The two rails were polished to a shine, gleaming brightly in the sunlight.
A train roared past, and the "crowds" wandering in the fields and villages rushed in, running and jumping.
In several carriages, a group of passengers seemed to be infected by this "enthusiasm," leaning out of the windows and shouting in response.
The remaining carriages were packed with people, but no one made a sound.
...
"There are 1226 people on this train, 670 men and 556 women."
"But only two people can live in the front of the train, and the remaining 1224 people have to live in the back carriages."
"You say you want to join us, but what makes you think you can?"
Silas wore a faint smile as he brazenly sized up the girl in front of him.
The girl wore a small gray T-shirt with a fitted waist, and dark blue jeans that hugged her leg curves perfectly. The jeans flared out at her feet, resembling a simple and elegant little flower.
The girl calmly analyzed, "I am currently pursuing my master's degree in mechanical and electronic engineering. My father is a railway engineer, so I can help if you need to repair or modify trains. In addition, I exercise regularly and am in good health, so I won't be a burden."
Silas was quite surprised. He hadn't expected that there were truly talented people among them. Although they were a bit green, they would definitely be useful for his Armed Train Project.
"You can say your name now."
"Jade."
"Okay, Jade, you're hired."
"Wait a minute!" the girl interrupted Silas. "I have a condition."
Silas frowned. He didn't like being bargained with, but he held back because the other party was a talented person.
"Condition?"
"Take one person with you." Jade pulled a woman out of the back of the car, her brows furrowed with worry, and she looked at him anxiously.
"My mom is a nurse and can handle some simple illnesses."
Silas's eyes were bright.
The woman in front of him bore a striking resemblance to Jade, a mature version of the young girl. She wore a beige knit sweater, her long hair cascading down her rounded shoulders. She exuded a gentle aura, her lips parted slightly, and her soft voice carried a hint of embarrassment.
"Mr. Silas..."
She was beautiful, but it didn't help the plan much.
But he was, after all, a man tempered by the apocalypse, and his bottom line was much lower than that of the average person.
"No problem, Jade. Come to my room tonight. I need to test your professional knowledge."
Jade raised an eyebrow. Although she felt that this person's words were a bit strange, she didn't overthink it.
But the woman, experienced in such matters, naturally sensed something was wrong. Holding her daughter's arm, she said with a hint of pleading, "She's still a child..."
Silas nodded in understanding, "Then you can come with her tonight."
"Next."
The crowd made a commotion for a moment, and a chubby, greasy middle-aged man squeezed out from within.
Silas instantly lost his appetite and waved his hand, "Forget it, that's enough for today, go back."
The middle-aged man's eyes widened, and he shouted, "Why did it end when it was my turn? You only interviewed five people in total!"
The thought of going back, being crammed into a small, cramped space with a group of people, and possibly being eaten by zombies in the carriage behind him at any moment made the middle-aged man's voice rise, becoming more and more agitated as he spoke.
"You only picked two good-looking people out of five, what's the point of an interview? Why don't you just pick all the good-looking women out there?!"
The people behind them also started to get restless.
"Just tell me what conditions you want!"
"Do you want money or something else? I have a gold necklace here."
"I still have some food left, could I stay in the front..."
"I can sleep with you tonight!"
The smiling expression on Silas's face vanished, replaced by a sudden chill.
He put a finger to his lips and said menacingly, "I'll give you one more chance. Go back to the back."
The middle-aged man felt that things had already fallen apart, and coupled with the pressure since the apocalypse, he completely gave up and cursed Silas, pointing at him, "You bastard, why do you have to occupy the front of the train, leaving more than a thousand of us crammed in the back? You'll die a horrible death!"
"And you two sluts, this bastard just wants to sleep with you. You've practically offered yourselves up and you're still smug about it. Once he's done with you, he'll feed you to the zombies. There are so many women on this bus, do you think you can have a few days of peace?!"
The middle-aged man's voice abruptly stopped as a hole appeared on his forehead.
His bloodshot eyes were filled with anger and resentment.
"Boom."
The body lay on the ground, but not a drop of blood flowed from the wound.
The crowd that had been packed in the aisle between the two carriages suddenly took a big step back.
Feeling the slight burning sensation on his fingertips, Silas said calmly, "Drag him back."
