#245 - Chapter 245 Reasons
Inside a partitioned ward at the sub-base.
Little Cong, who had just finished his business and been helped back by Li Shenglin, stared blankly at the ceiling, a look of utter despair on his face.
"Brother Li... I can still feel things moving inside... I'm so scared...."
His face was pale, his hair plastered to his head with sweat, and his pants bore traces of filth from when he had fallen into the latrine in fright.
"I feel so disgusting right now... I wish I were dead... Waaah..."
As he spoke, he began to sob quietly.
Any modern person who saw a pile of worms, big and small, wriggling out of their bowels would experience a complete breakdown of their worldview.
Lin Shenglin, standing beside him, also looked unwell. He had seen the scene when he went to rescue Little Cong, and now the image kept flashing in his mind, raising goosebumps all over his body.
It was too damn disgusting.
So he understood Little Cong's mental state perfectly.
"Hang in there! Don't think about it so much, distract yourself by thinking about delicious food! Chicken legs, cake, dumplings, noodles, barbecue – you've overcome so many difficulties, how can you fall at this final hurdle?!"
He continued to comfort his companion considerately, knowing that all he could do was soothe him for now, and that a solution could only be expected from Green Source.
"Why don't you try to recall what you've been in contact with recently? Otherwise, how come you're the only one in our group who's sick? You must have touched something unintentionally."
Brother Li kept trying to distract Little Cong, to stop him from questioning his existence.
Hearing this, Little Cong indeed stopped wallowing in self-pity and began to recall his recent activities.
During this time, they had mostly been working hard at the Green Source sub-base during the day, listening to Brother Li's advice to slack off as little as possible and strive to perform well in order to earn more points, so that they could be promoted to Level 3 personnel like Brother Li and Brother Liang, and be eligible to live at the sub-base.
They also ate the food distributed by Green Source for two meals a day, which, in theory, shouldn't have been a problem.
And then they would go back to Residential Area 1 to rest in the evening after work.
Thinking of this, Little Cong suddenly had a flash of inspiration.
"I think I know the reason! It's Wang An and the others who live next to us! The day before yesterday, they got some sugarcane from somewhere and gave me a few stalks, wanting me to keep an eye out for when Green Source was recruiting people to work again!"
"There must be something wrong with the sugarcane they gave me! Waaah... I'll f***ing kill them..."
As he spoke, a look of anger replaced the despair on Little Cong's face, as if he had really figured something out.
Li Shenglin knew what sugarcane was – a semi-aquatic plant that grew by rivers or ponds. After peeling the outer skin, the inner root could be eaten and had a slightly sweet taste.
Although it couldn't be considered proper food, it could still be used as a "snack" to replenish some energy and satisfy cravings. He used to eat it often when he was a child in the countryside.
But could this really be the cause?
Li Shenglin didn't blame Little Cong for not telling them about the snack, but instead felt puzzled, because he and his friends had eaten a lot of it when they were kids, and he had never heard of anyone experiencing what Little Cong was going through.
"Do you still have any of those sugarcane stalks left? If you do, I'll get them and have the Green Source base analyze them."
"Uh... no, I ate them all in one go the day before yesterday and threw away the chewed-up remains..."
Little Cong said a little embarrassedly. Although it wasn't filling, it really could satisfy his cravings, so he couldn't resist eating it all at once.
Hearing this, Li Shenglin didn't have any good ideas either.
The two of them continued to chat aimlessly, trying not to think about the scene of the worms crawling out of his intestines.
In other partitioned wards at the sub-base, there were as many as fifty or sixty people in the same condition as Little Cong!
Some with mild symptoms only had slight abdominal pain and discomfort, while others with severe symptoms had already started to develop fevers and convulsions!
Panic was spreading.
*****
Main Base Resource Warehouse.
Several figures were talking at the entrance.
"Miss Luo, we have received President Qin's approval to collect the anti-parasite medication to treat the infected personnel outside. This is our requisition form."
Zhao Ling, leading a few people, arrived at the base's important material storage area, which was managed by Luo Dandan and Qin's mother.
As the captain of the base's warehousing department, Luo Dandan was already the nominal boss here.
She took the paper document that Zhao Ling handed over, saw the list of medicines on it, and the unique steel-stamped seal of Qin Jin at the bottom.
"No problem, Sister Zhao, please wait a moment, we'll send someone to retrieve them right away."
Since the procedures were all correct, she naturally wouldn't deliberately make things difficult. She had also heard about the inexplicable infections that had broken out outside today.
Soon, Luo Dandan instructed two of the personnel beside her to enter the warehouse and retrieve the corresponding medicines.
Seeing that only Luo Dandan was left at the door, Zhao Ling hesitated for a moment, but finally spoke the words she had been wanting to ask.
"Miss Luo, could you help me see if we have a lot of these medicines in the base?"
Hmm?
"I want to talk to President Qin about saving the other survivors outside."
Luo Dandan roughly understood that Zhao Ling wanted to help other people.
She didn't answer immediately, but turned and walked to the table next to her, operating the computer on it.
After a good while, she stood up, waved her hand grandly, and said to Zhao Ling with a heroic air:
"We have a lot of these medicines in the base warehouse, we can't use them all up. If you want to do it, then go ahead! I support you too!"
Hearing this, Zhao Ling nodded, gaining a clearer understanding.
The personnel transporting the supplies quickly brought over the corresponding medicines, and Zhao Ling, along with the people who had come with her, took them and quickly left.
There were still many people waiting to be treated.
Medicines were also considered important materials at the Green Source base, and most of them were usually stored in the main base's temperature-controlled and dehumidified warehouse. The external medical center only had some simple daily medicines, so it was necessary to come here to specifically collect them.
*****
In a more remote and desolate area of Mentang Town.
A group of nearly ten people arrived here in several vehicles.
They were personnel from the Green Source base who had come to investigate the recent large-scale outbreak of the parasite crisis.
Zhang Tiankai cautiously walked forward, wearing a white hazmat suit, as were the team members behind him.
They had briefly investigated the infected people and found that most of them had personally gone to the wild to search for food, or had eaten things that their relatives and friends had brought back from outside.
Many clues pointed to the wilderness, so several captains from the combat department led people to check the places that these people had gone.
After the acid rain last year, many plants outside had withered.
But after this winter, when spring came, many of the originally withered trees had actually grown new shoots, and many small grasses had also re-emerged from the soil.
Even in such harsh soil, it couldn't stop the growth of some tenacious plants.
Zhang Tiankai and his team walked through a patch of grass that was half a leg high and finally arrived at the edge of a pond.
Without wearing a mask, he immediately smelled a strong stench, like the smell of rotting meat!
He endured the discomfort and squinted to scan the pond, and the scene in front of him made his pupils contract instantly!
He saw some dead fish of varying sizes and the corpses of several animals floating on the surface of the pond, and on the opposite bank, there was a zombie with only half its body left, slightly waving its arms!
The surface of the water shimmered in the sunlight, and in the shallow water near the shore, some small "fish fry" were slowly swimming!
"Don't go over there!!"
When the team members behind him wanted to go forward to take a closer look, Zhang Tiankai sternly stopped them loudly!
"It's good enough to look from here! The pond in front is full of worms!"
"The pond has become a breeding ground for parasites!"
(End of chapter)
