When Jiang Xueling heard that Feng Jun was inviting her to dinner, she naturally went to Feng Jun's residence immediately.
Feng Jun naturally couldn't entertain a beautiful woman with canned food, so he personally cooked three dishes: scrambled eggs with tomatoes, Mapo tofu, and braised eggplant.
He also prepared two glasses of red wine.
When she arrived, Feng Jun had just finished cooking these three dishes, and as soon as she opened the door, the aroma of the food made her stomach rumble.
"Don't just stand there, come sit down and eat," Feng Jun greeted them, gesturing for them to sit.
The delicious food immediately conquered Jiang Xueling's taste buds; it was the best meal she had eaten in the Doomsday.
"Where did you get all this food? And the red wine?" Jiang Xueling asked, taking a sip of the red wine in her glass.
The land in the wasteland has been severely polluted, and food grown in toxic radiation is no longer suitable for consumption.
It is said that in the distant northwest region, there are still a few pure lands that can produce low-pollution food, but this is limited to grains.
It would be even more difficult for vegetable crops, let alone the scrambled eggs with tomatoes in the three dishes just now.
Unless it's in a Refuge deep underground, where there are underground farms completely isolated from the outside world that can grow pre-war crops, but this requires a great deal of energy.
"That's a secret, of course, but as long as we do more trades in the future, you can always come here for a meal."
"Alright, for future trades with the Blackwater Merchant Guild, I will be your contact.
You can tell me about any materials you need to trade for." Jiang Xueling didn't press further; some things are better left unasked.
"If possible, in future trades, besides helium crystals, I hope to acquire some scientific research talents or high-level technicians," Feng Jun took the opportunity to tell Jiang Xueling.
Jiang Xueling was very confused as to why Feng Jun would be interested in this type of person, but Feng Jun vaguely answered her.
In the base behind him, there were many advanced devices, but due to the war, the people responsible for maintaining these devices were lost.
If Feng Jun could acquire a large number of such talents, it would help his base produce more food.
In the following days, Feng Jun occasionally inspected Iron Nail Town, and then he would travel back and forth between the present world and the Doomsday to transport supplies.
Since he had already taken control of Iron Nail Town, Feng Jun specifically found two warehouses to store the various materials he transported.
After staying in Iron Nail Town for two days, Jiang Xueling returned to Huaicheng District with the agreed-upon supplies.
When she left, she also took all the armed personnel of the merchant guild in Iron Nail Town.
Before leaving, Jiang Xueling urged Feng Jun to strengthen the defenses of Iron Nail Town as soon as possible.
Although Iron Nail Town is farther from the ruins than Huai City, it is still easily attacked by zombies and Mutants.
It is now November.
Winter in the wasteland comes earlier, and large Mutated Creatures have a habit of hibernating, but zombies will not stop moving.
There are several large Blood Nests in the Shangqing City Wasteland, from which an endless stream of zombie Mutants will emerge.
Before winter fully sets in, the settlements around Shangqing City will be attacked by a Zombie Tide.
After Jiang Xueling and her group left, Feng Jun gathered the Song Peng and Song Zhan brothers to discuss the next steps and asked how Iron Nail Town survived the last Zombie Tide.
"The last Zombie Tide occurred in July of this year.
At that time, there happened to be a passing mercenary group's heavily armored soldiers in the town.
Although we paid some price, we still held on.
At that time, Chen Jianbin, that coward, hid behind with his personal guards, forcing the slaves and town militia to stand at the front.
Even so, we were almost breached by the zombies several times.
With our current strength, it is best to choose to reinforce the town's defenses.
It's best to do it before the Zombie Tide arrives," Song Peng analyzed the current situation.
Thinking about the town walls of Iron Nail Town, made from scrapped cars and sheet metal, Feng Jun also felt that it was impossible to defend against a Zombie Tide with that thing, especially after witnessing the terrifying strength of the Roadblock, who could withstand hot weapons with his bare flesh.
"Since that's the case, we'll allocate manpower to build defenses, and our town walls also need to be rebuilt.
It's best if they can be rebuilt to look like the ones in Huai City." Ever since he visited Huai City, Feng Jun had looked down on Iron Nail Town's walls.
"The materials for building the city walls are not difficult to find.
If conditions permit, an experienced worker wearing a Power Armor, combined with machinery, can complete it in a month.
As for cement, it can be purchased from Huai City, which shouldn't be difficult given the boss's connections.
The most difficult part is the personnel for building the city walls," Song Peng also agreed to build the city walls, but currently, there was not enough manpower.
Song Peng had originally recruited a dozen people, and with the five hundred people brought back from Huai City this time, it was still less than a thousand.
Moreover, they had just occupied Iron Nail Town and captured a group of Chen Jianbin's former subordinates.
These people also needed manpower to guard them.
Among the five hundred people Feng Jun brought, only over two hundred were professional soldiers with combat experience; the rest still needed training.
Furthermore, manpower also needed to be allocated to maintain order within Iron Nail Town, so it could be said that Feng Jun was currently in urgent need of manpower.
