I put Wang Tingyun into the car, and she was taken over by Xu Shu.
The little girl wasn't familiar with Xu Shu, so when she saw I was handing her over, she immediately wrapped her tiny arms tightly around my neck, looking at me pitifully.
There was nothing I could do, so I had no choice but to get in the car with her.
Just as I settled in, I remembered that Chen Pu was climbing down.
I mentioned it to Xu Shu, and her expression changed slightly.
She glanced out the car window, intentionally or not, a couple of times, but after a while, she only replied, "He can manage on his own. It's not that difficult."
Hearing this, I sighed lightly and exchanged a glance with Yangyang, who was also watching.
I gave him a sidelong look and thought to myself—if I could be as tough on Yangyang as Xu Shu is on Chen Pu, he would definitely be in a much better state than he is now.
In the next few minutes, all of us were pressed up against the car windows, watching Chen Pu, Uncle Gazi, and Taozi, who was swaying dangerously and clearly in more peril than the others as they descended from the building.
More and more walkers were emerging from Building 6, their numbers growing denser.
But having just barely escaped from them myself, I knew that the real horde hadn't come out yet.
They'd likely chased the others to the rooftop earlier, and now, having heard the noise below, they were making their way down the stairs—but that would still take a while.
The wall where the black-clad men had thrown down the escape ropes had no windows.
I didn't know if that was a deliberate choice on their part, but it was definitely effective—it prevented any dim-witted walker from spotting them and jumping out the window to grab them mid-descent.
Uncle Gazi jumped onto the rope slightly ahead of Chen Pu.
At this moment, Taozi was still swaying midair.
Although the number of walkers around them was barely being held back by the black-clad men, the situation was clearly becoming dangerously critical.
The two of them didn't wait for Taozi and immediately began running toward us.
Our vehicle was some distance away from Building 6.
Although the entire convoy had been started, there was no one standing near the other cars except Suo Tian.
As a result, the walkers were clearly more interested in the scattered black-clad men than in our vehicles.
Occasionally, a few clueless ones would wander over, but they were swiftly taken down by Suo Tian.
We were in the same large van as before, and since Chen Pu recognized our vehicle, he brought Uncle Gazi over with him as well.
Luckily, the van was big enough—otherwise, there really wouldn't have been room for everyone.
The moment Uncle Gazi climbed into the car, Tingyun, who had been quietly nestled in my arms, immediately cried out "Grandpa!" and lunged toward him, burying her face in his shoulder and actually starting to sob.
Uncle Gazi, looking thoroughly exhausted, froze for a second when Tingyun threw herself into his arms.
Then, with a look of comfort, he hugged his granddaughter tightly.
As he heard her cries—laced with fear—his face immediately showed a pained, heartbroken expression.
I let them settle into the car first, then quickly scanned the situation outside.
When I saw the last few black-clad men rapidly descending from the rooftop, a sudden tightness gripped my chest.
I closed the van door and turned to ask Uncle Gazi, who was gently soothing his granddaughter in a low voice, "What about the others? They didn't make it out?"
Hearing that, Uncle Gazi froze for a moment, then a look of concern appeared on his face.
After letting out two heavy sighs, he finally said, "That kid with the last name Zhang took the Han girl and those two young men and hid on the ninth floor. They're probably still trapped in there. Who knows what's going on now."
"Han Xue is there too," Shen Feng, in the driver's seat, said with a slightly strange expression.
I knew he was thinking about Shen Xue again and couldn't help but sigh.
I gave him a reassuring look, then shifted my gaze back outside toward Suo Tian and the black-clad men who had just landed and were now trying to gather up the ropes, seemingly unsure of how to handle it.
In just this short time, the number of walkers pouring out of Building 6 had become incredibly dense.
The black-clad men who had been stationed in front of the building were now forced to continuously retreat.
But seeing that the main horde had finally emerged, everyone simply threw down their daggers and raised their guns, unleashing bursts of gunfire at the walker swarm.
Against such a dense horde, guns were naturally far more effective than daggers.
The sudden barrage bought enough time for those gathering the ropes to finish up.
In the apocalypse, no piece of equipment that's hard to come by should ever be discarded lightly—because it might just be the thing that saves your life the very next second.
Like those few ropes, which didn't even look particularly sturdy, they had practically saved the lives of everyone in our group.
Once the black-clad men quickly finished packing up—leaving two behind for cover—the rest turned and sprinted back toward their respective vehicles.
Probably as a precaution, I noticed that all the ones carrying sniper rifles climbed up onto the roofs of their cars, followed by the crisp click-clack sounds of their rifles being loaded.
After everyone was in their vehicles, the lead car finally began to move slowly.
Thanks to the delay tactics just now, the walker horde hadn't yet reached our convoy.
As our line of vehicles started to move one by one, the last vehicle—ours—was only slapped a few times by the first few walkers that reached us before we quickly left them behind.
The gate of the shelter had already been opened by the four black-clad men who arrived first.
When they saw us coming out, they all moved to the sides.
Once we had all exited, I turned my head and looked out the rear window, just in time to see them slam the gate shut with a loud bang.
To my surprise, one of the black-clad men had stayed behind inside.
