Armed Train in the Apocalypse

Chapter 452: Chapter 289: Bludgeoning_2

So the soldier’s intentions are obvious.

’Using me as a tool, is everyone that brave?’

Seeing Su Huan laugh, the group of officers felt a chill in their hearts.

”You, come here.”

Su Huan pointed to the soldier who reported Mountain Goat.

The latter was so nervous that cold sweat streamed down his back, but he still walked out with a righteous demeanor.

Clanging, ”Conductor.”

Su Huan ignored him, turning to say, ”Give each of them a weapon, today they can vent their grievances all at once.”

The officer handed the sticks to five soldiers.

The whistleblower’s stick was handed to him personally by Mountain Goat.

Once everyone had their short sticks, Su Huan asked the woman lying on the ground again, ”Will you still fight?”

The woman wiped the blood off her face, nodding repeatedly.

Then a bizarre scene unfolded in the square.

A group of soldiers watched as seven people fiercely beat the prone Old Wu with their sticks.

The whistleblower initially didn’t want to join in.

But upon seeing Su Huan cock his gun, he suddenly understood something bad was happening and reluctantly joined in.

After a while, even with Old Wu’s Tier One Evolver physique, he was unconscious.

Several soldiers who had been abused by him vented their anger and retreated calmly.

Only the whistleblower and Old Wu’s woman were left, crying while hitting Old Wu’s body.

It felt like they were grief-stricken in advance.

Old Wu woke up several times from the pain, only to be knocked out again.

Even though he was much stronger than the two, he didn’t dare retaliate, just endured it.

From noon, they beat him until the floodlights came on.

The two looked like demons crawling out of hell, their tangled hair and filthy faces covered in congealed, dark blood stains.

Old Wu on the ground had long disappeared, replaced by a shapeless pile of mud.

With a thud, the woman couldn’t hold the rubber short stick anymore and threw it aside.

The soldiers on site shivered collectively.

Using the corners of their eyes, they looked at the figure enveloped in darkness. Even though they couldn’t see the face clearly, everyone felt those dark eyes staring at them!

Mongoose seemed to awaken from a dream, looking at the conductor.

Unlike others, she could clearly see Su Huan’s long narrow eyes.

No anger, no joy.

Just like the night, vast and boundless, calm and tranquil.

”Alright, that’s it for today. Wish everyone sweet dreams.”

Su Huan uttered the last words of the day.

No criticism, no further punishment.

Once his silhouette disappeared into the train, a string of thumping sounds came from people collapsing.

...

”May 28, the wind calms.”

”Stayed gentle for too long, they think I transformed.”

The deserter incident ended with Old Wu’s death, but this punishment that cost only one life imprinted the conductor’s terror in everyone’s heart.

No evidence, no righteous judgment.

Just cold and ruthless orders.

The recruits finally saw what kind of person the usually slack-off conductor was.

Someone wanted to learn about the conductor’s past.

Old passengers unanimously remained silent.

The relaxed atmosphere on the train turned tense again, with work efficiency improving a lot.

But limited only to repetitive tasks, like Director Xu’s research, the quantity remained unchanged.

The track upgrade plan originally set for completion in June was finished three days earlier.

The train tracks reached an astonishing width of 4.6 meters, made from new materials extracted from the Sand Armor Beast. This material was very resilient, even weighing less than half of green steel.

That’s less than one to two tenths the weight of normal steel.

No metal was mixed in, so the naming convention didn’t follow green steel, armor steel, but was called Sand Armor.

Simultaneously, Sand Armor also became the main material for bulletproof vests.

In an abandoned city, they found an underground warehouse, sealed away excess resources, and the armed train left the ruins of Xiaohe City, heading to Zhijin City in the north.

On water, the train was already slow, and in the Storm Zone it became even slower.

Occasionally they had to use robotic arms to assist in moving.

Moreover, energy consumption was massive.

The conductor’s charging cycle went from once every seven days to every three days.

