Homeland had a total of ten super cities, and Future City located in the northwest direction had four satellite cities named North City, South City, East City, and West City. Each city had two counties, named Left County and Right County. Each county had two towns, named Upper Town and Lower Town. The scale and layout of the towns varied.
Unlike the wilderness, zombies could be seen everywhere in the small towns, and vehicles were also scattered throughout. In layout and detail, these game towns had no difference from an ordinary real-world small town—the only difference was the absence of normal residents within the game towns.
Vanguard Lin Wu silently killed a zombie that was blocking the way, and then gestured with a hand wave. The three people behind him crouched and walked over to Lin Wu's side, staying vigilant and observing their surroundings. This was a residential area with detached houses on both sides of the highway, complete with front and back yards and grasslands. Some houses had open doors, some front yards still had laundry hanging out to dry, and some houses were half-burnt. Vehicles that had been in accidents were parked on the road.
Stone spoke softly, "Enter a building, clear all the zombies inside, and meet the conditions for occupation, then you can establish a Survivor's Base. Within the base's safe zone, zombies will not respawn. Also, the safe zone has one of the most powerful features: unlimited ammunition and weapons with unlimited durability."
Daiyu pointed to a house across the street, "That one looks good, no zombies in sight."
Lin Wu looked toward the house. What was good about it? It didn't have any geographical advantages.
Little Knife disagreed and said, "It's very average."
Stone said, "Lin Wu, scout out the road and come back, everyone else rest here."
"Okay."
Stone said, "Be careful of blind spots, and be extremely wary of zombies with distinctive appearances." The known mutant zombie so far was the Screamer, which, even though it lacked attacking capability, no one wanted to hear its wailing cry.
After putting down his backpack and going in light, Lin Wu hadn't walked far before he encountered a group of zombies. Around a dozen zombies were lined up, following a fat zombie as they meandered slowly along the road. Lin Wu had no choice but to leave the road and enter a house by the road, climbing over the fence, and into the front yard of another house. When he climbed over the third fence, Lin Wu stepped on an unknown object. He quickly adapted, pretending to stumble and rolling to the side. He then looked toward the bottom of the fence, and there lay a Screamer, sleeping.
The Screamer, having had its sleep disturbed, tried shakily to get up. Lin Wu, without any hesitation, drew his knife and pounced on it. Knife in hand, he swiftly dispatched the Screamer's life. After completing this, Lin Wu stood still, listening carefully to the surrounding sounds, confirming no other zombies were alerted before looting a box of matches from the Screamer's body and continuing forward. This time, Lin Wu had learned his lesson, thoroughly checking what was behind each fence before climbing over it.
It wasn't the zombies he feared, but the sudden appearance of zombies. The body could withstand bites, but the heart couldn't withstand the shock.
Ten minutes later, Lin Wu returned to his team, only to be stunned by the scene before him. He saw Stone and the other two people pinning down a fat zombie. Stone and Daiyu each held down a leg, and Little Knife sat in front of the zombie's head, curling her legs around its neck and using both hands to block its mouth.
Let go of that zombie, you beast, come at me instead.
Little Knife desperately tried to signal Lin Wu with winks and gestures. Only after getting closer did Lin Wu realize that the group of zombies he had encountered ten minutes earlier were nearby, separated by a fence and less than three meters apart. It turned out that before Lin Wu returned, the fat zombie leader from the group had climbed over the fence and fallen to the ground. Since the three people only had blunt weapons and dared not act rashly, they could only restrain the fat zombie together. Of course, it was Little Knife who acted first, with Stone and Daiyu learning by watching her.
After Lin Wu dealt with the fat zombie, the zombie group, having lost their leader, seemed confused. They looked around puzzled for a while then continued on their route as per usual, which was to climb over the fence.
The first zombie climbed over the fence, fell to the ground, and Lin Wu pounced quickly, executing it before it could get up. Then came the second one. By that time, two other zombies were on the fence, now seeing Lin Wu, but they didn't escape the laws of physics and both flipped over, crashing down. The zombies waiting to climb the fence had no idea what was happening on the other side.
Lin Wu's blade rose and fell, rose and fell, each stroke making only a slight squelching sound. In less than half a minute, all twelve zombies that made up the horde lay dead. Little Knife and Stone were responsible for looting the corpses—Lin Wu would kill one, and they would search it, turning out many sundries. There were flyers, wallets, coins, silk scarves, and even packages of beef jerky, among other small items.
Daiyu resisted the act of searching zombie bodies. As everyone looted, she couldn't help but remind repeatedly, "Let's go, we don't have much time."
Stone gave up on the last few bodies and came over to ask, "How's it going?"
Lin Wu picked up a stick and drew on the ground, "The best base nearby is a house at the end of the residential area. The backyard and the right side have a 50-degree slope, about twenty meters long. I think normal zombies wouldn't fancy climbing. The house is positioned in the middle of a T-junction. The left side of the 'T' leads to the town center's commercial area. I didn't go to the right side because there were too many zombies, but I did see a very tall signal tower."
Stone said, "Taking this place as a base, we can scavenge materials from the residential and commercial areas."
Lin Wu added, "The front yard of the house is level with the road, and there are two parking spaces at the entrance. The backyard is one level down, and quite sizeable. The main structure of the house has two floors, with stairs in the middle, and a room on each side."
Stone asked, "So we enter on the second floor?"
Lin Wu corrected, "One and a half floors, go down half a level straight to the backyard, with a room on each side. Go up half a level to the second floor, with a room on each side. I observed for a while and didn't see any signs of zombie activity."
After some thought, Stone said, "We won't go upstairs first. Even if there are zombies in those two rooms, the number won't be many. Daiyu, you guard the stairs, and Little Knife will coordinate with Lin Wu to clear the zombies on the first floor."
Daiyu replied, "My infection level is very high, and if I get caught again it might surpass 50%."
Stone seemed to think Daiyu made a lot of sense, "I'll guard the stairs, and Little Knife will coordinate with Lin Wu. It's only the first day, and the base isn't that great, so it shouldn't be too hard."
...
The prospective base had a concrete wall about 1.5 meters high in the middle, with an iron gate. To the right of the gate were two parking spaces, but there were no vehicles on them.
The four of them climbed over the wall cautiously. Lin Wu pushed open the front door, which led to the upstairs and downstairs stairways. Lin Wu stepped into the stairwell and quietly waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Daiyu, unaware of the situation, reminded, "We're out of time."
"Mm," Lin Wu responded, slowly feeling his way down the stairs, his hand on the railing; he had only felt up to this point earlier. After descending the stairs, a large open space lay before them. Lin Wu pointed to the room on the right, then to his eyes, signaling Little Knife to stay on guard at the entrance of that room. Little Knife nodded, took the Nail-Pulling Hammer, and stood against the wall by the door to the right room. Lin Wu entered the room on the left alone.
The room was pitch black, devoid of any light. They really should have waited for daylight to make an attack, but it was now 11:30 PM, and still several hours away from dawn.
Entering a room alone that he couldn't see into, not knowing its layout, Lin Wu was also very afraid. Who knows if the next second he'd have a close encounter with one of the zombies.