Zhou Ke'er felt her heart skip a beat as she listened to Zhang Yi mutter to himself. Nobody in the building realized how close they were to the edge—everybody's fate could be decided by his next whim. She thought, quietly grateful, Good thing I followed him.
Zhang Yi patted the sofa beside him. "Come here."
She curled up next to him like a warm cat in the little heated room. He turned to her with an oddly serious look. "Ke'er — from your point of view, should I fight them or negotiate?"
Surprised that he wanted her opinion, she answered carefully. "If you fight, can you hold off twenty-nine buildings?"
He smiled with easy confidence. "No problem." Privately he admitted a hairline doubt — maybe 0.01% — the kind that keeps you from being reckless: what if someone actually had explosives? Still, the chance felt as remote as a meteor hitting his block.
She pressed on. "If you negotiate, does that mean feeding the entire community?"
He snorted. "That's what they want. But when it comes down to it, people will prioritize their own. Everyone else becomes an extra mouth."
Zhou Ke'er sighed. "That's an impossible burden."
"Exactly," Zhang Yi said. "Which is why I have to get out of this trap. Either wipe them out — dangerous and messy — or find another way."
She tried to lighten the mood with a joke. "Run. Leave the community."
He considered it, then shook his head. His safe room was integrated into the building's structure; he couldn't just pick it up and go. Maybe, he thought, if he could move everything into his spatial storage later. For now, it wasn't an option.
They ran through the local power map in their heads: some factions ruled by force, like his; some by social engineering, like Chen Lingyu's Building 9; some by technical management, like Li Jian. The leaders distrusted one another. A unified front was unlikely.
"Time is on our side," Zhang Yi concluded. "We watch. We wait. The initiative stays with me."