Zombie Apocalypse: Creation-Chapter 759: Setting up the Caravan
"Not Encrypted? That’s a big security concern. You should definitely talk about it with her."
"That’s what I’m trying to do if you weren’t standing in the way," Yueyue murmured as she held a toolbox in her hand.
"Oops."
Xiaoyun quickly moved over to the side, letting Yueyue open the door and enter inside before he followed suit.
"Mhm... Just have them be at the field in twenty minutes or so... Okay, Commander Xiaoyun and I will be at the training field, see you there."
As Houqin hangs up the phone, she is a little confused by Yueyue, who stands right next to her commander.
"Yueyue, is there something I can help you with?"
"An advisor of mine told me your phone call doesn’t have end-to-end encryption. I’m here to help you install it."
"Oh, okay."
With zero hesitation, Houqin handed the desktop phone over. As Yueyue examined the phone for a bit, she soon turned over to her toolbox.
"When did you know how to work with this kind of stuff?" Xiaoyun curiously asked as he watched her unscrew the desktop phone.
"One of my agents is an expert in telecommunication... She’s busy doing something else, so I’ve come here instead."
After a few minutes of unboxing and putting in a mysterious chip into the desktop phone case, Yueyue puts everything back together.
"It should be all good now. Try to make a phone call, and I’ll see if I can listen in to your calls now."
As Houqin dialed a phone number, the mysterious-looking tool in Yueyue’s hand started making more and more static noises.
"Hello?"
"Sorry, called the wrong number... Did it work, Yueyue?" Houqin curiously asked as she hung up the call.
"Worked perfectly. Now it’s only static noise. Just make sure no one else tamper with the phone."
Yueyue quickly packed up her toolbox and left the office, leaving the two of them scratching their head as they looked towards the desktop phone.
"You think she encrypted your phone?" Xiaoyun asked.
"I think so? I don’t see what else she could be doing... Are you trying to suggest something, Commander?"
"Nothing. Ahem, let’s get back to the plan for now. What do we need to do again?"
"Wuli is calling up a Regiment to lead this operation to the training field right now. We should probably start heading over there."
"Let me drive you."
---
After driving to the training field, the two of them could already gather at the open field, with several officers waiting in the front.
Seeing them not in military uniform made Xiaoyun feel a little weird, but he didn’t think too much about it as he shook hands with each of the officers.
"Commander! The 20th, 21st Division is awaiting your order."
As Wuli yelled out loud and saluted in front of Xiaoyun, he saluted back before looking over to the rows of soldiers behind her.
"The other half of the 4th army corps is over in Zhongshan, right?" Xiaoyun asked as he counted the number roughly in his head.
"Yes. They’re currently under General Han Bang’s command... But rest assured, we’re more than capable of fighting at a moment’s notice."
Xiaoyun didn’t say anything back as he watched more and more soldiers enter through the training field entrance before joining the formation.
"These soldiers are technically on break, right?" Xiaoyun asked as he looked over to Houqin.
"Yes, the majority of them are on their week-long rotation break... But we can just defer it to a later date."
"No need. We don’t need this many people. Wuli, ask around a thousand or so of them to stay here for the test mission."
Wuli and her officer didn’t hesitate a single bit as they turned around and started giving out the memo to the soldiers.
After a ten-minute wait, only a single regiment remained. All of the other soldiers were dismissed as they all exited through the training camp.
"These are the volunteers who are willing to give up their break?"
"They’re willing to serve the country, sir!" Wuli responded as all of the soldiers behind her held their chins high.
"Very well... Ahem, you all might be wondering why I didn’t require you all to come here in your uniforms."
All of the soldiers’ faces filled with curiosity as they were never allowed to wear casual clothes in the training field.
"You’ll all be going on a vacation to Changsha. I know this might come out of nowhere, but the mission we’ll be doing is not a confrontation."
The curiosity soon turned into confusion, as all of them knew what had happened in Changsha through the newspaper.
"All of us will be acting as traders, going over to Changsha to trade and to help evacuate civilians out of Changsha city and Hunan province as a whole."
