Train Survival: You're really trying to survive!

Su Li snapped out of her daze and found herself back at the transfer station. She glanced around and saw her own train still under repair at the factory. Not far away, Sofia and Ivan were chatting.

Recalling the instructor's unfinished words, Su Li felt a surge of crisis: "Our civilization is being targeted? Ugh! Tsk, I'd better not spread this news around, lest the mastermind behind it all targets me."

After composing herself, Su Li walked out of the training field.

Upon seeing Su Li return, Ivan excitedly waved to him, "Brother Su~ Welcome back!"

"Oh," Su Li greeted, then stretched her body. "It feels a little different. Is this the feeling brought about by muscle memory?"

After moving around a bit, that uncomfortable feeling disappeared.

Su Li walked over to the two of them and sat down casually. "What are you talking about?"

“The carriages,” Sofia said succinctly, “we don’t have enough space.”

Su Li looked at Ivan and asked, "So you want to add another carriage?"

This is something we can actually consider.

There are three ways to obtain a carriage in this game.

The first method is to use items, specifically survival coins, to unlock a train car limit, and then buy them.

The second is upgrading. Every time a train reaches a multiple of 5, it gains a train limit.

Thirdly, there's the recruitment of members. Each member relinquishes their train conductor status and loses the basic limit on the number of carriages they can occupy. This limit is then transferred to the train conductor. However, if a member dies, the option to reclaim the limit can be made. This is to prevent people from inflating the limit.

Since Zurich took in Sofia and her brother, there was naturally one more carriage available.

“It’s no use thinking about it, we can’t afford it.” Su Li shrugged. “The first new carriage requires 500 wood, 300 stone, 200 iron ingots, and 500 survival coins. It’s not something we can afford.”

“Yes, we know that, so we’re discussing how to get more survival coins and how to alleviate the current pressure.” Ivan explained, “15 square meters is still too small. It takes up a lot of space to put boxes in, and there are three of us now, so it’s a bit crowded living there.”

“That’s true. There’s a smelting furnace and a forging table inside. The space is too small,” Su Li agreed. “It seems that the next step is to build the new carriages first. Putting aside everything else, we should at least set up toilets.”

You can't just stop the car every time you need to use the restroom, can you?

Before, when driving for more than an hour, Su Li would just open the door and relieve herself whenever she needed to use the restroom, which was very enjoyable.

Speaking of which, the toilet paper Su Li uses is made from the leaves of those trees. Su Li had even planned to cook and eat these leaves and bark, but since they're poisonous, she hasn't eaten them. The leaves are quite tough, so they're not bad for wiping her bottom.

“Yes, and besides, we also need to grow things,” Ivan said with a troubled expression. “Each planting pot, once made, will take up 1 square meter of space. We’re planning to make four, which will be 4 square meters.”

We currently have 11 storage boxes in our train. Although they can be stacked, the interior space is less than 3 meters high, so we can only stack them two layers high, which takes up another 6 square meters of space. There's also a smelting furnace that takes up 2 square meters, and a forging furnace that takes up 2 square meters. Our living space is only 1 square meter.

Excluding the planting boxes that haven't been made yet, there's only 5 square meters of living space in the car right now, including a table and chair. Su Li has been sleeping on the table for the past few days.

If you calculate it this way, it's really a bit cramped for three people to live in this 5-square-meter space. With a planter box, it's practically uninhabitable.

After Ivan finished speaking, he sent a screenshot to Su Li, "So, I think I've found a good option."

Su Li looked at the screenshot Ivan had sent.

[Small External Cart: A cart attached to the back of the train, containing 100 slots, each capable of holding 99 of the same material]

[Required materials: 50 wood, 50 stone, 50 iron ingots, 50 survival coins]

Su Li looked at these materials and thought, "I think I can pull them out myself."

He must have missed this before. There were just too many projects in the factory; he was overwhelmed by them.

"That's a good method," Su Li nodded. "With an extra 9900 storage capacity, we can remove the storage box."

Su Li checked the supplies; there was enough wood and iron ingots, but not enough stone.

Go to the exchange; the current exchange rate for timber and stone is 3 pieces of timber for 2 pieces of stone. Zuli exchanged for 26 pieces of stone and then went to the factory to choose to build.

Construction began, and Su Li looked at her supplies and sighed.

