Once the plan to replenish freshwater went up in smoke, Shen Cong could only choose to continue on his way and try to get to Chaohu as soon as possible.

 That night, Titan was parked in a place called Baimu Village. It was a naturally-formed village governed by Yinpingzhen, and it was located outside the region with the hills. If Shen Cong drove forward by another few kilometers, he would reach Yinpingzhen, which was only separated from Chaohu by Yuxi River.

 This meant that Chaohu was already within sight of his goal.

 Without mountains shielding it from the storm, Baimu Village had been leveled to the ground. No ruins of any buildings could be seen at all. It seemed that due to the place being flat, the amount of sand had started to increase. When the wind blew, a layer of sand that looked like fog stirred up and covered the tyre tracks Titan left behind.

 Before the sky turned completely dark, Shen Cong intended to check the air pressure within the twenty-two special tyres.

 1The tyres had been worn down quite badly when he drove the truck over the stone-covered road. If it were not for Activity protecting them, he had no idea just how many of them would have burst by then.

 Now, they had entered a place that was comparatively softer than the road before, so he had to change the pressure in the tyres. This task was relatively simple. The inflator in the truck had a function that could automatically set the tyre pressure for the driver, and he could change the tyre pressure in the wheels by just moving his fingers.

 Each tyre required him two minutes to set its pressure. Since there were twenty-two tyres, Shen Cong had to spend more than forty minutes on this task.

 He often stood up to check the area. When he was done with the entire thing, the sky was completely dark.

 He performed a final check, but noticed no danger. It was only then that he brought the inflator back to the truck, but before he even approached the door, a sense of danger rose in his heart, and the source of the danger came from under his feet.

 The sand on the ground was blown off, and a mutated monster similar to the earth-digging insect shot out at Shen Cong.

 The powerful impact forced him off his feet, because he was caught unawares, and the inflator rolled to the side. After falling down, Shen Cong managed to instantly react to the situation. He drew the fang dagger at his waist with a reverse grip, poured Activity into it, and instinctively brought it in front to serve as his shield.

 Shick!

 One of the mutated monster’s front limbs was cut off by the fang dagger, but its entire body still rammed into Shen Cong. Its mouth latched onto Shen Cong’s elbow, which was protected by Sky Lifting Pillar 1.0.

 Crack.

 The Activity-infused armor was not any normal steel board. The mutated monster could not bite through it.

 Shen Cong seized the moment and attacked the creature again with the fang dagger. The bone struck the mutated monster’s head, and a faint, green liquid instantly gushed out, spraying Shen Cong’s entire body. The sudden attack lasted only for a few seconds before the mutated monster that had charged out at Shen Cong perished from a single strike.

 A normal mutated monster could no longer pose as a threat to Shen Cong, who had Sky Lifting Pillar 1.0 protecting him.

 Of course, they could still give him a scare.

 “Whew…”

 Shen Cong used his hand to wipe off the faint, green liquid from the Activity-filled armor. It should be the mutated monster’s blood.

 He climbed to his feet and rubbed his chest. The monster’s charge had a powerful impact. If he did not have the armor protecting him and an improved physical constitution, he might have a few cracked ribs right then.

 He cast his gaze on the dead mutated monster.

 ‘It’s an earth-digging insect. They look really similar, after all.’

 The monster before him was a little different compared to the earth-digging insect, but as a whole, their physical characteristics were mutated based on the foundation that they were cockroaches. This mutated monster’s Activity core was also the scythe-like chelicerae by its mouth.

 Shen Cong picked up the inflator along with the earth-digging insect and went toward his truck.

 But things just kept happening to him, and at that moment, a new problem arose. The fugly cat bound to the side of the truck started letting out piercing shrieks. They were vastly different from its usual meows, and Shen Cong raised his eyebrows. He dropped what he was holding and grabbed the fang dagger with his left hand and an Activity-infused handgun with his right. With his back flat against Titan, he went to where the fugly cat was.

 And he instantly felt his hair raise.

 2Under the illumination of the yellow light cast by Titan’s exterior lights, there was an almost naked. The woman had barely anything covering her body.

 And she was using her hands to break off the fugly cat’s bone spikes. The fugly cat was bound, so it could not fight back. It could only let the person break off its bone spikes while it shrieked in pain.

 “Stop!”

 Shen Cong did not have time to think. He had actually run into a person! And so, he just went straight ahead and shouted at the person coldly.

 Judging by the person’s figure, he was standing before a woman. Her clothes hung off her body like strips of cloth, and her exposed body parts were covered by dirt. She looked like a savage.