Just as I was wondering why he would do that, I suddenly heard a faint clack from behind the gate.
My heart dropped—and in that instant, I understood: he had locked the gate.
There was no lock on the outside of that gate; it could only be secured from the inside.
Did they... intend to leave the people inside there forever?
But then, almost immediately, that black-clad man climbed out from within the gate.
I couldn't help but click my tongue in amazement.
That gate had been built specifically to keep walkers out, so its surface was extremely smooth, and even inside, there were hardly any places to get a foothold.
And yet, he'd managed to jump out so nimbly.
After all of the black-clad men had gotten into their vehicles, the convoy finally started moving again.
I looked back at the gate, now far behind us, and instead of feeling any relief after surviving such a terrifying ordeal, I felt an overwhelming sense of emptiness.
I couldn't shake the feeling that it wasn't over—that things couldn't possibly be this simple.
Too many questions were still unanswered, all of them tangled up in my chest like a knot I couldn't undo.
It was maddening.
And then there was the most important thing… Zhang Hongsheng, Han Xue, and the two others still in Building 6.
If they had managed to make it to the ninth floor, there was still a good chance they were alive.
If we left now, weren't we just abandoning them to burn in the pit?
Yes, we had done some things before that could be called turning a blind eye to others' suffering, but we had never once abandoned our own teammates.
Back when I risked everything to search for Yangyang, I had dragged so many people along with me through danger.
And now, if I could just leave those four behind in that strange shelter without feeling a thing, then honestly, I wouldn't be much different from those walkers out there.
And then there's Xiao Xue… innocent Xiao Xue.
She was buried right in front of that shelter's entrance. If she were somehow still aware of what was happening now, would she blame us for leaving her behind in such an unclear, desolate place?
In just a brief moment, countless thoughts—some rational, some not—rushed through my mind.
Then, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted the walkie-talkie tossed to the side.
I took a deep breath, leaned over, and picked it up.
After thinking for a moment, I pressed the button and said, "Are we really just leaving like this?"
I had expected a firm confirmation that we were moving on.
But after a short pause, the voice of a middle-aged man came through, saying, "Boss, half of our gear is still back there."
Hearing that, everyone in the car turned to look at me—or more precisely, they were staring at the walkie-talkie in my hand.
Judging from the look in their eyes, I knew exactly what they meant: they all wanted to go back and rescue the remaining team members.
Otherwise, they wouldn't have looked so hopeful after hearing that news.
After a moment of silence, Suo Tian's calm voice came through the speaker: "There's a bank two kilometers ahead. We'll wait there for a day. Tomorrow, we'll be ready to go back to the shelter—to retrieve the gear and rescue the others."
"Yes, sir." A few affirming voices followed from the other end of the walkie-talkie.
After Suo Tian finished speaking, I noticed a subtle but unmistakable joy spread across everyone's faces.
That expression—so unconsciously heartfelt—warmed my heart.
What truly made them so happy wasn't the idea of returning to that shelter itself.
The real reason was that we had a chance to save people—to help our comrades escape death.
It turned out that none of them, not even Suo Tian, ever intended to give up on those few teammates so easily.
Let's put aside, for now, whether the survivors who stayed behind at the shelter would use those same chilling tactics again—luring the walkers back into the halls of Building One.
Even if Han Xue and the others somehow managed to escape the horde, they might still not be able to escape those twisted, deranged residents.
That thought made me immediately speak into the walkie-talkie again: "What about Fatty Niu and his group? Were they the ones who smashed the gate of Building Six earlier?"
As soon as I finished speaking, the gruff voice of the bearded man came through with a string of curses: "Don't even get me started! Those bastards, acting all proper and decent… Anyone else would've closed the door and released the dogs, but not them—when they realized they couldn't take us on, they shut the doors and released the damn walkers! If the boss hadn't nailed Fatty Niu right through the skull with a throwing dart while he was facing off with us on the rooftop of Building Five, who knows what kind of mess those sons of bitches would've caused."
Throwing dart?
When I heard that, I paused for a moment and suddenly remembered the small silver dagger Suo Tian had been holding earlier.
I hadn't thought much of it before, but now that the bearded man mentioned it—it really did look like an oversized throwing dart.
And come to think of it, that dart had been missing ever since Suo Tian came down from Building Four.
After a short silence, the bearded man seemed to be catching his breath, then continued, "It was already damn unlucky that we got chased all the way to the rooftop. That bastard Niu had his men lying in wait up there. The moment we showed our heads, they opened fire. And now some of those bastards, even with their heads half-rotted, are back on their feet again."
He paused slightly again, then his voice dropped a little, quieter and heavier. "It's a damn shame about Brother Li. He was leading the charge—got taken out with two bullets before he even had time to react."
Hearing all that, the people in the car—those who had been with them—didn't show much of a reaction, probably because they already knew.
But I hadn't known the full details until now.
Listening to it firsthand left me deeply shaken.
We already suspected that Fatty Niu was trouble, but hearing it confirmed like this—right in my ears—was still hard to accept.
From the way the bearded man spoke, it sounded like Fatty Niu's entire group… was already dead.
----------------
Exclusive access on patreon to Ch 150
Join now : p@treon*com/DeCakraWnloverz