You were supposed to hoard supplies, why the heck did you hoard zombies!

"You saw it clearly?"

"There are really so many people in the community?"

Upon hearing this, Zheng Youcai's eyes suddenly sharpened, the tone of his inquiry growing more intense.

The tall and thin man felt the knife on his neck loosen slightly, and he immediately nodded his head like a pecking chicken, fearing a slow response might displease the two men in front of him.

"I saw it very clearly!"

"At least forty or fifty people came out to move things!"

Without waiting for him to catch his breath, Zheng Youcai pressed again, "Men or women?"

The tall and thin man's gaze suddenly became hesitant.

Men or women?

How would he know?

For fear of being discovered, he hadn't had a chance to look closely; he had turned around and walked back as soon as he saw the convoy coming.

Seeing Zheng Youcai's gaze growing somewhat somber, the tall and thin man immediately blurted out:

"Men!"

"Mostly men!"

"There seemed to be women, too, but not many!"

As he spoke, he deliberately showed a hint of hesitation, stuttering an addition: "At that time, I was afraid that the kid would discover us, so I dared not stay near the community for long."

What kind of lie is the hardest to detect?

The answer is simple.

Just mix in a few truths.

A mix of truth and fabrication is often the most effective, especially for someone as suspicious as Zheng Youcai.

Sure enough, as soon as he finished speaking, the tension in Zheng Youcai's eyes eased.

A smile then appeared on his face.

"Well done."

"Are the others all dead?"

The tall and thin man was taken aback, then immediately showed a guilty expression.

"I'm sorry, Boss Zheng."

"I really couldn't save them."

"At that moment—"

He wanted to say more to defend himself, but Zheng Youcai had already smiled and patted his shoulder, interrupting the tall and thin man.

"It's okay, I know how dangerous it is out there."

"It's good that you made it back alive."

"The wound on your stomach—"

"It really was scratched by wire, I swear!"

"I swear to heaven!"

"If there's a single lie in what I just said, may I, may I meet a terrible end!"

Having been with Zheng Youcai for so long, the tall and thin man naturally had some keenness and understood what the other meant, right?

He immediately held up his fingers, making a solemn and earnest gesture.

His eyes were also unwaveringly firm.

Zheng Youcai looked him over for a few more seconds, then nodded slightly.

"Go back."

"Someone will bring you some things later."

The tall and thin man's hanging heart finally relaxed, and after saying thanks several times, he promptly turned and headed upstairs without looking back.

"Brother Zheng, is this really—"

The man with a common face still appeared somewhat worried.

His real name was Zhao Quan, and he had just left the military before starting his shop.

After the chaos in the shopping mall, it was Zheng Youcai who rushed over with his people first, saving Zhao Quan's wife, who was about to be brutally victimized.

From that day on, Zhao Quan followed Zheng Youcai's orders to the letter.

Zheng Youcai shook his head at him.

"We'll talk about it later."

"You go find someone to bring him some food first."

After he finished speaking, he headed upstairs, and seeing this, Zhao Quan didn't ask further questions, leading his men to follow.

As the group reached the fourth floor, they saw several people standing at the stairway entrance.

The one leading them was Xu Lin.

Upon seeing the two coming up, he immediately asked:

"What happened?"

"Was that person just now coming back from outside?"

Zheng Youcai had already regained his usual amiable expression. He nodded at the people around him and then replied softly:

"It seems I can't hide it from Inspector Xu."

With that, he sighed, before continuing:

"Staying in the mall is certain death sooner or later. I thought of sending someone out to look for a suitable place."

"But sending out a few people, almost all of them died outside."

"Only he came back."

Xu Lin fell silent upon hearing this.

He had done the same thing before.

But it had all ended in failure.

The thousands of zombies in the mall were certainly dangerous.

But the world outside was not necessarily much safer than inside the mall.

Seeing Zheng Youcai's dejected face, he thought for a moment and then stepped forward to offer a few words of comfort, but the other party soon excused himself to rest upstairs, citing a bad mood.

Xu Lin watched as the crowd upstairs gradually vanished inside the stairwell, a flicker of doubt crossing the depths of his eyes suddenly.

Zhang Ye had just left, and Zheng Youcai sent people out?

Could it be such a coincidence?

—

"Chen Bingjiang?"

"What are you doing here?"

As soon as Zheng Youcai entered, he saw a fat man sitting in his office.

Seemingly just noticing someone had come in, the fat man turned around.

His heavy body made the chair creak plaintively.

"Where is that kid with the surname Zhang?"

Chen Bingjiang squinted at him, his tone surprisingly calm.

It was as if he were speaking to an old friend.

Zheng Youcai was taken aback, then chuckled a few times and pulled a chair over to sit down.

"You're asking me?"

"How would I know?"

Chen Bingjiang did not speak, but instead gestured towards the surveillance outside.

For some reason, a red light had switched on in the middle.

It was the running state.

Zheng Youcai looked back and his heart sank instantly, his tone of voice becoming somewhat chilly.

"You fixed the backup power?"

"When?"

There were surveillance cameras installed on each floor of the mall and in the escape passages.

And the monitoring room and the electrical room were both on the eighth floor.

That was Chen Bingjiang's territory. Discover more content at empire

Once the surveillance was restored, wouldn't he and Xu Lin have no secrets in the other's eyes?

Not to mention the things he had been planning all this time—

Wait.

Zheng Youcai suddenly thought of something.

He looked at Chen Bingjiang and his gaze took on a hint of mockery.

"I see."

"You sent people out too."n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

"What, none of them came back?"

Chen Bingjiang's face twitched a few times, a flash of anger appearing in his eyes, but he quickly suppressed it.

He even chuckled heartily.

"Boss Zheng is still Boss Zheng, always so clever."

"You guessed right."

"All dead."

The mockery in Zheng Youcai's eyes became even more pronounced.

Normally, he would never dare to provoke the other party so blatantly.

But today was a bit different.

This was his territory.

He even felt the urge to call the people outside to come in and throw the fat man who was occupying his chair out of the window.

But his reason continually suppressed this idea and kept telling him:

There was no point in doing this.

Even if Chen Bingjiang were killed, the seventh and eighth floors would not belong to him.

Those who were once law-abiding citizens had all turned into a bunch of thugs.

The moment the fat man died, they would immediately plunge into endless infighting until another boss emerged to intimidate everyone.

More importantly, Zheng Youcai no longer wanted to stay in the mall.

The horde of zombies below was a guillotine hanging over his neck, never knowing when it would come crashing down, dragging everyone into that layer of hell.

In this situation, what was the point of fighting?

It was better to think about how to escape.