CHAPTER 73: NEXT UP, IT’S YOUR TURN

Mr. Jing was frowning, pondering how to get some payback for his daughter, but her domineering approach also shocked him.

Jing Shu, in one smooth motion, inserted the hooked wire through the peephole. She maneuvered it to the door handle on the inside, gave a gentle pull, and the door swung open. After ten years of the apocalypse, if you hadn’t maxed out your lock-picking and window-climbing skills, you’d be ashamed to even call yourself a survivor.

Next year, the sea level would rise, and the central area of Wu City would be flooded. Anyone who hadn’t fully upgraded this skill wouldn’t even be able to loot the submerged supplies. Those with quick hands looted various supplies to trade for food, while the slow ones could only resort to drinking water teeming with red earthworms.

In her previous life, Jing Shu could only trail behind, surviving on red earthworms. There’s an old saying about someone being so out of luck they "can’t even get shit while it’s hot"—that perfectly described Jing Shu in her past life. Fortunately, Jing Shu later learned many skills to secure better food, proving that a motivated slacker could become incredibly capable.

Jing Shu kicked the door open and strode in, with Mr. Jing right behind her.

Wang Qiqi, a beat too slow, was hit in the forehead by the rebounding door. "OW!" He gasped, mouth wide with pain, not daring to make a sound at first, but finally shouted, "Gou Yitian, let’s see you run your mouth now!"

A wave of heat and the overwhelming stench of urine and feces assaulted them from the dim house; Jing Shu nearly fainted from the smell.

Mr. Jing switched on his flashlight, its beam landing on Gou Yitian, who was stripped down to his underwear, holding a phone and lying on the sofa, startled.

After months without vitamins or nutrients, and with the rotten corpse insects having devoured his food days ago, Gou Yitian’s eyes bulged like a dead fish’s. His cheeks were sunken, his beard was unkempt, and he reeked—a typical state for most people these days.

"How... how did you get in..." Gou Yitian was stunned. He never expected these people to just barge in. Are they Devils? he wondered. That loud bang earlier—did they break down the door?

But so what? Weren’t their group, Biri, planning a major operation today? With his guidance, wouldn’t taking over the residential complex be a matter of minutes? Could these people really kill him today? If not, they were all dead meat! Gou Yitian thought bitterly.

Just as Mr. Jing rolled up his sleeves to teach the brat a lesson, and Wang Qiqi managed to utter, "You—" he froze, his mouth hanging open.

Because Jing Shu had already lunged forward, kicking wildly. If Gou Yitian covered his head, she kicked his stomach. If he covered his stomach, she kicked lower. Gou Yitian had no time to react before he was brutally pummeled with kicks.

How strong was Jing Shu? No one knew.

Gou Yitian only knew that the first kick felt like an elephant had stomped on him. The pain was so intense he couldn’t even utter his usual bluster, only managing agonized screams.

Then, one of Jing Shu’s kicks landed on two soft mounds...

Gou Yitian thought he heard a "CRACK!" as something shattered. The piercing pain shot from his groin up to his kidneys, suffocating him, and he fainted on the spot.

How painful could it be? Still faking? Jing Shu kicked a few more times, stopping only when she was sure he wasn’t reacting. That felt great.

Wang Qiqi’s jaw remained dropped, especially after seeing the contorted expression of agony on Gou Yitian’s face. His teeth began to chatter. "Did... did... did she kill him? This is nothing like the script I imagined!"

Mr. Jing also shivered. Only men truly understood the pain of being kicked in the testicles; it was a pain one couldn’t comprehend without experiencing it.

"It’s okay, he’s still alive," Jing Shu said. She forcefully tied Gou Yitian’s hands and feet together with the hooked wire she’d used to open the door, fashioning a deadman’s knot that would only tighten the more he struggled. It couldn’t be cut with a knife; only pliers could break it.

"Alright, let’s get Auntie Wang over to help deal with this."

