Chapter 377 - 180: The Fall of Ming Pearl

Chapter 377: Chapter 180: The Fall of Ming Pearl

The SUV drove through the wilderness, its wheels rumbling dully over the rutted, uneven ground.

The scenery outside the window was unchanging. Xu Mo sat in the back, listening to Bingbing’s story.

Bingbing recounted the full story of how Ming Pearl Port was breached as she drove, while Zhong chimed in with additional details.

Through their words, Xu Mo gradually came to understand what had happened to Ming Pearl Port.

Originally, Ming Pearl Port had been in great shape. As one of the eight major shelters, it had reached its zenith right before its fall. It had a population of over 1.5 million, a comprehensive system of defensive walls, and well-equipped combat units capable of carrying out missions beyond its borders.

They had sent out combat units to clear the surrounding cities and towns, achieving considerable success. At that time, the survivors of Ming Pearl Port all believed that life would only get better, that human civilization was slowly recovering.

But just over six months ago, things took a turn.

A dense fog suddenly appeared in a mountainous area more than fifty kilometers north of Ming Pearl Port. It wasn’t an ordinary fog, but an incredibly thick one—a vast expanse of white where you couldn’t see a thing.

At the time, no one paid it much mind. There were plenty of strange occurrences in the apocalypse; what was a bit of fog?

But the problem soon emerged. Endless waves of zombies charged out of that Fog Zone, heading straight for Ming Pearl Port to attack.

In the beginning, the number of zombies wasn’t too high—only about a thousand a day.

But people quickly realized something was wrong.

The zombies from the Fog Zone seemed endless. Kill a thousand today, and two thousand would come tomorrow. The day after, four thousand.

No matter how many they killed, new zombies always poured out of the fog. They were seemingly infinite, impossible to completely eradicate.

Ming Pearl Port started taking the matter seriously. They sent scout teams into the Fog Zone to investigate, trying to figure out what was inside. But no one who went in ever came back.

Team after team of scouts went in, and all of them vanished into the vast white fog without a trace.

Faced with this situation, Ming Pearl Port stopped sending scout teams and instead began a fierce artillery barrage on the Fog Zone. Shells rained down into the area, their explosions shaking the heavens. But after the bombardment, the Fog Zone remained, and the zombies continued to pour out unabated.

Ming Pearl Port exhausted every possible means, trying every method they could think of. But the Fog Zone was like something not of this world, unaffected by any attack. The zombies kept charging out, their numbers growing and their assaults becoming more ferocious.

Finally, Ming Pearl Port was forced to play its last card—a nuclear weapon.

The nuke detonated within the Fog Zone. A massive mushroom cloud rose as the shockwave swept over everything. And then, the zombies stopped.

For two and a half days, not a single zombie came out of the Fog Zone.

For two and a half days, all was quiet to the north.

Just when everyone thought the nuke had finally destroyed that damned thing, even more zombies charged out. And these were no longer ordinary zombies.

The nuclear radiation had caused the zombies to mutate, making them even more terrifying. Some grew bone spikes, like monsters clad in armor; others could spit a highly corrosive venom...

The combat capabilities of these mutated zombies were outrageous, stretching Ming Pearl Port’s defenses thin. The defensive line they had barely managed to hold began to show cracks. The firepower that had once been effective was now significantly less so against these new monstrosities.

At this critical juncture, something even worse happened.

Zombies began appearing inside Ming Pearl Port itself. They weren’t coming from outside; they were suddenly turning within the city. Someone would be walking down the street and abruptly turn into a zombie, lunging at the person next to them. Someone would go to sleep at home and wake up as a zombie, killing the loved one sleeping beside them.

At first, there were only a few isolated cases. Then the numbers grew, spreading until they were everywhere throughout the city.

They were fighting a war on two fronts—inside and outside the city.

No matter how strong Ming Pearl Port’s army was, it couldn’t withstand such attrition. The zombies outside were endless, while the zombies inside ran rampant. The defensive lines shrank day by day as casualties mounted.

After holding on for less than a month, the massive shelter of over 1.5 million people was on the verge of collapse.

Under these circumstances, the high command of Ming Pearl Port made a difficult decision: sacrifice the land to save the people.

The people could retreat; the land could be lost. As long as the people survived, they could one day return. If the people were gone, then everything was gone.

Thus, Ming Pearl Port initiated an evacuation plan. The combat units and government personnel voluntarily stayed behind to cover the retreat. They swore an oath to live and die with Ming Pearl Port, buying time for the evacuation with their lives.

The remaining survivors began a mass evacuation. They took all of Ming Pearl Port’s supplies: weapons, ammunition, food, medicine, industrial equipment, technical data, crop seeds—anything and everything that could be carried was loaded onto vehicles and taken away.

The direction of the evacuation was toward the areas that Ming Pearl Port had previously cleared. There were no zombies there, or very few, allowing them to establish new settlements and carry on the flame of Ming Pearl Port.

And so, the great exodus began.

At first, the retreat was relatively orderly. The survivors were divided into multiple columns, evacuating in different directions. Everyone was organized and disciplined. Though it was difficult, they could still manage.

But soon, chaos erupted.

For some reason, fighting broke out among the survivors. Some groups began to plunder supplies from others; some began to absorb weaker groups. Allies one day could be backstabbers the next. Conflict, slaughter, and betrayal became a constant on the road of their flight.