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墨書 Inktalez
Chapter Seventy: Gathering
As Ming Junwei had said, Chao Yifan did not keep everyone waiting. At noon the next day, the Golden Cup Bread stopped in front of the government building.
At that moment, Jiang He and Ming Junwei were carrying a bunch of assorted food items, preparing to head upstairs. They vaguely heard the sound of an engine and turned around to see the van chugging over.
The first to get out was Cao Liang, who seemed to have injured his right leg. His walking posture resembled that of Wu Lao Er, who had suffered a stroke, as he leaned on a rake and gave both men a hearty hug.
Chao Yifan was the second to exit. The Bald Kid proudly opened the back door of the van, revealing the three Pillars snoring away in their seats. A shadow leaped down and obediently squatted at Chao Yifan's feet, wagging its tail in a flattering manner.
"What are we having for lunch?" Chao Yifan asked cheerfully, seemingly having forgotten the unpleasantness of the previous night. He reached under the seat and pulled out a backpack, tossing it over.
Ming Junwei caught the backpack mid-air and weighed it in his hands, realizing it was quite heavy. "What's inside?"
"Ammunition," Chao Yifan replied as he glanced at the Zombies wandering on the street before climbing back into the van to wake up the three Soldiers.
"You all made it! That's great! I was going crazy running back to the courtyard!" The Pillar exclaimed upon seeing a room full of people. Although they were one graduate student short, he was still overwhelmed with emotion. "What happened? That fire was huge!"
Jiang He rummaged through some hard bread he had just confiscated from a grocery store and shared it with everyone while recounting the entire incident to Pillar and the others.
Cao Liang lay flat on a large office desk while An Zheng carefully examined his condition. When Cao Liang entered the room, he startled several girls; after crawling out from the ruins, he was covered in dirt from head to toe. Luci was overjoyed to see him return safely but ended up giving him a hug that nearly knocked him off his feet.
An Zheng used scissors to cut open his clothes and wiped him down with a damp towel, only to discover that this strong man was covered in bruises.
"What happened?" An Zheng frowned, her expression darkening as she gently touched Cao Liang's swollen right calf, causing him to wince in pain.
Cao Liang gasped for breath, feeling somewhat embarrassed; after all, he was a tall man at six feet tall, lying on an office desk wearing nothing but his underwear while surrounded by both men and women.
"I fell from the roof," Cao Liang chuckled awkwardly as he recounted how he had collapsed the roof. Seeing everyone trying to hold back their laughter made Old Cao feel aggrieved. "I was just one step away! Just one step!"
"Stop laughing everyone; go find a piece of wood," An Zheng said, trying to keep others from laughing but failing herself as a smile crept onto her face.
"Did you break it?" Ming Junwei pulled out the drawer of the desk and flipped it over onto the floor, smashing it with a loud crack underfoot. He picked up a wooden strip from the frame and handed it to An Zheng.
Cao Liang struggled to sit up, looking at his increasingly swollen right calf, and let out a long sigh. "I thought I just twisted it; this is going to be a hassle."
"The calf is probably fractured, but it's not broken," An Zheng said as he took a bottle of aged liquor from the top of the bookshelf, twisted off the cap, and sprinkled some on his hand, gently rubbing it on the injury. "We need to find a crutch; try not to put weight on your right leg."
Cao Liang looked miserable and scratched his head. "Sorry, I’ll have to slow everyone down."
"It’s no problem; just take care of your injury," Ming Junwei said, patting him on the shoulder. He turned to An Zheng and asked, "Do you need any medicine?"
"It would be best to have something to promote blood circulation and reduce swelling; if not, a plaster will do," An Zheng replied as he cleaned his hands and rummaged through the wardrobe in the bedroom to piece together an outfit for Cao Liang.
Jiang He was puzzled by the wardrobe. The shirts that Song Yao and Luci were wearing had also come from there. He couldn't help but ask, "Are there still clothes in there? We could all change!" He was still in the camouflage outfit he had worn at the camp, which was now in tatters.
