Translator: AnubisTL
Just then—
A knock came from outside the locomotive cabin. Old Pig soon pushed the door open and reported in a hushed voice, "Lord Mang, Wildcat and I have questioned all the survivors rescued today. None of them match his girlfriend."
"Mm."
Chen Mang hadn't held much hope for this anyway. With such a high mortality rate, the chances of Wildcat's girlfriend still being alive were slim. He simply instructed softly, "Tonight, give the new survivors a simple meal. Also, ask if any of them are couples. If so, bring them to see me. And if any troublemakers cause trouble, kill them."
"Understood."
Old Pig hesitated before adding in a low voice, "Regarding Ji Chuchu and those young celebrities you requested, Lord Mang, I had female slaves specially assigned to wash them. They're clean now and waiting in the Enforcer Car. They can come at any time."
"Send Ji Chuchu over."
"Yes."
"Stop staring."
Inside the Enforcer Car, Old Pig rolled his eyes at Black Rat, saying with annoyance, "Stop staring. Lord Mang wants Ji Chuchu to come over. Don't wait until she's in power and then try to curry favor. By then, your life won't be worth a damn."
"But..."
Black Rat watched Ji Chuchu's curvaceous figure disappear, his Adam's apple bobbing slightly as he muttered, "Lord Mang said back then that if we Brothers worked hard and finished the Doomsday Abyss, then..."
Slap!
Before Old Pig could speak, Biaozi slapped Black Rat on the head. "Why are you talking so much? Has one woman already driven you mad?"
"But she's not just any woman—she's a celebrity!"
"That's precisely why she's dangerous. Throughout history, beautiful women have brought disaster. Shut your mouth. If you want to die, don't drag me down with you."
"I know what you're thinking."
Old Pig's face was ice-cold as he spoke each word deliberately. "I need to remind you that on this train, there is only one voice that matters: Lord Mang's."
"He controls all firearm weapons."
"Forget about breaking promises. Even if Lord Mang has countless flaws, anyone who dares complain will only meet death. Only the superior can bring up their own promises. If anyone else mentions them, it's considered an act of rebellion."
"Do you all understand this?"
"Of course we do."
Biaozi's expression was serious. "Trainmaster Zhu, rest assured. We definitely understand this. Black Rat just lost his head for a moment."
Inside the Train.
Ji Chuchu pushed open the door, her face a mixture of panic and obedience. Dressed in a camisole dress, she knelt on the carpet, unable to meet the gaze of the mysterious man seated before her. She buried her head almost against her chest.
Yet a familiar voice reached her ears.
She couldn't help but glance at the screen in the locomotive cabin beside her. It was playing a variety show she had recorded before. Quickly, she lowered her head again, her eyes filled with unease.
After an unknown amount of time, Chen Mang, seated at the control panel with his legs crossed on the table and puffing clouds of smoke, glanced at Ji Chuchu on the variety show and couldn't help but click his tongue in admiration. "Her acting is truly mediocre."
He turned his head to look at Ji Chuchu, kneeling obediently on the carpet. He raised her chin with his cane, gazing at her delicate, pink cheeks. After a moment of scrutiny, he said casually, "She's even prettier in person."
Chen Mang nodded in approval, then ignored Ji Chuchu and continued watching the variety show on the screen. After a moment, he couldn't help but sigh again. "How can someone act so badly even in a variety show?"
"I don't look like a philanthropist. Everyone on this train must prove their worth to earn its protection. Do you have any value?"
"Yes."
Ji Chuchu exhaled a long sigh of relief, raised her head, and gazed at Chen Mang with a seductive look. Much of the anxiety in her eyes had vanished, replaced by a hint of a smile. "My stage acting might be mediocre, but my off-stage acting is quite good."
"For example?"
"For example..."
Ji Chuchu, still kneeling on the ground, chuckled. "For example... like this."
Chen Mang looked at Ji Chuchu, who had obediently knelt back down beside him. The anxiety on her face had largely faded. He slowly lit a cigarette, took a long drag, and exhaled before chuckling softly.
"Not bad at all."
