Chapter 80 It's Not That Simple

When Gao Yuan returned to the shelter, he saw Luo Xingyu, her face etched with tension, among the people.

It was not until Luo Xingyu saw Gao Yuan at the back of the line that she finally relaxed, a smile spreading across her face, then she frantically waved to Gao Yuan.

Unfortunately, Luo Xingyu couldn't run over to talk to Gao Yuan or hug him because he and his team had been in close contact with zombies and needed to be quarantined.

Avoiding the onlookers, in a specially prepared open space, Gao Yuan and the others stripped down in the cold, first letting the Anti-Chemical Militants spray disinfectant on their bodies, then soaking their clothes in a special disinfection pool for washing. Of course, this included their weapons and everything else, which all had to be disinfected. With resources tight, discarding was out of the question, so items could only be reused after disinfection.

For this reason, Gao Yuan didn't bring his PSK on his first outing; he didn't want to toss his PSK waist pack into a disinfection pool out of his sight.

Having been sprayed with disinfectant, they had to wash it off with clean water. Even though the Anti-Chemical Militants used warm water, it was only slightly hotter than ice water.

So everyone shivered as they got sprayed down by the Anti-Chemical Militants in front of everyone, then hurriedly dried off with towels that had been prepared earlier, before wrapping themselves in their own blankets and heading back to their dormitories.

The quarantine took place in their own dormitory. After all, if one were actually infected, symptoms would show up in no more than twenty-four hours, so the quarantine period wasn't really that long.

Dinner was also resolved in the dormitory. When Gao Yuan returned to his dormitory, dinner was already prepared, and besides the meal, there was a large pot of ginger sugar water for everyone.

"Eh, it's actually sweet."

Gao Yuan didn't like ginger sugar water, but now, sweets were a rarity, so even the ginger sugar water he usually didn't like seemed tasty now.

The piping hot ginger sugar water warmed the bellies of the ten cold and hungry people, and their spirits finally returned. Naturally, the conversation picked up.

Li Xiaodong put down his meal basin and sighed, "Machine guns really are superior. We struggled with swords and shields in the village for half a day, nearly losing several lives. And what was the result? Only seven zombies killed. Look at those with machine guns; a few moments of firing and hundreds were taken down."

Zhang Zhe sneezed and, rubbing his nose, said with an unconcerned expression, "What's the rush? We'll be using machine guns soon enough. Besides, even if machine guns make the job go faster, someone still needs to search and clear out zombies door to door. Didn't you notice? Clearing them out with swords and shields is actually better than using guns. That's something Chief Zhou himself said; they've decided to equip everyone with a broadsword too."

Li Xiaodong looked puzzled and asked, "You're saying we're going to use machine guns? Who told you that?"

"No one told me, isn't it obvious?"

Zhang Zhe pointed to himself and said, "Me, a machine gunner, heavy machine gunner, a professional heavy machine gunner. What's the one thing our shelter is short of? Machine gunners. Why do you think I ended up with you guys instead of being assigned to a military unit where I belonged? Because volunteers will eventually have to use machine guns, and I'll be one of those gunners."

That made sense to Gao Yuan, and he nodded in agreement, "Yeah, you're right; keep going, Captain."

Li Changfeng whispered, "Then why don't they just let us use them right away?"

"Just watch, within a month, heavy machine guns will absolutely be issued to us. Otherwise, we'll assist the regular army. Either way, we're definitely going to use heavy machine guns."

"Why not light machine guns?"

Zhang Zhe glanced at Gao Yuan and said, "Are you kidding? I'm a heavy machine gunner. Oh, if they issue light machine guns, wouldn't that be a waste?"

Taking a sip of the ginger sugar water as if enjoying a fine wine, Zhang Zhe said with pride, "Let me ask you, do you guys know how big our shelter is? How many survivors, how many regular troops? I'll tell you, our shelter has over two hundred thousand people, and the regular army? Barely five thousand!"

Zhang Zhe held up a palm, "Five thousand! How can they defend such a large shelter? Do you know how many machine gun positions there are around this shelter? Let me tell you, there are six hundred machine gun positions encircling the entire shelter, with no option for setting up key defensive directions. They have to be evenly distributed around the perimeter. Six hundred might sound like a lot, but once it's spread out, that's a severe shortage of manpower."

