Chapter 469: Battle of Zhaoqing (1)
"It\'s May 1st, so almost a month... You miss home already or something?" The other soldier asked as he looked out the window.
"Hell no. The last thing I want is to go back home and deal with my dumb wife."
"If your wife is dumb, I don\'t mind taking it."
A much older voice appeared as several soldiers entered the living room from the hallway.
"You wish. Anyway, the floor cleared?"
"Yep. Every room was checked. There are no zombies at all. The inside looked completely abandoned a long time ago."
As soon as the senior soldier stated it, the first soldier quickly stood up before the other one came back from the window.
"Time to leave."
---
As the squad soldiers exited the condo building, they put red tape over the entrance before closing the broken door.
With one building finished clearing, there were still hundreds of thousands of various buildings in the city.
But they weren\'t alone. The entire army had split up into squads and checked each assigned condo one by one.
Walking down the street, they could hear constant scouting planes flying overhead.
Suddenly, the older-looking soldier\'s walkie-talkie turned on.
"Squad 1170, please take shelter nearby. There are around a thousand zombies in your next building."
Within seconds, they immediately ran towards a grocery store with red tape at the entrance.
In the distance, they could see other squads dispersing into nearby buildings, seeming to be waiting for something.
After a few minutes, a loud, mixed, growling sound could be heard traveling down the street.
One of the soldiers took a little peek, only to see the entire street filled with zombies running down the road.
The soldier immediately ducked back down, remaining still with the other soldiers as they waited for the horde to pass by.
Just as the growling sound had passed away, a loud explosion replaced it in the distance, followed by a gunshot and window shattering.
Despite all the noise, the ten soldiers remained in place, waiting for the signal from the walkie-talkie.
"All cleared. You may resume your mission."
As the soldiers stood back up and walked out onto the streets, they could see piles of bodies down the road.
Hundreds of soldiers were all carrying some sort of broken pieces of furniture, getting ready to burn all the bodies.
"Let\'s go. We still have our job to do."
---
After walking for a bit, they finally stopped at a condo apartment that was free of red tape.
"Corporal, how many more buildings do we have to clear today?" The senior-looking soldier asked.
"Two more, and we can return to camp for the day." The young soldier replied as they entered the building.
As soon as they entered the entrance, the soldiers immediately separated into pairs next to each of the doors.
All of the pairs began to have one of them take out a fire ax from their backpack while the other held their rifle.
With each of the pair in position, they all looked towards the corporal for the signal.
"Go!"
A loud bang could immediately be heard throughout the entire hallway, with the lock bashed open.
The soldier on the back with the rifle immediately kicked the unlocked door, and the other soldier took out their pistol.
"Anyone there?"
Hearing a low growling sound from the darkness inside, the two soldiers quickly turned on their helmet flashlights.
As the pair began walking in with their back facing each other, they could hear the growling sound getting louder and louder inside.
"We\'re the military. Please say one, two, three if you\'re human."
Hearing an even louder growling sound coming from one of the hallway rooms, the two soldiers started clearing the other room first instead.
"Kitchen cleared."
"Bathroom cleared."
After clearing all the rooms one by one, there was now only a single room that hadn\'t been cleared.
"It\'s not locked." The first soldier stated as he could turn the doorknob back and forth.
"Even better. Help me open the door and run back. I can handle this myself."
As the second soldier aimed his pistol, the first soldier started slowly turning the doorknob fully.
The moment a small gap was pushed, the first soldier immediately let it go before the second soldier kicked it open.
Just as they expected, a single zombie was standing behind the door, being pushed to the ground by the door.
Not hesitating a single bit, the second soldier immediately opened fire, killing the zombie right in the head.
"Man, if only every condo house were like this, " the second soldier murmured as he quickly grabbed a few pieces of cloth nearby.
"You wished. We got lucky there\'s only one."
As the two covered their hand with the bedsheet cloth, they began wrapping the zombie corpse before dragging it out.
The moment they stepped outside of the condo, the other pairs had already finished clearing their rooms.
"You guys got six zombies?" the first soldier asked curiously as he stacked the zombie bodies on top of the others.
"I got two. Squad B and C also got two. What\'s taking the other E so long?"
Just as the corporal finished talking, another pair of soldiers finally emerged from their room with five different corpses wrapped in cloth.
"God damn, did the whole family inside or something?" The third soldier curiously asked.
"Yep." The fifth and the sixth soldier said at the same time.
"Rough... Anyway, it\'s time to clear the other rooms. We don\'t have all days."
As the ten soldiers split up into pairs again, they went to their separate condo rooms in the twisting and turning hallway.
"Ready?"
With the same method as earlier, the first and second soldiers entered the condo room and started clearing each of the individual rooms.
After clearing the entire thing, there was no single person or living thing inside.
"That\'s the entire first floor cleared. Let\'s go to the second floor."
As a few of the pairs were still clearing the first-floor room, the two soldiers started walking up the stairs.
They quickly picked one of the rooms and busted it open, using the same method repeatedly to clear the rooms.
Even though it was the same process, neither of them were willing to let their guard down.
It was almost as if they had heard examples of what happened when a few soldiers had taken their jobs too carelessly.
"Bedroom cleared."
"All cleared again... We are getting really lucky today. No zombies twice in a row."
"Don\'t jinx it."
As the two began heading back into the condo\'s 2nd-floor hallway, several other soldiers had already started clearing the other condo rooms.
"Let\'s go clear the last one."
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After clearing from the sun being in the middle of the sky to the evening, they had finished clearing the entire condo building.
There were just shy of a hundred zombie bodies lying right at the condo entrance, with all kinds of clothes wrapped around them.
With a simple flick of a match, the entire pile caught onto flames as they began heading away from the building.
"Do you guys have any more ammo left?" the sixth soldier asked as he revealed an empty magazine in his pistol.
"Let\'s just go back to the camp to catch a little break. We still need to clear one more building before we can end the day."
All nine soldiers in the squad were overjoyed by the corporal\'s answer as they let out a sigh of relief.
"Finally, there\'s a break. I\'m starving already."
The second soldier murmured as they began walking towards where they came from at the first building.
"We just ate a few hours ago. All you think is eating, aren\'t you?" The seventh soldier joked.
"Of course that\'s what I\'m thinking about all day. Or else why would I join the military?"
"We aren\'t eating in our break. That\'s for after we finished the mission."
The energy on the second soldier immediately disappeared, his eyes losing focus as if he had lost purpose in life.
"We\'re going to eat dinner at like eight by then." The second soldier complained.
"You want to get sent to stand guard instead?"
The second soldier fell into silence, not speaking a single word as they continued down the road.
"Yu, you want a peanut bar?" The first soldier suddenly offered as he held something from his backpack.
"Hell yes! I knew I could rely on you——Bruh, really? You know I can\'t eat chocolate."
"Hehe, too bad."
As the first soldier started eating the chocolate-flavored peanut bar, the other eight couldn\'t help but laugh out loud.
"You can trade some of your salary into snacks if you really want——"
"Hell no. I\'m saving my money for my future wife."
"Who\'s still asking for Bride price in an apocalypse? Tell me, and I\'ll go teach them some reality check."
The corporal\'s offer was rejected as the second soldier shook his head in disagreement.