Kingdom of Corrosion
Chapter 746 - 349: Angel’s Alliance

Chapter 746: Chapter 349: Angel’s Alliance

Because it was a mining town, designed to facilitate the transport of large trucks, the main thoroughfare of the town was very spacious. Stone, relying on his skill, shook off all the zombies without any damage and drove the jeep to a stop 40 meters away from the edge of the Angel’s Alliance safety zone.

Stone got out of the car, and Lin Meng was about to open the door when Lin Wu pressed her shoulder, "Check your weapons before you get out, and with the jeep as the center, do not enter any safe zones."

Lin Meng looked at Lin Wu, "Don’t you have friends here?"

Lin Wu said, "We can’t rule out the possibility that our friends have already been eaten by them."

Stone walked alone towards the safety zone and was soon greeted by someone. The two engaged in conversation within the ’populated’ safety zone. Stone spoke through the headset, "You guys fix the car first, I’ll use their radio."

Lin Meng stood beside the jeep, puzzled, "Why do we need to fix the car?"

Lin Wu said, "That’s just for their ears."

Lin Meng said, "Can you not make it sound so scary? It’s like there are bad people everywhere."

Lin Wu said, "This time, you’re probably right. From the images Little Fight sent back, the people here don’t seem to be bad."

The footage sent back by Little Fight revealed that deep within the Alliance, some people were farming, some were carrying water, and they greeted each other amicably; the atmosphere seemed rather good. If this was a group operating a black shop, without external resources, there would inevitably be internal strife. However, this also indicated that conditions here were not exactly favorable.

One issue might be water sources. Although the stream guaranteed water supply, the distance each base had to travel to reach the stream varied. Some bases had to walk more than a kilometer, while others only ten meters. Therefore, all bases were squeezing towards the stream direction, highlighting problems with alliance-building.

With only two to three people per base, limited by manpower, they could only form alliances in pairs. The Alliance was a key safeguard for defending their territory; non-alliance bases, even if willing to help, could only use firearms and other long-range weapons outside the safety zones for a joint defense. Lin Wu didn’t believe they had that many bullets.

The most important principle in a community is fairness, from the distribution of resources to the allocation of bases, all highlighting an unfair aspect. To successfully operate such a community, the leader must possess extraordinary talents. Even so, there were surely some who felt they were treated unfairly.

The root of the problem was still resource scarcity.

...

Five minutes later, Stone came out from the ’populated’ base and returned to the jeep, saying, "The Alliance doesn’t have any Outpost Cards. A base called Torrent had one, but it’s connected to a power source. It’s said that Torrent Base is a gathering place for the Angel’s Alliance at night."

Lin Wu asked, "What about Snow Egg and Little Knife?" That was really the key point, wasn’t it?

Stone said, "They left the Angel’s Alliance."

Lin Wu asked, "Why?"

"Because of the armored truck, because of Infrastructure Skills, because they talked too much, and didn’t know how to conceal their wealth."

When they split up, Snow Egg and Little Knife took the armored truck to tackle the zombies in the passage leading to the Angel’s Alliance. They arrived successfully at the Angel’s Alliance, were welcomed by everyone, and settled down there.

All of the cars in the Angel’s Alliance had broken down. Several days after Snow Knife settled in, someone asked to borrow their truck to go to the woods to cut timber, first to stockpile some building materials and secondly to prepare for winter fuel. They were not empty-handed; they brought a basket full of vegetables. It would be rude not to lend it, so they did.

These people were quite generous, and when they returned the truck, they brought Snow Knife some more farm products.

The next day, another person came to borrow the truck. Then the third day, the fourth day... Eventually, people began to arrive empty-handed to borrow the truck, arguing that since Snow Egg was able to harvest a unit of fuel daily and they weren’t using it, it wouldn’t matter if others used it.

On the fifth day, Base A encountered a five-star siege. According to their survival rules, as soon as a siege exceeded five stars, they would immediately evacuate the resources and change bases. But this family had stacked a large amount of wood in their home, and if they decided to abandon the base, all materials within the safety zone would be lost, and the base would revert to unclaimed status.

The wife of Base A was the sister of the husband from Base B, and during the ten minutes of siege preparation time, both bases approached Snow Egg and Little Knife to borrow bullets and the truck. Snow Egg and Little Knife knew they didn’t have the means to return the bullets, and using the truck as a defensive weapon would definitely cause it to break down, if not totally destroy it.

Snow Egg and Little Knife refused to lend the truck but gave them 30 pistol bullets. Base A was breached, and all their assets were lost. Afterwards, Base A didn’t thank Snow Egg and Little Knife, reasoning that a straightforward yes or no would suffice. They believed that had it not been for the 30 bullets that created a false sense of security, they would not have suffered such great losses.

Although they couldn’t speak such words openly, Bases A and B began to harbor discontent towards Snow Egg’s base. Soon enough, Base C, who was also denied the truck, joined the anti-Snow Knife faction.

At this point, Snow Egg and Little Knife realized the crux of the problem. In simple terms: they were not from the same social circle. They were too affluent, not only possessing an armored truck and endless fuel but also a variety of weapons and a significant number of bullets. Even their clothes were System Items, not the fabric they pieced together from scraps.

One day, while doing laundry, downstream Snow Egg and Little Knife saw people from Bases B and C upstream deliberately stirring up the water. They appeared to be playing in the water with their feet but were actually kicking up the mud and even spitting into the water.