Ye Fan's four cars drove into the courtyard, and when he got out, he deliberately maintained a rather elegant pose.

The car door opened, and military boots hit the ground.

Zhuge Yunxue handed him a white cape, which he flicked gracefully, creating an elegant arc that draped over his shoulder.

Then.....

The courtyard in front of him was cold and desolate, not a single person in sight.

Ye Fan stood there for a full minute, surrounded by silence.

"It's really strange, the radar clearly showed there are people here."

Ye Fan stepped forward and walked into a room.

The things inside had been hurriedly packed away, and if you didn't look closely, you couldn't even tell that anyone had lived here.

He walked into the kitchen, which was also empty.

Ye Fan looked down at the stove, the coal inside had been extinguished, but it still retained some heat.

"Is it that they don't want to see outsiders?"

Although Ye Fan was not very happy, he could understand these people's mentality.

As a small survivor force, living in the apocalypse indeed came with many concerns.

Just like when the Dawn Army looked for survivors, sometimes without a semi-coercive approach, many survivors wouldn't dare to show themselves.

But he had traveled all this way to find someone to ask for some information; it's not acceptable for these people to not show up.

Ye Fan stood in the middle of the courtyard and spoke loudly, "Survivors here, we're just passing by, wanting to understand the situation around here and trade some things. You don't need to be afraid."

No one answered.

Ye Fan continued, "I know you're hiding in the tunnels, come out. Your place is so poor, is there really anything worth worrying about someone taking?"

Still, no one answered, perhaps they thought Ye Fan wanted to trick them into showing up.

Ye Fan was getting a bit annoyed; it seemed that unless he showed these people some power, they wouldn't obediently appear.

He closed his right eye, and squinted his left.

With the radar observation, plus his already extraordinarily powerful vision, he quickly discovered some issues.

"Right in front of me, there's a hole in the wall, and there's someone spying, single eyelid, with eye crust at the corner."

The person who was observing behind it was taken aback, hurriedly wiped the corner of their eye, and indeed found crust.

"Under the woodpile on the left front, there are two people poking gun barrels out, ready to shoot at any time, but I advise you not to do that. Your shotguns and semi-autos pose no threat to us and could even bring disaster to you."

Saying that, Ye Fan picked up a stone and casually threw it over.

The powerful throw of the Level 2 Evolver sent the stone flying into the woodpile, clanging as it hit a gun barrel!

A startled cry came from under the woodpile.

"Under that collapsed wall is actually your food stash, five bags of rice, three bags of flour, and a bit of salt and soybean oil. Believe it or not, if you don't come out, we could eat it all up in a day!"

The Red Alert Soldier beside him nodded slightly, this officer wasn't bluffing; their group of over thirty could eat as much as a hundred regular people.

"And as for your tunnel, barely a meter deep, who could it stop? We don't even need weapons. Udyr... stomp it!"

Magnetic Storm Infantry Udyr approached.

Since becoming Hero Level Magnetic Storm Infantry, Udyr's physical attributes had changed significantly.

He became stronger, his strength utterly non-human, and with his heavy armor, he weighed over three hundred kilograms.

The reason why Ye Fan didn't fully staff the helicopter was that this guy by himself weighed as much as four or five people.

Udyr stepped forward and stomped hard on a vacant spot.

Crack~~!

The ground cracked and showed signs of collapse.

A series of startled cries came from below; they were exposed.

There was a noise in the room, and a man came out.

Out came a young man, appearing in his twenties.

He was carrying a rifle and was a Level 1 Evolver.

When the man came out, he was angrily holding the gun, looking like he was about to fight Ye Fan's group.

But once outside, his anger immediately disappeared without a trace.

Because he felt the power of this arriving group.

In Ye Fan's team, besides Xiao Jing and the two cooks, the weakest was a Three-Star Paratrooper.

The strength of Three-Star Paratroopers was comparable to, or even slightly stronger than, a Level 1 Evolver.

The team formed by such people left him without even the qualification to fight desperately.

"Who... who are you?"

"Ha! It's good you're out. I said we are just passing by, and want to understand the situation around here, with no malice."

The man stood there with the gun, somewhat at a loss.

The Evolver who was usually so mighty, now seemed like a sheep standing among a pride of lions and tigers, shaking its horns yet appearing so ridiculous.

"Come, have a seat. What should I call you?"

Ye Fan took out a pack of cigarettes, Soft Zhonghua, and casually tossed one to the man.

The man sat somewhat nervously in front of Ye Fan, lit the cigarette, took a puff, and relaxed a bit: "My name is Xie Zhenggang, I'm the leader here."

"Oh, I'm Ye Fan, from a faraway place. Can you tell me about what's going on here?"

The man took another deep drag, clearly he hadn't smoked such a good cigarette in a long time.

He carefully observed Ye Fan and the people around, growing increasingly shocked as he looked.

Zhuge Yunxue and Xiao Jing were top-tier beauties, surrounded by impressively tough warriors. It was evident that Ye Fan was not ordinary.