"I'm glad you like it, Lord Mang."
Only then did he call Old Pig over using the walkie-talkie.
Soon after—
Old Pig entered the room without looking left or right, ignoring Ji Chuchu completely. His voice was respectful and hoarse as he addressed Chen Mang. "Lord Mang, you called for me?"
"Mm."
Chen Mang nodded, lost in thought for a long moment before finally speaking. "From now on, she'll be treated as a First-Class Slave aboard the Stellaris train. She'll reside in the Enforcer Car. You should have records of the slaves mining in the Doomsday Abyss these past few days. Rank the top performers, including you and Biaozi. As for the rest, the ones at the bottom of the list, aren't there some young celebrities among them? Just arrange things as you see fit."
"All right, take her away."
"Understood."
Old Pig nodded, while Ji Chuchu, kneeling on the ground beside him, breathed a long sigh of relief. It seemed her chances of survival were now secure. Being a celebrity in the apocalypse did have its advantages. No matter who captured her, her life was essentially guaranteed.
Inside the Stellaris's Enforcer Car.
Biaozi watched Ji Chuchu, who had already devoured sixteen slices of bread and was still eating, with a complex expression. He couldn't help but remark, "She really can eat. Must have been starved pretty badly before."
Finally, after the seventeenth slice of bread disappeared, Ji Chuchu patted her full stomach contentedly, burped, and licked the crumbs from her lips as if savoring the flavor.
"She really is..."
"That's way too much food."
Four days later.
They had searched the entire outskirts of Taiping City, rescuing nearly all the survivors they could find. In total, they had saved 801 people.
The deeper they ventured, the fewer survivors they found.
Including the slaves already on board, the train now had just over 1,000 slaves.
As for Taiping City's urban center, the high-rise buildings had collapsed too severely, and the terrain was too treacherous for even the Stellaris to penetrate deeply.
To put it simply:
The Stellaris had already reached the top of the Regional Rankings, boasting a power value of nearly 4,000—a crushing victory over the second-ranked train. And it had achieved this feat as a Tier 2 train! The Train Radio had been buzzing with excitement for days.
Based on his calculations, Chen Mang had also roughly figured out where the survivors of Taiping City had gone.
Data never lies.
Even if the power values of all trains on the Regional Rankings were calculated based on the number of survivors they had, the total would still be just over 100,000 people. So, excluding the possibility of an extremely high death rate, the most likely explanation was this:
After the apocalypse, most of Taiping City's survivors had been randomly teleported to other zones.
This ensured that even sparsely populated zones would have initial survivors for trains to take in, preventing train conductors from wandering for days without finding a single survivor in those desolate areas.
A train without survivors was like a train without energy stones—it would eventually break down.
This explained why so few survivors remained in Taiping City.
At that moment, dawn was just breaking.
Chen Mang steered the Stellaris train across the wasteland at high speed. The Resource Detection Radar constantly scanned for resource points nearby. He had just built eight ordinary carriages to house the newly acquired slaves.
But this was clearly not a long-term solution.
He couldn't afford to equip all eight carriages with Tier 3 Armor. The cost would be too high, and his current resources couldn't support such extravagance. Moreover, eight slave cars posed too many risks, severely limiting the train's maneuverability.
He decided to store the new slaves in Refrigerators.
But crafting a Tier 10 Refrigerator with the "Cosmos Within" effect required 4,500 units of iron ore.
With so many slaves, he'd need at least four Refrigerators to fit them all, totaling 18,000 units of iron ore.
And he currently had only 1,000 units of iron ore.
The slaves were too numerous. They consumed too much food, and housing them was a problem. He'd also need to hire more thugs. The current ten thugs were barely maintaining order among over a thousand people—no small number.
If they were all piled up in the square, they'd completely cover it.
Finally—
"Beep beep beep"
The Resource Detection Radar beeped, signaling a discovery. Chen Mang had found a Tier 1 Iron Ore deposit in the wasteland. Though he now looked down on Tier 1 Iron Ore, even a mosquito was meat. And right now, he desperately needed that mosquito meat.
