Chapter 24: Handling the Aftermath

Dong Junwei heard the word, obviously a bit uncomfortable, but she forced herself to say: "Yes, this kind of thing—maybe we'll often run into it later; we can't always rely entirely on boys to protect us; we need to quickly adapt to the present situation, train our will—I think that's the best choice for everyone; the enemy won't go easy on us just because we're girls."

That makes sense.

Chen Mu naturally had no reason to refute.

Dong Junwei turned and told Du Jia Jia and Zhao Xiao Yan the general situation.

When they heard they would have to handle the corpses together, even Tang Jing felt her legs tremble a little.

But in the end, Dong Junwei's reasoning still convinced them.

Especially Du Jia Jia, who felt she now had another chance to prove her worth, and was even a bit eager to try.

But though the idea sounded good, once they actually approached and saw the scene, all four girls turned and ran off, vomiting loudly.

……

Only now did everyone have a chance to carefully examine the three attackers.

Their clothes were already ragged, but one could still make out that they were the summer uniform of Ziwei High School.

According to school rules, senior year students aren't required to wear uniforms, but freshmen and sophomores must, so these three are likely underclassmen from our school.

Dong Junwei and the others' spirits sank even further.

It's only been three days.

Has it already come to this?

Chen Mu felt even worse.

He recalled just now, remembering the numbness on their faces, his heart still pounding. The three before him seemed not human at all, but three lifeless puppets.

That was an aura of despair.

People were living only on instinct.

Could the outside world really have become this brutal?

But thinking about it, it's not impossible.

After all, the nine of us in Class 4, Senior Year 3 have managed to survive this long thanks not only to the efforts of Chen Mu and the others but also to luck accounting for much of it; others might not unite, even if they united they might not awaken, and even if they awakened they might not gain suitable abilities.

Given that humans can hardly beat any animal, it's not hard to understand why scenes of mutual slaughter and resource looting occur.

"These three must have observed us for a while, knowing we have food and water, so they attacked when only the three of us were outside, hoping to pick us off one by one, wipe us out, and seize our rice and water."

Chen Mu gave a rough analysis.

"Why not attack at night while we're asleep?"

"They've never entered this room, know nothing about the interior, and since we're all together, even if they managed to take down one or two, the rest would swarm them and they couldn't escape."

Dong Junwei sighed: "Actually, why bother? If they just came over and talked, even if we didn't take them in, we'd at least give them food and water."

Chen Mu said: "Everyone's experiences differ, so their thoughts differ too; maybe they've done this before, but after being attacked by others, judging from their appearance, such a thing is quite possible."

The uniform's quality certainly isn't great.

But in just a few days it's become this ragged, clearly their ordeal has been brutal.

……

Moving corpses is certainly not fun; it's not just physical labor, but also a severe psychological test.

But humans are animals with extraordinarily strong adaptability; for everything, there's only a difference between zero times and infinite times.

Even someone as frail and obedient as Zhao Xiao Yan, after a while, could cover her mouth and nose and help use the brought-over soil to cover the bloodstains on the ground.

Limited water certainly can't be used to wash away the bloodstains.

Besides, it wouldn't wash them clean anyway.

Chen Mu planned to later use his ability to shave off a layer of this concrete ground, but for now he needs to conserve his mental energy in case of a second wave of attacks—who knows if these people have accomplices.

Actually moving the corpses, that's still the boys' job.

But deciding exactly where to throw them is a headache.

If it's too close, we'd worry about attracting ants later, but we also dare not go too far.

Chen Mu even thought about digging a grave for them on the concrete, but he doesn't currently have the ability to dig a pit big enough for three bodies, and even if he could, he wouldn't want to waste mental energy on this.

In the end, the decision was to simply toss the three corpses onto the lawn outside the concrete road.

The concrete road stands about ten centimeters above the surrounding grass; to people now, it's also a cliff that makes one's heart hang, and Wei Dalei especially doesn't dare get near the edge.

After everything was done, the time had already passed noon.

Being attacked for no reason wasted so much time, and it somewhat disrupted Chen Mu and the others' rhythm.

For lunch we had scallion pancakes made under Chen Mu's guidance and personally prepared by Du Jia Jia, but whether it was the pancakes' fault or the aftermath of what just happened, nobody had an appetite, so everyone ate little.

Only Wei Dalei, carefree, ate two large pancakes.

And Chen Mu also forced himself to eat the prescribed amount.

After lunch, the time was already approaching two or three in the afternoon.

Right now nobody has an accurate sense of time; we rely entirely on the sun's position to make a rough estimate. Theoretically, if you knew the date and the sun's position you could calculate the time, but obviously no one here has that ability.

Only Tang Jing.

Although she herself says it's only a rough estimate.

But according to Chen Mu's observation, her accuracy is still quite high, which impresses him while also leaving him a bit puzzled.

Thinking back to how, whenever discussing phenomena after the human body shrinks, Tang Jing always gives a remarkably precise scientific explanation and manages to make him understand each time, Chen Mu finds it unbelievable.

Can a senior-year girl really understand so much?

Before, I only knew Tang Jing was impressive.

But after spending time together, I realized the word 'impressive' hardly does her justice.

After Tang Jing demonstrated mental calculation of the nth root of any five‑digit number, Chen Mu was utterly convinced—though he couldn't dispute it even if he wanted to, since he had no way to verify.

But the strange talent Tang Jing displayed leaves him with a perpetual odd feeling.

"I was thinking, we should build some simple defensive works." Chen Mu proposed his idea.

"Hmm, I've already thought about it."

Tang Jing pulled him onto an empty patch of ground.

Only when they got closer did they discover that many lines had been drawn on the ground; upon closer inspection, they seemed to be some sort of blueprint or similar thing.

Chen Mu was greatly surprised.

So, she had already finished drawing the plans?