Apocalypse Survival: Starting with a Shelter

In Jianghe City's local communication channel, the most discussed topic was still the road-clearing operations on the surface.

After a brief hesitation, Su Wu decided to continue.

He was already close to the destination—turning back now over a minor anomaly felt unwarranted.

By the riverbank, the leading micro-excavator moved steadily, unaffected by Su Wu's growing anxiety. It maintained a constant speed of two meters per second, methodically searching for a path down to the riverbed.

Occasional gusts of wind swept along the river, carrying fine grains of sand that clattered against the micro-excavator's metal shell, creating a series of crackling sounds—an eerie welcome from the desolate wilderness.

Finally, after advancing several hundred meters, a gentler slope appeared ahead.

The AI immediately took control of the excavator, simultaneously using radar to map the path and cautiously maneuvering it down the incline.

As the convoy entered the riverbed, the firm soil and rocky ground gave way to soft sand.

Su Wu directed the team to start digging near the outer perimeter instead of venturing further in. The sand here wouldn't be of the highest quality due to the lack of thorough sifting, but that didn't matter. Once brought back to the shelter, there would be ample time and manpower for deeper processing.

In a post-apocalyptic environment, the risks of prolonged exposure to the elements far outweighed any concerns over labor and time costs.

Given the limited carrying capacity of the micro-transport vehicle, the sand-digging process didn't take long. In just five or six minutes, the vehicle's cargo bed was filled with sand and gravel.

Following the principle of maximum efficiency, the AI automatically sent the transport vehicle back along its original route while the excavator stayed behind, awaiting the transport's return to resume work.

Su Wu couldn't help but feel uneasy at the sight of the transport vehicle operating independently, but after a moment's hesitation, he refrained from intervening.

Unless faced with obvious threats like severe weather or other dangers, there was no reason to disrupt the most efficient course of action.

On its return trip, the transport vehicle moved significantly faster, thanks to the pre-mapped route. It maintained near-maximum speed the entire way.

Before long, the transport vehicle appeared on the shelter's surveillance feed, carrying its load of sand and gravel to the storage depot.

"One load successfully delivered," Su Wu muttered, exhaling slightly.

With the AI's precision, as long as the weather remained stable, the process could now proceed smoothly without his direct oversight.

Su Wu turned his attention to the shelter's interior. He dispatched two construction robots from the fourth underground level, equipping them with tools to handle the freshly delivered sand. The selected high-quality sand would be brought deeper into the shelter to be used as materials for the expansion of its underground levels.

Through a camera positioned at the highest point of the shelter, Su Wu observed the worksite from above.

The surface area, once a quiet farmhouse courtyard, now bore no traces of the recent storm. Neatly leveled land was dotted with piles of materials bound with metal straps, a partially constructed one-story bunker awaiting reinforcement, and an unfinished drainage system for the shelter's exit structure.

Though these structures weren't visually impressive, their very existence signaled the gradual return to order following the chaos brought by the storm.

"All it needs is more time," Su Wu thought. "Once the bunker and the exit structure are completed, we'll no longer have to fear another hurricane."

With the shelter's tasks temporarily under control, Su Wu redirected his focus to the cleanup crew stationed at the city's edge.

After nearly ten hours of work, the specialized transport vehicle and large trucks had advanced to the vicinity of Tekra Mall.

Beyond the mall, the difficulty of progress increased dramatically, with collapsed buildings completely blocking many streets. Often, clearing these blockages would be more labor-intensive than simply bypassing them.

For such decisions, the basic AI lacked the capability to make optimal judgments, requiring Su Wu's real-time corrections.

Despite these challenges, progress was steady, partly due to the involvement of other shelter inhabitants who joined the cleanup efforts within the city limits.

"These collapsed buildings are an excellent source of materials," Su Wu noted, his gaze fixed on the endless piles of rubble. "Once the cleanup is done and the supplies stored in the official shelter are retrieved, I might consider hauling a few loads of construction debris back."

The process of clearing streets was long and monotonous. Other than occasionally redirecting the transport vehicles, Su Wu spent most of his time idly observing the surrounding environment.

The massive ruins of thousands of collapsed buildings seemed like a limitless treasure trove of construction materials to him.

Though the debris was some distance from the shelter, its sheer abundance and the convenience of loading it directly into transport vehicles made up for the inconvenience.

Switching the camera view on the specialized transport vehicle, Su Wu spotted faint lights flickering among the darkened buildings in the distance.

They were from other shelters' construction crews, operating machinery even in the oppressive heat.

With outside temperatures exceeding 70 degrees Celsius, normal human activity was nearly impossible. However, specially modified construction vehicles were able to function in such extreme conditions.

According to the official forums, these modifications primarily prevented the machines from overheating, but they offered little comfort to the operators inside.

While the cabin temperatures weren't as high as the external environment, they were still far from tolerable. Every worker operating those machines was enduring a grueling ordeal.

Su Wu watched the distant construction teams for a while and gained a rough sense of their efficiency.

Despite their larger equipment—excavators and bulldozers noticeably bigger than Su Wu's specialized transport vehicle—their suboptimal operations often resulted in repetitive or inefficient actions. It frequently took seven or eight of their machines to match the efficiency of Su Wu's single transport vehicle.

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