Ye Fan ran to the window and glanced outside, only to see a motorcycle parked downstairs.
With a grass-green body, a driver’s seat accompanied by a sidecar, it appeared much larger than usual motorcycles, with a sturdy build indicating high quality.
On ordinary days, Ye Fan might have stopped on the street to admire this motorcycle, but at this moment, he had no such interest.
Zombies rampaging in the apocalypse, a motorcycle is simply not a safe mode of transportation.
"My legs can’t ride a motorcycle for now."
"Commander, your military satchel contains a small medical kit suitable for use now."
Ye Fan hurriedly opened the satchel, and the thought of the medical kit brought it into view.
A small square box, white with green stripes, opened with a gentle press, revealing bandages, hemostatic drugs, anti-swelling and bruising drugs, anti-inflammatory drugs, syringes, and a bottle of what seemed like red gel.
Commander’s medical kit (Squad Leader Level): Includes common medicines to handle minor injuries, along with a bottle of antiviral serum that can save a person before they reach 50% zombification.
Note: (Medicines refresh every 24 hours, antiviral serum refreshes one bottle every 48 hours, quantity non-stackable).
Seeing the serum, Ye Fan was delighted.
This really is a good thing. Although he hadn’t yet encountered zombies outside, he knew their greatest weapon was infection.
Once scratched or bitten by a zombie, one would quickly turn into one.
This serum could disperse the zombie virus; nothing could be more precious during an apocalypse.
As for those ordinary medicines, they were quite useful in everyday situations.
"Commander, these ordinary drugs are just common, but as the supreme commander, using them will have a 200% recovery effect. You can now bandage your ankle."
Ye Fan’s ankle pain was a problem, making it impossible to go out, fight zombies, or even forget about searching for gold and silver.
This medical kit came just in time, and he applied the medicine to his ankle and wrapped it with a bandage.
A refreshing sensation spread from his ankle, and soon he felt much less pain.
"Wow! This is miraculous."
Ye Fan moved his foot; though not fully healed, he could now barely walk without leaning on a mop.
What was initially expected to take a week to heal might recover completely in one or two days.
"Is this Black Technology from Red Alert?"
"It is the commander’s special privilege."
Ye Fan nodded with a renewed sense of hope.
As the apocalypse arrived, this system undoubtedly would allow him to transform.
His foot was no longer a major issue, and he changed into his uniform.
The camouflage uniform fit perfectly; Ye Fan’s physique remained quite well, standing at six feet tall, with defined muscles, exuding a masculine aura in this uniform.
"No wonder they say the military uniform is best suited for men; it’s truly impressive, much better than during military training."
With a hat on, looking at the shoulder badge on his shoulder, the broad military belt around his waist, the sturdy combat boots on his feet, Ye Fan felt exceedingly content.
"Although not a real squad leader, it feels nice. The only flaw is being a lone commander, without subordinates."
Ye Fan was keen to quickly gather gold and silver to create conscripts, but he remained cautious.
Based on what he saw downstairs, zombies were certainly not easy to deal with.
Fearless, lacking pain sensation, not dying unless hit in the head, able to transmit viruses—he, with an ankle not fully recovered, must be doubly careful.
He touched the revolver at his waist; a gun with only six bullets couldn’t provide complete security.
"I need to prepare more weapons."
He went to the kitchen; his home lacked any heavy weapons, the most lethal being a bone-cutting cleaver and a dagger.
The cleaver felt heavy in his hand, but it likely wouldn’t do much damage to zombies.
After searching through the house for a while, he found a steel pipe.
Leftover from previous renovations, over a meter long, Ye Fan spent half a day fitting a dagger onto it, grinding and wrapping, until over an hour later he had crafted a makeshift long spear.
"This dagger is a Mongolian knife, quite well-made. I only wonder if it can pierce a zombie’s skull."
Ye Fan did not go out immediately; his ankle was still not fully healed and required more rest.
