The doors of the air-raid shelter were already wide open. Although survival was right before their eyes, the survivors were so hungry they barely had the strength to walk. If the soldiers hadn’t half-dragged, half-carried them onto the plane, they would never have been able to crawl out of that underground tunnel on their own.

David Bolton’s face was ashen, a stabbing pain in his chest, his legs weak and unsteady. The long period of starvation made everything feel somewhat unreal to his mind. But he still clenched his teeth, desperately bracing himself against the wall, stumbling out of the basement.

The mutants were getting closer and closer. People could even make out their indifferent faces, and the greed and murderous intent radiating from their red pupils.

The young warrant officer put down his G180S, grabbed two bundles of G6 long-handled grenades tied together, pulled the ring, and hurled them fiercely toward the dense crowd of mutants in the distance. In an instant, a blinding, dazzling fireball erupted at the street corner, and within the massive shockwave, black severed limbs were blasted everywhere.

Everyone who witnessed this scene stared blankly at the explosion in the distance, their faces filled with incredulous shock.

That bundle of grenades contained more than ten, weighing at least seven or eight kilograms. The distance thrown was over a hundred meters... Such arm strength was truly astonishing.

“Kill them, leave none alive, wipe out every last one of these bastards—”

The warrant officer grabbed a fully loaded assault rifle, pressed his lips together, and repeatedly pulled the trigger at the approaching mutants. Beneath the face partly hidden by his arm and the gun, one could faintly see his resolute and calm gaze.

How many mutants had died at his hands? Probably no one could say for sure. But one thing was certain—he alone held back more than half of the monsters. That terrifyingly precise accuracy was simply unbelievable.

As the transport plane loaded with survivors slowly lifted off the ground, the mutants swarming from all directions began their final frenzy. Perhaps they couldn’t bear to see their prey escape so easily! They all sped up their assault. At the same time, a tall figure wielding a multi-barreled heavy machine gun appeared at the open hatch.

“Die! You filthy bastards—”

It was still the same warrant officer. The rapidly spinning six-barreled machine gun erupted with a roar that seemed to shatter eardrums. The thick muzzle flashed with hexagonal flames, and the dense hail of bullets pounded the black targets like a torrential storm, blasting them backward in the opposite direction. On the rain-soaked, muddy ground, there were flesh fragments everywhere, and conspicuous white fluid mixed with the earth.

The plane had already ascended to a height unreachable by the mutants. Looking down at the black horde gathered below, waving their slender bone blades and roaring in fury at the sky, the survivors sitting in the cabin felt an indescribable mix of fear and relief.

“If it weren’t for you, we never could have escaped this hellhole.”

John Bolton crouched, squeezing over to the warrant officer sitting by the hatch. He fished out the half pack of “Honghe” cigarettes he’d been reluctant to smoke and handed it over. Looking at the other man with admiration, he said, “I’m from the 705th Infantry Regiment. What about you, how should I address you?”

The warrant officer turned his head, smiled at him kindly, pulled out a cigarette and lit it. Through the curling white smoke, one could see his handsome face tinged with a bit of confusion.

“I used to belong to the 75th Division, now I’ve been transferred to the 64th Mobile Unit. As for my name... I’m Brian Carter.”

……

Everywhere, people were calling for help.

From Yunnan to central Sichuan, every city and town in this region was desperately sending out unending distress signals.

“The situation is extremely critical, requesting support—”

“Ammunition is almost gone, food is running out, without reinforcements we’ll all be trapped and die here—”

“Whoever you are, please save us—”

Thousands of cities and towns were sending out distress signals in various ways. And that didn’t even include the countless villages and settlements scattered in the mountains and countryside.

Yiqian was lucky. Those survivors who got off the plane and received food probably never imagined that while they were escaping death, many more people were starving, trapped, or killed...

Lieutenant General Eric Bennett stood with his hands behind his back in front of a giant electronic screen, his stern face betraying not a trace of extra emotion.

On the map of Yunnan and Sichuan provinces, red and green colors dominated.

Each red marker represented a location sending out a distress signal. They covered more than two-thirds of the map. The entire southwest region of Yunnan was completely red, and nearly half of Sichuan, stretching northeast, was swallowed by the red glow. Only the main urban areas of Chengdu, Chongqing, and a few others, separated by a thick black line, still glowed softly green.

That was no ordinary black line, but a steel defense formed by countless soldiers.

The 21st Group Army had been fully mobilized, forming a defensive line southwest of Chengdu.

The 122nd and 131st Divisions had also set out from Chongqing twenty-four hours earlier, linking up with the line from the direction of the local garrison.