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

When he woke up, it was already sunset. Thinking that today was the last day of the severe cold disaster and that the system would publish a ranking list based on the survivors' strength, Zhang Shi suddenly became alert and looked forward to the moment the ranking was announced.

"Huh huh huh~"

Due to the rising temperature, the windows in the villa were open, and Zhang Shi could clearly hear the cries of the piglets.

"I almost forgot about these three little guys. I have to find a home for them."

Zhang Shi opened the trading market and found that the batch of weapons previously on the shelves had all been sold, so he made another batch to replenish them.

After taking a look at the transaction orders, Zhang Shi found that many of the orders were purchased by a person named "Human-shaped Teddy". He remembered this person and he always left messages under his transaction orders. Zhang Shi felt annoyed and never replied.

"Is this the rise of another new force?"

Zhang Shi had no intention of expanding his territory, he just wanted to live a good life in his own little piece of land, but he was very sensitive to the actions of these forces.

"Why buy so many weapons? We can't get together."

Zhang Shi ignored other things, bought a livestock pen in the trading market and turned off the system.

He placed the pen next to the sheep and chopped some vegetables and roots, mixing them with the bread. This was the wild boar cubs' first meal in the sanctuary, and Zhang Shi was quite generous.

The three little pigs had never eaten such fine bran before, so they temporarily forgot their fear and buried their heads in the trough.

Zhang Shi murmured as tears of relief streamed down his face.

"Eat more and gain weight."

Seeing the piglets eating so happily, Zhang Shi also felt a little hungry. Thinking of the two bags of flour he had just harvested, Zhang Shi decided to change his taste today and make dumplings.

According to his childhood memories, Zhang Shi poured a pound of flour into a wooden basin, stirred it with his hands, and added water. When the water was almost enough, Zhang Shi kneaded the flour into a ball. After a while, all the flour condensed into a large dough.

Zhang Shi was very happy to see that the most troublesome step of kneading the dough was a great success. He covered the wooden basin with the dough and turned to prepare the meat filling.

Zhang Shi was raised by his grandparents, who lived near the mountains, where wild boar was common. During festivals, his grandmother would always make dumplings stuffed with wild boar.

Zhang Shi was a little depressed when he recalled the taste of his childhood. Pipi was keenly aware of Zhang Shi's mood swings, kicked his legs, threw himself on Zhang Shi's legs, and looked at him with a pair of big eyes.

Zhang Shi squatted down and touched Pippi's big ears, talking to himself.

"Don't think about so many trivial things. Right now, being able to live well and have enough food and drink is the greatest happiness."

Quickly adjusting his mood, Zhang Shi took out a piece of fresh wild boar meat. The meat was fat and lean. Although Zhang Shi couldn't tell what part it was, he guessed that it should taste delicious.

"It just so happens that the green onions in the fields have been harvested, so today's filling will be pork and green onions."

……

From kneading the dough, chopping the stuffing, seasoning, wrapping the dumplings to finally putting the dumplings into the pot, Zhang Shi was busy for more than three hours and was sweating profusely.

The moment the dumplings were taken out and served on the table, Zhang Shi didn't even wait to prepare the dipping sauce, and directly picked up a chopstick and put it in his mouth.

"Wow, mmm, it smells so good."

Thinking that his friends probably hadn't had noodles for a long time, Zhang Shi put all the dumplings into the pot, generously filled three plates and traded them to Zhao Feng, Wu Qing and Ge Dalong.

After eating and drinking, Zhang Shi suddenly remembered that he hadn't put away the gill net yet. It had been a while since he had cast the net, and he didn't know if it had yielded any results.

Holding an oil lamp, he groped in the darkness, and for a while, Zhang Shi peered around the courtyard wall. The shelter was quiet at night, with the occasional chirping of birds, animals, and insects, but no large beasts appeared to be harassing him. He supposed it was the Black Mist Guards' work.

Seeing that there was no danger, Zhang Shi went out and came to the river.

He dragged the fixed network cable up with force. Even though Zhang Shi's level had reached eight and his strength attribute was very high, Yue still expended a lot of effort.

With the help of the light, Zhang Shi could vaguely see some fish and shrimps being caught, and conservatively estimated that there were dozens of kilograms of fish caught.

Zhang Shi put his catch into his backpack and cast his net again in the dark. Suddenly, a bright light appeared in the night sky. Zhang Shi looked up, his face filled with astonishment.

"That's a star?"

Zhang Shi was certain that the twinkling lights in the night sky were starlight.

This was the first time he saw stars since he came to the wilderness world, and he couldn't help but look at them a few more times.

After returning to the shelter, Zhang Shi opened the chat channel.

Sure enough, many survivors noticed the changes in the night sky and began to discuss it.

Zhu Dachang: Did you see that? A star suddenly appeared in the sky. What’s going on? Could it be that a meteorite is about to fall?

Cheng Xiaobai: Brother, don’t worry too much. I have seen that star as well. It is very far away from us. Even if it falls, it will not fall to us.

Zhao Weiwei: I am an astronomy enthusiast. There is something obviously wrong with the constellations in this world. I have never seen a scene with only one star in the entire sky.

Wang Wu: By the way, the severe cold weather will end at 12 o'clock tonight. Do you think this system will create a ranking list like last time?

Hou Kun: Is there any need to think about it? There will definitely be one. I wonder how many places I can rank this time and what level of reward I can get.

Zhu Dachang: Instead of thinking about rewards, I should think about how to deal with the next natural disaster. Anyway, I've stockpiled enough supplies this time, so if nothing unexpected happens, I should be able to get through it easily.

Liu Yu: Everyone, for the better survival of our survivors, I declare the Alliance of Light officially established. Here, we uphold the principle of mutual assistance and never harbor selfish ambitions or exploit our fellow survivors. There are no barriers to joining; interested parties can chat privately. [Stronghold (Purple) x1: After use, you can convert a shelter into a stronghold. Friendly units can choose to merge a shelter into a stronghold. The stronghold owner has ultimate authority.]

Unexpectedly, Liu Yu would make such a big move after being silent for a while. Zhang Shi was quite curious about this stronghold, so he sent a private message to Liu Yu to inquire.

When Liu Yu saw that it was Zhang Shi chatting privately, he replied immediately.

"Boss Zhang Shi, what do you want from me? Are you interested in joining our Bright Alliance? If you want to join, I can give you the position of president."

Of course, Zhang Shi politely declined and instead asked about the specific usage of this stronghold prop.

Liu Yu had anticipated Zhang Shi's reaction, but he still told him everything he knew.

"I stumbled upon this thing while mining. To put it simply, it allows you to merge shelters. After the merger, each member still has management rights over their own shelter, but the manager can freely enter and exit everyone else's shelter and has the right to allocate all resources within the base."

"As of now, our Alliance of Light has absorbed nearly a hundred people, and they have already merged the shelter into their base. My philosophy is to gather together for warmth. Humans are social creatures. Rather than endure loneliness alone, it's better to form an alliance and face difficulties and setbacks together."

Zhang Shi nodded, respecting Liu Yu's idea. However, once there were more people, the mix of good and bad would inevitably lead to various problems. Zhang Shi didn't have the energy to deal with them, and he kept his distance from such alliances.