Apocalypse: I Can Upgrade Everything

Chapter 163: Thick Fog

Chen Ye leaned over the center console and rummaged through the pile of supplies stacked in the backseat. He dug out a can of cola, a vacuum-sealed sausage, and a squashed Snickers bar.

He had originally planned to force Boss Wang to cook him a hot meal, but since his designated chef had been eaten by a bipedal goat, foraging outside was no longer a realistic option.

He would have to settle for a cold breakfast.

He checked the expiration dates. The cola had a nine-month shelf life and was technically still good for another three days. The sausage and the Snickers bar, however, were long past their expiration dates.

Before the apocalypse, Chen Ye would have tossed them straight into the garbage without a second thought to avoid food poisoning. But now?

These were hard currency.

Out in the frozen wasteland, a single expired sausage was enough to make starving survivors beat each other to death with rocks.

He devoured the meager meal in less than three minutes.

Chen Ye wiped his mouth and peered out the windshield. The pale morning fog was gradually thickening. Even the crimson sun bleeding over the eastern horizon had lost its sharp edges, looking fuzzy and bloated through the mist.

It was actually quite beautiful.

More importantly, the sun was out!

A genuine thrill of excitement ran through Chen Ye. Ever since they had driven into the supernatural blizzard surrounding Rong City No. 2 Primary School, he hadn’t seen the sun once.

The ambient temperature outside the truck had also risen significantly. The biting, sub-zero chill that had penetrated his bones for weeks was finally gone.

The only issue was the fog. It was growing denser by the minute, drastically reducing visibility.

Chen Ye pulled out his heavy machete and checked the holographic upgrade timer. It still had over 70 hours left.

“Ah-choo…”

Chen Ye let out a massive sneeze, rubbing his nose. The adrenaline from the chaotic escape and the night-long gauntlet of psychological horrors was finally wearing off. His nerves, which had been pulled taut as piano wire for 24 hours, were starting to fray.

Even with the enhanced stamina of a cultivator, he was running on fumes.

He triple-checked the electronic locks on the Doomsday Pickup’s doors. Placing the heavy, fusing machete within arm’s reach on the floorboards, he climbed into the backseat, curled up, and instantly fell into a dead sleep.

While Chen Ye slept, the world outside changed.

The pale morning mist he had admired earlier did not burn off with the rising sun. Instead, as the hours ticked by, the fog grew impossibly thick.

The hazy red sun was completely swallowed. The world was reduced to a suffocating, featureless gray void. Visibility dropped to near zero.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

“Chen Ye… Chen Ye! Are you in there?!”

Chen Ye violently jolted awake, his heart hammering against his ribs.

He instantly snatched the heavy blade from the floorboards, spinning around to face the passenger window.

A face was pressed flat against the glass.

The man was staring directly at him, but his eyes were completely dead and unfocused.

Anyone who has ever woken up from a deep sleep to find a face silently watching them through a window knows the sheer, visceral horror of that moment. It was a jump scare pulled straight from a cheap horror movie.

Even though the face looked incredibly familiar, it didn’t lessen the terror. Every hair on Chen Ye’s body stood on end. He raised the heavy blade, preparing to smash it through the reinforced glass.

“Yezi! You heartless bastard, how the hell can you sleep at a time like this?!”

The muffled voice belonged to Chu Che.

Chen Ye froze, blinking rapidly to clear the sleep from his eyes. He squinted at the face pressed against the glass. The sharp eyebrows, the weary eyes, the distinct expression that was somehow a perfect blend of righteous authority and utter sleaziness…

It really was Captain Chu Che.

Chen Ye immediately snapped his fingers, mentally dismissing the perimeter of Absolute Aura Shielding that surrounded the truck.

“Damn it, Captain! You finally showed up!” Chen Ye laughed, throwing open the heavy armored door. “If you took any longer, I was going to die of boredom!”

As Chu Che stepped back from the window, Chen Ye noticed a thick nylon climbing rope tied securely around the captain’s waist. The other end vanished into the surrounding fog.

It made perfect sense. The moment Chu Che had stepped into Chen Ye’s Absolute Aura Shielding, he would have instantly lost his sight, hearing, and supernatural perception. He had essentially walked into a sensory deprivation void completely blind. Tying a lifeline around his waist was the only way to ensure he could find his way back out.

As the gray smoke dissipated, Chu Che finally saw the Doomsday Pickup clearly.

He had tracked Chen Ye’s markings all the way down the highway until he stumbled upon a massive bank of fog that felt fundamentally different from the natural mist blanketing the area.

