Chapter 52: Scavenging The Abandoned Service Area To Make A Fortune
Survival Time: 13 days
On the second day of the acid rain disaster, temperature: 11, northeast wind level 6.
The game area population is still +9999, but the number color doesn’t seem as vibrant as at the beginning, not sure if it’s an illusion.
Now almost every day, at various times, people are saying their friend’s name has turned black again.
Everyone seems to have gotten used to it, not as sentimental as before.
Yu Jiang gets up in the morning and first checks the vehicle status; the car paint and metal parts on the shell are overall fine.
The 5% shield is gone, and after more than ten hours, the wear and tear has only increased by 2%.
The 500 crystal coins were well spent!
After washing up, Yu Jiang puts on the anti-corrosion raincoat and sits in the driver’s seat, leisurely eating two flower rolls with eight-treasure congee, and checks today’s situation on the public screen.
The destructive power of the acid rain is stronger than yesterday; although it’s not strong acid that burns a hole on contact, once rust appears on the car body and isn’t dealt with promptly, it will spread quickly in this environment.
The rainwater will also seep into the interior through gaps, causing the engine, brake discs, and metal parts in the middle of the tires to rust.
This situation can only be solved with rust removal spray or repair card, or by gathering upgrade materials.
At this moment, the public screen is in chaos.
Sicily: [Seeing everyone in such trouble, I’ll spare one repair card to trade for blueprint, food exchange card*5, gathering herbs*20. Gathering herbs isn’t really useful for everyone, so trade with me instead.]
Player 3450: [I really thought you were being kind. Want to check the current price of herb inventory? Treating others like fools. With acid rain now, where can you gather on the road?]
Sicily: [Already received the crafting blueprint~]
Innate Abstract Holy Body: [I’m done. Worked so hard, just leveled up to level 2 vehicle the day before yesterday, emptied all inventory! Today the paint on the front hood is gone, rust went from coin-sized to 50% wear and tear, estimated it won’t last until noon today. How to complete this week’s mission? I’m not crazy, really!]
Not just him, many players are saying the same.
The water of East Lake, my tears: [My vehicle hasn’t been upgraded once yet, I’m even worse! The car made creaking noises while driving, a piece of the plastic shell above the front wheel has fallen off.
Without materials and repair card, I definitely can’t finish the remaining mileage, can only stop and accept ‘nothing gained’, see if I can survive until the acid rain ends and things get better, with drinking water to endure hunger for two or three days.]
After this disaster passes, the probability of supplies appearing might go back up.
Yu Jiang grips the steering wheel with both hands, maintaining around 100 km/h, speeding ahead.
No gathering on the road, just bare emptiness, no boxes either, no need to slow down.
Her next trip will be troublesome too, need to wear raincoat and do protection.
On the road, she sees severely damaged, abandoned level 1 vehicles on the parallel road, too lazy to get off and scavenge.
A level 1 vehicle in this state yields very few materials when scavenged.
A scavenger seeing resources for the first time shows no interest, thinking too few things; Yu Jiang has also forgotten the days when she was so poor she dug up every blade of grass.
She spent almost the entire morning driving, weekly mission 700km shows completed.
Around 1 PM, house buildings appeared on the desolate road!
The structure looks a bit like a service area, but somewhat different; previous service areas had lights, this one doesn’t, looks more rundown.
Yu Jiang starts slowing down, and only upon getting close does she see clearly: this is a pre-apocalypse abandoned service area!
The most severely damaged houses have steel bars exposed inside, and most importantly!
There are many abandoned cars parked there, even a faded, rusty shell tourist bus.
Can’t drive, but can scavenge, must have lots of resources inside!
Can’t rush in and raid like crazy!
Yu Jiang puts on the raincoat, fastens the hat, takes out the beggar-version protective goggles made from water bottles during midday rest.
Just two plastic pieces, polished not to scrape skin, edges stuck with scavenged double-sided tape and rag strips for double protection.
Then drill holes, thread replacement shoelaces through, tie behind ears securely, fixed and won’t fall off.
She fears acid rain flowing into eyes, affecting vision, that would be game over.
Homemade protective goggles are very scavenger-style: crude, ugly, doesn’t matter, as long as useful.
Fully geared up, Yu Jiang clears 12 space grids before taking tools off the vehicle.
First observe surroundings: five wandering normal zombies, two mutated zombies, that’s what she can see.
Yu Jiang holds the bayonet, sneaks up from behind, arms around a normal zombie and stabs.
Critical hit or bleeding effect, either one instantly kills a normal zombie.
No effect, then quickly stab a few more times, turning the zombie into a sieve.
She stealth-killed 5 normal zombies this way, plus an elite zombie hiding under a car that she ambushed similarly.
It was quite unlucky, critical hit + bleeding, instantly killed just as it grabbed Yu Jiang.
In less than ten minutes, the parking area in front of the abandoned service area is cleared.
Zombies ambushing from dark spots, with so many obstacles, easy to get sneaked up on; normal people coming in would be lucky to keep half their life.
But Yu Jiang is even more cowardly than zombies, bearing the achievement title of not upholding martial virtue.
Here she maneuvers everywhere, skills useless, only lost 30 health points, even when surrounded by three elite monster zombies.
Interestingly, Shi Xu as an assassin mostly fights head-on.
She as a long-range attack, area damage player, instead does lots of surprise one-stab things; beat them then pile on, can’t beat then run.
Yu Jiang pockets the bayonet, switches to crowbar, scavenging time begins!
She targets the tourist bus first, swings the hammer to smash open the luggage storage spaces on both sides of the body.
Seeing big and small bags inside, a bit old but overall intact duffel bags and suitcases, Yu Jiang’s eyes light up.
This is over a dozen luggage items, no different from blind boxes.
Yu Jiang opens a pink suitcase first: all change of clothes and a pair of mid-heel single shoes.
These shoes not suitable for apocalypse survival, she only takes a thick jacket.
Next black duffel bag, has food inside: a bag of premium red dates, some local specialty snacks, some expired but light screen scan says edible, not spoiled, Yu Jiang takes all.
Luggage mostly clothing, Yu Jiang takes a few decent-looking ones, puts the rest back.
Things she can’t use, selling them not worth much, no need to waste time emptying everything.
Yu Jiang boards the bus, carefully pokes the corpse in place with a stick.
The playing-dead zombie comes alive, but before it stands, Yu Jiang pins it down and finishes with one stab.
On the vehicle there’s a roll of plastic bags, probably prepared by the conductor for motion sickness just in case, take it.
Lots of food on the vehicle, pity many are dried out; seeing shrunken, discolored zongzi leaves, Yu Jiang sighs lightly.
These things remind her that this place was once a normal world, still seeing remnants of human civilization.
Yu Jiang: What? Abandoned service area? Scavenger overjoyed
