Chapter 62

The temperature has warmed up, and in the blink of an eye, the outdoor temperature has reached a comfortable 25°C. The trees outside are also growing more and more lush, and wherever you stop, you see a dense forest.

The satellites have become useless. Even though Tong Shu and her family have installed navigation software on all their electronic devices, they are now just decorations. Whenever the family can't tell which way to go, they have to stop and discuss it with the map.

Qin Xiaoxiao also came out of the island. She really liked the giant trees and plants outside, and could sit by the window all day staring at them while holding a cup of hot water.

"...bird."

"Xiaoxiao? What did you say?" Shuya, who was always watching Qin Xiaoxiao, asked with a look of surprise.

Qin Xiaoxiao belatedly stretched out her finger and pressed it against the glass window: "There are birds outside."

Wang Jie also became interested, put down the medical book in his hand and came over to take a look. He stared for a long time but did not see any bird. However, he did hear a few clear bird calls.

"It really is true, there's a sense of everything coming back to life now," Wang Jie remarked.

"What's that place up ahead?" Wang Jianye asked, sitting in the passenger seat, as he could vaguely see a building in the distance.

Tong Songming was driving when he heard this and slightly turned the car around, heading towards the place Wang Jianye pointed out. He was a little lost at the moment, and finding a landmark would be a good way to reconfirm his route.

“...D County No.1 Middle School.” Tong Shu tried hard to make out the rusty characters at the entrance.

“One of my colleagues is from this county, so it seems we’re in L province now,” Wang Jie said.

Province L is west of City Z, which means their current direction of travel is correct.

"Further west are continuous mountain roads. I don't know if the old roads are still passable." Tong Songming pulled up the electronic map to examine it carefully. Although the navigation was no longer working, it was still a very detailed map.

"Let's drive to an open area and rest for a bit. You guys have been driving for five days straight. Get a good night's sleep, and you'll need to be more alert when driving on mountain roads," Shu Hua suggested, bringing over some fruit.

They had encountered danger on the small hills they passed on their way out of Z City. Now that they were in unfamiliar territory, they didn't know if they would encounter even more terrifying plants. The best way was to keep driving day and night. After listening to Shu Hua's suggestion, Tong Songming started the car and prepared to drive to the nearest square to rest for a few days.

"Hey—" came a shout from outside the door, "Don't go! Wait!"

A middle-aged woman ran out from behind the dilapidated school gate. Her clothes were tattered and her hair was filthy. Tong Songming knew something was wrong and was about to step on the gas to leave when the woman rushed up to him, grabbed the rearview mirror, and pressed herself against him.

"...Don't go! Please, help me!" The woman's face was covered in tears, and her panicked expression seemed genuine. However, the Tong family had been through a lot recently, and they were extremely wary of such a sudden appearance. Tong Shu and Wang Jie peered out the car windows to check for any ambushes, while Tong Songming and Wang Jianye kept a close eye on the woman to see if anyone else was following them.

The woman, peering out of the window, couldn't see what was inside, but the suddenly appearing van was her only hope: "Please, save my students, they're dying! Help!" She screamed desperately, not knowing if the people inside could hear her.

"A student? Is she a teacher here?" Wang Jie asked in a low voice.

"Otherwise, let's ask what's going on... If they really are children fleeing from disaster, we should lend a hand if we can," Shu Li finally said, unable to bear it any longer.

Shu Hua turned to look at Tong Shu. Although she didn't say anything, the reluctance in her eyes was unmistakable.

Tong Shu sighed inwardly, gripped the gun tightly in her hand, and nodded.

The car window rolled down a crack, and Tong Songming put on a gas mask. His deep, muffled voice carried out, "Are you a teacher?"

"...Yes, yes!" The woman, surprised that the person in the car would actually respond, quickly spilled the beans, explaining the situation: "My name is Ren Ya, and I'm a teacher at D County No. 1 Middle School. Our school's sports field is built on a mountain, and there's an air-raid shelter there. When the disaster struck, we were doing our morning exercises in the indoor gymnasium, and the principal led us all inside. Later, the floods and the sharp drop in temperature didn't affect us too much. But, but recently, the plants suddenly grew wildly, and there were also attacking vines and mushrooms that sprayed poison gas, killing many students and teachers..."

Ren Ya burst into tears, sobbing as she continued, "We couldn't stay in the air-raid shelter anymore. The principal sent a few physical education teachers down the mountain to check, and they found that the water had receded, and there weren't many plants around the school building. So we quickly organized the students to come down the mountain to take refuge... But then, large numbers of students started getting fevers and coughs. And our principal... he didn't make it. He passed away last night..."

It seems that the ground, frozen for almost half a year, has bred a lot of virulent germs. The people in the car fell silent after hearing this.

