Robots descended from the helicopters one after another, their Bolters firing continuously, suppressing the constantly surging Mutants. Soon, the convoy was under the protection of the robots, and working with the UAV swarm in the sky, they continuously fired, eliminating the horde of corpses on the ground. The convoy quickly escaped its dangerous situation.
"Oh! My God. My heavens, are these robots heavenly soldiers sent by the heavens to save us?" Guo Tianzhu almost made a cross on his chest, but immediately remembered that he had converted to the Heavenly Master Dao, and changed to the standard cupped hand salute.
This group of Mutants was clearly not enough for the robots to kill. After dealing with the Mutants, the robots returned to the side of the convoy, standing in a line with their guns. So many tall robots gave a strong sense of oppression. Everyone stood there in a daze, not even daring to look directly into the robots' eyes or pick up their weapons, fearing that they would be eliminated together if they were not careful.
Three more helicopters flew in from afar, but this time they did not directly air-drop robots. The robots cleared an open space on the ground, and the three helicopters landed steadily.
A team of soldiers wearing excellent Power Armor walked out of the cabin, their exquisite armor painted with fresh new paint. Compared to them, Guo Tianxiong and the others looked like an African tribe next to a national honor guard, not to mention how shabby they were.
Song Zhan walked out of the cabin, grimly scrutinizing the convoy's survivors. The scars on his face made him look very intimidating. The survivors all swallowed their saliva. Seeing Song Zhan's officer uniform, they knew he was the commander of this group of soldiers and robots. Everyone held their breath, fearing they would offend him.
Song Zhan walked a couple of steps in front of the convoy. He looked at these tattered vehicles and the disheveled group of people. It was hard to imagine how these people had made it this far. When he saw the tattered Power Armor worn by Guo Tianxiong and Guo Tianzhu, he almost burst out laughing. This convoy didn't even have a decent mechanic; the Power Armor was so broken, and no one had repaired it.
"Who's in charge here? Or who has the final say?" Song Zhan asked.
Everyone looked at each other. Guo Tianzhu turned his head to look at Chen Dong. With him leading the way, the nearby survivors also turned to look at Chen Dong. Song Zhan's eyes followed everyone's gaze to him.
"This damn black bastard." Chen Dong cursed in his heart, reluctantly stepping out from behind. After taking off his gas mask, he jogged to stand in front of Song Zhan.
"Greetings, officer. Thank you for saving us, Officer. My name is Chen Dong. Your great kindness in saving us is beyond repayment. This is a small token of my appreciation, please accept it." Chen Dong said with a fawning smile, taking out a pack of cigarettes from his Pregnant and handing it to Song Zhan.
It was a crumpled pack of cigarettes, but its exterior was still relatively intact. Inside, there were fifteen perfect cigarettes. These were all cigarettes Chen Dong had saved up one by one. Now, to save his life, he couldn't care less about the heartache.
Song Zhan didn't even look at the cigarette pack in Chen Dong's hand. He just asked where their merchant team started from and where they were going. Finally, he specifically asked Chen Dong to count the number of people in their convoy.
Chen Dong naturally dared not conceal anything from Song Zhan and truthfully reported the detailed situation of this convoy to him. He reported that they had set off from Jincheng, near Shangjing, traveled south along the coastline, and their current destination was Huaicheng District. Finally, he truthfully reported that the team currently had 120 members. In fact, their team initially had nearly 200 people when they set off, and later, as more people joined, it once reached over 500. However, after encountering various dangers, their numbers continuously decreased. Just now, in the battle against the Mutants, another fifteen people died. If Song Zhan hadn't arrived in time, probably more than half would have died.
Song Zhan was not very concerned about the convoy's situation that Chen Dong described, but he was very concerned about these 120 survivors.
"The Huaicheng District you're going to no longer exists. It's now renamed New Shangqing City," Song Zhan said.
"Ah ~ New Shangqing City!" Chen Dong was a bit confused, but in the wasteland, human bases had all sorts of names, and New Shangqing City was a very common name.
Song Zhan took out a red card from his pocket, with a design of blue sky, white clouds, and the sun and moon shining brightly. Song Zhan signed his name on it with a pen and then handed it to Chen Dong.
"Today you met me, and by chance, I'm in a good mood. You'll find this pass useful; otherwise, with your impoverished appearance, I'm afraid not even half of you would be able to enter New Shangqing City," Song Zhan said. "I will send a UAV swarm to protect you. Follow the UAVs all the way, and you'll reach New Shangqing City before dark."
After speaking, Song Zhan turned and returned to the helicopter, and the soldiers followed him onto the helicopter. The robots also successively returned to the aircraft, leaving only a small group of UAVs hovering not far in front of the convoy.
The convoy's survivors quickly recovered. After a brief rest, they began to move forward again, following the UAVs' guidance. However, compared to before, this time the path was much smoother. Even the sporadic Mutants were directly killed by the UAVs in the air. Guo Tianxiong and Guo Tianzhu, who were clearing the way again, did not kill a single Mutant.
Song Zhan was originally testing the new generation of combat robots, soldier Type II, and incidentally clearing the Mutant hordes north of New Shangqing City. For him, this was an extremely easy task: flying the improved White Egret Type III helicopter to the northern area, using the UAV swarm to attract Mutants, then deploying soldier Type II combat robots to eliminate as many hordes of corpses as possible, and then leaving.
Discovering this wandering convoy was purely by chance, but for Song Zhan, it was also a good thing. Half a month had passed since the civil war in Huaicheng District, and the repairs to the city walls and defensive facilities had long been completed. However, tens of thousands of people were lost. Although Feng Jun later allocated some people from Yanqing Industrial Park and Longmen Town, the vast New Shangqing City still felt empty.
The original entry fee had been reduced to one helium crystal per person, and the conditions for purchasing and allocating housing were relaxed as much as possible. This indeed attracted all the surrounding survivor groups, but currently, less than ten thousand people had been absorbed. Restoring the previous population was still a distant prospect.
Therefore, to stimulate population growth, Feng Jun offered quite generous rewards to his subordinates. Within a limited period of twenty days, as long as they could increase the population of New Shangqing City, they would be rewarded with one hundred bottles of Maotai liquor for every settled resident introduced. Of course, this matter was limited only to Song Zhan, Song Peng, Yan Xin, Jiang Xueling, Jiang Si Yuan, and Zhu Wenyao, the few people in the command hierarchy. After all, Feng Jun didn't want to give every single one of his subordinates a hundred bottles of liquor; otherwise, the entire New Shangqing City would probably be dead drunk.