Chapter 143.2 - Raising a Big Cat in the Apocalypse (22.2)
Chapter 143.2 – Raising a Big Cat in the Apocalypse (22.2)
Soft sunlight passed through the fog and surrounded Ding Qiuyun from all directions.
He was asking this of Gu Xinzhi, who was never willing to acknowledge losing to anyone, and he didn’t expect to get any answer from him. He reached out to touch the head of the black leopard who’d been sitting behind the children, then walked off with Boss towards his motorcycle, leaving Gu Xinzhi with nothing but his back.
Gu Xinzhi was smart, so he understood what Ding Qiuyun meant.
When dealing with these children, he had to learn how to win and how to lose.
Even if he didn’t understand it, the future was long, and he would study hard.
As he thought about it this way, he raised up his hand and stroked his chest.
…… He’d also hidden three cards in his chest.
They were his favorite ones, so he’d chosen to carry them with him. It was a rabbit, a carp, and a rose.
There was a rabbit, who held a rose in its mouth as it tried to get the fish under the water to accept its heart.
It didn’t know how to express its love or how to get the fish to accept it, and it could only jump and bounce around anxiously, even pouncing into the water and making a mess. But the fish still refused to approach and only swam around nearby.
The rabbit was anxious and miserable, but it gradually discovered that swimming in this pool of water was actually quite comfortable.
It gradually understood why the fish liked to stay in the water and refused to go ashore with it.
So, the rabbit decided to try hard to learn how to swim so that the fish would see it every day until one day, the fish might be willing to accept the rose.
Meanwhile.
061, who’d seen what had happened really didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
He could personally guarantee that Chi Xiaochi hadn’t been acting. He was really crappy at playing.
It was the first time in his life that he’d seen a man who could walk away so righteously and powerfully after being defeated so thoroughly. He’d even found such a beautiful excuse, and it made him want to pinch Chi Xiaochi’s face.
A few strokes was enough to coax the ‘disobedient’ leopard, and it also eliminated the frustration Chi Xiaochi felt at being defeated in the game. He put on his helmet and started up his motorcycle.
The leopard settled in behind him, simulating a human hugging posture. Its arms exerted force and tightened slowly, pulling the person in front of it fully into its embrace. Its movements were sneaky but also unusually gentle.
A few days later, Ding Qiuyun’s team set out again. Their aim was to collect materials.
They were in a strange city when they met some cannibalistic ivy, which they hadn’t seen in a long time.
Fortunately, they already had experience dealing with it.
Three well-stocked gasoline guns spewed orange-red tongues of flame, forming a dense attack net. The burned ivy couldn’t help letting out a high pitched scream. It left behind its cut off charred branches and escaped.
After clearing up the obstacles, Chi Xiaochi didn’t dare to slack off and drove through most of the block before choosing an already empty 24 hour automatic supermarket to rest.
The freezer in the supermarket was filled with fruit that had dried up from the cold, and some sushi rice balls that had become inedible a long time ago.
Like when dealing with monsters, the team had long stopped taking goods and supplies indiscriminately the way they had before.
They took the grill out from the truck along with half of the fresh venison and some potatoes, cutting it all into small pieces with a military knife. They sprinkled some rosemary on top and brushed on the black pepper sauce that Sister Jing had made before putting it onto the rack and lighting the oven with saltpeter.
The juice from the meat dripped down the iron grill as the gravy and meat gradually gave out a surprisingly rich fragrance.
Before the meat finished roasting, Yan Lanlan and several teammates went to the supermarket to search for supplies. The few people who were left idle began to discuss how to deal with the AI and new humans.
After establishing a stable foundation, Chi Xiaochi had removed all the AI base stations within 200 miles of the town as soon as he could. Otherwise, the AI would have regarded the town like a thorn in their eye and constantly have sent new humans to harass them.
However, the sentry system that Chi Xiaochi had established was very militarized. Additionally, they’d taken in a group of AI who had good intentions towards human beings, and they also had 061’s guidance. They’d established their own AI base station, and they were building up momentum to fight against the new humans who had AI support, developing a place that existed outside the law in this post-apocalypse era.
Even so, they didn’t dare to relax so easily.
AIs had no physical body, but they’d still been able to manipulate the entire human race.
This small town they’d built was still too small. Even if they had Shu Wenqing as an ally, it still wasn’t enough.