Very quickly!
The 200 old slaves on the train began disembarking one by one, shouldering their pickaxes and entering the mine shafts to start another day of mining. They hadn't mined for several days, so this break had been a long rest for them, and they were brimming with energy.
As for why they didn't have the new slaves do the work:
The train currently didn't have enough iron ore to forge new Tier 2 pickaxes. Crafting one Tier 2 pickaxe required 10 units of iron ore, and equipping all 800 new slaves would require 8,000 units.
After nightfall, when the old slaves emerged from the mine shafts with their pickaxes, they brought back 2,400 units of iron ore.
This amount wasn't even enough to forge pickaxes for the new slaves. It wasn't that the slaves were slacking off; it was simply the nature of Tier 1 Iron Ore. Unlike Tier 2 Iron Ore, one unit of Tier 2 Iron Ore was equivalent to ten units of Tier 1 Iron Ore.
The efficiency remained the same, but the yield increased tenfold.
The next day, just as dawn broke, Chen Mang used the 2,400 units of iron ore from the previous day to forge 240 pickaxes. He distributed these to 240 new slaves, sending some of them down into the mines to work alongside the old slaves. That day, they brought out 4,000 units of iron ore.
The new slaves' work efficiency was noticeably lower, due to various factors: their mindset, physical condition, and so on. But none of that mattered. They would be trained over time.
Day 3.
The 4,000 Units of iron ore mined yesterday were forged into 400 pickaxes and distributed to 400 new slaves.
Day 4.
7,000 Units of iron ore were mined.
Though it was only Tier 1 Iron Ore, the current daily output was already approaching the daily yield of the Tier 2 Iron Ore Chen Mang had once mined beneath the Doomsday Abyss. Before the goblins arrived, that Tier 2 Iron Ore mine had produced just over 10,000 Units of iron ore per day.
Day 4.
Chen Mang took out over 1,000 Units of iron ore and forged another hundred pickaxes, distributing them to the remaining slaves. Now, every slave had their own pickaxe, and mining progress accelerated.
That day, 8,000 Units of iron ore were mined.
Day 5.
There was no fifth day. After the fourth day, the mine was completely exhausted.
While the yield of Tier 1 Iron Ore wasn't fixed, it generally ranged around 20,000 units.
Considering the food and water consumed over the past few days, the train currently held only 9,000 units of iron ore—still insufficient to build four Tier 10 Refrigerators. They needed to continue searching for Tier 1 Iron Ore.
On the wasteland, the Stellaris train raced toward an unknown destination, its Resource Detection Radar constantly scanning the terrain.
Meanwhile, Old Pig entered the carriage to report the daily consumption details to Chen Mang.
"Lord Mang," Old Pig began, "all our Tier 1 and Tier 2 slaves are now receiving two meals a day. Each slave consumes twenty slices of bread and four bottles of mineral water daily. Hard labor makes them sweat heavily, increasing their risk of dehydration."
"Ten slices of bread equal one unit of iron ore, and making ten bottles of mineral water requires another ten slices of bread, or one unit of iron ore. That means each slave's daily consumption amounts to 2.4 units of iron ore."
"With over 200 slaves, including thugs, we're spending 500 Units of iron ore daily."
"Now we have a new batch of slaves, treated as Tier 3 slaves. Each gets ten slices of bread and two bottles of mineral water daily, costing 1.2 Units of iron ore per slave. With 800 slaves, that's 960 Units of iron ore daily."
"Lord Mang, your initial instructions were that rations remain fixed regardless of whether we mine iron ore that day. We wouldn't reduce rations just because we didn't find any iron ore on a particular day."
"In other words—"
"Even if the Stellaris train does nothing all day, we're already starting with a fixed daily consumption of 1,460 Units of iron ore."
"If we can't mine any iron ore today, that's pure consumption."
"When we had fewer slaves, it was manageable. But now that we have so many, if the train doesn't have at least 10,000 Units of iron ore in reserve, and we fail to find any for several days in a row, this entire batch of slaves will starve."
(End of the Chapter)
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