Chapter 283: None Of You Respect Him
As he was about to leave, Goat said, “I’ll consult you on a few evolution-related questions after I’m done with work.”
“Me?”
Seeing Lin Jin somewhat dazed, Goat shrugged. “Who else? You’re a genius at evolution. I’ve been Tier 1 for a long time and still haven’t awakened any new skills.”
Lin Jin lowered his head with a bitter smile. “Can’t even touch the Train Conductor’s shadow—what kind of genius is that.”
Goat froze at the doorway, his expression subtle.
“You are a genius, no doubt, just not very lucky—you ran into a monster.”
Listening to Goat’s receding footsteps, the pressure in Lin Jin’s heart suddenly eased a lot.
‘So the Train Conductor is just too strong…’
The dull friction sound outside the car window jolted Lin Jin awake; he couldn’t help but look up.
The setting sun hung low, its dim yellow light slowly spreading through the city.
The dust-covered city blended ever more harmoniously with the heavens and earth, like a legendary golden city.
The entire city seemed like it had been submerged underwater for years, then suddenly pulled out to dry. Both buildings and roadside abandoned vehicles were covered in a thick layer of gray crust. There were also few mutated plants outdoors—not rampant like in the acid rain area—so looking out, there wasn’t a speck of clutter.
In other places, mutated plants compete with the city for space, but in the storm zone, mutated plants instead rely on human-left city ruins to vie for survival space with the storm.
Due to its size, the train scraped against an office building. The hard armor ground the sharp-edged corners into smooth arcs. The building shook, dust rained down, and zombies howled as they crawled out from nearby buildings.
It had been a long time since entering the flood zone without seeing these “old friends.”
Suddenly seeing the Butcher’s fat, greedy face, Lin Jin inexplicably felt a bit of familiarity.
The Butcher had just raised the road sign in his hand when a massive bloody hole appeared in his head.
It must have been a sniper on the train who took the shot.
After the baptism of war with Black Kite, the remaining recruits had also made significant progress.
A Tier 1 zombie horde was no longer a threat to the current armored train—just a minor interlude in the combat group’s daily work.
Before Lin Jin could finish spacing out, the heavy sniper had already picked off the large Tier 1 zombies in the zombie horde.
Then the sharpshooter mowed down the agile zombies like Jumpers and Night Demons.
Finally, the firepower specialist swept through with a barrage.
Hundreds of zombies lay quietly on the ground.
The commotion they caused was even less than the loud noise from the armor scraping the office building.
When that area finally slid past the car window view, the Armed Corps and manufacturing group’s attendants had already driven off to collect materials. In one or two hours, they would catch up with a pile of valuable materials.
Honestly, this was a bit different from the apocalypse he had initially imagined.
At first, he thought it would be like in games and movies: every day, during bright light when zombies were sluggish, collect supplies; after sunset in the darkness, no lights or noise, wrap noisy items in cloth, eat expired canned food and moldy biscuits, living a fearful, uneasy apocalyptic life…
But it seemed like that was only the case right after the apocalypse broke out.
At least on the train, life was no different from before the apocalypse.
Children studied, adults worked, scientists researched, soldiers fought—everyone had things to do, no one idle.
Though some got injured, some died.
But no one on the train ever fell into despair.
Under the Train Conductor’s high pressure, they didn’t wither—instead, they showed a strange vitality.
Was this still the apocalypse?
Lin Jin didn’t know, but he liked this life—the apocalypse unique to “Dong Huang people.”
……
News of the armored train breaking through Black Kite’s blockade spread through the post-apocalyptic world at terrifying speed.
As the train headed toward Zhijin City, almost all forces learned the general process of the war, even down to the Train Conductor’s eating habits, speech quirks, and more.
Tong Zizhan and the others had racked their brains over the report on the water operation.
Deep Blue Data didn’t waste it, packaging the data and selling it directly to other forces.
The earned money was poured vigorously into cultivating gene primordiums.
Originally, many forces had only treated gene primordiums as evolution incubators, but after seeing Su Huan’s overwhelming combat power, they couldn’t sit still.
Though some forces didn’t want to research it.
But who knew what others were thinking?
If others developed it and you didn’t, could you still get along peacefully?
Black Kite was a bloody example.
