Watching Jiang Baimian and Bai Chen return to the car, driving the jeep to a more secluded spot not far away, Shang Jianyao and Long Yuehong each checked the "Ice Moss" pistol and "United 202" pistol on their armed belts, as well as the "Berserker" assault rifles slung across their bodies.
After confirming every detail, they took turns squatting down, retying their combat boot laces, ensuring there were no oversights.
Having completed the corresponding tasks, they carried their assault rifles, walking neither too fast nor too slow along the dilapidated cement road, heading towards the plaza.
Although it was currently autumn, and the weather had already turned cool, there were still many mosquitoes in the overgrown areas, buzzing around Shang Jianyao and Long Yuehong.
After holding it in for a while, Long Yuehong finally couldn't help but ask:
"Do we have to take turns swatting mosquitoes too?"
He believed that someone should be responsible for vigilance at all times.
"Or, should I help you?" Shang Jianyao asked, looking at the black mosquitoes swarming Long Yuehong's face.
Long Yuehong asked warily:
"Are you trying to slap me in the face?"
"Are you thinking too badly of me?" Shang Jianyao chuckled.
He then took out a small plastic bottle, about the height of an index finger, from his pocket, unscrewed the cap, and sprayed himself a few times:
"Have you forgotten that our company is called 'Pangu Biology'?
"The effect of this mosquito repellent, hey, it's really good."
Long Yuehong asked with a slightly dazed look:
"You, when did you get that? Isn't it in the car?"
--Inside "Pangu Biology," there were almost no mosquitoes, and in the few days since arriving on the surface, Long Yuehong had not felt troubled by mosquitoes, so he had forgotten that there was such a thing as mosquito repellent.
"I had it on me when I was on night duty before," Shang Jianyao replied candidly.
"Why didn't I encounter any mosquitoes when I was on night duty?" Long Yuehong asked, deeply puzzled.
Shang Jianyao glanced at him:
"You can figure out the answer if you use your head a little."
Seeing that Long Yuehong still didn't understand, Shang Jianyao revealed the answer:
"These past two days, the team leader and I have been on night duty first, and she sprays mosquito repellent around.
"Actually, she also sprays it when starting a bonfire, didn't you see it?"
"..." Long Yuehong didn't expect the answer to be so simple.
In order not to be ridiculed by Shang Jianyao, he immediately pointed to the right and said:
"Let's go and take a look at those buildings first, the team leader said they were a hospital and a radio station."
He was referring to the three buildings located on the right side of the cement road, arranged in an open square, one of which had already collapsed.
"Okay." Shang Jianyao casually went to put away the bottle of mosquito repellent.
"Me, what about me?" Long Yuehong's mouth was half-open, surprised, astonished, and at a loss.
Shang Jianyao chuckled silently twice:
"You didn't say you wanted to spray some? If you don't say it, how would I know..."
"Stop, stop! Don't imitate lines from radio programs." Long Yuehong immediately interrupted Shang Jianyao.
Shang Jianyao didn't tease him any further, quickly unscrewing the cap and spraying him, after all, they were in the wild, in the ruins of the steel mill, jokes had to be moderate, and shouldn't distract them or lower their guard against the surroundings.
Having initially gotten rid of the mosquito problem, the two turned towards the place Jiang Baimian called a hospital and radio station, first seeing two solitary pillars standing there.
"This, the gate was moved away?" Long Yuehong suddenly felt a bit of a toothache.
Shang Jianyao said "Mm":
"This is called human agency.
"If the broken cement and bricks couldn't be exchanged for anything, these two pillars might not even be standing here."
"Tsk, tsk." Long Yuehong sighed twice, walking between the pillars.
Only then did they discover that there was a row of single-story buildings leaning against the wall in front of the building closer to the road, which could be reached by simply turning right.
And if they went straight, they would go up a slope to a small plaza with a pond, a garden, and parking.
Through this plaza, it seemed they could directly enter the second floor of the building near the road.
Long Yuehong gestured and took the lead, walking towards the passage between the row of single-story buildings and the main building.
There was a narrow drainage ditch here, full of moss and weeds.
Long Yuehong looked left and right, finding that the ground floor of the building had doors opening on this side, the spaces inside varying in size. The two closest to the slope were connected, and the windows facing outwards were completely open, with no obstructions. The row of single-story buildings was neatly divided into roughly equal small rooms, and in the area within their sight, there were desks with drawers fully open, and overturned stools.
Combining the words "hospital" and "radio station," Long Yuehong tried to figure out what area this belonged to, but couldn't come up with an answer.
"What is this place?" he asked, not expecting much, not thinking Shang Jianyao would be able to answer.
Shang Jianyao withdrew his gaze, lowered his right elbow, and slightly raised the muzzle of the "Berserker" assault rifle:
"Outpatient department."
His voice was low and his tone was assertive.
"Ah?" Long Yuehong was surprised and confused.
He was about to ask how he recognized it, when he suddenly remembered something:
Inside "Pangu Biology," each floor of the "living area" had a small infirmary, responsible for common illnesses like headaches and fevers for the residents of that floor. Such an infirmary had two rooms, the outer one being a pharmacy on one side and a doctor's office on the other, and the inner one being an infusion room on one side and an injection room on the other.
Besides these, "Pangu Biology" also had three large hospitals, which were located on specific, different floors, mainly to treat employees who couldn't be treated in the infirmaries.
