Suddenly, the onlookers scread again, but this ti their voices carried an unmistakable tone of fear. They stared at the ground in front of the car, backing away step by step. So hurriedly fumbled for their phones, unsure whether they should call for help or start recording.
Yu Xi frowned and took a few steps to the left, adjusting her angle to get a clear view past the car’s hood and see what was happening.
The driver, who had been standing closest, also backed away in shock. He had the most direct view of the incident, and whatever he saw had shaken him badly.
The person who had been hit was now standing up.
However, both his arms and legs were twisted at unnatural angles, bent as if they were broken.
His entire body was covered in blood, his pupils unfocused, and his expression blank. Despite looking severely injured from the crash, there wasn’t a trace of pain on his face. Not only was he able to stand, but he also limped forward, step by step.
Each ti he moved, the surrounding onlookers gasped and instinctively stepped back.
A zombie?
Yu Xi guessed, but she quickly dismissed the thought.
If he were a zombie, he would have already lunged at the people nearby. Instead, he was just moving in an eerie, unnatural manner, but he showed no signs of aggression—at least not yet.
Among the crowd, soone finally managed to get through on an ergency call. The person’s voice trembled as they described the scene. After hanging up, they inford the crowd that ergency personnel were on their way and warned everyone not to approach.
The injured man staggered forward, taking a few unsteady steps before suddenly collapsing again. As he fell, dark red blood gushed from his mouth in large amounts.
Yu Xi noticed sothing unusual.
His blood was dark red.
How is that possible? Isn’t blood supposed to be bright red?
And as more blood pooled on the ground, the putrid stench in the air grew even stronger.
By the ti Yu Xi had finished refueling both her vehicle and the portable gas containers, the ergency responders arrived.
However, it wasn’t just an ambulance that pulled up—several military jeeps followed close behind.
Fully ard dical personnel swiftly lifted the injured man onto a stretcher and secured him. At the sa ti, heavily ard soldiers disembarked from the jeeps and quickly set up a periter, cordoning off the entire scene.
So of the soldiers approached the driver and the onlookers, questioning them about the incident. Once they had gathered information, they told everyone to accompany them back for a brief report.
The driver had no choice but to comply—he was, after all, responsible for the accident. However, the other onlookers resisted.
“We were just watching! We didn’t do anything! Why should we go with you?”
This was a Western-style city, and people here strongly believed in their personal rights. They demanded a reasonable explanation and refused to cooperate without one.
Normally, such resistance would be expected, and they might have gotten away with it.
But not this ti.
The soldiers didn’t waste ti arguing. When persuasion failed, they forcibly detained everyone in the area, loading them into military vehicles one by one.
As chaos erupted at the scene, Yu Xi remained seated in her jeep across the street, silently observing.
Although she could have gotten a closer view from inside the gas station, the mont she spotted the military vehicles, she sensed sothing unusual.
Adding to her suspicion was the strange condition of the injured man.
So, she had left the gas station through a side exit and parked on the opposite side of the street to watch from a safe distance.
As expected, after the soldiers had rounded up the driver and the onlookers, the remaining troops expanded the periter, sealing off the entire gas station.
Yu Xi didn’t linger. She started the car and drove away.
Looking at the map, Fran City was vast.
Compared to the first city she had visited—Wu Kong City—this place was at least five or six tis larger.
Aside from the urban districts, the city also encompassed several suburban towns and a military base.
According to the location data sent by each individual, Xi Yuan was currently in a small town called Ordo, near the military base. The other three, aside from Lin Wu, were scattered across different districts of Fran City, with significant distances between them.
Lin Wu, on the other hand, was in a small town southwest of the city. While it was still technically part of Fran City, it was outside the main urban area.
Xi Yuan’s current identity was that of an employee at a supermarket in the town. Based on the mories associated with his resident identity, it could be inferred that this station’s map included Fran City’s urban area, several surrounding towns, the northern military base, and the vast eastern forest along with Fran Lake.
He had appeared inside the supermarket’s break room, and his assigned residence was a small villa about a ten-minute walk away. The house was modest but had a front yard with a lawn, spacious enough to accommodate five people comfortably.
Initially, he thought he had gotten lucky—plentiful supplies, a low population, and the possibility of moving everyone to his location.
However, before he could even send a ssage to the group, the military arrived, sealing off every shop along the street and taking all personnel away for what they claid was a disinfection inspection due to an ergency situation.
At the ti when Yu Zhenzhen had sent the ssage about the unlimited currency, Xi Yuan had just been placed inside a military truck. Because he was surrounded by people, he had sent his ssage discreetly.
At present, Xi Yuan had completed his inspection and was being held at a temporary quarantine station near the base. According to what he had overheard, as long as everything remained normal for 24 hours, he would be released.
The quarantine space was small and had no caras, which allowed him to contact them again. Since all personal devices had been confiscated upon entry, he avoided using his local phone to prevent the military from detecting any transmissions. Instead, he used his Endless Train world phone.
His resident mories inford him that sothing strange had happened in the town before the military intervened. The lockdown and disinfection process were routine; as long as nothing unusual was found, residents would receive an access permit and be allowed to move within designated safe zones.
Because this town was the closest to the military base, it had been classified as a protected area, and the army was systematically disinfecting and expanding the safe zone.
From Xi Yuan’s perspective, he was perfectly capable of escaping, but since they had to survive in this place for 44 days, it wasn’t wise to provoke the military within a confined map.
So, he chose to comply and wait for the situation to develop.
Fortunately, everything appeared to be normal on the surface—though the atmosphere within the military was extrely tense.