The man vaguely felt that this might be a good opportunity.

Gathering his thoughts, the man began to speak: "Then you should know we belong to Penglai City."

"Yes, I know this."

"We belong to Longmen County in Penglai City. I'm just part of a non-prominent small faction here. The largest force here is the Heavy Truck Corps. Small factions like us have to pay taxes to the Heavy Truck Group. Initially, we thought your group was from the Heavy Truck Group, so we didn't dare come out."

Ye Fan nodded: "Then if I want to acquire some resources, like gold, where should I go to get it?"

The man was startled: "Gold? Gold is probably not easy to get, right? Now in our area, gold is used as currency for trading. The Heavy Truck Corps mandates that only adventurer squads registered with them have the right to possess gold, others are not allowed to keep gold."

"Is the Heavy Truck Corps really that overbearing?"

Hearing Ye Fan inquire about the Heavy Truck Corps, the man slightly shook his head, clearly hesitating to express too much.

"So where is this Heavy Truck Corps?"

"They are in the Shannan Scenic Area, which was once a tourist area. After the apocalypse, a group of people occupied it and gradually established the Heavy Truck Corps. Our Longmen, as well as Golden City in the southwest and Qixia in the southeast, are all under the Heavy Truck Corps' sphere of influence, with five to six thousand people already there."

Ye Fan roughly understood; to acquire gold in this main production area, one must deal with the Heavy Truck Corps first.

Of course, Ye Fan could also choose guerrilla tactics, flying around in the combat helicopter to hunt for gold stores, but it wouldn't be easy.

Firstly, he's not familiar with the local situation, and even though there's a radar, it doesn't mark where the gold stores are.

Thus, it seems a visit to the Heavy Truck Corps, to obtain the adventurer squad identity Xie Zhenggang mentioned, is necessary.

Once that's done, they can openly go out to collect gold to lay the foundation for the impending battle at Dawn City.

At this point, more survivors gradually emerged from Xie Zhenggang's place, probably realizing Ye Fan and his group meant no harm, thus daring to show themselves.

Ye Fan saw that these people generally appeared sallow and emaciated, in tattered clothes, showing classic signs of malnutrition.

This is the real state of the majority of survivors, barely keeping hunger at bay and preserving safety day to day.

Though the coast isn't far, about dozens of kilometers away, Ye Fan asked them why not collect food from the sea.

Xie Zhenggang smiled bitterly: "Brother, are you joking? Is the ocean still a place to go? There are massive mutant creatures in it. Initially, people from the Heavy Truck Corps planned to occupy a dock, but a shark over twenty meters long rushed out and gulped down dozens of people, shooting was completely ineffective. Now no one dares approach the seaside."

This news sent a chill through Ye Fan's heart.

There are mutant beasts in the ocean as well!

This is utterly bad news.

Because Ye Fan's Red Alert System needs development, and a shipyard must be established. If there are mutant beasts in the sea, building a shipyard may not be too safe.

This is truly a tricky problem; considering that oceanic mutant beasts are surely much more terrifying than those on land.

Fortunately, for now, Ye Fan doesn't intend to develop and build by the sea, and dealing with this issue is still a bit remote.

Seeing how impoverished Xie Zhenggang's people lived, Ye Fan pulled out some meat from his bag.

About three hundred pounds, used sparingly might last them a while.

Seeing this food, Xie Zhenggang and his people's eyes gleamed green, promptly expressing endless gratitude to Ye Fan, even inviting him to stay for a meal.

Ye Fan waved his hand: "No need for a meal. I'll go see the Heavy Truck Corps you mentioned."

"Alright, but be careful on the road, try to take main roads and avoid small ones, try to go around the city instead of through it. Shannan is roughly one hundred eighty kilometers from here."

Ye Fan rose and bade farewell to Xie Zhenggang and his people.

Four vehicles started up, slowly leaving this grain collection station base.

The route towards Shannan had already been scouted by Dark Clouds, and Ye Fan's group decided to drive rather than fly.

Tang Yafei piloted the combat helicopter without moving, planning to take off when night fell, to hide somewhere nearby.

The vehicles accelerated on the road; encountering zombies, they didn't stop but directly ran them over.

The route Dark Clouds found clearly had been traveled by convoys, with few zombies around.

After driving for more than two hours, dusk descended as they approached a mountainous area ahead.

It wasn't a major mountain range; even the roadside had luminous signs indicating the distance to Shannan.

"Shannan Base, 21 kilometers."

Ye Fan stretched his body; finally, they were almost there, tired from sitting for so long.

Suddenly, he saw on the radar screen, ahead at an entrance to the mountains, there were dozens of blue dots.

"What? Could it be a checkpoint?"

The vehicle slowly advanced, and as they reached the vicinity of the blue dots, no people were visible.

Ye Fan's eyes narrowed slightly; this is... running into give-away money... no, encountering bandits?

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