Long Yuehong had been relatively healthy since he was a child, and his parents and elders hadn't had any serious illnesses, so he had only been to the infirmaries on his floor and the university floor, and lacked a direct impression of the outpatient area.
Shang Jianyao's mother, on the other hand, had died of illness, and had been hospitalized for a long time. At that time, Shang Jianyao had to travel back and forth between school, the hospital, and his home every day.
Having roughly figured out the reason, Long Yuehong closed his mouth.
Shang Jianyao then used his chin instead of his right hand, pointing to the row of single-story buildings:
"This side should be the consultation rooms, injection rooms, and infusion rooms, and there's more than one of each."
He then turned towards the building area:
"The two rooms on the very outside that are connected should be the pharmacy, there should be iron bars on the windows, and gaps left for giving medicine, but now they've all been taken away. The others could be machine rooms, finance rooms, laboratories, things like that, can't be sure."
"Mm-hmm." Long Yuehong didn't refute him.
The two searched room by room, assault rifles in hand, but didn't find anything useful. Even the remaining wooden tables and chairs were broken and incomplete, obviously taken away to light bonfires.
When they reached the last room in the row of single-story buildings, Long Yuehong had just kicked open the half-open wooden door when he saw a white skull, meeting the gaze of two dark empty sockets for a second.
He was startled and raised the "Berserker" assault rifle slightly, preparing to shoot.
Shang Jianyao looked left and right and said in a low voice:
"It's been dead for a long time."
Only then did Long Yuehong relax a little, carefully observing the situation inside:
A wooden table had fallen to the ground, and several yellowed and dilapidated pages of paper were scattered messily. The skeleton leaned against the table, without any flesh remaining, without a single piece of cloth covering it, and missing several bones.
"The previous relic hunters didn't even leave the corpse's underpants... many wild animals have been here..." Long Yuehong had at least gone through rigorous training, and could deduce many things from some traces.
As soon as he finished speaking, a small black shadow darted out of the corner, ran to the side by the wall, and disappeared into an inconspicuous hole.
"...A rat." Long Yuehong almost fired a burst at it.
Shang Jianyao nodded thoughtfully:
"Can you eat it?"
"...Theoretically, yes, but there are too many bacteria, viruses, things like that, it's easy to get a serious illness." Long Yuehong tried his best to explain, so as not to let his friend have a sudden whim. "If the team leader were here, she would definitely say: if there's another way, don't eat this kind of thing."
Shang Jianyao exhaled, seemingly a little regretful.
"Watch the surroundings." He stepped forward a few steps and squatted next to the yellowed pages of paper.
Unfortunately, there was nothing written on them.
But Shang Jianyao also saw something: the outlines and sizes of the intact parts of these pages were basically the same, and they should have been torn from the same notebook.
"If there was important information on them, they would have been picked up long ago," Long Yuehong said his thoughts.
Shang Jianyao didn't commit himself:
"Let's put them away first, and let the team leader study them later."
After saying that, he took out a bag and a plastic tweezers, picked up the pages, and put them in the bag.
The two searched the side of the building again, but still didn't find anything.
Returning to the slope, Shang Jianyao and Long Yuehong went up to the small plaza area and saw that the building opposite had collapsed, and the four-story long building on the far right was covered in green plants.
Above the main entrance on the first floor of this building, there were three large red characters, which had become mottled and faded, appearing vaguely in the green:
"Inpatient Department".
"It really is a hospital." Long Yuehong glanced at the building next to the slope. "This also belongs to the hospital, then, this collapsed one seems to be the radio station."
The bricks and stones at the very top of the collapsed building had been pried open, showing the relic hunters' professionalism and patience.
"Let's go in and take a look." Shang Jianyao took the lead and walked towards the inpatient department.
There were many glass shards and animal droppings inside, but it was generally well preserved, except that there were no beds in any of the rooms.
"No way, beds should be very heavy..." Long Yuehong was quite surprised.
"They can be pushed," Shang Jianyao said simply. "Or they might have brought cutting tools."
"Really nothing left... Is this what relic hunters are like?" Long Yuehong sighed, following Shang Jianyao up the stairs to the second, third, and fourth floors.
Walking in this inpatient department always made him feel gloomy and cold. The smell he breathed in was also strangely indescribable, not quite like the kind that was close to rotting for a long time, leaving only a little residual taste.
"Is that enough? There's nothing here," Long Yuehong couldn't help but urge Shang Jianyao.
"Mm." Shang Jianyao looked at the bathroom near the stairs, took out paper and pen, and started drawing a map of the hospital area against the wall.
"Can't you do it outside?" Long Yuehong paced back and forth.
"Almost done, almost done." Shang Jianyao moved the pen swiftly.
Finally, he drew a strange symbol inside the inpatient department, resembling someone squatting.
"What does this represent?" Long Yuehong asked curiously.
Shang Jianyao didn't answer him, but drew the same symbol again next to it, drew a horizontal line, and labeled it:
"There's a toilet."
"..." Long Yuehong didn't want to bother with Shang Jianyao anymore.
Having finished this part of the map, the two left the inpatient department and continued down the slope.
After entering the main road, before they had time to look for the next target, they saw two figures coming out from the depths of the steel mill, each riding a bicycle and carrying a rifle on their back.
ps: Seeking recommendation tickets~