Rebirth of the Last Days: Double Pets

Inside, rows of neatly stacked boxes were arranged, each labeled clearly by category.

“Oh! Supermarket! Here I come!”

Compared to all these supplies, the mountain backpacks they had brought suddenly seemed laughably small; after all, the backpacks couldn’t even fit two boxes of instant noodles!

Hu Haotian glanced around the room and noticed the loading door on the warehouse’s outer wall. The door opened from the inside out.

Everyone noticed it too. They stood at the entrance, giving Hu Haotian a nod. Hu Haotian then went ahead and opened the door.

There were zombies outside, but fortunately, not many. As soon as the door opened, the ranged ability users attacked, flinging their abilities until no zombies remained in sight.

“Go find a truck,” Hu Haotian said, “because none of our cars can hold enough supplies.”

Everyone agreed, so they split up into the two groups as before, each group searching for a large truck.

There was already a truck near the warehouse, so it didn’t take long for Hu Haotian’s group to find a two-ton delivery truck.

When they opened the truck’s back door, they found a decent amount of drinks still inside.

So, they decided to keep loading up until the truck was completely full.

The nine of them began working as makeshift warehouse loaders, hauling supplies for nearly two hours.

“Man, I used to think hiring thirty loaders for a supermarket was a waste of money. Who knew physical labor was so much harder than mental work,” Hu Haotian grumbled. Despite having awakened an earth-based power, he didn’t feel that much stronger. Moving boxes for a few minutes was fine, but two straight hours had left him worn out.

“Brother Hu, you can’t treat us like you used to treat the hardworking people you underpaid back in the day,” someone joked, not missing a beat.

“Yeah, Brother Hu, we’re all good workers here. If we go on strike, you’d be swamped on your own…”

Hu Haotian leaned against the wall and replied, “Come on, no way! You’re not just my employees anymore—now we’re all brothers and sisters. There’s no pay here, just equal shares!”

This was exactly what everyone wanted to hear, so they put in even more effort.

Once the truck was packed full, along with all of their own vehicles, they’d only managed to move a quarter of the supermarket’s warehouse. They decided to head back and return in the afternoon for another load.

Hu Haotian thought it was safer to keep the supplies in the villa than at the warehouse. The villa had a complete security system; even the windows were made of bulletproof glass, making it far more secure than a commercial building labeled as a supermarket.

So, they all drove back to the “Imperial Court” in a mighty convoy.

When they had left in the morning, they’d cleared out a wave of wandering zombies. Naturally, on their return, another wave of twisted, grotesque zombies was lured to the convoy’s tail.

After two weeks of working together, the team had developed solid tactics. There was Pan Dawei’s quirky trio, Hu Haotian’s heavy-hitting squad of four, and Bai Qi’s unbeatable duo.

In about fifteen minutes, the zombies trailing them were completely taken care of.

“Brother Hu, we should build a wall around here,” suggested Luo Ziqiang, the earth-based ability user on Hu Haotian’s team. “Even though the house is sturdy, a wall would make it even safer. Plus, it’d let our families enjoy the yard without worry.”

Before the apocalypse, Luo Ziqiang had been a real estate manager in H City. After the disaster, he escaped with his wife and son and ended up joining Hu Haotian, following him ever since.

Since they couldn’t head over to the military zone in the West District yet, they were settling here for the time being, so they naturally wanted to reinforce the security around the place.

Hu Haotian surveyed the surroundings.

Though the villas were almost entirely unoccupied, the nearby high-rise buildings had a much higher occupancy rate, so stray zombies would often wander over.

“Alright, after lunch, let’s go back to transport the rest of the supermarket supplies. Tonight, we’ll all meet in my villa to plan our next steps.”

The group then went back to their respective places for lunch. Since they already had plenty of supplies, they didn’t need to dip into the newly acquired stock just yet.

After a busy morning, Bai Qi and his two teammates were ready to regroup right after eating. Not having time to cook something fresh, Tang Ruo simply brought out some prepared meals and invited them over to eat.

After lunch, it was time to head back to the supermarket for more supplies.

It took four trips that afternoon to clear out all the boxes.

As they were about to leave, Liu Bing squatted down near a wall in the supermarket warehouse and said, “There’s a sound coming from here.”

“What sound? We already cleared out all the zombies here,” Luo Ziqiang said, curious.

Everyone turned to Hu Haotian.

They had no choice; as the owner, he was the one who knew this place best.

Hu Haotian thought for a moment, unable to pinpoint it.

Suddenly, a thought struck him. “Could it be the sound of some electrical system operating?”

Liu Bing replied, “Yes, it sounds like a generator. I didn’t expect this place to be so advanced, with a backup generator that lasts this long.”

Hu Haotian said, “Everything here was built to the highest standards back then. That battery wasn’t cheap either!”

With the national power grid down, there was no electricity in the villa. If they could bring back a battery connected to the grid, it would make things a lot easier.

Liu Bing asked, “Hu, how does your battery charge? Solar power?”

Hu Haotian thought for a moment. “I think it’s just a regular rechargeable battery, not solar-powered.”

Everyone sighed a bit at that; if the battery needed charging, there might not be much power left in it by now.

Liu Bing said, “No worries, it’s a simple fix. We can just modify the battery a bit, hook it up to some solar panels, and it’ll recharge. If the battery’s big enough, it could supply power to all three villas.”

“A simple fix…”

Everyone’s mouths twitched slightly.

Hu Haotian pointed out, “The issue is, no one here actually knows how to do that ‘simple fix.’”

Liu Bing smiled. “I can do it. This is my field of expertise. Our research team even applied for a patent on this, though it didn’t come through before the apocalypse…”

A real talent.

With such expertise among them, it was clear they had to locate that battery for a better quality of life for everyone.