Apocalyptic Reincarnation: Start with a 30-million Bonus

Chapter 557: Chapter 500: Population Exceeds 300!_2

Li Yu heard this and responded with a hearty laugh: ”Hahaha, old Luo, I was concerned about you guys for a while. Welcome! And who are these other brothers we’ve not seen before?”

One by one, people like Old Bi and Old Yi disembarked from the vehicle, and at this moment they saw people lining the walls, each armed with a gun, which made them somewhat wary.

Their hands did not let go of their guns.

Seeing Old Yi and the others behind him, especially seeing them warily raising their guns, Old Luo immediately said, ”Old Bi, Old Yi, put down your guns. This is Li Yu, Director Li, whom I’ve often mentioned to you before. He’s the steward of Big Camphor Tree Base.”

Then he added, ”Everyone put down your guns.”

Old Yi and Old Bi were the first to put down their guns. They were also somewhat nervous, hence the instinctive action of raising their guns.

Thinking about their own situation, they had traveled all this way just to join others; now still holding their guns made Old Yi’s face somewhat embarrassed.

Li Yu also called out to his people behind him: ”Relax, everyone. We’re all on the same side. Put down your guns. Hahaha.”

His hearty laughter and words helped Old Yi and the others to relax their tense emotions, visibly easing up a lot.

It couldn’t be helped; they had been surviving in this post-apocalyptic world for over a year, always in a state of high alert with their guard up.

Li Yu looked at them, silent for a few seconds, and finally said, ”Welcome to you all. Xiaoshi, you should have introduced the base’s situation to them, right?”

Xiaoshi stepped forward and nodded to Li Yu, saying, ”I’ve told them all about it.”

Li Yu pondered for a moment and then said, ”Alright, joining us is fine, but all firearms in the base are allocated uniformly, so we might need everyone to hand over their firearms for the time being. Tonight, everyone will stay in Weng City temporarily.”

Hearing Li Yu say this, Old Bi and Old Yi were somewhat conflicted. Handing over all their guns, wouldn’t that leave them completely at others’ mercy?

No, they absolutely could not hand over their firearms.

They were not familiar with Director Li or the Big Camphor Tree Base; handing over their firearms recklessly would leave them without any means to fight back.

Silence.

Xiaoshi was the first to hand over her firearm, then said to the others behind her, ”Don’t worry, Director Li’s word is his bond. Just hand it over.”

Old Luo was also conflicted for a moment, but ultimately handed over his firearm. He saw that Old Bi and Old Yi were conflicted and had not put their guns down even after hearing Xiaoshi’s words, then he stepped forward and said, ”If they wanted to do something to us, we couldn’t run away anyway.”

The two looked around; they were surrounded by people, with high walls trapping them. There was nowhere to run.

If they were going to commit, they might as well go all the way.

After struggling internally for a while, Old Bi finally put down his gun, and Old Yi followed suit.

Li Yu was very satisfied with this scene.

He knew these people were former soldiers with formidable combat abilities, but for Li Yu, what mattered most was obedience and the ability to follow orders.

Before the apocalypse, perhaps one could overlook their character, but in this world, human nature was too unpredictable, and without the constraint of the law, vigilance was necessary.

That these people were willing to hand over their firearms at least showed a basic trust in the base, or perhaps they had a lot of faith in Xiaoshi and Old Luo.

This was important.

Li Hang and the others moved the surrendered firearms away and placed them in the duty room.

Seeing that they had all handed over their arms, Li Yu was also frank: ”We have rules here; everything is done according to the rules. Actually, there’s also a points standard for entering the base, and in principle, you shouldn’t be able to enter the Outer City directly since you just arrived. However, Old Luo and the others contributed a lot back in the situation with Luo Tianyan, so we allowed you to join us directly.

I’ll explain your duties. When executing tasks outside, attendance by the required personnel is mandatory, and the security of the base must be protected.

There are also regulations that must be followed in the base; Dapao will explain them to you later.

Lastly, regarding welfare, food is uniformly distributed and will suffice for everyone’s daily needs.”

Hearing this last point, their eyes widened in disbelief, especially Old Bi and Old Yi.

If joining a base meant getting food and shelter provided, in a post-apocalyptic world, that would be living the dream.

But something felt off to them; they had heard from old Luo and the others that they could only exchange food based on contributions. So how come they now had direct access to the basic daily food needs?

Seeing old Bi and old Yi so elated, old Luo couldn’t help but feel less cheerful, especially after hearing that Li Yu could allocate daily food for them.

He had wanted to ask about the initial 1,000 tons of food they acquired from the military base, which Li Yu had promised to share half with them. This agreement was discussed privately between Li Yu and old Luo.

That would be 500 tons, but as there were too few of them, they could only move tens of tons.

However, now that they had agreed to join the Big Camphor Tree Base and Li Yu mentioned that food was included, they did not have to worry about food anymore.

But, that was 500 tons of food.

With just their few dozen people, that would last for 70 years!

But at this point, it didn’t seem right to bring up the matter again.

Promises are important, but in a post-apocalyptic world, anyone who actually delivers on a promise of 500 tons of food would be a fool. Old Luo had considered the possibility of Li Yu backing out. To be honest, he never really expected Li Yu to hand over 500 tons of food directly.

This was an apocalyptic era, an era suffering from food shortages.

What mattered more than dignity, integrity, and face? Wasn’t it more important to survive, for oneself and for the people around them?

Although Li Yu didn’t mention the 500 tons of food, providing them with enough food daily was practically a fulfillment of his promise in a roundabout way.

Knowing this, old Luo no longer held excessive hopes. The current outcome was satisfactory.

Currently, the base users like He Chao had accumulated a high amount of points, so the food they exchanged was sufficient for daily consumption.

After completing these few missions together, Uncle Qin and his group also had enough food. Hence, those who had entered the Outer City had resolved the issue of food shortages.

After assigning some tasks and noticing the sky darken, Li Yu asked them to rest for the night and consider moving to the Outer City the next day.

The night darkened, moonless.

Returning to his room, Li Yu placed his hands behind his head, pondering in silence.

Right now, in the Outer City, there were almost forty people led by He Chao, fourteen with He Bing, and thirty with Uncle Qin. That made eighty-four people here. If counting the forty people little Shi brought today.

The population of the Outer City could reach 124 people.

Along with the 140 people in the Inner City of the base, just the population within the base totaled 263 people, and if including some extra staff outside,

The total exceeded 300 people!

In this post-apocalyptic world, this was already considered a medium-sized scale.

Initially, right after the apocalypse broke out, there were organizations with tens of thousands of people, but they all collapsed in the face of the food shortage crisis.

To support ten thousand people, the logistical pressure was immense. Even the several hundred tons of food Li Yu’s group acquired, once the rice was hulled, would only suffice for two to three months for those ten thousand people.

In this post-apocalyptic world, population wasn’t the sole symbol of strength; oftentimes, it was more a burden.

But for the Big Camphor Tree Base, this population size was still manageable, although their current cultivation area of 60 acres could not sustain self-sufficiency for these hundreds of people.

Even with the support of several hundred tons of food, they couldn’t afford to deplete their resources, because some of the food needed to be exchanged with those outside the base.

This method of exchange allowed them to achieve maximum influence and deterrence with the least amount of food.

Thus, now was the time to expand the base’s scale.

Mulling over these thoughts, Li Yu fell asleep.