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

"Big brother?"

"Why aren't you saying anything?"

"Did those people bully you and Sixth?"

An apparently honest man, seeing his older brother remain silent, hurriedly leaned in and asked.

Peng Yue lifted his head to glance at Fourth Brother but just sighed.
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Then he shook his head.

Bullying?

It was now the law of the jungle.

This wasn't his first time trading; taking a bit of a loss wasn't anything significant.

Moreover, the other party was right—if they didn't sell the fruits, they would eventually rot in the orchard.

So, no matter how low the price Zhang Ye offered was, he wasn't at a loss.

He might even say he had made quite a bit of profit.

The reason Peng Yue had been silent all the way until now was that he only managed to accomplish half of the trade he intended in the safe zone.

He wanted to buy guns.

But Zhang Ye had not agreed.

No matter how eloquently he spoke, Zhang Ye still refused to budge.

"You know very well what a gun signifies."

"If it were you,"

"would you sell it?"

Those were the exact words from Zhang Ye at the time.

He refused to sell guns and even declined to part with the metal armor worn by his guards.

And these two items were precisely what Peng Yue and his convoy needed most.

"Boss, did they refuse to sell us guns?"

Someone quickly guessed it.

As soon as he spoke, everyone saw a bitter smile appear on Peng Yue's face.

He then nodded.

The brothers gathered around him instantly fell somewhat silent.

Each of them knew exactly what this meant.

What was lacking here actually wasn't food, at least for the next few months.

Instead, it was Chen, who had been becoming more active lately, increasing their conflicts.

To make things worse, their convoy hadn't gained much from these clashes.

Continuing like this, the orchard would definitely be lost.

And their base might be jeopardized as well.

"Big brother, I have an idea,"

"Want to hear it?"

Just as Peng Yue and the older brothers were feeling troubled, Peng Liu suddenly spoke up.

The brothers looked at each other, their eyes filled with doubt.

Could Sixth, who was usually so flippant, have a moment of cleverness?

Peng Liu was no fool; he could see what his older brothers were thinking.

He sneakily peered outside and then beckoned with his hand.

The brothers immediately got the hint and gathered around.

"We could do this..."

Meanwhile.

In a room outside.

Big Beard watched Wang Wei and the others with a flickering gaze.

He had personally reported the events of that night to Zhang Ye.

The most important detail was the deck of playing cards that Wang Wei gave him, which he then exchanged back.

A six-person combat team, knowing full well the dangers of night, still chose to move under the cover of darkness.

This implied they didn't want others to know about their operation.

Barely risking it to enter the target shop, they only took a deck of cards.

Why?

Big Beard couldn't figure it out.

But he felt something was amiss.

Especially when Hou Shubin returned the deck of cards to them, and they showed an unexpectedly surprised expression.

What did that mean?

They didn't believe Hou Shubin would return the cards to them.

But how could a mere deck of paper cards elicit such an expression from them?

"The answer is simple."

"That deck of cards is extremely precious to them."

"So precious that no one who obtains it would ever willingly hand it over to someone else."

That was the conclusion Zhang Ye reached after hearing the two men's account.

Big Beard and Hou Shubin thus had one more mission.

To figure out what secret was truly hidden within that deck of poker cards.

So the first thing the two did upon returning here was find an excuse to call Wang Wei and his son over.

"Um, Brother Tian, Brother Hou."

Wang Wei's eyes were glued to the several cans before him and wouldn't move away.

Big Beard's real name was He Tian, so he directly addressed him as Brother Tian.

"If there's anything you need help with from me and my son, just say the word."

He managed to swallow a mouthful of saliva before he spoke.

It's said that unbidden guests are often the most troublesome, either schemers or thieves.

Big Beard and Hou Shubin had saved their lives, and not only did they not ask for anything in return, but they also brought over so much supplies.

Anyone clear-sighted could see something was amiss.

Most likely, they had something they needed from them.

Indeed, no sooner had Wang Wei finished speaking than he heard the other party already asking:

"Those poker cards the other day..."

Poker cards?

Father and son were both momentarily stunned.

They suddenly understood why they had been called over.

After a brief hesitation, they spilled everything about the poker cards.

In truth, it wasn't much of a secret.

Jiangbei District actually had far more than just this one group of survivors.

There were dozens of other groups, big and small.

All armed.

The strongest among them was led by a boss, too.

His name was Li Wanhao.

This man used to run a playing card factory.

But once the apocalypse arrived, he quickly relied on his years of business acumen to identify the key issue.

Food.

It so happened there was a farmers' market right next to the playing card factory.

So Li Wanhao didn't hesitate to incite a few employees to follow him and storm the market.

Because the zombie outbreak had occurred in the afternoon, the flow of people was not very high.

So, when they arrived, there were only a few dozen scattered zombies in the market, mostly passersby.

And a few unlucky shop owners.

The other survivors joined him in using cars parked along the road to build a wall.

They further fortified it with furniture from nearby houses.

Thus, the well-supplied farmers' market instantly became an isolated paradise cut off from the world.

Li Wanhao thereby became the savior in everyone's eyes.

His word was law.

He quickly gathered most of the survivors from the surrounding streets.

Immediately after, he implemented strict resource distribution and population management systems, thoroughly securing the area around the market under his control.

To cope with the problems of resource allocation and trade brought about by population growth, Li Wanhao faced the same dilemma as Zhang Ye.

That was what to use to replace the now worthless Shen Zhou currency.

His choice was playing cards.

A kind that was printed with special patterns and numbers.

However, due to technical issues, the patterns on the back of the cards were not changed and remained the same as in the past.

When Big Beard and Hou Shubin heard this, they suddenly realized.

"So..."

"You guys were thinking of making counterfeit currency?"

Father and son nodded sheepishly.

"I, I used to work at a printing factory, making playing cards."

"Just thought if we could possibly..."

Wang Guoqing stuttered and struggled to finish.

His son Wang Wei, however, had already taken over his father's words and continued:

"We just wanted to try if we could print another layer of pattern over those ordinary playing cards."

"After all, they don't have any machines to check the authenticity."

"They probably won't be able to tell."

Big Beard was still a bit puzzled upon hearing this.

From what the two had just said, Li Wanhao's territory was a distance from here, located north of Jiangbei District in the old industrial area.

Even if they managed to print them, what then?

Run all that way to spend it?

Isn't that too dangerous?