Chapter 176 Intrusion
A young man in a white coat walked out from the corner.
It was the same refined-looking researcher from yesterday.
He walked closer to Josh step by step. "What you said... has it really become like that outside?"
Josie smiled at him. "What do you want to hear? The apocalypse has been going on for almost a year. Most of the survivors are fighting for resources to stay alive. Without enough food, is it hard to imagine that something like that could happen?"
His face paled slightly, and his expression turned pained. "Are there still many people alive outside?"
He stared intently at Josh's face, afraid that Josh would say there weren't many people left.
If that's the case, what's the point of him staying here to conduct experiments?
"There are many, but there are even more zombies, that's for sure. The ordinary people who have survived until now are all ruthless, unless they have superpowered people taking care of them."
The young man fell silent.
Just then, the heavy entrance gate of the base opened again, letting in a biting chill and snow.
Josh noticed the commotion, immediately stopped talking to the other person, and walked towards the door.
Xie Jue and Luo Xiang, along with the last group of people who remained at the temporary camp in the wasteland, finally arrived.
When the team entered the warm interior of the base, everyone's hearts relaxed.
Besides the twenty-odd people with superpowers, the group consisted of an elderly professor with white hair and a hunched back, as well as a pregnant woman and an old woman.
They were wrapped in thick clothes, yet still soaked through by the wind and snow. Their faces were bluish-purple from the cold, their lips were chapped, and they looked extremely exhausted. They were practically carried in by the young and strong team members.
Several elderly professors even coughed violently as soon as they entered the warm air, their bodies trembling like leaves in the wind.
This scene left the original staff stunned.
They had always assumed that Josie's team consisted entirely of skilled superhumans, pure predators.
But the sight of these frail elderly people and weak women and children completely overturned their understanding.
Recalling Josh's cold yet truthful description from yesterday, complex emotions began to arise.
Perhaps, these people... aren't entirely bad?
At least, they protect the elderly and the infirm.
"Quickly! Medical team!" Li Weiguo was the first to react, his voice urgent.
The medical staff at the original base also sprang into action, taking out the last of their emergency medicines and working with Josh's team to quickly settle the frail professors in a warm rest area, taking their temperatures, administering their medication, and providing them with hot water.
After seeing everyone working efficiently, Josie led the support staff into the temporarily converted kitchen area.
Fresh radishes, potatoes, and a limited amount of dried meat, which were stimulated by the wood-type ability user, were washed and cut into pieces.
The hot oil in the large iron pot was boiling, and the sizzling sound of the ingredients being added to the pot, along with the rich aroma, exploded instantly, like the most powerful magic, dispelling the last trace of coldness and isolation within the base.
The long-lost aroma of fresh food forcefully penetrated everyone's nostrils, arousing the most primal desires.
The original staff members sat in their seats, trying to maintain their last shred of composure, but their eyes involuntarily drifted toward the source of the fragrance.
Their throats bobbed, and the sounds of them swallowing saliva rose and fell.
They had long since run out of pre-made food and had been eating compressed biscuits and energy bars for over a month, their stomachs protesting wildly in the face of such real temptation.
Some people kept their heads down, while others pretended to look elsewhere, but their bodies betrayed them.
Josie looked at their awkward and pitiful attempts to put on a brave face, a slight smile playing on her lips. She deliberately raised her voice, "Hey, you over there! Hurry up and get in line for your food! It'll get cold and won't taste good."
A young soldier blurted out instinctively, "We...we can get them too?" His voice was filled with an incredulous longing.
“Of course!” Josie answered decisively, her gaze sweeping over all the original residents. “I’ve said before that we are one. We accept you, make you part of our group, and share the resources and protection here. Now, we also hope that you can truly accept us, become our partners and comrades, and not just… tenants.”
Her words were frank and powerful.
After a brief silence, someone stood up and walked towards the group that exuded a deadly alluring fragrance.
Then came the second, the third... like dominoes being toppled.
Those researchers, technicians, and soldiers who had once been hostile eventually got up silently and joined the line to receive food.
Self-esteem temporarily yielded to the instinct for survival and the aroma of food.
During the queue, eye contact and quiet conversations were inevitable.
After the initial awkwardness, a subtle sense of closeness, born from shared hardship, began to grow.
When the steaming, oily stew of potatoes and radishes, along with a small piece of dried meat, was placed in everyone's bowl, the warmth seemed to flow down their esophagus into their hearts.
The days that followed accelerated, woven into the minutiae of daily life.
When they discovered that the new members were wearing thin bedding, some of the original staff quietly opened the base's storage warehouse and took out spare warm sleeping bags and thick clothing that they had previously stockpiled.
Without a word, it was simply handed over silently.
This silent act is more powerful than any declaration.
In return, the members of Josie's team put in even more effort in the renovation of defensive fortifications and the maintenance of equipment.
In the process of jointly resisting the cold and sharing limited resources, a bond called "companionship" is quietly being established.
However, the peace was shattered on the tenth day.
The piercing intrusion alarm once again shattered the peace inside the base.
On the monitor screen, a large group of people appeared near the entrance, far exceeding the size of Josh and his group last time, numbering more than thirty.
They were equipped with different items, but their eyes were fierce, and they exuded a strong aura of killing intent and predation.
The leader was a burly man with a hideous black scar on his face. He walked directly to the main camera, punched the sturdy lens housing several times with his fist, making a dull sound, grinned at the camera, arrogantly raised a thumb, and then suddenly flipped it downwards.
The next second, the screen went black, and the camera in that location was violently destroyed!
"They sabotaged surveillance camera number 3!" the former technician at the control panel shouted, his face turning ashen.
Immediately afterwards, a tremendous, drum-like crashing sound came from the thickest entrance gate of the base!
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
The impact was so loud that the ground seemed to shake.
The piercing alarm instantly escalated to the highest level, and the red light flashed wildly, illuminating everyone's faces with a look of panic!
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