"Recruit those captives as soon as possible.
If not, just put slave collars on them directly.
Then, recruit manpower within the town.
If they are willing to participate in the construction of the city walls, they will get three meals a day." Feng Jun made his decision after much deliberation.
"In addition, if possible, recruit soldiers from among the residents of Iron Nail Town as much as possible; I will solve the food problem."
"Okay, boss, I'll arrange it right away." Song Peng and Song Zhan stood up, ready to carry out the tasks Feng Jun assigned.
In a prison cell in Iron Nail Town, a group of Chen Jianbin's former subordinates were held.
Chen Jianbin originally had over four hundred subordinates; excluding those who were killed and those who saw the situation was bad and fled in the chaos, the remaining more than two hundred people were all captured.
Now, this group of people is all confined in a separately isolated area.
Zhang Heng was one of them.
As someone who had been with Chen Jianbin since before he became the town mayor, Zhang Heng's status in Iron Nail Town was naturally not low.
Although Zhang Heng despised Chen Jianbin's style, in the wasteland, it was pretty good to follow someone who could give you a meal.
The day Feng Jun brought people to attack, Zhang Heng was on a routine patrol in the town.
When he heard that someone had broken in, Zhang Heng's first reaction was to lead his brothers to guard the town gate, but before he could reach the town gate, he saw a team of soldiers in Power Armor surging in menacingly from the town gate, followed by a group of elite soldiers in mechanical exoskeletons.
Looking at the broken gun he held in his hand, which was almost falling apart, with the stock welded on by Zhang Heng himself.
Zhang Heng made a wise choice in an instant: he turned and ran.
Realizing that he couldn't possibly defeat the other side, Zhang Heng had no intention of leading his subordinates to meet up with Chen Jianbin.
What a joke, the other side had the terrifying force of Power Armor.
As for surrendering and becoming a captive, that was impossible.
In the wasteland, being captured meant being sold as a slave, because Chen Jianbin himself came from a slave-trading background.
Zhang Heng did not want to wear an electronic collar around his neck; at that point, he truly would be unable to live or die as he pleased.
However, Zhang Heng still underestimated the speed of the other side's occupation; before he could run to the back door, he was blocked in an alley by Li Lu and a group of people.
After more than a dozen of his men were killed by the other side, Zhang Heng chose to surrender.
At this moment, he and his subordinates were confined in a small room, waiting for someone to arrange their fate.
"Brother Heng, they've kept us here for several days now.
What are they going to do with us?" asked a man with a handlebar mustache next to him.
"What else could they do? Wait for the slave traders to come.
Once the collar is on your neck, you're a clearly priced slave," Zhang Heng said regretfully.
"No, let's rush out together.
There are only a few of them."
"Go to hell.
Do you see the Power Armor standing over there?
That thing can crush your head with its bare hands.
Even if you have a gun, you can't break their defense.
Just stay put.
Take it one day at a time."
Soon, Zhang Heng's greatest fear came true: a team of fully armed soldiers began calling them out one by one.
Soon, it was Zhang Heng and a few others' turn.
"Ding~" A slave collar was thrown in front of Zhang Heng and his group.
Without needing the other party to say anything, Zhang Heng understood what it meant, because behind the Power Armor nearby were several corpses of those who refused to wear the slave collar, their heads crushed.
"Our supply of slave collars is limited; you decide what to do," a man with a scar on his face said.
The cruel reality was laid bare before Zhang Heng; this slave trader had become the commodity he least wanted to be.
The material of the slave collar was very light, and it felt like nothing when worn around the neck.
However, Zhang Heng felt an unusual chill.
When selling slaves, for disobedient slaves, the most effective method was to randomly detonate one of their slave collars.
Just a tap on the IEM could blow a person's head open.
"This thing uses composite materials and a biometric chip.
And it can expand as a person's body grows larger, and shrink if they lose weight.
Black people in America all have this thing around their necks, but you can't see it because they're dark-skinned." This was what Chen Jianbin had told him.
What was even more alarming was that these people didn't seem to intend to sell them.
After putting on the slave collars, Zhang Heng found that their food had improved.
It changed from the lowest-grade aggregated energy bars to aggregated energy bars plus an unknown kind of flatbread.
Although he didn't know what kind of flour it was made from, in terms of taste, it was definitely flour, and it was also mixed with the meat of Mutated Creatures.
However, in Zhang Heng's view, this was just to let them eat better for a few days, so they could fetch a good price later.
Soon, the scarred man came again, leading Zhang Heng and his group directly to the outside of Iron Nail Town's walls.
It seemed that slave traders would come to buy them soon.
"What are you standing around for over there? Come over and work!" A shovel was thrown at his feet.
In the following days, Zhang Heng and his group began the work of building the city walls.
At first, Zhang Heng was worried that he would be whipped or mistreated, but later he found that his worries were unnecessary.
Not only could he eat expensive pasta, but he could also drink a bowl of hot meat soup almost every day.
After more than ten days, Zhang Heng touched his stomach and found that he had gained a lot of weight.