The current date time is 20260109T0820. Following the cold, meticulous study of the intel provided by Lisa, Thien Anh began integrating live satellite feeds of Noi Ha City to forge his tactical blueprint. His paramount objective: to infiltrate and neutralize strategic outposts with surgical swiftness.
The reality was stark: the natural cataclysms had struck with such sudden ferocity that both the government and the populace were plunged into total paralysis. The collapse happened so rapidly that the military had only managed civilian evacuations, leaving weaponry caches in "peace-time security" modes rather than war-time alert. To an infiltration specialist like Thien Anh, this was a golden tactical aperture.
He did not rush. Thien Anh drafted every conceivable scenario, establishing "worst-case" hypotheses and running them through computer simulations to find the optimal path. Moments like these made him realize the true cost of operating solo.
No human is omnipotent. Excellence in one field often leaves a void in another. A professional team would have logistics officers, tech specialists, and scouts. He, however, was handling the gargantuan workload alone. But in the apocalypse, there were no alternatives—only the demand to work twice as hard.
…
The following day.
Thien Anh remained entombed in his command room, eyes glued to the structural blueprints of military reserves and high-ranking official shelters. This wasn't merely a heist for lead and steel; it was a gambit to seize the initiative in the New World.
As for Thien Lang and Thien Thanh, they began venturing further into the frozen wastes to hone their newfound strength. Concerned for his companions, Thien Anh had meticulously fitted Thien Lang with long-range comms and a micro-surveillance camera mounted on his collar.
Initially, he spent hours staring at the monitors, tracking their every twitch. Only after confirming their overwhelming biological dominance and seamless synergy did he finally feel secure enough to return to his own tasks.
One should not mistake Thien Anh's week-long planning for sluggishness. In the world of assassins, those who plan poorly and ignore extraction routes are simply "reckless gamblers." And gamblers in this world ended up "pushing up daisies" very quickly. The mutated beasts outside would never debate human rights with their prey.
Meanwhile, Lam Linh was far from idle. She followed Thien Lang and Thien Thanh into the field for live-combat experience. Nature worked in mysterious ways; after the initial Great Transformation, Lam Linh seemed to undergo a total metamorphosis. Her endurance and cognitive learning capacity skyrocketed. Even without Thien Anh's direct tutelage, the crushing weight of survival forced her marksmanship to improve at a breakneck pace.
When one is forced to pull a trigger until their wrist is numb and their joints ache every single day, progress becomes an inevitability. As Thien Anh had mused, under such draconian training conditions, even a fool could become a sharpshooter.
…
Seven days vanished in a heartbeat.
One morning, after every gear check and contingency plan was finalized, Thien Anh decided to sortie. The first target: The City Military Armory Cache.
Before the zero hour, he sat down for one final hot meal within the sanctuary of the bunker. During the meal, Lam Linh asked abruptly: "Do you know the volcano nearby?"
Thien Anh nodded slightly, his chopsticks moving with rhythmic precision. "I do. Why?"
Lam Linh placed more food into his bowl, her expression grave. "There is a dragon's nest on that mountain. Thien Lang says nearly twenty of them have congregated there."
Thien Anh fell silent for a moment. He understood her intent. Lam Linh was reminding him that once their firepower was secured, they needed to uproot this threat to harvest more evolutionary materials.
"I understand," he replied, his gaze sharpening into lethal needles. "Eat up. Once we move out, I doubt we'll have the luxury of a meal like this for a long while."
Lam Linh smiled faintly. "I'm full; any more and I'll burst. You're the one who needs the energy—eat more."
Thien Anh didn't offer a rebuttal, focusing entirely on his rice. He didn't eat quickly, but he chewed thoroughly. This was a vital survival habit: thorough mastication allowed the body to absorb maximum nutrients and maintained satiety for longer.
On the battlefield, no one grants you a timeout to refuel. A single second of exhaustion, a momentary dizzy spell, or a tremor in the legs is enough to cost a life. This was a lesson Thien Anh hadn't learned from books; he had learned it from the colleagues who now lay in graves. The success of others might be hard to replicate, but the mistakes of the dead were to be avoided at all costs.
The meal ended. The bunker hatch groaned as it prepared to open, marking the beginning of a cold, calculated hunt.