"Quite a few; they're all formal wear," Song Yao said as she and Luci sat side by side on the sofa. Both were wearing oversized white shirts on top and damp shorts below, their long legs crossed and close together, resembling covers from Eastern adult magazines. Their clothes were still wet, and the trousers in the wardrobe were far too large—one pant leg could fit her entire body.
The men unconsciously turned their heads away; two beautiful girls in such attire were simply too tempting.
After tending to Cao Liang's injury, everyone gathered in a circle to discuss their next steps.
Big Yellow Dog rushed straight towards Xiao Pan Luo as Little Pan squealed in surprise and joy, ignoring the mud caked all over Big Yellow Dog as she spun around with it in her arms. Luci's Tabby Cat stood on high alert, its tail puffed up as it bared its teeth at this big fellow from a distance.
Chao Yifan saw that everyone was settled and opened his backpack, pulling out bullets, cigarettes, a flashlight, and other items. "I first ran into Brother Cao; we retraced our steps back along the way until we reached near the reservoir where we found Zhuzi and them. Zhuzi said they had made some discoveries."
"A dog?" Jiang He scratched Big Yellow Dog's chin and chuckled. "This guy is practically becoming a spirit; it's everywhere."
"Indeed, this dog is incredibly perceptive," Zhuzi said excitedly as he rubbed his hands together. "That day, the three of us chased after it for quite a distance; we almost crossed that cornfield. The wind was strong, so I thought I might have seen it wrong and was about to turn back. But Xiaomi ran off so fast that he didn’t hear me or Xiao Wei calling him." He glanced at Xiaomi, whose face was flushed with embarrassment. "We were worried something might happen to him alone, so we kept chasing him. By the time we got out of the cornfield, it was already getting dark. We figured you all must be worried too and were preparing to head back when Xiao Wei spotted a dog in the woods!"
"You saw a dog over by the cornfield?" Jiang He recalled the terrain around the cornfield; he remembered it being vast. If they had crossed through it, wouldn’t they be close to the mountain by the reservoir?
Zhuzi understood the meaning of Jiang He's words and nodded, saying, "It's right under that mountain. The dog wasn't on the mountain; it seemed to have run over from the highway. You can't say it's not clever; after feeding it a few times, it remembered us and came rushing over, biting at my pant leg and wouldn't let go!" To prove his point, Zhuzi even showed a few people his pant leg. Indeed, there were several bite marks in the mud-stained fabric.
"And then?" Ming Junwei was intrigued, gaining a new appreciation for the intelligence of this Chinese rural dog.
"Then it started pulling us back. Isn't that strange?" Zhuzi got excited and rolled up his sleeves as he spoke animatedly. "The three of us saw this situation and thought it was odd. We used to have military dogs in our unit, so it must have discovered something and wanted to take us to see it. We figured you all were in the yard and there shouldn't be any major issues, so we followed Yellow Dog. In the end... sigh, if we hadn't left our posts without permission, the small courtyard wouldn't have burned down." Zhuzi felt a pang of regret and started to drift off-topic.
"Brother Zhuzi, continue with the story about the dog," Song Yao said, somewhat captivated, quickly interrupting his lament.
"Oh, right." Zhuzi chuckled sheepishly and said, "Guess where Yellow Dog took us!"
"To the Power Station?" Jiang He raised an eyebrow. His most vivid memory of this dog was at the Power Station when Yellow Dog had carried two 81-style rifles in its mouth, sprinting away with its little legs while being chased by two groups of people and a wave of zombies—no one could catch up to it.
"Nope! It took us to the highway—the very place where you parked!" Zhuzi wore an expression that said 'bet you didn't expect that' as he continued, "We had no idea what it meant. The wind was howling at that time; although there were no zombies on the road, it was still quite eerie. The forest was dark and you couldn't see anything. A few cars were parked on the road, and we all felt a bit uneasy."
Jiang He and the others indeed felt puzzled; the highway was quite a distance from the Power Station. So, Zhuzi and his companions had been led that far by Yellow Dog?
"We checked the abandoned cars, and we really found something off," Zhuzi's expression suddenly turned serious. "We had helped you retrieve things from those cars before; that coach and the red SUV were yours, right?"
"That's right. What happened to the cars?" Ming Junwei asked, drawn in by curiosity as he leaned forward.
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