Rebirth of the Last Days: Double Pets

Outside the royal court villas, armored vehicles lined up and entered the community, while troops armed with machinery were engaged in combat against the surrounding zombies.

This was an elite military unit sent to exterminate zombies, ensuring that political officials and wealthy businessmen would have a safe place to land.

At the onset of the apocalypse, after the government realized the severity of the disaster, they opened the western base. Consequently, some influential people from City A and a few perceptive ordinary citizens retreated to the western base. However, the zombie virus continued to spread, posing a threat far greater than any flu they had previously encountered. It directly endangered human survival and spread on a massive scale worldwide.

As more and more people sought refuge, the western military district could no longer accommodate everyone. Thus, political officials convened to discuss establishing a well-equipped temporary base in City A.

After a full two weeks of discussions, map consultations, and debates, the officials selected this new planned area in City A.

This area was relatively close to the military district and had already been planned, but the new district had just been developed by major developers, with very few completed houses and even fewer residents moved in. This well-situated new development caught the attention of these political officials.

The members of the convoy in the walled villas heard the gunfire and gathered at the windows to watch.

“The army has arrived.” Pan sister exclaimed as she witnessed the scene outside, tears of excitement falling from her eyes. “Xiao Tang was right; this place will really be chosen as a military base. This means we can find Xuanxuan!”

Pan Dawei looked unreliable, but he actually missed his daughter very much. “Yes, that’s great! I originally planned to push into the western district, but who knew they would come here now… We’ll go over and ask them later.”

Old Qin said, “Let’s wait for a moment. In this apocalypse, it’s important to prioritize caution. We should first discuss it with Hu Haotian and Bai Yan, those two young men.”

Pan Dawei nodded seriously and went downstairs to Hu Haotian’s villa.

Inside Hu Haotian’s villa, everyone was also discussing the situation.

“Brother Hu, the army has arrived. What should we do? Should we go out soon?”

Hu Haotian didn’t know what to do either.

Although everyone was excited to see the army, he felt a surge of excitement himself; they still needed to make careful plans.

In this apocalypse, the previous social order was certainly no longer applicable.

What the new standards of the military were, nobody knew. They had been living in isolation for over half a month, and information had long been cut off.

When the advanced troops first arrived at this “royal court” community, they found it very strange.

This community was too clean, with seemingly only a few scattered zombies.

However, regardless, they still used a loudspeaker to announce a previously unified message, which had been modified based on the earthquake rescue protocols: houses with survivors should hang white flags from the windows, while houses where zombies posed a threat to survivors should hang red flags. Any houses without any signs would be forcibly entered before afternoon. In the future, the state would build a base here, and unoccupied houses might be subject to forced requisition by the government.

After Bai Qi hung a white towel from the window, he saw Hu Haotian across the way waving at him.

Tang Ruo also noticed. “Captain Hu is calling us over.”

“Yeah, you go wash up first.” Bai Qi reached out to smooth her hair.

Tang Ruo didn’t hesitate any longer and quickly washed up, dressed neatly, and left with Bai Qi to Hu Haotian’s villa.

The three villas were securely surrounded by walls, preventing any zombies from getting in.

Seeing Bai Qi and Tang Ruo arrive, followed by Tian Hai, Hu Haotian welcomed them all in. “Did you hang white cloth at your windows?”

Bai Qi nodded.

The four of them sat down in the living room.

All sixteen people from the convoy had gathered here.

The army had arrived early, and many in the convoy hadn’t had breakfast, but everyone treated this place like home, so eating while holding a meeting was no big deal.

“I’m feeling both happy and worried,” Hu Haotian said, looking at everyone.

Bai Qi took out a bottle of soy milk and some rice balls from his bag, handing them to Tang Ruo as breakfast. Tang Ruo opened the plastic wrap, let Bai Qi take a bite first, then took it for herself to eat.

Hu Haotian glanced at the couple and, used to it, turned back to continue speaking. “What makes me happy is that we won’t have to go through all the trouble to get to the western district anymore, but I’m worried about whether the army might also be short on supplies. Is the legal social order still intact? What if they come and forcibly rob us? I really can’t bear the thought of that.”

