Ye Lei's face started turning purple from the beatings, but he still had an unyielding look on his face, and he whimpered, "You made me lose face, and now you want me to apologize to a little whore? Does she deserve it?"
Zhao Xiweng probably understood what was going on. She had worked with Ye Lei for over a decade and knew his temper inside out—arrogant, disrespectful of hierarchy, and looked down on women who relied on men to survive, which was what led to this disaster.
Subconsciously, she automatically categorized Su Mo as that kind of person.
"Whore?" Su Mo laughed, holding the knife and approaching him with ice-cold eyes. "Didn't your mother tell you to respect women?"
Ye Lei knelt on the ground, defiantly shouting, refusing to accept defeat, "Isn't she just a little whore kept by the Admiral? What respect are you talking about?"
Even a clay figure has some anger, and after being insulted repeatedly, Su Mo was thoroughly enraged. She lifted the Tang Blade high and stabbed it into Ye Lei's calf as he knelt on the ground.
Her hand holding the blade twisted, gouging out a large piece of flesh and blood. "The Jiang Residence has produced such trash, truly a family misfortune."
Piercing wails emanated from Ye Lei's mouth as he was thrown onto the ground like garbage by Jianxiong, who then spat disdainfully on his face, "I hate bastards like you the most."
"I'm just following military orders to see you off," Lu Chen said, crouching down with a chilling gaze at Ye Lei, "The stuff from the negative second floor, I'm giving it back to you."
"Negative second floor?" Ye Lei shuddered, then began to frantically struggle, pulling his upper body toward the outside in an attempt to crawl away, finally showing fear. "No, I don't want to go there, I am a superpower user, you can't kill me!"
"Xiwen, Xiwen save me!"
Jianxiong dragged him by the leg, unfazed, and walked toward the residence. Zhao Xiweng sat on the ground with a pale face, her mouth moved, but ultimately, she did not speak.
Someone always has to pay for their crimes.
Ye Lei was thrown by Jianxiong into the elevator shaft, clutching Jianxiong's leg and wailing, "It would be better to kill me than to feed me to the zombies."
"Did you think of this when you were deceiving me?" Jianxiong kicked him off and pressed the button for the negative first floor. As the door was about to close, he swiftly stepped out.
The elevator, carrying Ye Lei's desperate howls, slowly descended.
The villain dealt with, Su Mo felt refreshed. She pulled up the panel; she was five zombies away from her goal.
Looking around at the scattered zombies nearby, she picked up the blade and killed several that were close to them. It was only after filling the progress bar that she stopped.
She needed to find a suitable opportunity to see what new functions came with the upgrade.
Zhao Xiweng collapsed beside the vehicle, struggling to get up.
Seeing this, Su Mo approached to help her up, smiling as she asked, "Do you have somewhere to go?"
"Ah," Zhao Xiweng looked panicked and glanced unconsciously towards Lu Chen, speaking urgently, "No, I have nowhere to go, please take me with you."
Turning to Lu Chen for approval, Su Mo suggested, "Let's take her with us."
"Hmm."
"Hey, at least we won't be short of water now. You sit here for a bit," Su Mo said cheerfully as she helped Zhao Xiweng back into the car, her internal calculations clicking satisfyingly.
Although this woman had a thing for her direct superior, Su Mo felt that, for the sake of living quality, she could endure it; after all, it was really uncomfortable always bathing with large chunks of ice.
Jianxiong returned after discarding the person and checked the car's engine, which was already starting to emit white smoke. The engine was broken.
He also tried adjusting the radio station, but apart from the buzz of static, none was broadcasting normally.
"Damn," he swore, kicking the car tire with frustration. "The car is broken, and the radio has no signal."
"Wait here," Lu Chen said after a moment's thought, then turned and walked back into the residence.
"I'll go too," Su Mo followed eagerly.
The two reentered the residence, and after a glance at the elevator entrance, she followed Lu Chen upstairs.
She trailed behind him into the room at the very end of the hallway, where a man's name hung on the door. He expertly entered a string of numbers and went inside.
"What are you doing here?" Su Mo looked around curiously and asked.
The room was empty except for a simple desk and a sofa.
Lu Chen gave her a glance and walked to a wall, saying coldly, "Activate iris scanning."
A red beam emanated from within the wall, scanning his eyes up and down. Eventually, it turned into a green light and disappeared.
The wall split into two halves to reveal a small space within, much to Su Mo's astonishment, "Is everything so high-tech now?"
She had never seen a real iris scanning secret room before.
Inside was a small compartment, its four walls covered with weapons and various props, ranging from daggers to hand grenades.
Su Mo felt her jaw might just drop as Lu Chen's image grew even larger in her mind.
This man is incredible!
"Lu Chen, is this even legal?"
Her naïve question earned her a disdainful look from the man, who took a small revolver off the wall and tossed it to her, "I modified this myself, added a silencer."
Catching the gun, Su Mo felt as if she had a hot potato in her hands; she had never used a pistol before and decided to stash it in her backpack after some thought.
"If we had had this equipment earlier, it would have been great," she couldn't help fantasizing about picking up the gun and firing it rapidly.
The man flicked her forehead with his finger, "Can you predict the future?"
"Heh, that's true," Su Mo said with a smile, curling her eyes. She just felt it was a pity, those were experience points, after all.
Of course, if Ye Lei had been a bit smarter back then, they wouldn't have narrowly escaped death either.
Lu Chen kept storing various firearms and ammunition into his Space. Finally, he took a bunch of keys off the wall and headed outside, "Let's go."
"Where to?"
"To pick up a vehicle."
"Oh!"
Once outside, Lu Chen made his way to the back of the Jiang Residence, where there were parking spaces separated by rolling shutter doors. Most of the doors were rolled up high, revealing the empty insides.
He used the keys to open one of the electronic doors.
A brand-new military vehicle appeared before them.
Su Mo touched the vehicle and exclaimed internally, if this were before the apocalypse, Lu Chen would be a true military scion and a wealthy tycoon.
One vehicle goes down, and another one comes right up.
The two parked the new vehicle in front of the damaged car. Lu Chen pulled out the keys, stepped down, and tossed them to Jianxiong, "You drive."
"Alright!" Jianxiong laughed merrily as he climbed in. It wasn't every day he got to handle an Admiral's vehicle; he had to get a feel for it.
Su Mo obediently climbed down from the vehicle to help Xiwen into the back seat.
Once everyone was seated, Jianxiong drove off slowly. Leaving the military district's jurisdiction, he gripped the steering wheel, not sure where to head and asked, "Admiral Lu, where to now?"
"To the supermarket first."
The supplies in Lu Chen's Space, enough for him and Su Mo, would last a while. But with two more people suddenly joining them, he needed to stock up.
"Got it."
Su Mo and Xiwen sat in the back seat. Su Mo relaxed and brought up the panel; an icon of a large treasure chest appeared at the end of the progress bar.
While the woman beside her was looking out the window, she tapped the virtual space to open the chest, and a message immediately popped up before her eyes.