Captain Lv led everyone to start inspecting every corner of the house; every room had to be checked, including corners behind doors and other inconspicuous spots.
Being cautious is wise in this post-apocalyptic world; when approaching an unfamiliar dwelling, the first priority is inspection, to resolve any potential hazards.
A loud thump caught everyone's attention.
Captain Lv furrowed his brows, signaling the team to encircle and approach the direction from which the sound had emanated.
He gripped the short blade in his hand tightly, focusing intently in that direction.
Under the illumination of the light, the room ahead was lit up; just as a teammate was about to enter—
Captain Lv hurriedly said, "Hold on!"
The teammate immediately stepped back, looking at Captain Lv with confusion, unaware of any issues.
"Wait a moment, the sound just came from inside the room; whether it's a person or a zombie, we must be cautious!" Captain Lv saw the confusion in his teammates' eyes and patiently explained.
As soon as he finished speaking, the door of that room creaked halfway open, and then silence fell again.
Captain Lv glanced around, took a small iron tin from a nearby table—a tin previously used for tea leaves, now empty except for a bare, echoing interior.
Captain Lv shook the tin in his hand and then threw it into the room.
The tin hit the floor with a jarring sound, piercingly loud in the silent house.
Following that, several growls were heard, moving towards where the tin had landed.
Through the flashlight's beam, they clearly saw four or five zombies hiding behind the door; zombies lack intelligence, it must have been a coincidence or perhaps the sun didn't reach behind the door during the day.
The teammate who had almost entered the room felt a sense of relief. Thankfully, Captain Lv had warned them not to rush in carelessly; otherwise, facing these few zombies at such close quarters, it would've been easy to get overwhelmed and bitten.
Captain Lv exchanged a knowing look with his teammates. As if reading each other's minds, they stepped back a few paces and waited at the door.
The zombies moved towards the location of the tin's sound but found nothing and soon noticed Captain Lv and the others, instantly surging out from the door.
The small size of the doorway limited the number of zombies that could pour out at once.
The first zombie to emerge, almost skeletal, had decomposed over the hot days and the passage of time; it had mostly lost human features, with flesh rotten and clothing tattered and decayed, scraps barely clinging to its frame.
Captain Lv charged forward, the blade of his dagger nearing the zombie's head, and stabbed!
He withdrew quickly—no blood spurted out, just some black, rotten fluid oozing out, stinking horribly.
The several zombies that followed were also promptly dispatched by teammates.
To have survived up to this point, almost everyone with Captain Lv had killed zombies, not just once; they had grown accustomed to killing zombies.
From initially believing it was some kind of disease and that the zombies were still humans, reluctant to strike with lethal force,
to being forced into life or death situations that brought on guilt, and eventually rising to resistance,
in the later waves of the Zombie Tide, after killing a multitude of zombies, their hearts had become desensitized.
Simply dispatching a few zombies left them utterly unaffected.
Looking at the fallen zombies, Captain Lv then said, "Laoshan, Laoli, let's go check it out. Don't just head in—sweep the doorway with a glance first, if there are no zombies then enter."
Logically speaking, there should be no more zombies inside the house.
Lao Xie and Lao Li leaned against the door, one on each side, using the light to illuminate the interior and carefully checked before saying, "There should be no problem. Let's go inside and have a look."
The two went in and, after another thorough inspection, said, "This room is safe."
"Mm, let's stick together and not split up. Let's check the next room," said Captain Lv.
Following this pattern, Captain Lv led his team members and checked each room thoroughly.
Zombies were found in two of the rooms, but with prior experience to draw from, and with their careful approach, none of them were injured.
Inside a small room at the back of the second floor, they found some disposable toothbrushes and daily necessities, which they gathered. Later, in another room—where zombies were encountered—they found half a bag of Wuchang rice, though it was crawling with rice weevils.
Still, this discovery delighted them for a long time. What were rice weevils anyway? They were still edible. As long as the rice wasn't completely moldy, it could be cooked and eaten.
They continued searching the room for supplies and found the following items:
34 disposable toothbrushes, with matching small packets of toothpaste.
3 large bottles of shampoo, all of which had been used.
4 sealed 20-liter containers of water with some sediment due to age, but still drinkable. Water, as long as it's sealed, can still be consumed after a year or half a year.
Two canisters of gas, both half-used.
Half a 100-pound bag of Wuchang rice with weevils.
A complete set of kitchen equipment, although some knives seemed to be missing.
Plus some miscellaneous items that weren't very useful but better than nothing, which they all gathered.
Finding these items truly made them happy for a long time.
There were signs that the house had been rummaged through, but it seemed to have been done in haste, perhaps due to the presence of zombies, and the person searching had not looked carefully, leaving the find to them.
The supplies they found rekindled every person's hope to survive. The little they had harvested wasn't much, but in this desperate situation, it gave them the courage to keep persevering.
By the time they completely checked the rooms, nearly an hour had passed.
The others weren't idle, either—they tidied up the rooms they had inspected on the second floor, and finally, they started cooking in the kitchen on the second floor with the rice they had just found.
After the rice was cooked, everyone gathered to sit in the large hall on the second floor.
All the windows on the first floor were closed.
They had carefully considered whether to remain in this building since it was near a highway, and it was not a place to stay for long.
Drinking the rice porridge, which had too many rice weevils to bother removing—besides, the weevils were high in protein and still edible.
Sipping the black-and-white rice porridge, with its steaming vapors curling up, even though they were few in number, their hearts were calm at this moment.
Back in Jiefeng City, although there were many people, they had various intentions, with each family forming its own small group.
But here, the 32 people were all based around Captain Lv, with the team members as the link, forming a small group. This group was not large, but exceptionally familiar and united.