the front, to handle.

Everyone knew the situation they were facing. The timid mother Sheng and Cheng Wei tried their best to control their breathing and emotions, and leaned tightly against the tree trunk. They did not ask for help, but they would never make things worse.

It was the middle of the night and it was extremely quiet. The chirping of insects had stopped for some reason. Only the evening breeze blew the leaves in the woods, making a slight rustling sound, which made the sound of the approaching footsteps outside so clear.

Eighty meters, fifty meters, the group was getting closer and closer.

When everyone was nervously gripping their weapons, ready to escape at any time or fight to the death with that gang, that gang suddenly stopped.

A strong voice came from a distance: "Is there anyone camping in the grove? If so, don't be afraid! We are a squadron of the Xingcheng Armed Police, and we are here to capture the fugitives and send them to Shishan overnight. We looked at the nearby terrain and found that this grove is suitable for camping and resting. We will stay here for one night. Please forgive us if we disturb you."

After the man said this, he made a gesture, and nearly fifty armed police officers, each pushing two criminals, stopped one-third of the way into the grove. They did not move forward and started to make a fire and cook on the spot.

The fire started quickly. Cheng Suming saw from behind a tree that among those people, there were about fifty people wearing the combat uniforms of armed police officers. Everyone was holding a gun and pointing the muzzle of the gun at nearly a hundred criminals who were handcuffed and had shaved heads, and ordered them to make a fire and cook. It didn't look like they were faking it.

Cheng Suming gestured to everyone to come out, and then he and Yang Wentao walked up to the armed police squadron leader who was wearing a three-star combat uniform and said, "So it's the armed police comrades. Nice to meet you."

A captain of the armed police squadron named Yan Hongyi, who was about 40 years old, with a dark complexion and a handsome appearance, walked over and shook their hands. "Is it not scary?"

"No." Cheng Suming shook his hand back and said politely, "We passed by here and saw that it was not suitable for night travel because of the dark, so we chose to camp here. In the middle of the night, we heard noises on the highway and thought someone was going to take advantage of the fire to rob us, but we didn't expect it to be the armed police comrades."

Yan Hongyi looked them up and down and saw that one of them was handsome, elegant, and looked very cultured, while the other had a scar on his face and a fierce look, and didn't look like someone who was easy to mess with. He was curious about the relationship between the two.

After shaking hands with Yang Wentao briefly, he said, "After the earthquake, houses and roads collapsed severely in various places. Many people died or were injured. We were too late to rescue them and had no time to take care of other things. The social order was in chaos. We soldiers have the will but not the strength. We can only do what our superiors ordered. Thank you for your hard work."

"It's not hard, it's you who are hard-working." Cheng Suming smiled faintly and pointed at the criminals who were digging pits and cooking not far away and said, "It's so late and you're still traveling with so many criminals. I wonder what you are going to do in Shishan?"

"The Xingcheng military has decided to build a military base at the foot of Shishan Mountain to accommodate the affected people and rebuild their homes. We have been ordered to capture these criminals who escaped from prison and take them to Shishan Mountain for initial construction and renovation." Yan Hongyi did not hide it from them.

The military decided to establish a military base in Shishan a day ago.

Rescue operations in the city were basically at a standstill due to the lack of large cranes, bulldozers, excavators and other equipment.

Today, Xingcheng is littered with corpses, rotting bodies, flowing corpse fluid, and swarms of rats and cockroaches running around on the corpses, carrying bacteria everywhere. Countless survivors, medical staff, soldiers, firefighters, armed police soldiers, and police officers have been infected with the plague, suffering from skin ulcers, vomiting and diarrhea, high fever, difficulty breathing, and other symptoms of bacterial plague.

A large number of survivors, medical staff, and soldiers had no cure and died frequently. The superiors could not bear to see everyone die, so they decided to send healthy soldiers from various branches of the military who were not infected with the plague virus to build a base at the foot of a stone mountain with a special terrain, solid ground, and countless stones and pebbles.

Because the planned base construction area is very large, it cannot be built in a short time by soldiers alone. Their armed police and special police, following orders from their superiors, investigate and capture the serious criminals who escaped from the prison after the earthquake, and take them to Shishan for labor reform.

This is a tough job. Xingcheng is now in ruins. It is very difficult to capture the escaped criminals from such a huge city. After capturing them, transporting them and traveling a long distance to the foot of the stone mountain is another headache.

Fortunately, they are all well-trained soldiers, armed with hot weapons, and their superiors have given orders that if any criminals dare to resist, escape, or threaten the lives of their armed police during the escort, they can execute those vicious criminals on the spot to protect their own safety. They no longer have to be afraid to take action against anyone as they did before the end of the world, for fear that those people would bite back and tarnish the image of the military.

Now all the arms in the city have decided to retreat collectively, taking the survivors to Stone Mountain to jointly establish a Stone Mountain base.

However, it will probably take a long time to screen the surviving survivors in the city and mobilize them to leave.

The military decided to leave half of the troops in the city to do the aftermath work, and the other half would rush to the foot of the stone mountain to build the base before the next natural disaster.

Therefore, it is no longer a secret that Shishan wants to build a base.

Whenever Yan Hongyi met ordinary people, he would tell them about this matter and mobilize them to go to Shishan together. Cheng Suming and others were naturally among those he persuaded.

"How is it?" When Cheng Suming and the other returned to the tent area, Si Nan was the first to ask.

Cheng Suming said, "The armed police have arrested a group of serious criminals and are sending them to Shishan to build a base. I have agreed to Commander Yan's suggestion to go with them."

Cheng Wei was surprised and said, "Brother, do we really have to go with them? Didn't you say they were escorting a group of serious criminals? What if those criminals have some bad ideas and use us as a prey? Wouldn't it be more trouble than gain?"

"Risks and rewards coexist." Yang Wentao, who had never spoken, stood beside her and said, "Those armed police officers are armed with live ammunition. If we follow them, we can reduce the number of times we are stopped on the road. If there are criminals who want to escape on the road, we can help those armed police officers catch them. It will be considered a meritorious service and will leave a good impression on the armed police officers, which will make it easier to deal with things when we get to Shishan."

Cheng Suming said, "Yang Wentao is right. The news that Shishan is going to build a base has spread throughout Xingcheng. We must rush to Shishan before most people do, seize the opportunity, and get housing conditions in the central area of Shishan Base. Only then can we live better in the base in the future."

Cheng Wei suddenly realized why Cheng Suming had not let her tell them that a base was going to be built on Shishan. It turned out that once others knew about this in advance and went to Shishan to occupy houses like them, the good locations in the central area would soon be gone. At that time, they would only be able to choose a residence outside, and might even have to live in a dormitory.

The thought of being separated from Yang Wentao and squeezed into a cramped dormitory with others was more painful than killing her, so Cheng Wei no longer resisted going with the armed police.