After rummaging through the house, he found some food: twelve packs of instant noodles, four kilos of rice, over a dozen eggs, some sausages and pickles.
"I need to get some water. In time, even tap water might be contaminated."
While there was still water and electricity, Ye Fan picked up the electric kettle and boiled a good twenty pots of water.
Once cooled, the water was poured into a container for holding mineral water.
This container was directly stored into the military satchel, perfectly utilizing its one cubic space.
He then boiled three packs of instant noodles, adding four fried eggs and a sausage. Ye Fan had always had a large appetite.
Previously he felt nauseous eating instant noodles daily; this time, however, he thought they tasted particularly good.
Perhaps with the arrival of the apocalypse, people become more easily contented.
After eating, Ye Fan first set an alarm on his phone for ten in the morning.
The reason for selecting this time was because the Red Alert system’s bullet refresh time was exactly midday twelve every day.
Lying on the bed, he thought of his parents at home and his younger sister attending school, uncertain of their current situation.
"Once I have the power to leave here, I must find them. No matter what, I need to confirm if they are still alive."
With these thoughts, Ye Fan, a bit carefree, fell asleep.
The alarm rang, signaling ten o’clock the next morning had arrived.
The moment Ye Fan woke up, he was momentarily dazed, then sprang out of bed, went to the window, and looked outside.
Desolation, bleakness, bloodshed, deathly silence.
The gray world reminded him everything from yesterday was no dream.
His mood somewhat heavy, Nana’s voice rang: "Good morning, Commander."
"Good morning, Nana."
"Commander’s foot has mostly healed."
"Wow, really!" Ye Fan indeed felt no pain in his foot, and moving around seemed fine, improving his mood.
"Commander should quickly gather gold and silver to initiate unit production, unlocking buildings, defenses, technology units, etc., and needs your rank upgrade to unlock them."
"Okay."
Ye Fan took a deep breath; he had never faced zombies before, but he knew this was a step he must take.
In the apocalypse, lacking the courage to face zombies means lacking the right to survive.
Last night as he lay in bed, he had thought out the process for collecting gold and silver.
Gold and silver mainly concentrated in two places: one in bank vaults, the other in malls within jewelry stores.
However, he currently lacked the capability to open a bank vault; maybe one day with a tank it could be blasted open, but certainly not now.
Mall jewelry stores were always located in the busiest, most crowded areas.
More people meant more zombies, and with the virus outbreak happening around midday, the time when crowds were largest, Ye Fan guessed there were few living people now in any shopping area.
With his current status as a lone commander, heading to a shopping area was impossible.
Apart from banks and malls, the only other place he could think of was inside residents’ homes.
What modern woman does not have a few gold and silver pieces of jewelry? A ring might weigh several grams, a necklace or bracelet could be dozens of grams.
If one finds a diamond ring, that’s a true bargain.
Nana explained that silver, gold, diamonds were all evaluated using the decimal system.
A gram of silver is equal to 0.1 Gold, a gram of gold is equal to 1 Gold.
A carat of diamond equates to ten Gold.
One carat equals 0.2 grams, thus a gram of diamond actually equals fifty Gold!
Moreover, gems, jadeites, jades have value too, all more expensive than gold.
If lucky, one could find enough gold and silver for a conscript within a single household.
Although conscripts in the Red Alert game are the weakest combat unit, they are soldiers nonetheless.
Looking at his revolver, Ye Fan thought, as a commander it’s better if he doesn’t appear on the battlefield himself.
The only issue is the nuisance of security doors now; every household tightly shuts their doors, making entry somewhat difficult.
However, Ye Fan knew that two couples renting apartments upstairs often kept their doors open, drinking and arguing noisily, keeping him awake frequently. Uncertain if their door was still open now.
"Let’s go. Without entering the tiger’s den, how can one procure tiger cubs? It’s also a matter of fate; let’s take a look!"
Ye Fan first listened carefully for any movement in the stairwell, prepared necessary items, and then quietly pushed his door open a crack.