"It's really hard to spend these points. I only have 50 survival coins left."

We should also add some wood and stone. However, these are the most common materials; iron ingots are the rarer ones.

Even if there is a shortage of timber and stone in the future, iron ingots can be used to exchange for them.

In the shop, iron ingots cost 20 survival points each, which is 10 times the recycling price. Therefore, the player trading price in the handbook is set at 36 wood for 1 iron ingot. Any higher, and people might as well just buy it directly from the shop.

"Is this enough?" Su Li hesitated. He looked at the 145 iron ingots he still had, then at the two training courses worth 200 survival points each, and recalled the accelerated game progress. He gritted his teeth and stomped his foot.

"Done!"

Open the exchange and enter the trading interface.

[1 Iron Ingot - 5 Survival Coins] * 60

Iron ingots sell for 10 Survival Coins each in shops, and are bought back for 2 Survival Coins each. The market price fluctuates between 4 and 5 Survival Coins. Zuli listed one at a relatively high price.

Su Li looked at what else she could buy, and after looking around, she went to the pawnshop and sold 100 pieces of wood, exchanging them for 50 survival coins, thus accumulating 100 survival coins.

It wasn't until 10 p.m. that the 60 transactions that Su Li had listed were finally completed. Now he had 400 survival points.

"Sophia, come here for a second." Zuli called Sophia over.

"Train conductor, you wanted to see me?" Sophia walked over and asked softly. Her voice was steady and pleasant to listen to.

“I’ve saved up 400 survival coins, enough to buy two training courses,” Su Li said succinctly. “Which one would you like to choose?”

"What is the train conductor planning to choose?" Sofia countered.

"I'm going to choose a warrior," Su Li replied. He knew his own limitations; he wasn't particularly bright, and his admission to a top university was due to three years of diligent study after a sudden change of heart. He was really not cut out to play a mage. He might as well choose a warrior.

“A warrior… then I’ll choose the archer. I was originally a hunter, so I have some experience with shooting,” Sophia replied.

"Okay, tell your brother, then choose basic marksman training. I'm off."

Su Li allocated 200 survival points to Sophia, and then selected [Basic Warrior Training] for herself.

This training is different from swordsmanship training. Swordsmanship training is simply about practicing swordsmanship. This is professional training. It doesn't train combat skills, but teaches you how to become an extraordinary professional.

Su Li's vision went black as she entered the familiar training ground, but this time the instructor was not the scarred man from last time, but a handsome guy who looked very aloof.

"Start?" the handsome man asked coldly.

"We can begin, instructor!" Su Li quickly stood at attention and nodded.

"It's tough, stay focused," the instructor instructed. "First, I'll help you sense what magical energy is..."

And so began seven days of non-stop teaching!

At 5 a.m., a figure flashed across the square, and Su Li appeared.

He let out a long breath, stretched his body, and then, following the breathing technique taught by the instructor, absorbed magical energy from the air.

Having already noticed Zuli's return, Ivan saw this scene and did not go forward to disturb her.

A few minutes later, Sophia also appeared in the square. Then, like Su Li, she sat down and began to cultivate.

Half an hour later, Su Li opened her eyes and let out a long breath.

"Phew~ I did it. These 7 days of training weren't for nothing."

After stretching his body, Su Li felt that his physical strength had increased a lot.

"This cultivation method feels a bit like cultivating immortality, absorbing energy to strengthen the body."

He benefited greatly from the seven-day training. Under the guidance of his teacher, he learned a lot of basic knowledge and cultivation methods, and even learned a skill called Magic Energy Slash.

"The only downside is that you can't take out all the training results from inside. All you can take out are experience and muscle memory. It feels like a dream... my body isn't even tired."

Then, Sophia finished her training. She stood up, stretched her body, and felt no fatigue at all.

"What have you learned?" Su Li asked.

“Magic Shot. But we don’t have enough magic power right now, so we can’t fire it,” Sophia concluded.

Ivan's eyes lit up when he heard this. "Really? Then you'll become Superman, sister?"

“I can’t fly yet.” Sophia ruffled her brother’s hair. “Now I can protect you better.”

"Hmm... But, sister, I'm going to protect you from now on. I've decided, I'm going to become a Guardian."

"..." Sophia glanced at Su Li expectantly, and Su Li immediately understood. To become a guardian, one needs knowledge, one needs to attend classes, and attending classes requires paying tuition. Su Li held the reins of the finances.

