"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten."
Lu Xi'an counted the barrels stacked together, all made of iron, totaling ten. He speculated they corresponded to the ten dormitories in the shelter.
These might be used in emergencies, but for now, they seem to have no use.
Additionally, there are two identical ones in the kitchen, likely meant for kitchen use, but they were destroyed by the two people who were previously trapped here, rendering them unusable.
He had previously searched the bathroom completely, paying attention to all these barrels.
Only, Yao Wei's car no longer had space for the barrels, so he didn't bother with the ones stacked in the bathroom.
Now, these ten barrels could finally be put to use.
"I have an idea."
Lu Xi'an, looking at the ten barrels, suddenly spoke.
"What?"
Yao Wei asked.
However, Lu Xi'an said, "No rush now, let's talk later."
Yao Wei: "..."
At this moment, she really wanted to point a gun at Lu Xi'an, demanding he say it immediately. But that's not her style, and she suppressed the urge to act.
The two of them took the barrels to the bathroom door, and then went inside to tidy up.
They entered the cold storage and emptied some boxes filled with dehydrated vegetables and sausages, using them to contain the trash.
All the kitchen garbage was packed into boxes, and the two of them ran back and forth to the tunnel entrance to transfer the trash there.
After all the garbage was transferred, they brought two shovels originally used for cooking and put them aside temporarily.
The ten newly discovered iron barrels were also taken.
Lu Xi'an opened a small gap at the exit and attempted to maneuver the drone to fly out and check the area.
The screen on the remote lit up, the view shaky, venturing outside.
This was Lu Xi'an's first time operating a drone, and he felt it wasn't going very smoothly, not as if it were an extension of his arm.
Luckily, they didn't need the drone to do much; it just needed to fly high, survey the area, and confirm there were no people around.
Upon seeing the outside still deserted on the screen, Lu Xi'an and Yao Wei opened the entrance and went out, found a spot, and used shovels to dig a pit and buried all the garbage.
This was no issue for them either.
Although the dehydrated, shriveled, rotten vegetables took up a lot of space, they did not occupy as much as when fresh.
The most space-consuming item in the trash was still bag after bag of flour.
Lu Xi'an and Yao Wei, with great effort, quickly dug a deep pit.
They swiftly transferred the trash into the pit, covered it with soil, and tamped it down to ensure it was solid.
Then they scattered the excess soil and fetched dry loose soil from elsewhere to cover the wet soil, making it undetectable from the surface.
After finishing all this, they went back into the tunnel, took the barrels out, and fetched water by Jiang Yu's reservoir.
Once the ten barrels were filled, they went back into the tunnel and sealed the entrance.
All their outside work was done.
By now, the sky outside was finally starting to darken.
"Phew..."
Lu Xi'an exhaled lightly and said with a smile, "This day was tense and nerve-wracking. Before we found this shelter while running everywhere, we weren't this worried."
"Hmm."
Yao Wei nodded, also feeling nostalgic.
However, they both knew the reason—
Previously outside, they were all alone, moving forward and finding things as they went, carefree, with nothing to lose.
Now they had this place where they planned to stay for a while, but if discovered, their "secret base" would be exposed.
Having attachments meant fear.
Yet fortunately, once the work was done and the cave sealed, with outsiders not being the Neo-Humans nor having Gou to find a weak spot to enter, safety was assured.
At this moment, Lu Xi'an felt an indescribable sense of security.
"Let's go."
He packed the drone and remote into the specially carried backpack for these gadgets, grabbed a barrel in one hand, and spoke.
Yao Wei also picked up two barrels.
On the path back to the shelter, neither of them spoke.
Yao Wei pondered what Lu Xi'an intended to do with the barrels. They were already filled with water, yet he wouldn't say anything, leaving her curious about when he will reveal his purpose.
Perhaps she should ask, keeping the question inside felt uncomfortable.
Why was she not willing to ask just now? It seemed strange.
Lu Xi'an, meanwhile, thought about taking Gou with them next time for water.
Unfortunately, Gou's detection range isn't far, although it may be useful for early reconnaissance searches, it doesn't serve well when used as a defensive radar to constantly check the surrounding area for safety.
If only Gou could fly like a drone and survey the surroundings.
Lost in thought, Lu Xi'an suddenly felt a jolt in his heart.
He suddenly remembered when Luo Ping took out the drone, and the glowing light in the robotic dog's eyes.
Gou's eyes wouldn't flash easily; it must have detected something.
What on the drone could trigger such a reaction in Gou?
Could it disassemble the drone's propeller to attach to itself?
Lu Xi'an felt he was being imaginative.
After five trips back and forth carrying all the water barrels, Lu Xi'an went to the innermost monitoring room.
Yao Wei didn't know what Lu Xi'an was up to but followed him anyway.
Inside the monitoring room, Gou was hanging itself on the electrical box, with black wires extending from its body and connecting to the circuitry.
Lu Xi'an ordered Gou to separate the wires and circuitry, plunging the shelter back into darkness, although Gou's eyes still lit up.
Lu Xi'an took out the drone and remote from the backpack and asked, "Back in the car, which one did you react to?"
The mechanical dog's eyes instantly illuminated the remote.
Then Lu Xi'an and Yao Wei heard a "click" coming from above Gou's head.
With the help of the dog's light, they peeked at the mechanical dog's head and saw it opened a cover, revealing a slot.
The slot had a complex structure, with a row of metallic vertical teeth at the bottom and a series of small points emerging from the walls, their purpose unknown.
Yao Wei looked baffled, but Lu Xi'an suddenly understood something.
He asked Yao Wei and Gou to leave the monitoring room, then went to the outermost rest area, found Yao Wei's toolbox, opened it, and then unscrewed the drone remote.
The remote's internal structure was simple: a chip, circuitry, battery compartment, screen—constituting everything.
The light from Gou's eyes immediately pointed at the chip.
With such an obvious hint, how could Lu Xi'an need any more thinking?
Despite the chip's size and specifications seeming incompatible with Gou's head slot, Lu Xi'an chose to trust Gou and carefully removed the chip from the remote.
Luckily, the chip was smaller than the slot and could definitely fit inside.
Lu Xi'an tried placing the chip into the slot, and the vertical teeth at the bottom suddenly moved, clamping the chip, while the small points on the slot walls also moved, anchoring themselves on the chip.
"Click—"
Gou's head closed.