The dignified Director Number Three was pinned down and carved up alive, his entire force at others’ mercy.
No leader could accept such a situation.
Of course, not everyone was so panicked. The news ultimately circulated at the top levels—for ordinary survivors, the Train Conductor’s heroic legend wasn’t as real as a can of luncheon meat.
Even a single bullet could let him sleep more soundly.
But for some, the news was worth reading over and over—even the most useless parts, like the Train Conductor’s speech quirks, were savored word by word by Li Wangchuan.
“It looks like the armored train has no intention of turning back this lifetime. What’s the point of spending so much to buy their intel?”
Haywood asked puzzledly, holding a tea cup.
Seeing no reaction from him, Haywood could only shrug helplessly and stand up.
Every so often, Li Wangchuan would buy a batch of armored train intel here, then enter this manic state—his expression more focused than when caressing a lover.
One wall in the room was entirely made of bank safes pieced together—no one knew how many good things Li Wangchuan had stashed inside.
Beyond the partition wall formed by the safes was a huge floor-to-ceiling window.
Outside the window, continuous drizzle fell over the current “New City”—more accurately “Chuantao,” but acid rain area people habitually called it “Tao City” or simply “New City.” With the Steel Council wiped out by that zombie tide, it was now history.
This was thanks to Li Wangchuan’s stubborn insistence on adding “Tao” to various names, gradually replicated by people as an unwritten rule.
Newborns in New City all had “Tao” in their names.
Due to manpower shortages, New City’s scale not only fell short of initial plans but was even smaller than the old base.
Only six main buildings, about the size of a residential community.
With the six main buildings as pillars and outer row villas as walls, it formed a “city” carved out in the urban area.
And this was already the largest city in the acid rain area, housing twenty thousand people.
So even if Haywood wanted to chat with someone, there was nowhere—Li Wangchuan might have fallen, but his place could still be called a city; other survivor settlements were still toilet-level.
A burst of laughter suddenly came from the room.
Haywood was baffled—he’d been promoted a level from this battle and wasn’t this happy.
What was Li Wangchuan, who had lost his whole family, so joyful about?
“They see Su Huan as a fat piece of meat to be slaughtered at will. I dare say Wang Yi was definitely there!”
Li Wangchuan appeared behind Haywood, eyes gleaming.
Haywood nodded. “That guy’s a jinx. Good thing Black Kite took a big fall—everyone will take him seriously now.”
“No, the same thing will happen again.”
Haywood furrowed his golden brows. “Friend, big company people aren’t idiots. I guarantee no one will provoke this jinx.”
Li Wangchuan smiled meaningfully and held up the briefing in his hand.
“They will. This whole thing never mentions ‘Su Huan’ or ‘Train Conductor’—instead using dual professioner or gene primordium. Even you who know him best are arrogant enough not to call him Train Conductor.”
“You’re overthinking, Li. It’s just a name. Even so, the armored train getting stronger doesn’t benefit you…”
Haywood explained.
“If you don’t even respect him, how can you defeat him?”
Li Wangchuan shook his head with a smile, saying no more.
“Weird Dong Huang people…”
Haywood muttered resentfully nearby.
……
As various forces began researching gene primordiums and this battle.
The armored train finally left the city ruins before nightfall.
It wasn’t that they couldn’t stay overnight in the city—for the armored train, underwater, sea, isolated islands, acid rain, abandoned cities… nowhere was off-limits. It was just quieter away from the city center.
Otherwise, waves of zombies or survivors interrupting—everyone on the train was already swamped with post-war matters—so they unanimously chose to avoid trouble.
At this point, the armored train was parked on a national highway, its white whale bones crackling under the wind and sand.
Though a meeting was about to start, the tough major battle was over. The atmosphere in the dining car was relaxed. Director Xu and Professor Ma in white coats, etc., were holding a small academic salon. Dried fruit and snacks sat on the table; Xiao Zhao sat nearby, occasionally refilling tea for the glaring old folks.
Perhaps because He Jie wasn’t there, the Armed Corps was much quieter today.
Huang Hai dressed like an old farmer, sitting in the booth opposite the cabinet chatting with Li Han.
Besides these elders, there were many new faces today.
Tan Yunxi sat next to Lin Xi. Though not as stunning as the latter, she had more human warmth—together, each had her merits.