During this time, He Jie became ruthless, tormenting everyone in the Armed Corps, including Yu Yue.

No one dared to utter a word.

The deserter incident caused He Jie to be demoted from Major General to Colonel, Mountain Goat directly demoted to Second Lieutenant, and Pang Tu, responsible for arranging guard posts, was also demoted to Second Lieutenant.

It was truly like returning to the pre-liberation era.

However, under He Jie’s pressure, everyone’s evolvement speed increased rapidly.

The Armed Corps had seven members become Tier One Evolvers, all veterans captured from the Steel Council.

Combining their combat habits, they first formed several officer squads.

He Jie’s adjutant was Second Lieutenant Mountain Goat, along with Captain Liang Kuan, then randomly snatched two Tier One non-commissioned officers, forming the Colonel squad.

At his rank, he could certainly form the strongest squad.

But then there would be no one in the other squads.

For combat balance, He Jie chose people restrainedly.

Qu Hang was responsible for sensing reconnaissance, and based on He Jie’s suggestion, he chose Corporal Mongoose as his adjutant, plus Xiaoba, where Xiaoba was responsible for the fire suppression position.

Ordinary ”operators” couldn’t adapt to this position.

But Xiaoba was special, as long as he’s there, no matter how much firepower the opponent has, it will be suppressed.

Finally adding two Tier One non-commissioned officers.

Yu Yue chose Second Lieutenant Pang Tu as their adjutant, along with Lin Jin, and two Tier One non-commissioned officers.

Tong Zizhan was normally supposed to be split from Gao Yuan, but the two had uniqueness, so they stayed in one squad.

Lu Xiao, Jiang Rong, and Miao Qi were arranged into one squad.

The remaining non-commissioned officers were directly allocated by He Jie, forming seventy-five officer squads.

Finally, two hundred recruits were thrown into the training camp, with Lao Er, who happened to be free, as the chief instructor.

After this period in the battle group, Lao Er grew not only muscles but also some brains.

To manage independently... not likely.

But definitely managing recruits wouldn’t result in malicious events like Old Wu.

Beyond the Armed Corps, many in the crew also advanced to Tier One.

Wan Xing and Lin Xia were the earliest.

The former advanced to a ”Pharmacist”, Lin Xia unexpectedly advanced to Tier One ”Healing Fire”, which was an uncommon profession, somewhat similar to Su Huan’s past life ”Electromagnetic Mage”.

One switches from offensive to healing, one switches from supplying to attacking.

This led to them being somewhat bizarre.

Their characteristic was healing external injuries with a gentle flame, stabilizing conditions.

But according to Su Huan’s understanding of the profession, it excelled in healing internal injuries.

Effective against certain frostbites and burns.

Director Xu’s lab had two, the battle group had three.

They ushered in an evolution wave.

But this was just a prelude, many on the train, including Nonsense, Xiaozhao, Huang Sea, etc., were at the stage of imminent evolution, just not meeting special evolution conditions, waiting for the opportunity.

Like Wan Xing, the ”Pharmacist” opportunity was configuring certain medicines, and Lin Xia was healing injuries.

As for Xiaozhao’s target profession ”Mechanical Apprentice”, advancing required creating some machinery.

But most of his time was spent on administrative work for the research group.

Planning to take a few days off with the conductor, then take part in Yu Jing’s exoskeleton research project, boosting his evolution level.

It’s estimated in mid-June, the armed train will see the first evolution wave.

By then, Tier One Evolvers will become the train’s main force.

”Still a bit slow.” Su Huan looked at the roster, frowning.

Shu Wei responded calmly, ”According to Black Kite Laboratory’s forecast, the world-wide Tier One evolution wave should occur a year after the apocalypse; even top forces only advance this time to about five months post-apocalypse.”

”Jump-start so much, just around five months?”

”Their time is abundant, but resources limited, only allocated to a few, most can only evolve after the apocalypse, so progress isn’t much faster than the train, fastest about a month or so.”