So far, this tension was contained within the small town, and the general public in Fran City remained unaware.
Yu Zhenzhen, intrigued, typed: what exactly happened?
Xi Yuan: reanimated corpses. Bodies went missing from the hospital morgue, and two days later, pieces of the corpses were found in a ranch outside the town… of course, this is just hearsay. The news didn’t report it, and it’s only circulating in small circles. Most of the public has no idea.
Ya Tong: no, so of them probably do know—just in the wrong way.
Lin Wu: what do you an?
Ya Tong: I’m in the western part of the city. Earlier, I saw a group of students and parents protesting outside the police station, with reporters present. It seems that so students were taken away during a gathering a few days ago, and they still haven’t been released. This happened five days ago. They don’t know the exact reason for the detainnt, but according to what they told reporters, they haven’t been allowed to contact their families for five whole days, and the authorities have no reasonable explanation.
Yu Zhenzhen: ah, classic freedom-loving western city behavior…
Yu Xi: 44 days is a long ti. Xi Yuan still has over twenty hours left in quarantine. Let’s first agree on a eting point and gather supplies on the way. Fuel is easy to stockpile here, and Zhenzhen has a large storage capacity, so she can store so as well.
Yu Zhenzhen: got it!
Lin Wu: for now, we can et at Zhenzhen’s location. She’s in the northeastern part of the city, making her the closest to Xi Yuan out of all of us. Even so, there’s still so distance to cover. If Ordo town turns out to be safe, we’ll regroup there. Based on past experience, that area is also likely to generate mission clues and reveal the hidden train station. If it’s not safe, we’ll head directly east toward Fran Lake. We have a boat, so we can temporarily retreat to the lake and decide when to return to the city later.
Yu Zhenzhen: if we’re considering the lake, what kind of boat did you stock up on?
Lin Wu: it’s in Yu Xi’s storage—an inflatable raft with a paddle propulsion engine.
Yu Zhenzhen: …forget it, I’ll make a trip to the lake first and see if I can get a real boat. For now, I’ll check into a large suite at a hotel and send you all the address and room number. You can make your way over slowly.
The five mbers of the team were all reliable, and their communication was quick and efficient.
After finalizing their plans, everyone started taking action.
Yu Xi put away her phone and prepared to hit the fifth gas station. Her 30 cubic ters of fuel tanks were now more than half full, but she was still far from reaching her goal of 30,000 liters.
This was an A-level station. If sothing were to happen, it was likely already unfolding. Her instincts told her that the current peace wouldn’t last long, and she needed to make the most of this initial calm.
**
Yu Xi’s instincts had always been sharp, but this ti, the situation escalated even faster than she had expected.
Her randomly assigned location was in the southern part of Fran City. Following their plan, she was making her way northeast to et Yu Zhenzhen. However, while passing through a certain district, she ran into a major traffic jam.
She had just finished collecting fuel from her sixth gas station. According to her planned route, she was supposed to stop at a large supermarket ahead to stock up on supplies.
But she hadn’t expected a relatively sparsely populated city like Fran City to experience such a severe traffic jam.
After waiting for about ten minutes, she got out of the car to assess the situation. Many drivers had climbed onto the roofs of their vehicles to get a better view of what was happening ahead.
The road she was on wasn’t the main site of the congestion—the real gridlock was on the intersecting street ahead. Drivers at the front said the road had been blocked for over half an hour due to a large protest.
Yu Xi stepped forward and asked soone who seed to be inford, “Excuse , do you know what the protest is about?”
“Who knows? Lately, all sorts of weird things have been happening… A friend of mine has a girlfriend working as a nurse at a hospital. I don’t know what happened, but the entire hospital was suddenly sealed off… Even the patients inside were taken away. So people say that on the day of the lockdown, they heard a lot of gunfire from inside. His girlfriend hasn’t co ho since! When the authorities act like this, of course the people are going to be angry!”
Yu Xi frowned. “Was this hospital in Ordo Town?”
“No, it’s in the western part of the city. Since it got shut down, things in the west side have been tense. The streets near the hospital are under traffic restrictions…”
As the person spoke, Yu Xi’s phone buzzed again—it was a ssage from Ya Tong.
She said she had encountered a traffic checkpoint and couldn’t head straight to the eting point. She was currently figuring out an alternate route.
Shortly after, Lin Wu and Yu Zhenzhen also reported that there were restricted zones in their areas. So had been in place for days, while others had just been implented today.
However, none of these restrictions were being reported in the news.
Since Fran City was so large, many people only commuted within their own districts. Those who hadn’t traveled to other areas had no idea about the lockdowns or traffic controls.
As Yu Xi was checking her ssages, a commotion erupted from the direction of the traffic jam.
Locking her car, she jogged over to the blocked intersection and found a café with a balcony. Climbing up to the second floor, she quickly looked toward the scene ahead.
At the far end of the street, the protesting crowd had encountered ard personnel. The officers, ard with shields and weapons, were ordering the protesters to disperse and stop blocking the road. But the demonstrators refused to comply.
They believed their rights were being threatened and refused to accept what they saw as unreasonable restrictions. They demanded that the authorities acknowledge their concerns.
A large crowd, full of energy, waved signs and banners while chanting loudly.
For a mont, the entire area was filled with the sound of their slogans, completely drowning out the voices of the ard personnel.
The people stuck in traffic, as well as those who had stepped out of nearby shops and restaurants to watch the commotion, couldn’t hear what the officers were saying.
Then, they noticed a sudden shift in the officers’ behavior.
One by one, the ard personnel tensed up, gripping their weapons and moving cautiously toward a specific section of the protest crowd.
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