Chi Xiaochi wanted Ding Qiuyun to go even further and look for other places that existed outside the law.
He knew that there were still many old humans and new humans in other places who yearned for peace. However, because of the blockage in information flow, they were like Robinson Crusoe stranded on an island and could only stay where they were, waiting anxiously for a signal from an ally somewhere out there.
They wanted to unite these people and gradually expand the territory that belonged to mankind.
While Chi Xiaochi spoke to himself in his heart and spoke unilaterally to Ding Qiuyun, Gu Xinzhi suddenly spoke up, “I have a way to solve this AI problem.”
Gu Xinzhi had never given any opinion on tactics before. When he spoke up suddenly this time, everyone, including Chi Xiaochi, turned their gazes towards him.
Gu Xinzhi said, “Before entering the global winter, AI had almost taken over all of the corners of the world. But they failed to control the thermal weapons. Reasonably speaking, our town could be razed to the ground with just one miniature missile. Captain Ding, you know why this is?”
Chi Xiaochi was silent for a moment.
Ding Qiuyun had been a soldier. He naturally knew why.
State-level and military-grade weapons all used AI support and were controlled by human beings. They were equipped with high-precision firewalls to avoid AI problems and cause a series of serious chain reactions.
After the disaster, the AI attempted to attack the weapon bank, but were quickly discovered by the emergency warning agency’s people. The people there had immediately chosen to cut off all network lines, directly cutting off any possibility of an attack on the physical level.
Over the years, there had constantly been new humans attempting to restore the broken network, but they hadn’t been able to do so.
At this point, Chi Xiaochi had already guessed what Gu Xinzhi wanted to say.
He wanted to stop him, but Gu Xinzhi had already continued, “Sun Bin understands this aspect very well. We just need to find a few more relevant technical personnel, try to recover the use of these heavy weapons and occupy the absolute high ground in terms of attack power. Bomb several new human settlements with heavy bombs or missiles, and the new humans will know who they should cooperate with. It’ll just be a matter of time before we can borrow their power to destroy the AI base station.”
There was silence all around, and Sun Bin, who was named, was even more dazed.
After processing the amount of information contained in this speech, Sun Yan sucked in a breath of cold air. “… Is this considered a solution?”
Chi Xiaochi rejected this proposal directly. “It’s one way. But it’s not a way that people should consider.”
Gu Xinzhi shrugged his shoulders. It was as though his proposal was just a joke he mentioned in passing, “If you don’t like it, then forget it.”
Gu Xinzhi’s speech left everyone a little disturbed and uncomfortable, up until Yan Lanlan ran over with something in hand. “Captain Ding, look at what I found!”
What Yan Lanlan found was indeed a treasure.
It was an older model polaroid camera. There was also a power cord attached to it, and it should be something that the former supermarket owner had dropped while in a hurry to escape.
Everyone skimmed over the previously stiff atmosphere and began to gossip. They soon left behind the topic of establishing a counter offensive plan.
They used the hand-held generator to charge up the polaroid camera as they ate.
After dinner, Yan Lanlan confirmed that there was still photo paper in the camera and said, “Everyone, gather together. Let’s take a photo.”
Everyone was full and satisfied, and they were all young people. They naturally had playful hearts and gathered together, tidying up their hair and clothing.
They had nowhere to prop it up, so they put the polaroid camera on the table, spending a long time picking the right angle before they all crouched down together.
Ding Qiuyun was naturally at the center.
Gu Xinzhi squeezed the others away and crouched down beside him.
Yan Lanlan set up a 10 second delay for the camera, then immediately rushed back to the team. She called out, “Everyone, smile!”, so everyone all smiled broadly, but because it had been too long since they’d taken photos and the delay function made it difficult to grasp the timing, everyone’s smile was a little exaggerated.
Only Chi Xiaochi maintained an excellent sense of the camera’s timing. His left hand was on Boss’s back, his right hand on his right knee. He sported Ding Qiuyun’s face and flashed a brilliant smile.
But what he didn’t notice was that the person to his right, and who was to the black leopard’s left, didn’t even look at the camera.
Gu Xinzhi tilted his head, his eyes locked on the perfect arcs of Ding Qiuyun’s jawline and the tip of his nose. He couldn’t control the corners of his lips from rising up.
And the black leopard had its gray-blue eyes open as it looked at the young man’s face under his current skin