After a moment's hesitation, under Silas's intimidating power, two people still managed to drag the body back.
Silas stepped forward and locked the corridor door. Looking at the faces behind the glass, filled with anger but unable to speak out, he revealed a wicked smile.
He took out a notebook and wrote it down.
People were quite obedient during the first week after the apocalypse.
The notebook folded down, revealing a few bold characters on it.
Train Conductor's Log
...
Silas turned his head and saw that Jade's expression was normal, so he couldn't help but think more highly of her.
"The last private room is yours. Don't come out until you're called. There's a pack of biscuits and a bottle of water inside; that's your food for today."
Silas said calmly.
The woman hesitated, then Jade pulled her into the soft sleeper compartment and locked the door with a click.
Silas covered the glass door on the corridor and walked forward along the corridor to the deluxe sleeper compartment.
He had just pushed open the door to the private room.
"Boom!"
A muffled thud came from the window in front of him.
A large patch of scarlet blood was spread out on the window, and the dark figure was left behind by the speeding train.
This horrifying scene did not move Silas in the slightest. For others, this was the first week of the apocalypse, but for him, it was four years and one week since the apocalypse.
The first thing he did after his rebirth was not to collect supplies or build a safe house.
Instead, he bought a vintage train sightseeing ticket for the Universal Train.
Because only he knew that the ground beneath his feet would continue to heat up over the next month, reaching a terrifying temperature of over 100 degrees Celsius.
Water sources dried up, society collapsed, and a massive zombie virus outbreak turned the city into a living hell. (Note: Regional, not global heatwave)
After discovering that the temperature was lower in the north, the surviving humans began to flee north in droves.
In his past life, he barely escaped with his life on the line, and then struggled for four years before dying in despair in the face of various terrifying natural disasters.
So the first thing he did after being reborn was to run north.
Looking at the sweat gradually seeping onto his arms, and glancing at the thermometer hanging on the wall, he saw that the red line had reached 27°C.
Silas calmly took out his logbook.
He scrolled to the latest entry.
December 16th, early winter, temperature 23°C-27°C
A bunch of words were scattered across the text, with several highlighted: [vehicle], [sixteen days], [resources], [team]...
A month later it would exceed 100 degrees Celsius, but that didn't mean a person could live until then.
The most comfortable temperature for humans is 22°C; fluctuations above or below this temperature can cause discomfort.
Temperatures exceeding 35°C in humid environments and 50°C in dry environments pose a risk of death. Therefore, he only had sixteen days left.
Seven days had passed, and there were nine days left.
There were still 3,000 kilometers to go before they could escape the high-temperature zone.
The train traveled at 120 kilometers per hour, moving at full speed, and could escape the high-temperature zone in two days.
But other districts were just as dire.
Clean water, food, medicine, shelter, clothing...
Every resource was extremely difficult to obtain.
Therefore, escape vehicles must not only have strong defensive capabilities and long endurance, but also have an extreme load-bearing capacity.
This excluded private vehicles and airplanes.
After much searching, only trains met the criteria.
In the early stages of the apocalypse, even this long-discontinued sightseeing train beneath his feet could provide powerful protection.
Once the personnel and supplies were in place, the train would be equipped.
That was a mobile fortress.
The train chosen by Silas was an old-fashioned electric-powered diesel locomotive, which, simply put, generates electricity by burning oil.
The train had a total of 42 carriages: two for luggage and forty for passengers. Next to the locomotive was the VIP dining car, a two-story sightseeing car, two deluxe sleeper carriages, ten ordinary soft sleeper carriages, and twenty-six hard seat carriages.
Currently, Silas had dominated the first five quarters, leaving the rest of the players behind.
However, this was only temporary.
These people, including the zombies in the truck, were all part of his plan.
The large panes of glass on the carriages were great for sightseeing, and they were also good against the current level of zombies.
But when facing the later
So he planned to arm the train, tear through the zombie horde, and escape northward.
Imagine this: outside, thunder roars and floods rage. The
That feeling was even more exhilarating than running on an overpass on a stormy night.
...
"It's almost time to eat."
Silas simply jotted down a few things that happened that day in his notebook before putting down his pen.
This was a habit he developed four years after the apocalypse, using record-keeping to combat his increasingly shattered sense of time.
