You were supposed to hoard supplies, why the heck did you hoard zombies!

And to achieve this goal, the most pressing issue at the moment is still food.

Our company currently operates two food processing plants, one that produces instant noodles and the other mainly produces bread. Both require basically the same raw materials: flour.

Flour, as one of the most important daily commodities, is held in extraordinarily high stock in every city.

The Logistics Department's zombie scavengers tasked with gathering supplies need only dive into a supermarket or a grain and oil shop to bring back at least ten tons of flour and other semi-finished ingredients every day.

Therefore, these two food plants are unlikely to face a shortage of raw materials in the short term.

However, this is only based on the assumption that the population remains stable.

But what is the reality of the situation?

The rate of population growth within the safe area far exceeded Zhang Ye and the others' expectations.

They underestimated the ordinary people's ability to cope with crisis, with the number of survivors in the city district being at least twice what they had anticipated, certainly not just over a thousand.

It has only been three months since the establishment of the safe zone.

And already, the population has reached over eight hundred people.

And it's still increasing every day.

Initially, the survivors were mostly identified by the Market Intelligence Department, then soldiers from the Combat Department would bring them to the safe area for registration and settlement, and finally, the Logistics Department would take over their management.

But now?

Nearly a third of the new survivors are arriving on their own.

The majority of them had been hiding nearby; once they learned of the safe area, they did not hesitate to flee here.

Humans are, after all, sociable creatures that live in groups.

Sticking together is instinctual.

The immediate consequence of rapidly increasing population is the scarcity of resources.

The company cannot simply watch them starve to death.

They must offer some relief.

Meanwhile, these newly joined survivors have added much-needed manpower to the company, leading to a further increase in the resources that need to be allocated.

These resources include but are not limited to food, drinking water, and even precious medicine.

Among them, the food issue is the most critical.

Food is the most important.

If the vast majority among them are living on the brink of starvation, then the safe area Zhang Ye painstakingly established would inevitably be the first to get hit and become a casualty in the tide of unrest.

Therefore, Zhang Ye must take precautions and resolve this issue in advance.

Lin Mo's adventure had given him new hope.

To use the Mutant Beasts as food.

So, after just over half a month of cultivation, the first batch of meat rats, specifically selected for their meat, was born.

They were plump, with short limbs, and seemed to have a much tamer temperament.

Two signature incisors, however, were retained.

"This is already the fifth generation."

"I did my best."

Beneath Yu Yongkang's black-framed glasses were a pair of bloodshot eyes, and he constantly yawned while speaking.

He had hardly slept well in the past half month.

His body was already exhausted.

Standing in front of him were still Zhang Ye and Ai Bing, while the other two women were downstairs selecting tonight's dinner.

Ai Bing observed the Mutated Rat in front of her for a moment, and despite feeling repulsed, she carefully prodded its smooth body with a wooden stick. However, the Mutated Rat did not show any sign of aggression.

Seeing this, the woman immediately nodded to Zhang Ye and said,

"It should be okay."

"I'm just not sure whether its meat will—"

She was about to express her concern about whether the meat of these Mutated Rats would cause infection in humans when Yu Yongkang interrupted her, confidently saying,

"Director Ai, please rest assured."

"Absolutely not."

"I've been experimenting almost every day during this period."

"Every generation of rat species is subjected to toxicity tests before selective breeding can take place."

The tests he referred to actually involved experiments conducted on volunteers provided by Zhang Ye beforehand.

Most of these volunteers were criminals who had violated company regulations.

A minority were there of their own free will.

For the reward.

Since Yu Yongkang had said as much, Ai Bing naturally had nothing more to add and, after asking a few more questions about the breeding process, nodded and stopped talking.

"That's fine then."

"Now there's only one thing left for us to do."

Zhang Ye smiled verbally but felt somewhat emotional inside, wondering if he was the first one to ever make rat meat canned food?

But he had a strong premonition in his heart.

His canned food was destined to become a solid currency throughout Sanjiang City in the future!

As for instant noodles—

If you can eat meat, who the hell would eat instant noodles without the seasoning packets?

The location for the cannery was quickly decided on, still in the industrial area, but now it was renamed as the Fourth Zone.

The large influx of survivors also meant one other thing.

That the labor force was rapidly growing.

To Zhang Ye, the discovery of these large numbers of survivor enclaves meant his employee count ceiling had once again increased by hundreds, reaching an astonishing number of over nine hundred people.

It was almost equivalent to the number of survivors inside the safe zone.

These were his greatest assets.

Zombies won't rebel, won't complain, and certainly won't cause a conflict over a few packets of instant noodles or a piece of bread.

They just silently carry out the tasks arranged by the leadership at all levels.

Occasionally, they'd even awkwardly attempt to flatter.

So earnest it was heartrending.

As the most reliable workers, the cannery's production workshop naturally wouldn't lack their presence.

From the lowest level of the assembly line to the supervisor patrolling the workshop.

All of them were zombies.

When the first batch of Mutated Rats from the breeding farm arrived at the factory door, the dozen or so zombie workers assigned as unloaders were already skillfully beginning to offload them.

One hand receives, and the other delivers, working in near-perfect harmony.

Next came slaughtering.

The workers responsible for this part were still zombies.

With the bonus of having a profession, these zombies, which had already evolved once, showed almost no signs of incompetence.

Their gutting and eviscerating operations ran as smoothly as if they were buttered up on tofu.

The processed rat meat was immediately taken for washing.

The zombie well-digging team had already dug a well in the factory ahead of time, and to ensure safety and non-toxicity, a high-power water purifier had even been installed.

The fresh blood and waste left over from the slaughter would be thoroughly cleaned by the cleaning zombie workers who had been on standby.

They wouldn't leave any room for bacteria to grow.

After the rats were washed, zombies wearing full-body isolation suits would take the meat to the workshop for the final processing, where dozens of zombie workers in front of the assembly line would ensure all the fresh rat meat turned into the canned food familiar to people.

The materials for the cans were also collected from a warehouse in the Fourth Zone.

To increase reuse, these used cans would be collected and recycled by the company's logistics department.

The completed cans would then be packed in boxes.

Finally, they would be shipped to the stores in front of the base.

Priced at twenty dollars.