Li Xiaodong, looking puzzled, said, "That doesn't make sense. Three people to a machine gun position, right? So that still leaves over three thousand, doesn't it?"

"Are you fucking stupid? Don't you eat or sleep anymore? Just because you eat and sleep, do you think soldiers don't need to do the same? Don't those on the machine gun positions need to be rotated? If we switch shifts every twelve hours, how many people do we need?"

"Err, at least three thousand people."

"At least three thousand, and what about those maintaining order? What about the operators of tanks and armored vehicles? Don't we need some reserves? Is five thousand enough?"

"That means five thousand definitely isn't enough, far from it."

Zhang Zhe smiled proudly and said, "That's why I'm saying this gap must be filled, and who else to fill it but volunteers, which is us. So, don't rush, we'll definitely get machine guns. You won't be able to avoid using them even if you want to."

Zhang Zhe's logic was sound, very sound, but Gao Yuan just couldn't figure out where he got his data from.

"Captain, how do you know the number of machine gun positions?"

Zhang Zhe smiled, "I counted them myself. This isn't military secrets. Could I possibly go inform the aliens? Besides, you can look all you want as long as you don't interfere with the line of firing."

Tong Siming, puzzled, said from the side, "Captain, since we have tanks and armored vehicles, why don't we use them?"

Zhang Zhe sighed and explained, "It's really tiring to explain to you guys who are clueless about the military. Let me put it this way, every armored vehicle has something called motor-hours. What does that mean? It means that after running for a certain amount of time, it must be serviced. And what about fuel? So, obviously, we can't just move the tanks and armored vehicles willy-nilly."

"Even if we don't move them, we could set them up as artillery positions. Why leave them in the camp? Setting them outside works too."

Zhang Zhe gave a bitter smile, "We only have a few dozen vehicles. What's the point if you spread them out? A few armored vehicles in one direction, a couple of tanks in another? One shot and how many zombies can it kill? What's the use? The tanks and armored vehicles should be used in concentration. If a large number of zombies really do come, then drive out the few dozen tanks and armored vehicles in a line and just roll over them. That's the kind of firepower we're talking about."

"Oh, that makes sense."

Gao Yuan let out a long sigh. In fact, the questions Tong Siming asked were also his questions, and now they were finally answered.

But someone still raised a very foolish question. Ma Zihang asked quietly, "Wouldn't the tanks be invincible if driven into the city? Just roll over them!"

Zhang Zhe rolled his eyes and said, "Have you ever considered that tanks can't just roll over millions of zombies? A tank has just over a thousand horsepower. It can easily roll over a few dozen zombies, but what about a few thousand, or tens of thousands? Sending tanks into the city, should we deploy infantry to protect them? If we don't, and the tanks are surrounded by zombies, they won't even be able to see the terrain around them. What then? Collide with walls? And what if they run out of fuel, do we abandon the tanks? And the people inside?"

"Lure the zombies out and crush them... No, that won't work."

Ma Zihang admitted defeat, but Zhang Zhe picked up on his words, "Lure them out? Sure, lure out ten thousand zombies and deal with them easily, then another ten thousand, right? But what if you lure out too many? What if it's a hundred thousand? Half a million?"

"I said it won't work…"

Ignoring Ma Zihang, Zhang Zhe continued, "If we really lure a massive number of zombies out of the city, do we still want the troops we sent out there? If those troops feel they can't win, do they dare to retreat back to the shelter? If they bring several hundred thousand zombies here, do any of us in this shelter of twenty-plus people still want to live?"

Gao Yuan had originally thought it was simple, but after hearing Zhang Zhe's explanation, he felt that with the current strength and equipment, it was impossible to deal with the millions of zombies in the urban area.

The concept of 'do not use a hatchet to remove a fly from a friend's forehead' was exactly the situation. The biggest problem was that they did not dare to act rashly. They were already grateful that the zombies had not massively attacked the shelter. To actively provoke the zombies would be a death wish.

Feeling hopeless from what Zhang Zhe had said, Li Xiaodong asked blankly, "So, what do we do? Are we out of options?"

Zhang Zhe picked up his ginger sugar water, took a sip, and slowly said, "Of course not. Zombies, after all, are brainless. Being brainless means they're easier to deal with. There may not be a way now, but there will definitely be one in the future. Right now, I can guarantee that many smart people are thinking of solutions. So why panic? Take it slow, we can't rush this."