Elder Qin said, “They probably won’t forcibly rob us, but the social order definitely no longer exists. However, from what we heard on the broadcast, the government still wants to retake A City, so we shouldn’t be too worried.”

“But now all the production lines have stopped. The military must also be short on supplies. It sounds a bit difficult to talk about ‘retaking,'” someone replied.

“Yeah, without supplies, will they just support ordinary people for nothing?”

“So, it seems we might have to hand over something after all.”

Liu Bing said, “Actually, our discussions aren’t really a solution. We’ll have to wait until the army arrives in the afternoon to find out.”

Hu Haotian turned to Bai Qi and asked, “Brother Bai, what are your thoughts?”

Bai Qi took another bite of the rice ball from Tang Ruo’s hand.

Hu Haotian: “…”

Can we be a bit more serious when discussing important matters?

After slowly swallowing, Bai Qi said, “In the early stages of the apocalypse, there must be people in the military who have been infected by the virus and some who have awakened their abilities. As long as the government recognizes the role of ability users, they shouldn’t act recklessly. We just need to wait patiently.”

With that, everyone temporarily suppressed their anxious feelings.

However, they were still worried about the military forcibly entering their homes to search for supplies. After all, all three villas had solar panels on the roof, and the high walls surrounding them were too conspicuous. So, they moved all the supplies from the house into the basement.

Hu Haotian looked at the empty living room and still felt uneasy. “I’m still a bit worried. This feeling is really unpleasant.”

Luo Ziqiang said, “Brother Hu, isn’t the old man also a political figure in the military? He definitely won’t come at us too hard because of the old man’s influence.”

Everyone’s fears were not without reason. When they had nothing but their lives, the military’s arrival represented hope; after all, with nothing left, they had nothing to lose.

Now that they had a house, electricity, and supplies, they feared the military would come just to rob them and leave. Even though they were ability users, facing the military’s guns and cannons…

Still, two fists can’t fight four hands…

Regardless, in the afternoon, the time had come.

The military was led this time by a very young officer—Wei Lan. As he looked through binoculars at the “Royal Court” villa area, he noticed a plot of land surrounded by earthen walls.

“What is that over there? There wasn’t any symbol like that on the blueprint we received,” Wei Lan asked his aide.

The aide also took a look and said, “I don’t know… but it looks like an earthen wall built by an earth ability user.”

The military also had soldiers who had awakened their abilities, and they categorized this type as earth ability users.

“So there are ability users living here…” Wei Lan pondered for a moment. “No wonder there are so few zombies in the neighborhood.”

“Major General Wei, since there are ability users here, we should include them in the 34th Army. How many brothers have we lost as the vanguard force? It’s all because of that Colonel Zhou, who doesn’t treat us like human beings just to protect his own son. If he continues to dominate, he’ll definitely find an excuse to eliminate us in the future.”

Wei Lan continued to look through the binoculars for a while and then asked, “How many ability users do you think there are here?”

The aide said, “With those earthen walls built so high, there must be quite a few ability users, and with such a large area enclosed, there are probably many residents as well.”

Wei Lan nodded. “Isn’t there supposed to be a registry of residents here? Has it been obtained?”

“This morning, we went to the data center and retrieved all the resident information. We also have the property ownership details for the villa area, but everything needs to be verified this afternoon.”

Wei Lan nodded again. “Have someone go to the high-rise area and register everyone. We’ll check out the villa area by the earthen wall.”

However, upon seeing the earthen wall up close, both Wei Lan’s aide and the soldiers were a bit shocked.

The defensive earthen wall was so high and thick, with no other entrances nearby. After circling around, they finally spotted a villa’s front gate.

Turning around, they saw another villa that had been partially demolished, leaving only half of it standing.

The aide’s expression darkened.

He realized that this house was very likely owned by some political figure, and now it had been so directly torn down. What would they say when the residents came to live here later?

The front gate was sealed tightly and had no doorbell; with the distance involved, even if a soldier shouted at the door, no one would hear him.

Fortunately, Hu Haotian had asked Liu Bing to keep an eye on the outside situation. When Liu Bing saw soldiers approaching with binoculars, he went over to open the door.