He locked the door and went to the dining car in front.
The dining car was very quiet, except for the muffled thud of the train wheels rolling over the junction of the rails.
Warm sunlight fell on the red and white checkered tablecloth, and the green plants in the white porcelain vase trembled slightly with the vibration.
Outside the train window, scattered zombies, startled by the noise, gathered into a horde on both sides of the tracks, howling as they chased after the train.
Then it crashed headfirst into the metal sheet of the train carriage.
"Boom!"
Silas closed the refrigerator door.
Placing the last green pepper on the cutting board, Silas deliberately rinsed his hands with water to awaken his sense of touch, feeling the cool water flow through his fingers. He experienced a decadent, luxurious pleasure.
The true joy of consuming this precious vegetable could only be experienced by preparing it by hand and then eating it.
After preparing the ingredients, Silas casually pressed a button on the induction cooker.
An unplugged induction cooker emitted a crisp "ding" sound.
This was the core capability of the
<[Level 1 General Energy Conversion]> {Efficiency: 10%} [Can convert the energy in the body into light, heat, electricity, and the like.]
He used a trick involving heat to kill that middle-aged man earlier.
Logically speaking,
For example—
This was the name given by the passengers behind them; it was a bit strange, but it worked quite well.
Last time, a woman instigated her brother, husband, and seven or eight others, along with a group of shrewd individuals who wanted to seize control of the train, to launch an attack at night.
They spent five or six minutes roughly smashing the bridge door with tools.
Then, like idiots, they lined up in the cramped carriages to die.
When the third person died, Silas could tell that the person in front didn't want to go forward, but was pushed forward by the people behind. Then Silas "spotted" them one by one, killing more than a dozen in a row. The few who were pushed forward cried like pigs and dogs.
The door remained open all night.
Unfortunately, no one stepped over the dozen or so corpses even after waiting all night.
The next day, the woman who had instigated the crowd disappeared. Silas found her in the grass by the railway tracks; her hair had been plucked out and her intestines had been pulled out.
Half of the people had already left by morning.
Some people came back in the evening, and when they arrived at the new location, the number of people returned to the initial level.
New fools and self-proclaimed "leadership" experts emerged.
This boring cycle began again.
Silas had initially explained the rules, but people changed too quickly, and those who were capable were more willing to trust themselves and get off the bus to survive on their own.
Only those who had just boarded the bus, and the cowards who lacked the ability to kill and were unwilling to face the apocalypse outside alone, remained.
These cowards even formed a tacit understanding: they would elect out those passionate and ambitious individuals, let them provoke Silas, and then have Silas kill them.
Of course, no one explicitly said that they were going to do such a thing.
But that was exactly what they did.
Silas really looked down on these guys, so he couldn't be bothered to set any rules.
At first, he was very serious about killing, but later it seemed more like he was just going through the motions.
There were fewer and fewer hot-blooded fools being fooled.
Who would risk their life for someone they're not related to?
...
Silas's abilities were also central to the Armed Train Project.
The train's energy source.
Of course, that was for the future. Right now, the fuel tank was full, and there was enough time for him to grow to the point where he could drive the train.
He dried the water in the pan, turned on the range hood, poured in the oil... Boom, the range hood emitted a low hum.
The trees lining the railway tracks blocked the sunlight, casting flickering shadows on Silas's face.
Smoke was lit, vegetables were added, and the crackling sound of stir-frying drowned out the shouts outside.
Silas looked up in surprise and saw a lucky guy with a livid face hanging outside the car window. He had no whites in his eyes, and his entire eyeballs were a dark reddish-black color. He was staring at Silas with his mouth wide open, as if he wanted to eat him through the glass.
Silas smiled warmly, "Everyone who sees it gets a share."
He casually rolled down the car window and stuffed the remaining packaging bags and other items into the zombie's mouth.
Zombie: "(〇_o)/"
The zombie, having lost its balance, was thrown off the train before it could even clench its teeth.
As its body was crushed by the steel wheels, he could still vaguely hear the man's voice.
"Remember to eat well..."
(End of this chapter)
[This is a work of pure fiction, with no allusions. The dates, place names, and all settings are entirely fictional. Do not relate it to reality! Do not relate it to reality!]
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Author - 莽签
Translator and Editor - Husband
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