If what the teacher said is true, then it's easy to understand why she rushed towards the car for help. They had been hiding in the mountains for more than half a year, just like the people in the north of the city back then, completely unaware of the outside world, and probably still thought that people outside were helping each other and living their lives.

"Is there anyone who can vouch for what you're saying?" Tong Songming asked. He couldn't easily trust a stranger, but if what this person said was true, and they just left like this, dozens or even hundreds of children might lose their lives.

"Yes! Yes!" Ren Ya exclaimed excitedly, not expecting that the people in the car would actually lend a helping hand. "Please, please wait a moment, I'll ask my colleague to bring two students in better condition over."

Ren Ya stumbled and ran away. Tong Songming closed the car window and waited for the air in the driver's cab to be purified before lowering the partition between the driver's cab and the living area.

“This person doesn’t seem to be lying. If a large group of children are really sick, let’s help them if we can.” Grandma Tong had heard a lot about it, and thinking about how they were all teenagers, she felt very distressed.

The teacher returned quickly with his men. Tong Shu climbed into the driver's seat and gestured for Wang Jianye to switch places with her. The partition rose again, and Tong Shu put on her gas mask.

"Look, these are my colleagues, and also students from our school," Ren Ya said, pointing to the people beside her.

Although the two students could still walk, they were clearly ill, with pale faces, chapped lips, and occasional violent coughs.

"How many students are left in your school?" Tong Shu asked.

"There are still eighteen teachers and more than one hundred and twenty students left." Speaking of this, Ren Ya felt another pang of pain in her heart. After the disaster broke out, they buried corpses almost every day. One by one, the once vibrant lives disappeared, and the survivors suffered from mental illnesses to varying degrees.

Tong Shuxin had made up her mind. She said to Ren Ya, "We used to work for a pharmaceutical company, and we do have some medicine in the car. But you've been hiding in the mountains, so you probably don't know that things are in chaos outside. All supplies are scarce. We plan to use the medicine in the car to exchange for supplies. You need to save so many people, so you'll need a lot of medicine. What do you have to offer in exchange?"

Ren Ya was in a dilemma. They had planted a lot of things on the mountain before, but now no one dared to go back up to harvest them. She explained the situation to the truth: "There are a lot of lettuce, potatoes and sweet potatoes on the mountain, but those plants are too scary. We are afraid to go... Why don't you come with me to the teaching building and see if there is anything we can use?"

Most of the things in the teaching building were ruined by the water, but Tong Shu wasn't interested in them: "The plants that attack people won't come out during the day. You can go up the mountain to collect them during the day, and then hide in the teaching building at night without having to come out."

Ren Ya suddenly realized why she hadn't encountered those terrifying vines outside. She had thought it was because they had left the mountains, but it turned out that these things didn't appear during the day. They just happened to come out during the day to find some supplies and hide in the teaching building at night, which allowed them to escape unscathed.

"...Then, then we'll go up the mountain to dig potatoes and sweet potatoes tomorrow," Ren Ya said with difficulty, biting her lip. "Could you please give us some medicine first? A few students are about to collapse..."

Tong Shu thought for a moment and said, "Bring those students out and put them next to our car. We have a doctor in the car."

Upon hearing this, Ren Ya and her colleagues quickly thanked them and then hurriedly ran towards the teaching building, returning shortly with five students on their backs.

"You all go back, the students stay, the doctor will get out of the car to check on them," Tong Shu said curtly.

Ren Ya was a little worried, but there was really nothing she could do. She also knew that if she and her colleagues stayed here, these outsiders would not feel at ease. If these children did not receive treatment, they might not live for more than two days. With that thought in mind, she left, looking back every few steps.

"Brother Jie, I'll go down with you," Tong Shu said to Wang Jie behind her.

The car door opened a crack, and the two people crawled out of the car.

Just to be on the safe side, Tong Shu and Wang Jie both wore protective suits, and their gas masks were worn very tightly.

Wang Jie took out his stethoscope and listened to each ear, nose, and throat one by one. He then carefully examined the condition of the ear, nose, and throat and made a preliminary conclusion: "It should be viral pneumonia."

Tong Shu frowned; it seemed like she might need an IV drip.

The next second, Wang Jie said, "What should we do? We need to get an IV drip."

Tong Shu resigned herself to her fate. Looking at the five young-faced high school students lying asleep on the ground, she couldn't bear to abandon them: "Do we still need to prepare medicine?"

Wang Jie nodded.

Tong Shu took out a large tent from her bag and set it up with Wang Jie. The two of them then laboriously carried the students into the tent one by one.

"I'll keep an eye on things here. You go back and prepare the medicine," Tong Shu said to Wang Jie.

His own RV was right next door, so there was nothing to worry about. Wang Jie nodded, sprayed his whole body with disinfectant, and then climbed back into the RV to go back to the island to get his medicine.

Tong Shu took a sports water bottle filled with hot water and fed it to each of the unconscious students one by one.