Chapter 107

No matter when, food is always the top priority.

Fifteen days is neither long nor short.

If we tighten our belts, the current food should last about a month; besides, if it really doesn't work, we can have Du Jia Jia get Little Yellow to catch some mice, geckos, etc.

But this is ultimately not a regular method and carries great risk; besides, people cannot live on meat alone—grains and vegetables are necessities.

After dinner.

All members of Qiming held an emergency meeting.

The meeting's content was, of course, about going out to find food.

Before this, Chen Mu, Dong Junwei, Tang Jing, and others had already discussed it in a small circle; naturally, the list of those going out was drafted by Chen Mu.

Unlike the previous decision, this time, based on the actual situation, Chen Mu gave another list for the External Duty Team.

Five people in total.

He Ying, Chen Mu, Wei Dalei, Xue Xu, Lu Shanshan.

This list was the result of careful consideration.

First, the number of people going out cannot be too many; one, it would leave the home feeling empty; two, too many people would actually increase the risk of exposure.

Although Zhao Xiao Yan or Sun Yuan were originally planned to go, after repeated consideration Chen Mu decided not to bring them for now; although these two have some use in reconnaissance, their mental strength is still insufficient and their ability cannot sustain long, so their actual scouting effect is quite limited.

Originally, Wei Dalei was not intended to go out, because someone needed to guard the home.

But the situation now has changed greatly compared to a few days ago.

First, the work of sealing the door gaps has finally been completed thoroughly.

Although not completely sealed, the 125 stainless‑steel pillars, each 3 mm in diameter and thicker than a person's waist, cannot be bent or damaged even by Wei Dalei's strength.

As long as the enemy does not have some specific ability targeting it, it is almost impossible to destroy.

Secondly, Dong Junwei has been nonstop producing hand grenades, with astonishing output.

Qiming now possesses 315 explosive warheads.

Of course, because the production cycle is long and as Dong Junwei's ability grows, the power varies, but it is already more than enough to deal with ordinary people.

The remaining eleven people, if they all throw these grenades at once, could carpet‑bomb the area in front of the storeroom door.

If even this cannot deal with the enemy.

Then.

Whether Wei Dalei is present or not makes no difference.

Finally, and most crucially.

Little Yellow.

This little cat, aside from mealtime, mostly comes to find Du Jia Jia to play.

But Du Jia Jia follows Tang Jing's instruction, meeting it no more than two hours a day; in fact, once mental communication with the cat exceeds that time, Du Jia Jia also gets headaches.

But no matter what.

Having this cat guarding the entrance, everyone's sense of safety rises sharply.

And the actual effect is indeed good.

Just in front of Du Jia Jia, Little Yellow has dealt with two centipedes and a small frog that happened to pass by.

The frog was quite innocent.

Fortunately, at that time perhaps Little Yellow wasn't hungry, or Du Jia Jia felt reluctant and sensed it, so the cat merely played with the frog until it was half‑dead, then let it slowly crawl out of sight, thus sparing its life.

All these safety measures, plus the underground passages in each room, have made this storeroom as solid as gold and soup.

Therefore, Chen Mu has taken almost all combat strength with him.

Lu Shanshan's role is also obvious; with her, we can bring back more supplies.

And the reason we brought Xue Xu is also to have an extra safeguard.

As the biggest contributor who has kept Lu Shanshan and others alive so far, Xue Xu's ability is hard to describe in words, but its effect is simple and direct; especially when facing dangers like mice, even Chen Mu cannot be fully confident of protecting everyone's safety.

Of course.

Xue Xu and Lu Shanshan are currently not official members of Qiming, so theoretically, even if everyone voted, we could not force them to do this.

Chen Mu privately approached Lu Shanshan about this, asked her opinion, and she almost without hesitation agreed, and promised to persuade Xue Xu to agree as well.

This rendered many of Chen Mu's earnest preparations useless.

Therefore, the meeting ultimately just went through the motions, informing everyone of the decision and setting the departure for early the day after tomorrow.

Incidentally, Dong Junwei explained the work arrangements for the period after Chen Mu and the others leave.

……

The next morning.

After his Nth battle with He Ying ended, Chen Mu casually washed up, then as usual went to the place where he daily trains his Special Ability alone.

This spot is on the inner side of a shelf's support leg, blocking most of the outside view, so he won't be disturbed.

He sits on the ground leaning against the metal shelf's support leg, recovering the stamina spent in the recent fight while casually taking out the stainless‑steel weapon he carries.

A cartoonish figure with a long nose, resembling a blower, gradually appears.

"Do you really like Peppa Pig that much?" Dong Junwei's voice came from beside him.

Chen Mu had already heard the class monitor's footsteps, but he remained focused on carving the stainless steel, then smiled and said: "Mainly because I'm most familiar with it; when I was in the orphanage, this was the only cartoon I could watch every day."

He has now grown accustomed to using the image of Peppa Pig to test the precision of his ability.

Compared to the first day, this pig's head can now at least be recognized at a glance.

Dong Junwei blinked, momentarily at a loss for words.

"Is there something, class monitor?"

Although the position of class monitor of Senior Three Class 4 has long become a thing of the past, Dong Junwei's current official title is Qiming Chief Decision‑Maker, but at least the nine people of Class 4 still habitually call her that.

Nothing much, I just wanted to ask: you're heading out tomorrow, how many grenades are you planning to bring? That way I can pick some higher‑quality ones for you.

They still had a whole day off, and Chen Mu needed to make preparations—grenades were, of course, essential. Just then, Dong Junwei reminded him, saying, "I actually wanted to discuss this with you as well."

"Grenades?"

"Hmm." Chen Mu nodded, rose to his feet, and said, "The grenades' blast power should be enough for now; the main issue is accuracy."

"Do you have any good solutions?"

"No way." Chen Mu shrugged: "Da Lei and I have practiced a bit in our spare time, but it hasn't helped much."

Dong Junwei nodded: "That's indeed a problem."

"So, I've tried a different approach."

Chen Mu said this while bending to pick up a stone from the floor.

Although the room had been swept fairly clean, cement sand and dirt dust were unavoidable, and much of it, to humans at that moment, resembled stones.

Dong Junwei watched him silently.

Chen Mu went on: "Since we can't improve accuracy, I was wondering if we could increase the grenades' blast radius."