Additionally, Ban Yunzhang, Su Leiya, Qi Zhenbang, Glasses, Cook, Old Liu, Lin Xia, and others were all in the dining car.
These people might not be high-ranking, but they were in key departments.
This was the train’s first large-scale post-war summary—on Shu Wei’s suggestion, they were brought along.
According to familiarity, everyone gathered in small groups of twos and threes.
The one surrounded by the most people wasn’t Yu Yue or Professor Ma’s group, but the usually mild-mannered Hu Shuo.
As logistics group chief crew leader, Hu Shuo had temporarily taken on nearly all the chief crew leader’s duties.
He had even handled part of the Train Conductor’s secretary work before.
Most of today’s newcomers were his senior attendants.
Though numerous, Hu Shuo handled it orderly: first greeting other high-levels, then attending to every attendant present without anyone feeling neglected.
Hu Shuo spotted a middle-aged man in a suit in the corner—a gray-blue shirt and trousers that clashed with everyone else. His suit seemed borrowed, tight-fitting, making the already reserved man look even more stiff.
“Old Liu, how’s the work intensity lately?”
Faced with Hu Shuo’s question, Old Liu was flattered and hurriedly stood to shake hands, but felt it too overly familiar.
Hu Shuo patted his forearm, signaling him to relax.
Old Liu smiled. “Pretty good—actually much easier than before.”
Hu Shuo feigned annoyance. “Nice one, Old Liu—you think the tasks I assigned are too tough?”
“No, no…”
After joking a bit, Hu Shuo casually asked, “How are your two apprentices?”
Old Liu grinned. “Pregnant!”
Hu Shuo’s smile froze—he was thrown off by it.
Since the Train Conductor assigned those two apprentices to him, he asked casually for an update—in case Su Huan asked, he’d have something to say. But he hadn’t expected such a surprise from Old Liu.
Nearby, Huang Hai’s assistant Xiao Wang poked his head over with a grin.
“Both pregnant?”
Old Liu glared. “Bullshit—keep talking and I’ll smack you, kid.”
Hu Shuo shook his head with a wry smile. “You, you… how many months?”
“Just one.”
“Buy more food, supplement the pregnant woman well. If rations aren’t enough, tell me.”
Hu Shuo instructed a few words.
Turning to Lin Xia with his head down, just about to speak, he felt the atmosphere still.
A needle-like sense of danger came from ahead—no need to look up, Hu Shuo knew the Train Conductor had arrived.
Since the last battle, that bio-magnetic field neutralizer had failed. Luckily, everyone on the train was an evolver—no one would be scared to death by the Train Conductor.
But these high-levels who often met him still found it uncomfortable.
The Train Conductor, in his unchanging black shirt, walked out. He squinted, scanned everyone, then sat on his orange cat sofa. The originally short sofa instantly became the tallest “throne” in the carriage.
All eyes gathered on the twenty-three-year-old young man.
“Where’s He Jie?”
Pangtu in the crowd pursed his lips, holding back laughter. “Bow tie failed.”
Su Huan paused. “What bow tie?”
Everyone looked curiously; Pangtu had to start from surgery basics—like different knots for suturing wounds, why not bow ties, etc.
Old San puzzled, “We have plenty of talent on the train. Why not send a few more to learn? Save Lin Xia and them scrambling around.”
Most senior talents, including Director Xu, shook their heads slightly.
Goat clutched his stomach, chuckling. “Learn what? Learn bow ties from Lin Xia?”
Everyone burst out laughing; Lin Xia’s face grew more bitter.
Old San still confused. “Look at my big bro—knew nothing, self-taught to make guns. What’s so unlearnable about treating illness? Plus we have pros like Pangtu.”
Pangtu waved hands repeatedly. “I’m no pro. My tricks fool around with external wounds fine—battlefield just needs not dying. Real surgery needs tons of theory—not the same as making guns.”
Old San, “Isn’t Lin Xia a doctor?”
Lin Xia looked embarrassed. “I studied surgery… but my major wasn’t that, so I didn’t pay much attention.”
Su Huan wasn’t surprised at all.
Medical care on the train had always been a weak point—not that he didn’t want to fix it, mainly lack of professionals.
