Industrial Cthulhu doesn't believe in the end times.

Chapter 73 A Long Wall

While countless people were struggling on this land, Su Xun arrived in Xinfu City.

This is a county-level city under the jurisdiction of a province, with a permanent population of over one million. Before the apocalypse, it was administered by Fenggao City.

Near the chemical industrial park, there are five shelters with a capacity of 10,000 people each.

Su Xun's convoy did not travel very fast, but overall it did not cause much delay. The soldiers in the convoy gathered more than 300 survivors along the way.

These people boarded the trucks in the convoy. Most of them were in relatively dangerous situations. As for those who were in relatively safe situations, they had to wait in place for a while. The soldiers recorded their locations so that they could return to pick up these people when a larger force was assembled.

However, some people drove their own cars to join the convoy, and Su Xun accepted them all. Thanks to the traffic control measures implemented before the apocalypse, the journey was exceptionally smooth, much better than the situation in his previous life where there were vehicle wrecks everywhere.

That's why, by the time they arrived at the shelter, the convoy had grown several times larger.

The process wasn't without its unexpected encounters; they faced more than one mutated zombie. However, these lone zombies posed little threat, and as long as they didn't form a horde, most could be dealt with by guns.

The only time Su Xun had to take action was when they were near Xinfu City, where the sound of gunfire triggered a small-scale zombie horde. Su Xun intentionally wanted Xu Huan and Xiao Zhenru to practice their abilities more, and together with the two of them, they quickly dealt with dozens of zombies.

Upon arrival at the shelter, the chaos had been contained, and the shelter's leadership was preparing to consolidate resources to rescue the city's survivors.

In addition, some people had already arrived here on their own. These people were gathered in front of a long wall. When Su Xun entered the shelter, he heard a lot of noise from there.

Because there were too many people gathered around, Su Xun could only see a lot of photos pasted on it from a distance, so he simply asked, "What are those?"

The shelter manager, looking somber, replied, "It's a list of survivors. We originally planned to post the information of the dead, but there are too many people listed, and fewer survivors."

Su Xun realized that those people were looking for their families. The shelter was quite large, and after the survivors gathered, they were resettled in a place far away from the zombies.

Due to the current chaos, the number of survivors can only be counted to a very limited extent. The shelter has not yet established information files for every survivor. Only after finding the corresponding information here can these people confirm where their relatives have been placed.

Su Xun sighed softly. This was undoubtedly cruel for those who couldn't find the names of their family members. Most of the people in the shelter were students, many of whom had lost their children.

Although he felt saddened by this, it was the result of Su Xun's initiative to design the shelter, which included all students and children. This idea was proposed by him and was a strategy that was approved by the think tank before the apocalypse.

The one-person-one-room isolation method seems simple, but it has many difficulties in practice. Does the living room count as a room? Actually, no. If a survivor in the bedroom walks out of his room, he will still encounter zombies, and they will be zombies transformed from his family members.

This was extremely difficult for most of the survivors.

Therefore, the living room is actually an escape route.

Therefore, the issue of the number of people becomes a problem that needs to be solved, as not all families can provide a separate room for their members, especially families with children.

Sending these children to shelters ahead of time can alleviate some of the pressure in this area.

The initiative itself did not encounter much resistance, because everyone knew that the shelters were safer and few people were unwilling to send their children there.

The main reason Su Xun chose this method was that the loss of loved ones when the apocalypse came was an unbearable pain for all survivors, and the children in a family were often the ones who could most affect the emotions of other members.

Today, most children are either old enough to become militia members or reservists, or young enough to enter the shelter directly as a school unit. Those who are too young, due to their small number and the fact that their parents are mostly in their prime or even older, can enter the shelter together to serve as defense officers.

This is why these children weren't around when the apocalypse struck; they were far away in shelters. This gave them a vague, elusive hope, a glimmer of hope to continue living. Even if that hope ultimately vanished, the experience of traveling from home to a shelter allowed them to prepare themselves mentally, and seeing others going through similar experiences made them less likely to react extremely.

Of course, it's not easy; it's unlikely that this kind of thing can be completely eliminated.

Looking at the survivors with their various expressions by the wall, Su Xun instructed, "Make sure to maintain order and arrange for people to do ideological work with these people. If you don't have enough people, I'll get some from here."

"clear."

Although the shelters are crowded, they are mainly populated by civilians who are already under immense pressure. It's a miracle they haven't collapsed yet, so it's hard to say they can do any ideological work on others.

Let's set aside this issue for now and get to the main purpose of this trip.

How many cars do you have here?

"We have enough vehicles. After the traffic control measures were implemented, we requisitioned buses from the transportation company, as well as school buses from many schools. They are all currently parked in the chemical industrial park."

Su Xun nodded and said, "Integrate the manpower, and take the surviving workers to the chemical industrial park and the base respectively, and organize production as soon as possible."

"clear."

"Is there a suitable person in charge of this?"

"Yes, we have a militia company commander here named Zhang Wei. He used to run a fairly large private enterprise and has experience in production management."

"Also named Zhang Wei... Fine, then I won't assign you any manpower."

Su Xun thought back for a moment and realized that his stand-in was still alive, but he was no longer taking on the role of a stand-in for the time being. Instead, he was participating in more practical work, and now he seemed to be having some trouble with having a face that looked almost exactly like his own.

Putting those thoughts aside, Su Xun continued, "Another thing is that we can now launch a more in-depth rescue mission. Have you planned any important targets? We can resolve them as soon as possible while we're still here."

Su Xun wouldn't stay in this shelter forever; there were still many things he needed to do. Since he didn't need to worry about the chemical plant, he began to focus on the rescue efforts.

Many soldiers are still scattered throughout the city, and they are playing their part. But that doesn't mean we should just let them stay put. We need to regroup them as soon as possible to reap the rewards of this plan.

The shelter manager told Su Xun, "Our main targets are several large settlements in the city center. We may also consider sending more people towards Fengcheng."

Fengcheng and Xinfu are of similar size. They were originally prefecture-level cities, but were later abolished and divided into districts under the jurisdiction of Licheng. However, they are actually quite far from the urban area of ​​Licheng, but very close to Fenggao City, and can almost be said to be adjacent to Xinfu.

This geographical location also led to a lot of wrangling between Licheng and Fenggao over the ownership of Fengcheng, but these grievances did not prevent Xinfu from sending support to Fengcheng at the first opportunity.

The chemical plant in Xinfu is actually part of the Taimeng base, and the two are connected by a railway. The scale of the shelters attached to it is also relatively large. This may not be the case in Fengcheng, where the rescue pressure may be greater.

After pondering for a moment, Su Xun said, "Then you can mobilize more forces to the Fengcheng direction, and leave the several settlements in the city to us."

The person in charge nodded in agreement.

(End of this chapter)