 Shen Cong should have been happy that he met a living person who also happened to be a survivor, but he was very nervous instead.

 First, it was because he did not know how to converse with survivors. Second, this survivor’s actions were too strange. She did not greet him even though she had seen the modernized war truck. Instead, she went to snatch the livestock he reared.

 This was unforgivable. Based on Shen Cong’s outlook on life, worldview, and values, all those who snatched his things were people who were trying to harm him.

 And he would never be merciful to people who tried to harm him.

 When he told the woman to stop, he was already controlling his urge to kill her, and it was all because she was the first survivor he ever met.

 “Stop and move fifty feet away. Or else, I’ll shoot!”

 The female survivor heard Shen Cong’s warning and turned her head around abruptly.

 What did Shen Cong see?

 It was as if the woman had been cut by someone. An ugly scar ran from her left eye to the right side of her face. Her left eyeball had popped out of her eye socket, but the most terrifying thing was her mouth. She had four fangs which ripped through her mouth.

 Shen Cong was instantly reminded of the orcs in World of Warcraft.

 But orcs were creatures who only existed in movies. It was impossible for them to be in the real world. The woman was a survivor, and she had mutated.

 “AAAAHHHH!”

 The female survivor glared at Shen Cong through the eye that had popped out and screeched in an abnormal manner, seemingly trying to warn Shen Cong not to get closer. Her hands did not stop moving though. She continued breaking off the fugly cat’s bone spikes.

 Bang!

 The sound of a gunshot rose.

 Shen Cong pulled the trigger without hesitation, but a frigid expression. The bullet did not hit the female survivor. It just grazed her hand before hitting a broken wall in the distance.

 This was the first shot Shen Cong had fired in the post-apocalyptic world, and its target was a survivor.

 When the female survivor heard the gunshot, she instinctively wrapped her hands around her head. She squatted down on the ground and screeched. After a few deafening shrieks, she suddenly turned her head around and uttered a few words hoarsely, but she was only able to do this with great difficulty and in an incredibly awkward manner. “Don’t… kill… me…”

 She still had some semblance of rationality left and was unlike a normal mutated monster. She did not become a fierce, brutal creature without any intelligence.

 Shen Cong narrowed his eyes. He did not know how to handle the female survivor, but there was one thing he was certain of—the fugly cat was livestock he reared, so he would not allow anyone to touch it.

 “The cat is mine. Don’t touch it!” Shen Cong still had the gun pointed at her, and he tried to speak slowly with sentences that were much easier to understand to communicate with her. “Move fifty meters back!”

 “Eat… Hungry…” The female survivor’s features twisted while she spoke with great difficulty.

 Every time she said a word, she looked as if she was about to go mad. Rationality and confusion were struggling violently to gain control over her mind.

 “Move fifty meters back!” Shen Cong remained unmoved.

 “Hungry…” The female survivor suddenly stood up and screamed at Shen Cong. “AAAAHHHH!!”

 Bang!

 The sound of another gunshot rose. The bullet grazed the female survivor’s hair and hit the broken wall in the distance. A cloud of smoke and dust flew up.

 Shen Cong’s aim with the gun was very good, and that was mainly because he had a calm heart. Even if the situation right now was incredibly strange, he could still suppress the anxiety in his heart and hold his gun with a steady hand.

 “AAAAHHH!”

 The female survivor hugged her head and squatted on the ground again. She started screaming madly.

 Shen Cong just repeated his order coldly. “Move fifty meters back!”

The female survivor panted harshly. She looked at the fugly cat, then at Shen Cong. In the end, she moved back reluctantly. When she was more than ten meters away, she refused to move any further. She only stared at Shen Cong fixedly.

 Shen Cong untied the fugly cat and brought it into Titan.

 When he went inside, he used his binoculars to observe the area outside. Just as he expected, the female survivor rushed over and was circling Titan while growling.

 One minute later, Shen Cong opened the sunroof by the side of the truck and threw out a large piece of tumor pork that was about to start rotting, a bottle of mineral water, the earth-digging insect he had just killed, and a tracksuit.

 Then, he turned on Titan’s ignition, and for the first time ever, drove at night. Shen Cong sat in the driver cab and watched the female survivor through the rear view mirror. She was gobbling down the tumor pork. When he left, she looked up only once to see Titan leaving into the distance before she resumed shoving the raw meat down her throat.

 In a moment, her figure was swallowed by the endless night.

 Shen Cong’s expression remained indifferent while he drove.

 But a storm raged in his heart. He never expected that he would meet his first survivor in such a situation.