Chapter 113: See Who Runs Faster

The wild chickens on this unnamed hill had truly drawn the short straw in life.

As they tried to fly away, a stone silently and stealthily sailed through the air toward them, and as they attempted to run, a person would take a few large strides and quickly catch up.

All impossibilities became reality in Gao Yuan's hands, and in less than an hour, he was surrounded by a pile of wild chickens.

He had wiped out an entire hill's worth of wild chicken families, not too many, just about forty, and he also managed to snag five hares along the way.

There were four newly-dug exhaust stoves burning, with Panxin, Li Jingang, Yu Shunzhou, and Jia Weidong cooking for Gao Yuan, yet they couldn't keep up with the speed at which he was eating.

Their idea of cooking was just to get the wild chicken cooked. As for the method, Panxin and Li Jingang, being former chefs with special forces wilderness survival training, cooked the way they were trained to eat in the wild.

Eating raw food was not necessary, and Gao Yuan remained firm in his resolve not to do so. Despite the fact that the cooked wild chicken was horrendously difficult to swallow, he still refused to eat it raw.

Although he couldn't help but continuously eye the pile of plucked chickens.

Gao Yuan himself was worried, this mutation had turned him into a super glutton, and in these apocalyptic times, just eating was a big problem.

The four dogs that followed Gao Yuan were in luck, for the innards he didn't eat were all theirs.

"Did you understand?"

"Mhm, got it."

"Truly got it? Repeat it to me."

"First, use the compass to find the direction, then place the compass on the map like this, and set up the map using the method: north on top, south on bottom, west on the left, and east on the right, and then... uh, that should do it."

"How do you read contour lines?"

"Um..."

Xiang Weiguo sighed and said, "Alright then, being able to find your way is good enough for now. You won't need to worry about contour lines for the moment anyway. Even if there's a cliff or a deep trench, I reckon nothing could stop you."

Modern people have all been spoiled by GPS navigation, with fewer and fewer knowing how to read maps. Gao Yuan, who often traveled outdoors, at least knew how to read tourist maps, but military maps were a whole other story for him.

Military maps are much more detailed, showing every landform, depicting the height of mountains and the depth of rivers—things you'd definitely see on a military map.

But the problem was that Gao Yuan couldn't understand them.

"Can you distinguish between east, south, west, and north?"

Xiang Weiguo asked very seriously, and Gao Yuan paused before replying, "Of course, I can. Isn't that obvious?"

"Show me."

"East, south, west, north."

Watching Gao Yuan point in each direction, Xiang Weiguo said with satisfaction, "Not bad, you've got it clear. Among the new recruits I've trained, at least one-third can't distinguish the cardinal directions, they only know front, back, left, and right. It's quite an effort to instill a sense of direction in them."

From a distance, Panxin remarked, "You're telling me! Especially those from the south, most of them have no sense of direction. And with female soldiers, it's even harder."

Xiang Weiguo folded up the map and placed it, along with the compass, in front of Gao Yuan, saying, "Once you've eaten, set off. I'll remind you one more time, if it's too much, come back, but do not lead any zombies here. No matter what difficulties you encounter, remember, even if you die out there, you can't bring the zombies back to us!"

Gao Yuan nodded and said in a low voice, "I know what's important, don't worry."

Xiang Weiguo let out a breath and said, "Be careful out there."

Gao Yuan had already eaten twenty wild chickens. Since these birds weren't very large, averaging about a pound and a half of meat each, he had consumed about thirty pounds of meat in total.

Yet Gao Yuan still felt hungry.

After finishing off a chicken, Gao Yuan stood up and said, "You guys keep roasting; I'll step away for a bit."

Li Jingang, full of anticipation, asked, "Are you full?"

"It was just a big one..."

Gao Yuan was embarrassed, having gone to take a big one halfway through his meal, and then coming back to continue eating. The feeling was not good.

It could only be said that Gao Yuan's digestive system was far too strong now.

After returning from the bathroom and continuing to eat ten wild chickens and five hares to round out the meal, Gao Yuan finally said, "Okay, that's enough, I won't eat anymore, the rest is for you guys..."

Xiang Weiguo said in surprise, "You're full?"

"Just not that hungry anymore..."

Being full and not being hungry were two different concepts, but Gao Yuan had to leave some food for the others.

Gao Yuan stood up, patted the dirt off his butt, then looked at his shoes and said, "My shoes are ruined. Who wears size 43?"

Li Jingang said, embarrassed, "I wear size 45."

"Me, I'm a size 43, but my feet really stink..."

Panxin said embarrassingly and then began to take off his shoes.

It was a move that would bring quite the smell. As soon as Panxin's shoes came off, everyone unspokenly took a step back.

Especially Gao Yuan, who felt his sense of smell had become even more sensitive than before.

Holding his breath, he took Panxin's pair of shoes, and still holding his breath, he put them on; Gao Yuan stood up and walked a few steps on the ground.

Not bad, Panxin wore special forces rubber shoes instead of the usual combat boots. The downside of these shoes was that they maximized the strength of foot odor, but the upside was they were excellent for running.

After walking a few steps, Gao Yuan realized he hadn't felt any urge to breathe at all, despite not breathing from the moment he picked up the shoes to putting them on, a full two minutes. Before, he couldn't even hold his breath for one minute.

The improvement in his bodily functions was truly comprehensive.

Gao Yuan bounced around on the ground a few times, then picked up a stick and said to Xiang Weiguo, "I'm setting off."

Xiang Weiguo nodded, and Luo Xingyu silently watched Gao Yuan with worry, but she didn't say anything special.

This time it was Gao Yuan who took the initiative to embrace Luo Xingyu and said softly, "Don't worry, nothing will happen to me."

After speaking, Gao Yuan waved to the others and then started jogging away.

It wasn't a life-or-death farewell; there was no need for so many words.

Standing on the hill looking down, one could see the zombies from afar.

Zombies must have a set of recognition mechanisms, because they wouldn't fight each other when together, but as soon as a normal person passed by, the zombies would definitely swarm and attack.

What controlled zombie behavior remained a mystery, but Gao Yuan was eager to find out whether, after his mutation, the zombies would consider him one of their own and treat him differently.

Zombies that hadn't spotted prey would stand still or even lie on the ground motionless, but upon sighting Gao Yuan, those standing turned towards him, and those lying on the ground quickly stood up.

At a distance of about three hundred meters, the zombies had already noticed Gao Yuan, but they didn't charge at him directly.

Gao Yuan felt a glimmer of hope. Perhaps the zombies really wouldn't attack him?

Just as Gao Yuan thought he might have a chance, the nearest zombie suddenly sprang into action, running at him like mad, and as that one moved, a dozen nearby zombies also began to stir.

"About two hundred meters..."

Hope vanished. Watching the zombies approaching quickly, Gao Yuan increased his pace, and as the first zombie lunged at him, Gao Yuan suddenly sped up, dodging the zombie and beginning to sprint forward.

Dodging left and right, Gao Yuan was like a rugby player, avoiding one zombie after another while turning back to shout at the group, "Come on, bring it! Let's see who can run faster!"