“Captain, do you think the gun in that woman’s hand might be fake?” the lackey beside Zhao Zhu asked in a low voice.
Zhao Zhu shot the lackey a look. He also suspected that the gun in Jun Shutong’s hand was fake, but the problem was that he didn’t dare gamble on it.
Zhao Zhu egged him on. “Then why don’t you pretend to resist in a bit?”
Hearing that, the lackey instantly shut his mouth.
Like Zhao Zhu, he was also afraid that the gun in Jun Shutong’s hand was real.
“So we’re just giving up without resisting? It’s not easy to run into a woman this good-looking, especially now that it’s the apocalypse,” another lackey muttered unwillingly.
Seeing his two subordinates getting more carried away than the other, Zhao Zhu was somewhat at a loss for words.
If there were anyone else in the camp willing to follow him, he would have kicked these two idiots out without hesitation.
He might grumble under his breath, but Zhao Zhu still valued his life.
The four hurriedly dropped the watermelon knife and clubs in their hands, then obediently got down against the wall and slowly crawled toward Jun Shutong. They barely dared to breathe, afraid that even moving a little too quickly might cause her to pull the trigger.
Just then, Huang Jiafei hurried over with several burly men.
Seeing that Jun Shutong had already subdued the four thugs, Huang Jiafei finally borrowed her authority to bark an order, “Tie these four guys up first.”
With Jun Shutong’s gun pointed at them the entire time, Zhao Zhu and the others didn’t dare resist.
After being successfully subdued, Zhao Zhu and the others were brought before Jun Shutong.
“Put these four in the emergency passage for now. Once we’ve finished moving the supplies, I’ll interrogate them personally.” Jun Shutong was also worried about mistakenly harming innocent people, so her tone wasn’t especially harsh.
…
After everyone had carried the water back, Jun Shutong finally remembered Zhao Zhu and the others in the emergency passage.
She brought them back to the camp and deliberately cleared out a shop to serve as a temporary interrogation room. Then Jun Shutong sat behind a desk, expressionlessly looking at Zhao Zhu, who had been tied to a chair.
“Tell me. Why did you come to the mall, and what’s the situation at your camp?” Jun Shutong asked.
“Also, I’ll interrogate all four of you separately. If your answers don’t match, I’ll throw the liar outside to feed the demon beasts,” Jun Shutong added.
As a police officer, Jun Shutong naturally knew some interrogation techniques.
After hearing this, Zhao Zhu began struggling internally.
He knew exactly what conditions were like in his camp, and he also knew what he, as one of the camp’s minor leaders, had done there.
Zhao Zhu didn’t dare lie either, because he knew exactly how little loyalty his lackeys had.
Given the character of those three, all the other side had to do was threaten them a little and they would definitely spill everything about the camp and all the bad things he had done.
So Zhao Zhu simply admitted it frankly. “Our boss is the leader of the survivor camp in Building B of the Anke Residential Complex. I’m sort of a minor leader in the camp.”
“How many people are in your camp now? What are the conditions and mood like?” Jun Shutong continued asking.
“The conditions are terrible. Supplies are extremely scarce. It’s practically hell on earth,” Zhao Zhu said rather conservatively.
In truth, he had left out a great deal. For example, the camp’s food supplies were already nearly exhausted. If they still couldn’t find new food to bring back, their boss might even start eating people.
And when they had left that morning, they had already discovered that someone had starved to death.
Naturally, he would hide things like that if he could. After all, Jun Shutong hadn’t asked about them directly.
“Conditions in your camp are that harsh?” Jun Shutong asked thoughtfully.
“Extremely harsh.” Zhao Zhu nodded emphatically.
Building A of the Anke Residential Complex had originally had a high occupancy rate. When the apocalypse first began, some people had tried to band together for mutual support, but most had still only cared about the safety of their own families and kept to themselves.
Later, when food began running short, Wang Dazhuang started leading people from door to door to rob others. Those who dared resist usually met terrible ends.
However, there were also some people who stubbornly barricaded themselves inside their homes and refused to surrender no matter what. Wang Dazhuang’s group had considered breaking down their doors, but doing so made too much noise and could easily attract demon beasts.
After suffering losses once or twice, they no longer dared break doors down recklessly.
That was why those who still had food at home were now basically holed up inside, too afraid to go out. As for those without food, after joining the camp, anyone capable of working could barely stay alive, while those deemed useless could only starve to death.
People had tried coming to the mall before to search for food, but most of them had never returned. This time, if Wang Dazhuang hadn’t forced him into a corner, Zhao Zhu would never have brought his lackeys here to look for food.
He had even already made plans in his head: once he found food, he would first fill his own stomach. If there was plenty, he would secretly stash some away; if there wasn’t much, then he would bring it back to the camp.
But he never imagined that the moment he arrived at the mall, he would run into a beautiful woman like Jun Shutong. What he had thought was an unexpected windfall turned out to be unexpected retribution.
Jun Shutong had already confirmed that the young man named Zhao Zhu in front of her was no decent person, so she began questioning him in detail about the situation at the Anke camp.
After finishing Zhao Zhu’s interrogation, Jun Shutong questioned his three lackeys as well.