“Next time. There are no survival coins this time. Ivan is also my teammate, and I won’t let him fall behind forever,” Su Li promised.

This kid is well-behaved and courageous; there's no reason not to nurture him properly.

"Alright, it's 5:30 now, it's about time. Let's hurry up and eat breakfast, we'll be leaving soon."

Next, the group divided the work: Sofia and Ivan cooked, while Zuli went to the factory to pick up their modified car.

The new train has been raised a bit, presumably to accommodate the water tank. Zurich is quite satisfied with this. This way, it won't take up space inside the train.

It was dragging a four-wheeled iron box, which was 3x3x3 in size. There was a 1x3 platform where it connected to the train, and there were railings around the platform.

A sliding door was opened at the back of the train engine, and once opened, you could see the metal box outside.

Su Li tapped the iron box and felt that it wasn't very sturdy.

Nothing else changed. After parking the car, Su Li got out to eat.

Today, instead of having barbecue, we used a newly made iron pot.

[Iron pot: 3 iron ingots]

Today is the day to go to the new world. To make it a little more ceremonial, Zurich opened two bottles of drinking water and then put in two kilograms of dog meat, some salt grass, and some brown algae.

After cooking a large pot of soup, Zuli realized that they didn't have any bowls!

"That's easy, one serving of dog meat in exchange for four wooden bowls!"

There's nothing wrong with selling dog meat. These things, because they lack refrigeration, have a very short shelf life. He still has 22 jin (11 catties) of dog meat left; it'll spoil faster than he eats it.

Delicious... Well, Zuli really can't lie and say it was delicious. The taste was truly indescribable; the hyena meat was awful, the salt grass was awful, and the brown algae was awful!

Sofia and Ivan didn't say anything and finished their meal completely. Zuli, on the other hand, ate for quite a while because the food was so bad.

The three of them finished all the soup before they started packing up to leave.

The first thing they did was to tidy up the things inside the carriage and move the items from the storage boxes to the back of the truck.

After the transfer, only two black iron storage boxes were placed inside the vehicle, stacked one on top of the other, to store commonly used items and valuables, such as food, water, elemental fragments, and various tools.

The locomotive now has three doors in total, one on each side and one at the rear. Ivan made a straw curtain out of weeds and used it to enclose one of the doors. This door will serve as a makeshift toilet; everyone can relieve themselves directly outside while the train is running.

The forging table and furnace were placed in the left and right corners, a simple workbench was placed by the window, and then three chairs were placed there.

The layout is very compact, making it quite cramped to live in. However, the current conditions are too poor, so there's no other way.

Su Li made up her mind that next time, she would definitely build the carriage.

In addition, the materials for the four planting boxes are ready, but they are not sure if they can get enough water, so they haven't taken them out to plant yet.

Just as Zuli was about to throw in a portion of salt grass, Ivan told him to stop.

"What's wrong, Ivan? Did you find something?" Su Li asked curiously.

"Hmm." Ivan nodded. "This salt grass hasn't been put into the storage space yet, right?"

Su Li recalled that the salt grass was picked on the seventh day next to the train, and it had been left outside ever since, never put into storage.

"Yes, how did you find out?"

Ivan said, "Brother Su, I've discovered that this salt grass is still alive."

"Huh? Alive?" Su Li looked at the salt grass in her hand with some curiosity.

"Yes, this salt grass shows signs of sprouting. Brother Su, please give it to me."

“Okay, here you go. What are you keeping this for?” Su Li asked curiously.

Ivan carefully left the salt grass, then took out a wooden bucket, put the soil that Zuli had dug earlier into the bucket, and poured in the brine.

After finishing, he explained, "Brother Su, you said before that this is a plant that grows in saline-alkali land and can absorb salt to grow. I think that if we don't have a stable way to obtain salt in the future, we might be able to rely on this plant to obtain salt."

"I checked, this is a succulent plant, which can be propagated by cuttings. If we encounter saline-alkali land or ocean in the future, maybe we can use seawater to grow this. This way we will have a relatively stable source of salt."

Su Li thought about it for a moment and felt that it made sense. Even if the possibility of using it was slim, it was just in case. It could be a lifesaver in the event of a crisis.

"Okay, let's keep it then, it's not much trouble anyway."