Knowing Chen Ye’s abilities, Chu Che had suspected it was a trap or a hideout, so he decided to investigate. But the second he crossed the threshold, the world had vanished. The blinding white fog, the deafening silence—it was terrifying.

Not wanting to shout and risk drawing the attention of any lurking anomalies, Chu Che had tied the rope, blindly groped his way forward until his hands hit cold steel, and started pounding on the window.

That was why his eyes had been completely unfocused when Chen Ye woke up; he literally couldn’t see a thing.

“Holy shit, it really is you,” Chu Che gasped, a massive grin breaking across his weary face as his hearing and vision flooded back. “That fog of yours… it’s absolutely terrifying.”

“I told you I was useful,” Chen Ye laughed, stepping out of the cab and playfully punching Chu Che in the shoulder. “I knew a cunning, slippery old fox like you would definitely survive and track me down!”

“Right back at you, you ruthless bastard. I knew you were too stubborn to die!” Chu Che shot back.

Both men had secretly suspected the same thing: if the convoy scattered, the only two people guaranteed to survive the night were each other.

One was a brilliant, pragmatic strategist with an unknown number of aces still hidden up his sleeve. The other was a cold-blooded, highly adaptable killer who would do absolutely anything to survive.

“Just you?” Chen Ye asked, glancing past Chu Che into the fog.

“Just me, Uncle Bao, and Xiao Wang,” Chu Che said, his smile fading, a shadow of deep exhaustion crossing his eyes. “We haven’t found anyone else yet.”

“Relax. Iron Lion is practically indestructible; ordinary anomalies can’t even scratch him,” Chen Ye offered, leaning against the truck. “Sun Qianqian is sharp enough to keep herself alive. And Ding Dong is with her, so they should be fine.”

Chu Che let out a heavy sigh. “I’m not worried about the girls. I’m worried about Iron Lion. The guy is a complete idiot.”

Chen Ye: “…”

He couldn’t argue with that. He nodded in profound agreement.

Iron Lion was undeniably the most naive, pure-hearted cultivator in the entire convoy. The only reason he drove that massive, slow-moving school bus was so he could physically shield as many helpless survivors as possible. It was the same reason he had insisted on a communal food-rationing system.

If anyone was going to die trying to save dead weight, it was Iron Lion.

When the convoy had violently scattered at the primary school, Chen Ye had noticed the largest panicked mob of survivors swarming Iron Lion’s bus.

It’s a coin toss, Chen Ye thought grimly. Either Iron Lion somehow managed to drag the largest group of survivors to safety, or they all dragged him down and died together.

Having exchanged pleasantries, Chen Ye fully dismissed the last lingering wisps of his smoke.

If Chu Che had safely navigated this area, it meant the immediate vicinity was clear of high-tier anomalies. If there was danger, the first thing out of the captain’s mouth would have been “Run!”

A few dozen yards away, emerging from the fog, was Chu Che’s heavily modified off-road SUV.

The roof rack was still piled high with strapped-down supplies. Aside from a few fresh dents and deep scratches along the reinforced side panels, the vehicle looked remarkably intact. It was in much better shape than Chen Ye’s battered, bloodstained pickup.

Over the last few months, Chu Che’s SUV had proven to be an absolute mechanical marvel. It simply refused to break down.

Xiao Wang, the convoy’s nervous assistant, was pacing anxiously by the SUV’s open door. When he saw Chen Ye emerge from the fog, his shoulders visibly slumped in relief, and he quickly jogged over to greet him.

But before Chen Ye could ask about Uncle Bao’s condition, he noticed something deeply unsettling.

When he had fallen asleep earlier, the morning fog had been thick, but it was manageable. Now? The fog was a suffocating, dense wall of gray.

“Is it just me, or is this fog… way too thick?” Chen Ye asked, frowning at the impenetrable wall of white surrounding them.

“It’s not just you,” Chu Che said, his expression hardening. “Once we got clear of Rong City’s city limits, the blizzard stopped completely. But this fog… it wasn’t nearly this dense an hour ago.”

“First it was an endless desert, then a supernatural blizzard, and now we’re driving through a bowl of milk,” Chen Ye muttered, shaking his head. “Does the apocalypse even have normal weather anymore?”

“If it was normal, it wouldn’t be the apocalypse,” Chu Che replied dryly. He turned to look at Chen Ye, a flicker of genuine anticipation in his eyes. “Yezi, your cultivation path is entirely based on controlling smoke and mist, right? Try it. See if you can manipulate this fog.”

If Chen Ye could clear a path through this unnatural weather phenomenon, their chances of survival in the coming days would skyrocket.