Once she confirmed that Zhao Zhu and the others hadn’t lied, Jun Shutong returned to the office with a complicated expression.
Jun Shutong picked up the walkie-talkie on the desk and spoke into it. “Lu Li, come to my office. There’s something I want to ask you.”
Lu Li, who had been pondering how to get that seed to sprout, immediately put aside what he was doing after hearing Jun Shutong call for him and went to her office.
The moment he pushed open the office door, Lu Li saw Jun Shutong’s gloomy expression.
After sitting down in front of the desk, Lu Li finally asked, “What is it? Did the camp run into another problem?”
“It’s not about the camp.” Jun Shutong shook her head.
“We just caught a few survivors from another camp,” Jun Shutong said.
The instant Lu Li heard Jun Shutong use the word “caught,” he roughly guessed what had happened.
He had seen with his own eyes just how well Jun Shutong treated ordinary survivors. If she had forcibly detained someone, that alone was enough to show what sort of trash those guys were.
“And then?” Lu Li asked.
Jun Shutong continued, “These people aren’t good people. I learned about the situation at another camp from them.”
Hearing that, Lu Li felt a bad premonition flash through his mind.
He could already vaguely sense that Jun Shutong might have learned about the situation over at Anke.
Jun Shutong said, “That camp is in terrible shape. It’s being controlled by a group of villains.”
That confirmed it beyond doubt. The camp Jun Shutong was talking about was exactly the one An Kang had mentioned.
Lu Li sighed inwardly.
“So what are you thinking?” Lu Li asked tentatively.
“I’m wondering whether I should go over there and deal with those people who are doing evil,” Jun Shutong said, overflowing with conviction.
Good news: Jun Shutong wasn’t some saint who refused to kill people.
Bad news: This woman wanted to go be a saint.
Lu Li looked at Jun Shutong helplessly, his mind racing as he thought about how to persuade her to give up on the idea.
“First of all… setting aside whether it would even be safe for you to go over there, let’s just say you go there and kill them. Then what?”
“Can you guarantee the people who take over afterward will be good people? And if there are a lot of people over there, what’s the difference between leading that many people across the street and sending them to their deaths?”
“So my advice is this: just pretend you don’t know about it. Right now, your main responsibility is still protecting the people in this camp.” Lu Li didn’t forget to use her sense of responsibility to pressure her.
Jun Shutong pursed her lips and said with a wronged expression, “But I already know about it. How am I supposed to pretend I don’t?”
“You only have a few bullets in your pistol. What will you do when you run out? And are you sure they won’t resist? If more than five people end up dying, how are you going to deal with that?”
“I can bring people with me,” Jun Shutong weakly argued.
Lu Li said, “Under the open sky, the more people gather together, the easier it is for flying demon beasts to notice them.”
“I… I…”
Jun Shutong couldn’t find any reason to argue back.
Seeing that she had nothing left to say, Lu Li hurriedly pressed his advantage. “As things stand now, the good people over there might already be dead. If you go, you could end up rescuing a bunch of villains.”
“And besides, you can just let those villains fend for themselves. They’re already out of food, so they’ll definitely come to the mall sooner or later. When that happens, you can just take people and wait for them here.”
In the end, Jun Shutong gave up on the idea of going to the Anke camp to uphold justice. Seeing this, Lu Li finally let out a breath of relief.
He was genuinely afraid that this woman with her overwhelming sense of justice would get carried away and run off to fight the people at the Anke camp to the death without caring about the consequences.
“By the way, those four thugs you caught don’t seem like good people either, right?” Lu Li suddenly asked.
Jun Shutong nodded.
“I have a suggestion,” Lu Li said.
“Go ahead.” Jun Shutong looked at Lu Li.
Lu Li asked, “First tell me how you were planning to deal with those thugs.”
Jun Shutong said, “Lock them up for two days and teach them a lesson. If they behave themselves, let them join Dawn Camp.”
Lu Li: “…”
As expected of you, Jun Shutong!
Lu Li was speechless inside. Among those thugs, Zhao Zhu had already killed someone. What was the point of keeping someone like that around?
And the few little thugs who had helped the tyrant commit evil weren’t good people either. Although they hadn’t killed anyone, they had at least taken turns assaulting women.
“If you let them join the camp, that wouldn’t be fair to the other people who have contributed to the camp.” Lu Li said, looking at Jun Shutong with utmost seriousness.
He had to persuade Jun Shutong to abandon such an idea. A person could be kind, even saintly, but absolutely couldn’t be kind without any bottom line.
Jun Shutong had always been willing to humbly accept advice. She also understood her own temperament, so she was always happy to listen to the opinions of her subordinates.
“Then what do you plan to do?” Jun Shutong asked.
“Keep them locked up on ordinary days and provide them three meals a day. Then split the four of them into two groups and have them take turns being sacrificed to that ghost demon beast.”
“As for how long… that can depend on how serious their crimes are. For the more serious ones, make it a year. If they’re still alive after a year, then that can count as atonement.”
Jun Shutong: “…”
As expected of you, Lu Li!
Lu Li’s proposal and way of thinking fit far too perfectly with her stereotypical impression of Lu Li as a “demon beast scholar.”
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