Chapter 83

"Go!" Lin Tu drew her gun and fired, taking down the soldier perched atop the truck.

The man was still half-crouched, savoring the sight of civilians dying in agony, when a bullet tore through his forehead. His eyes went wide with disbelief, his hand rising to touch the blood trickling down his face before he toppled off the vehicle and hit the ground hard. Even in his final moments, he probably couldn't fathom how the hunter had so suddenly become the hunted.

The others opened fire on the Government soldiers in fury.

With the advantage of concealment, Lin Tu and her group cleared out the Government forces without much effort. But by now, Polly Plaza had become a scene straight out of hell.

"Take off your badges," Lin Tu said to the others before jumping off the rooftop. What they were about to do next didn't suit the Rebel Army's identity.

Lin Tu pushed into the crowd, checking on wounded civilians along the way. Among them, only Liu Sheng was a nurse. Guan Suiyue had grown up in a church and had learned a bit of medicine from the nuns. Anyone who could still be saved was handed off to Liu Sheng, and when he was overwhelmed, Guan Suiyue stepped in to take over.

"Doctor... doctor... save the others. This world is too painful, I'm going to die..." A middle-aged woman trembled, gripping Liu Sheng's hand, a relieved smile spreading across her face.

In just those few steps, Liu Sheng's eyes had already gone red. The woman was still saveable—a bullet had pierced her lung, and with immediate surgery and long-term treatment, she could regain basic function. The problem was that surgery was impossible here. The best he could do was stuff cotton into the wound and slow her descent toward death.

But Liu Sheng didn't do even that. For one, resources were far too scarce. For another, plugging the hole would only prolong her suffering—she'd still die from suffocation or infection soon enough.

Liu Sheng swallowed his tears and let go of her hand.

"God will bless you," Guan Suiyue said, taking the woman's hand in hers. Her golden hair seemed to glow in the sunlight, and for a moment, the woman felt a peace she hadn't known in years. "Is there anything you'd like to tell your family and friends? When you reach heaven, it may be many years before you see them again."

"Yes," the woman said, gazing at Guan Suiyue with joy as her eyes slowly drifted out of focus. "Tell them... my family... that I don't regret coming into this world. Because the happiest thing in my life was... meeting them..."

Lin Tu had already reached the front of the truck. She pulled aside a corpse lying face-down on the ground and was startled to see a familiar face. Just a short while ago, this boy had been sitting by the roadside with his glasses, reading a book.

"Little Luo Te! My son!" Beneath him, Luo Te clutched the boy's body. By the time he realized what had happened, his hands were already slick with blood. He scrambled up carefully to check on his son, weeping bitterly, consumed by regret.

"He died saving his father!" someone nearby said.

"I saw him dive forward."

"Those damned Government soldiers—they'd even kill a child!"

The civilians who'd survived the ordeal wished they could stomp on the Government soldiers' corpses a few more times to vent their fury.

Lin Tu climbed onto the truck and rummaged through the cargo. There was almost nothing inside.

It had been a meaningless slaughter. From the very beginning, the Government Army's goal had been nothing but massacre. And the reason for the massacre was likely that the civilians in this district were mostly Rebel sympathizers.

"Why not just kill us all!" someone outside shouted, having realized the same terrifying truth.

At the center of the crowd, Luo Te howled in agony, his face turned to the sky. He'd been so foolish—he'd actually prayed those Government soldiers had a conscience, that they might suddenly show mercy.

Many others recognized him now. In that moment when the guns went off, Little Luo Te's frail body throwing itself in front of the bullets had been a sight too shocking to forget.

Some tried to console him, but Luo Te stood up, holding Little Luo Te's body in his arms.

"Thirty years ago, they started a war without asking our opinion. They destroyed my hometown, took my land, and forced me to wander with them across this only piece of land not contaminated by nuclear fallout. I thought things would get better. I placed my hope in their mercy, or in someone stepping up."

"But thirty years later, they're going to war again. Look at my child! Look at your families! Isn't losing our homes, going hungry, and freezing enough? They still want to take more from us! I used to comfort myself by believing that enduring undeserved suffering was a kind of salvation. But now I've realized—enduring suffering is just cowardice. They never asked my opinion, but that doesn't mean I don't have one!"

"I have to say these things out loud. From today on, I, Luo Te, stand against both the Rebel Army and the Government Army. If they want to kill me, let them come. But I'll fight to tear a piece of flesh from those beasts, even if it kills me! For my son!"

The crowd fell silent for a moment. Then his words hit them like water dropped into boiling oil, setting off a torrent of reaction.

"He's right! We can't just sit and wait to die anymore!"

"For my mother!"

"I'll fight them with everything I've got!"

"No war! No war!"

"Tell us what to do! We'll stake our lives on it!" someone shouted.

Luo Te was at a loss for an answer. He'd only spoken the thoughts in his heart, but how to actually oppose the Rebel Army and Government Army—he had no idea.

"Find someone to speak for us. We'll negotiate face-to-face with the Government and the Rebels."

"Fight fire with fire—overthrow their rule!"

People below shouted suggestions.

They all seemed reasonable at first listen, but the more Luo Te thought about them, the more something felt off. His gaze drifted unconsciously toward Lin Tu. He couldn't say he knew her well, but from the way she'd given his son medicine, let Na Wei go free, and just now saved them all—he didn't think she was a bad person.

Lin Tu voiced her own thoughts: "We need houses to live in, food to eat, and then we fight for our homeland."

To fight for their homeland—the words sounded stirring, full of fighting spirit. But this woman who'd saved them, dressed in spotless, well-made clothes, clearly hadn't realized one thing: it wasn't that they didn't want a home, a full stomach, or a homeland worth fighting for. It was that they'd never had a choice.