When Wang Xue Mei arrived, she tearfully rained another flurry of punches on Gou Yitian, waking him up. However, to Wang Qiqi and Jing An, *this* was how a woman typically fought. Jing Shu’s method was a bit... COUGH, COUGH.

Regarding Gou Yitian’s fate, Jing Shu and Wang Xue Mei unanimously agreed that such a menace couldn’t be left alive. Mr. Jing felt that while such a person deserved more than death, it wasn’t worth going to jail over him. Wang Qiqi’s main worry was, "I’m just afraid if we let him go, he’ll find people to retaliate against us. But we don’t dare to actually kill someone."

Jing Shu smashed the computer, television, mobile phone, charger, power bank, and all other communication devices and electronics to pieces. She then wrapped the wire binding Gou Yitian’s hands and feet around the wooden slats of the sofa. Finally, she stuffed Gou Yitian’s own socks into his mouth and sealed it with duct tape.

"This way, he can’t call anyone, can’t run, and can’t even shout for help, unless he can take the sofa with him."

Gou Yitian glared at Jing Shu with hatred, emitting muffled, defiant sounds. He was bent at the waist, his legs splayed awkwardly, hands and feet bound together, unable to move an inch. In his heart, he already hated these people intensely.

With his hands and feet tied together and then to the sofa, Gou Yitian couldn’t even sit up, let alone escape the house.

He can’t run, and he can’t eat or drink, Wang Qiqi silently mourned for Gou Yitian for three seconds.

This meant Gou Yitian would be left to starve to death, die of thirst, or succumb to heatstroke on his own. During the Initial Stage of Apocalypse, some people still couldn’t bring themselves to kill someone outright.

Jing Shu planned to sneak out later that night, after her family was asleep, and use the "Tie Jia" method of execution to kill Gou Yitian.

This method involved placing wet paper sheets, one by one, over a person’s face until they suffocated. Usually, five sheets were enough to cause death. This type of death left no marks on the body. If Wang Qiqi found him, he would assume Gou Yitian died from heat or thirst, never suspecting her.

On the way back, Mr. Jing was a little uneasy. "Is this really okay, Shu? What if the police come knocking? Murder is illegal. Isn’t there a non-lethal way to solve this?"

"Dad, if he doesn’t die, he’ll find people to rob us. Besides, the police don’t have time to deal with us. They can’t even handle all the robberies and murders in the city."

Half of the Armed Police are stationed at the Artificial Sun, another half are guarding the granaries, and some are protecting various government offices and vegetable distribution points. Jing Shu couldn’t help but recall Professor Wu You’ai’s prediction. Wu City supposedly has 200,000 police officers. Even if this was a premeditated riot, how could it be that not a single police officer was seen?

Never mind, these aren’t things I can figure out, Jing Shu shook her head. The inner workings of such events were beyond an ordinary citizen like her. Once home, her daily routine included walking the Domestic Poultry and dealing with the manure in her storage space.

The ten black pigs were nearly mature, and Jing Shu needed to deal with them soon.

Previously, unscrupulous farms had secretly kept Domestic Poultry, which led to the rampant proliferation of rotten corpse insects. This, in turn, had nearly driven Domestic Poultry to extinction, except for those privately raised in rural areas with the right conditions, or the few in temperature-controlled facilities.

Thus, live pigs were scarce, even scarcer than grain and water. Money couldn’t always buy them.

Mulling over what to do with the black pigs, Jing Shu took Fat Chicken to the site where six people had died the other day. The soil there was loose; a mere touch caused it to sink, revealing countless rotten corpse insect larvae swarming over the bodies. It appeared the insides of the corpses were riddled with tunnels dug by the rotten corpse insects.

Fat Chicken had a sumptuous meal. Jing Shu collected some larvae for the frogs, estimating that these worms would be enough to feed Fat Chicken for several days.

That evening, while the family was enjoying a cheerful dinner, Jing Shu’s mobile phone rang again. As usual, she glanced at it.

Wang Xue Mei #2: "@Xiao Shu’s Villa District, it’s your turn next. Are you ready?"