"Commander, why doesn’t a civil servant just do this if it doesn’t require any combat?" Wuli asked the question on everyone’s mind.
"Because it’s too risky. It is still hostile territory that we’ll be entering. Ideally, there won’t be any combat.
However, there’s still a risk that we’ll be forced to fight along the way... Which is why I called you all here today."
As Xiaoyun looked around the soldiers’ faces for a reaction, most of them looked surprisingly calm and collected.
None of them were asking to leave or speaking up against the idea. Still, he wasn’t about to just roll with it.
"If anyone wants to leave right now, you won’t be punished. This mission still has a chance of death in case gunfire does break out."
After standing on the podium for a whole minute, not a single soldier spoke up. They all remained still as they stared right into his eyes.
"I’m going to assume everyone who’s staying is willing to go on this mission—" 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮
"Commander, will you be going with us?"
As an officer next to Wuli interrupted Xiaoyun’s speech, he thought about it for a second before nodding his head.
"I’ll be going with you guys all the way until Shaoguan. Afterward, Lieutenant Wuli will be taking over as the head commander."
Xiaoyun could see the disappointment in the soldier’s face, but he couldn’t break the promise he had already made with Yuqi.
"Don’t worry. I’ll be carefully monitoring your guy’s movement. Rest assured, I’ll personally lead the army into Hunan if anything goes wrong."
The soldiers looked much more cheerful, knowing they weren’t just being put into a suicide mission.
Still, Houqin looked over to Xiaoyun with questions written all over her face as she waited for him to salute the soldier and give a farewell.
"Commander, where are we going to get a whole army to enter Hunan?" Houqin asked as soon as he stepped off the stage.
"Yiming is already stationed there with his troop. We can just use them to enter right back at Hunan."
"But they aren’t fully trained yet. And we still haven’t fully equipped them up to standards—"
"It’s fine. Hopefully it doesn’t get to that point... Don’t add this to the projected budget. I don’t want to see a mobilization cost for it."
Houqin hesitated for a second. But she eventually nodded her head as Xiaoyun didn’t give her any room to negotiate.
"Xiaoyun, you’re actually letting me go?"
Wuli asked, walking over in complete shock as she still couldn’t believe her husband was letting her out of the reserves for once.
"Why not? You’re still a soldier, and you had enjoyed your paternity leave long enough... Don’t mess it up, okay?"
As she nodded her head, Houqin quickly handed her a document that she and Xiaoyun had written earlier for the mission.
"Inside should be everything that you need to know. I already told the staff to bring the supplies here. What’s taking them so—"
"Miss Houqin! Where do we drop this off?"
A loud voice interrupted Houqin’s comment as ten white minivans all pulled up at the training field’s entrance.
"Just stop it at the entrance. You all can head back to the logistics office now!"
"Okay!"
The three of them, along with the soldiers, watch hundreds of workers in white uniforms hop out of the vehicles before exiting on foot.
"What are you waiting for, Wuli?"
"Wanqing, Siyan, Qingge, and Xinglan, come here. I need you all to read this and go tell each soldier what their roles are."
"Yes, sir!"
As all four officers walked up to Wuli and took a copy of the plan, Xiaoyun couldn’t help but feel a little weirded out by it.
After watching the officer give out the commands to the soldiers, he finally realizes what was making him feel weird.
"Houqin, don’t you think there are way too many women in this regiment? Those soldiers in Jiangxi are going to get suspicious of this trade caravan, no?"
"Um... I don’t think so. I think this is actually a good idea. At least better than a bunch of men."
"Really? What makes you think that?" Xiaoyun curiously asked.
"If you’re a soldier from Jiangxi, you probably won’t expect a bunch of women to be professionally trained soldiers.
You’ll probably think of them as a bunch of women who had banded together to survive in the apocalypse as wandering traders."
Houqin paused for a second, then continued.
"If they were strong, muscular men from Guangzhou, they would probably be extremely alert and monitor everything they do."
"I guess you’re right..."
