The apocalypse begins with a dungeon game.

"This... do I have it or not...?" The guy who called himself Xing Dong touched his forehead and looked in Li Can's direction.

Of course not. There are only these players in the instance, and now they've all gathered. If the "crazy teacher" from that school hadn't died, and if they were lucky, they might have met Li Can and the others earlier.

Perhaps he could become the fourth child, Xing Bei.

It's a pity they left so early.

It is extremely rare to be able to bring everyone along safely and intact at this stage, with none of the surviving members exposed.

"No, that's all, haha." Xing Dong saw Li Can shaking his head behind Huang Xiaoqi's back and quickly finished his sentence.

"Well, I thought my sister-in-law, whom I've never met, wanted to collect all the winds (East, South, West, North) because she loves playing mahjong."

Li Lan said that she doesn't like playing mahjong, but now she loves playing zombie games, smashing them in the head with one punch, which is very satisfying.

"Maybe, that's probably it, hahaha, Auntie, you're so funny." Xing Dong smiled ingratiatingly, finally able to breathe a sigh of relief.

Qian Shi leaned against the corner of the wall and remained silent for a long time. When he finally had a chance to speak, he protested with a trembling body.

"Xing Dazhuang, I've treated you with my whole heart, and this is how you treat me? Our restaurant isn't even that big, and you've brought so many people back. Even if I cook until the bottom of the pot is leaking, I still won't make any money..."

His concerns are valid if money is useful.

But the next second, an omnipresent broadcast sound effect suddenly drifted throughout the entire city.

The deafening mechanical noise echoed in every corner of the city.

No matter what you're doing, you'll be able to hear it clearly.

[Notice: The terrorists who set fire to and bombed the city today have been executed. Their remnants are still on the move. All residents' exit permits have been completely wiped clean and must be re-registered as a warning.]

[If anyone reports a disturbance, after verification, the entire family can be directly escorted out of the city as a reward, without needing a separate exit permit.]

【…】

The broadcast continued, and as soon as Qian Shi heard the first sentence, he quickly took out the large red notebook from his pocket and opened it to his eyes.

Then, all the strength to struggle left his body, and he lay flat on the floor like a lump of rotten mud, melting and flowing away.

Except for Shen Yuan, who didn't have a certificate, everyone else opened their red booklets upon hearing this, and sure enough, it was just as the notice said.

As punishment, all funds were reset to zero, and everything had to start over.

It doesn't really matter to those guys who don't put in any effort and just laze around.

It's not scarcity that's worrisome, but inequality. Now everyone is on equal footing, starting from the same point, which isn't bad at all.

But for someone like Qian Shi, who could have easily saved up a little more money and left the city, it was like being struck by lightning.

It was no less than being killed again.

"Qian Shi, what's wrong with you? Wake up! Don't die in my room!"

"Hey, come quick! Nephews, come help carry him out, he's so heavy!" Huang Xiaoqi frantically checked Qian Shi's breathing with her fingers in front of him.

The results showed that they were all very weak.

He immediately turned around and called for help.

What they have in abundance here right now is manpower.

When I turned around, everyone in the room was staring at me.

Xing Dong and the others ran over to help carry the person. Qian Shi was half-dead, clutching the exit certificate in his hand. The bright red book was open, and the amount on it was reduced to a single printed symbol: 0.

The broadcast continued.

[…We especially congratulate the Xing Dazhuang family at the Baijie Hotel in the suburbs, and thank the kind citizen for providing the information. The door to the supernatural will open for you and your family.]

All residents who hear this message, please assemble at your nearest city gate one hour from now.

The last hint was repeated three times, as if afraid that someone might overlook it or not understand it.

Outside, you can already see a few indigenous people leaving their homes and moving towards the city gate.

Suddenly, Qian Shi in the restaurant seemed to have figured something out, and he came back in one breath, falling off the person Xing Dong and the others were holding up.

He plopped down on the ground with a heavy thud.

"Dazhuang, I am also your long-lost relative. I never thought you would be so lucky to be able to leave the city directly. Take me with you. When you arrive, just tell the guards at the city gate that I am anyone in your family."

Qian Shi tossed the certificate of leaving the city aside, his mind now completely focused on Li Can, eager to try and take this shortcut.

"I'll change my name right now. I'll be called Xing Shi. What do you think? Anyway, we've never had a household registration here, so it's not clear and detailed. Nobody knows exactly who's in each family."

"The city gate guards probably don't know either. We can just fool them and get away with it. Once I successfully get out of the city, I'll be your slave, Dazhuang. You won't abandon your buddy with such a good opportunity, will you? Please."

Qian Shi was still pleading desperately.

Little did he know that the culprit behind all of this, which caused everyone's city exit certificate balance to be zero, was Li Can.

The cause is in him, and the effect is also in him.

Lee Chan's focus upon hearing the broadcast was not on her nomination.

The strange creature had given him instructions before leaving, so he knew what was going on.

I just didn't expect him to keep his promise so well; there was no need for that.

What surprised him was that those staff members who were clearly scapegoats and couldn't possibly be the real culprits were executed by the people of Shangcheng in such a short time.

The result was rather hasty.

It's not hard to see from this that the guys in the City Lord's Mansion who can issue orders don't really care about the truth.

They just want to find someone to take the blame and get the job done.

Even though they knew perfectly well that the real culprit was hiding in the shadows.

Otherwise, they wouldn't have added a sentence at the end of the broadcast, still requiring indigenous people to provide clues and information for identification.

I was just lucky; I acted first and escaped unscathed. Now, the target isn't me, but the first one to be rewarded, while the other staff members have become the scapegoats.

"Alright, since we've all met at our Baijie Hotel, we're all family. Why distinguish between you and me? It's easy to leave the city; just call me 'Big Brother' each." Li Can was just trying to appease Qian Shi with these words.

In fact, there wasn't a very serious response.

He was still pondering how to refuse the arrangements made by the people from the upper city, and what the purpose of the broadcast asking everyone to gather at the city gate was.

The timing of a second act of sabotage, and how to utilize available resources and connections...

Unexpectedly, the indigenous people who were already loitering near his house all had excellent hearing and heard this sentence.

They found him based on what was said on the radio. Who knew this person was nearby? Since they were all going to go out to the city gate to gather anyway, they all gathered here to see what kind of amazing person the "Xing Dazhuang" who was mentioned was.

"What a kind person! I am now a member of the Xing family! Please accept my bow, elder brother." The old man, who looked to be in his seventies or eighties, threw away his cane and slid towards Li Can.

Qian Shi hurriedly pushed aside the crowd surging into the restaurant, "Make way, everyone! I was here first. Can't you guys follow the rules of first come, first served? Waaah, this is so cruel! The world is going to the dogs, people's hearts are no longer what they used to be..."