Beside the truck, someone was about to remind Lin Tu of this when she dropped a bombshell—

"Many shelters have been blown up recently, so they're selling cheap. I can buy the shelters around mine and provide them for you to live in. They're mostly damaged and need repairs. I'll supply the materials and tools, and I'll provide food for the first few days. After that, we'll fight together for our new home."

The crowd erupted. People looked around in disbelief, asking their neighbors if they'd heard correctly.

Even the players thought Lin Tu had lost her mind.

"She's really going to look after these people's lives? She's crazy!" Guan Suixing wanted to quit on the spot. "I sympathize with them too, but sympathizing and surviving are two different things! Isn't she just being a pure saint?"

"Why didn't Sister Lin consult us first? Is she really acting on impulse to help these people?" Li Yuanyuan grabbed Yi Ying anxiously.

"No," Yi Ying and Guan Suiyue said at the same time.

"That day," Guan Suiyue said, "I saw her buy the house next door. After getting the property deed, her phone seemed to vibrate."

"A side quest progress notification?" Li Yuanyuan mused. "Inherit and defend a civilian shelter... does that mean a player can inherit multiple shelters at once?"

"Looks that way."

"Oh, come on," Yi Ying said, trusting Lin Tu completely. "Don't worry, Sister Lin isn't stupid. When it's time for us to pitch in, we'll pitch in. All we have to do is sit back and wait for the clear."

The others were speechless, but Luo Yongzhi nodded approvingly. "Exactly."

.

Lin Tu's plan quickly won everyone's approval.

She put Luo Te in charge of managing the civilians. Having just lost his son, losing himself in work would do him good. As for Lin Tu, she returned to the players' side.

"Sister Lin, the plan's good and all, but supporting these civilians takes resources... Where are we getting that much from?" Yi Ying voiced the team's shared concern.

"I have a great idea—one that kills two birds with one stone," Lin Tu said.

The others looked at her with curiosity.

"All you need to do is go back to the Rebel Army high command and tell them you've found a way to burn down a Government Army warehouse, then earn enough military merit. Tomorrow morning, cash in that merit and exchange it for supplies."

"Wait, you mean... you're going to raid a Government Army warehouse?" Guan Suixing perked up. "Take me with you!"

"That place—only I can go."

Nightfall.

Lin Tu went alone to the shelter's basement and checked over everything she had on her.

Honestly, she hadn't wanted to do this. Even when she'd discovered she could inherit multiple civilian shelters and rake in side quest rewards, she'd never planned to go through with it. Lin Tu never thought she could take responsibility for other people. But seeing those civilians that day—people who'd endured disaster and calamity without seeking death, yet were willing to die for their family and friends—she felt she had to do something.

Or maybe it was just her greed for side quest rewards pulling the strings.

Lin Tu murmured softly—

"I, Lin Hanshan, am back."

In the next instant, the world spun. Lin Tu found herself looking at a familiar pavilion—the one she'd marked after following David into Government territory and slipping away on her own. It was a resource point flagged on the spy's computer—the location of the Government Army's warehouse.

When Lin Tu had come that day, she'd noticed too many patrol guards to risk entering, so she'd left a little mark instead: [I, Lin Hanshan, Will Return?*?]. She never expected it would actually come in handy.

This time, Lin Tu had plenty of time on her hands. And the [Night Blueberry] had grown another crop—five perfect fruits, enough to make her pop them like candy all the way into the warehouse.

She patted the seven Single-Use Backpacks slung across her back, waited for the patrol guards to change shifts, then popped a Night Blueberry and darted into the guard post to steal the warehouse key. Two more blueberries down, and she slipped into the warehouse without a sound, past layer after layer of guards.

It was a three-story warehouse, with rooms of varying sizes storing different goods.

The first floor was mostly materials.

Three storage rooms held lumber, steel, and bricks. Two more held heating and lighting supplies—generators, fuel tanks, dry batteries, rechargeable batteries, candles, and the like. The remaining rooms had glass, nails, paint, and other construction materials. Lin Tu focused on taking what she needed to repair houses, though she didn't skip the rest—whatever wouldn't fit in her Single-Use Backpacks, she could stash in the Back Mountain.

The second floor was mainly food.

Flour, rice, oats, beans, and other staples filled the largest room—a space as big as a hotel lobby, wall-to-wall with shelves. Bottled water took up the second-largest room. One room was dedicated entirely to canned goods, beans, and similar preserved foods. In a smaller room, she found compressed biscuits, dried tremella mushrooms, dried mushrooms, seaweed, and other pantry staples. The remaining rooms yielded powdered milk, smoked meat, spices, and assorted odds and ends.

The third floor held equipment and medical supplies. One room had a shelf of folding tools, crowbars, fire axes, and common repair tools like hammers and screwdrivers. Another was packed with clothes—cotton jackets, sweaters, thermal underwear, snow boots. One room was full of raw materials for clothing: fabric, yarn, and cotton. The rest held miscellaneous gear like protective suits, along with medicines—common ones like antibiotics, anti-inflammatories, and allergy meds, plus standard surgical supplies.

The Government Army's warehouse had so much stock that Lin Tu spent all night hauling it out, working until five in the morning before she finally cleared it. Her arms were nearly numb from exhaustion; if not for the Single-Use Backpacks, this monumental task would have been impossible.

While darkness still lingered, Lin Tu poured oil around every floor.

She struck a match, cast one last look at the empty shelves, then tossed the flame high into the air. Popping another Night Blueberry, she walked away without a backward glance.

Lin Tu sprinted toward the bridge in the southeast, as if racing toward the rising sun.