Crossing the wilderness to survive, starting with a broken kitchen knife.

A drizzle of rain fell, dispersing the bloody smell of the recent battle. The soldiers had experienced battles for several days in a row and were exhausted both physically and mentally. They returned to the tower to rest.

Zhang Shi deduced that with the arrival of heavy rain, the zombies would most likely hide themselves, and the nightly battle against the zombie tide would be temporarily halted, which was a blessing in disguise for the survivors.

"Next we need to focus on the problem of heavy rain."

As time passed, it was 12 o'clock in the morning, and the system's prompt sounded after a long absence, waking up many survivors who had fallen asleep.

Congratulations, survivors, on successfully surviving the extreme heatwave. I wonder if you're satisfied with the zombie challenge I added.

[In the coming days, the zombies will enter a period of dormancy. This is good news for you; you won't have to worry every night. In the coming days, you will have a very valuable period of development. Please take advantage of this opportunity to develop rapidly.]

[At the same time, I will break down some of the barriers between zones. You'll have the opportunity to encounter more unfamiliar companions, who may also be enemies.]

[By the way, the next natural disaster you will face is: heavy rain.]

[Later, the Wild World will rank the survivors based on the number of zombies they have killed. The survivors who rank high in their respective regions will receive generous rewards.]

As Zhang Shi expected, the zombie crisis was temporarily resolved, and the ranking rewards this time were very special. Not only were the servers merged, but the ranking was also different from the past, based on the number of zombies killed. I think the ranking list will be quite different from the last time.

Zhang Shi took a look at the number of people on the regional channel, which had surged from less than 3000 to 10.

Zhang Shi had a premonition that it wouldn't be long before organizations between divisions would emerge, and by then the divisions would be in chaos again.

Shaking his head to stop thinking about these things, Zhang Shi took advantage of the waiting time to click the golden finger to sign in.

System prompts, congratulations on signing in and getting:

[Barracks (White) x10]

"What do you mean? Are you complaining that I'm not developing fast enough?"

Zhang Shi has figured out some patterns of the signed-in items and guessed that the items he obtained are closely related to his current actual situation.

Before he could think about it, the system completed the ranking statistics and published them.

[Ding, the regional ranking statistics are completed and the rankings are now announced]

[First Place, Zhang Shi's Reward: Stable (Purple) x1]

Second Place, Zhao Feng's Reward: 1 Purple Ranch

[Third Place, Ge Dalong Reward: Ark (Purple) x1]

[Fourth Place, Wu Qing Reward: High-Efficiency Fertilizer Formula (Green) x1]

[Fifth Place, Liu Yu Prize: Rocket Car Design Drawing (Green) x1]

……

[Survivors, the next theme of the wilderness world is: Struggle for Hegemony! I hope you can withstand natural disasters, build achievements in this unclaimed land, and expand your territory.]

The system was subsequently taken offline.

Zhang Shi glanced at the leaderboard and, as expected, the regional rankings had shifted significantly since last time. Having to battle massive zombie hordes every night, Zhang Shi's group unsurprisingly occupied the top four spots. Notably, Liu Yu was right behind them; it seemed the knowledge that zombies were afraid of water had provided him with considerable support.

Chen Beipan, who had been in the top three for a long time, fell out of the top ten this time. It was probably because the mutual aid association fell apart. He could not attract too many zombies by himself, so the number of kills naturally could not go up.

For some reason, there was no world ranking this time, and Zhang Shi was unable to pay attention to the strength of other survivors.

Although the reward level this time is not high, it is definitely practical. It is also the kind of key building that is difficult to obtain. Zhang Shi knows that if everything goes well, the shelter will soon enter a new stage.

None of the four rested, gathering in the living room. Zhang Shi activated the territory control module and placed the pasture on the plains outside the shelter. By the light of the sunflowers, he could see a patch of muddy land suddenly sprouting with spiky green spots. Moistened by the light rain, the grass was growing rapidly, and he expected the first batch to emerge tomorrow.

Afterwards, Zhang Shi set up the stable.

This building efficiently generates warhorses for the shelter, surpassing the recruitment speed and quality of ordinary barracks. Zhang Shi intends to use these resources to build a cavalry unit. To this end, he specifically notified Gong Yi to expedite the production of a batch of horse armor tomorrow. Upon hearing the news, many assault soldiers volunteered to switch to cavalry. Zhang Shi didn't immediately agree, but instead planned to schedule a selection tomorrow.

Wu Qing's Shennongjia itself is already quite superb. Combined with Zhang Shi's farmer module, the crops in the shelter grow very fast. Coupled with the high-efficiency fertilizers rewarded this time, Wu Qing calculated that any high-quality plant can be grown and harvested within a day. The shelter truly has a bumper harvest every day.

Ge Dalong looked worried. His reward was an ark, which was as big as a warship and made entirely of unknown wood. It looked like it was specially built to deal with floods.

"I'm sure everyone knows the Ark's prophecy, so I won't be so pessimistic. Everyone should be mentally prepared in advance."

Zhang Shi still patted his shoulder.

"This shelter is our hard work. If a flood comes one day and we have to relocate, I will use props to move it as a whole. Everyone, please relax. Starting tomorrow, we will start digging the moat and make some preparations in advance."

……

On the first day of the rainstorm, everyone got up early without any prior arrangement.

Zhang Shi was just about to start planning for the day when Wu Qing called him to the farmland. Once there, Wu Qing, uncharacteristically anxious and uneasy, pulled out a wooden barrel filled with plump worms that looked like miniature zombie parasites.

I discovered this this morning when I was applying fertilizer. This is only a small part of the field. The entire farmland was infested with insects overnight. I'm afraid there's something strange about these insects, so you should take a look at them quickly.

Zhang Shi nodded, activated Ding Zhen, and found that it was just an ordinary cabbage worm.

After hearing this, Wu Qing's tense nerves relaxed a little.

"Even ordinary insects are a bit strange. These farmlands are clearly ignoring environmental influences, but they are infested with insects in just one night. There may be other factors at play."

Zhang Shi raised his head and asked tentatively, "Are you saying there's something wrong with the rainwater?"

Wu Qing nodded and added, "It's not just the rain, the soil might also be a problem. Those mutant zombies came out from underground, and these worms are so similar. I have to worry..."

Upon hearing this, Zhang Shi immediately built some greenhouses and enclosed all the farmland. To be on the safe side, he even activated the protective light curtain again, and then handed all the antidotes in his hands to Wu Qing.

"Notify me immediately if there's any problem. You'd better be careful when handling these worms."

Wu Qing felt warm in her heart and pretended to be calm. She took the antidote and hummed softly as a response.