CHAPTER 346: CHAPTER 8: SPYING

The "crude oil refining" method has been ongoing for over half a month, with the simple equipment managing to operate in a stumbling manner.

As long as there is a stable supply of raw materials, this equipment can produce two to three tons of fuel with different octane ratings daily.

Despite the low quality of the oil, with numerous impurities, for the "Holy Light" team, which lacks oil, this undoubtedly marks a breakthrough from nothing to something, with significant implications.

Every time Guo Yi, in charge of technology, sees the black oil slowly flowing, he gets so excited that he dances around, feeling a sense of achievement.

"If this was before the Industrial Revolution, with this equipment, I dare say we could initiate a chemical era, enough to support ’Holy Light’ in conquering a new territory!"

He even started pondering the recovery of waste gas from the refining process—containing large amounts of pungent sulfur dioxide, which with slight catalytic oxidation could turn into valuable crude sulfuric acid.

As for why there is such a large amount of sulfur dioxide, the reason is simple: in the post-apocalyptic world, collecting household plastic products has not been smooth, and discarded tires have instead become the main raw material for oil refining.

With the production of fuel oil steadily increasing, a new problem has surfaced—storage.

This isn’t something that can be solved with just bottles and jars; large quantities of fuel require specialized tanks.

"I don’t have that many oil tanks on hand!" Zhou Qingfeng was distressed in the camp office.

Before the apocalypse erupted, he had actually stockpiled over a dozen storage tanks and a few oil tank trucks under the guise of opening a gas station for the shelter.

But at that time, fuel was precious, and using it meant there was less left. For example, last winter, he burned several tons of diesel for heating, which made Xiao Jinlang, who prided himself on being frugal, wince painfully.

Nowadays, the "crude oil refining" has resolved the urgent need, quickly replenished the previous losses, and even filled the originally empty fuel tanks to the brim, with even the oil tank trucks temporarily requisitioned as storage containers.

Kerosene and diesel are easier to deal with due to their stable properties allowing long-term storage. However, gasoline, with its high volatility, poses a problem; over time, it will evaporate on its own, leading to invisible waste.

"Should we conduct some trade?" This thought revolved in Zhou Qingfeng’s mind. "If we conduct trade, who will be our partners? How should the prices be set? How would we transport it? What else can we procure?"

Initiating a project is easy, but the related issues will grow like tangled threads, requiring professional handling.

A high-powered directional routing antenna was set up between the "Holy Light" camp and the shelter, allowing Zhou Qingfeng to receive emails from Xiao Jinlang through the internal network while sitting in the office.

Facing these trivial but important issues, he simply forwarded them to Kelly with a single click, annotating in the email: "Trade issues are critically important; you are in full charge of this matter."

Afterward, he replied to Xiao Jinlang’s email, proposing to quickly establish the "Holy Light" executive committee to clearly divide all internal camp affairs for efficient operation.

As for himself... "I want to focus on military matters."

Though this was a joke, the threats both inside and outside the camp were still significant, especially after the "crude oil refining" equipment was put into operation, which attracted envy from many external forces.

The camp’s perimeter was under 24-hour drone surveillance, capturing sneaky figures daily. Among them were survivors in the town who still refused to submit, as well as some mysterious onlookers.

In the internal email sent to Xiao Jinlang, Zhou Qingfeng’s tone seemed somewhat heavy:

"Including Guo Yi and other refining technicians, there are currently seventeen shelter members in the ’Holy Light’ camp set in Avoni Town.

While the number of externally recruited survivors is forty-five, the ’basic labor force’ exceeds thirty, forming an obvious inverted ratio. This threat shouldn’t be ignored."

"A week ago, I stopped recruiting more ’basic labor force’ and began to strengthen the internal discipline control of the camp.

Those daring to slack off, argue, rob, or even fight were all heavily punished, and five recalcitrant individuals have already been expelled.

The expelled expressed nothing but resentment and anger.

To avoid leaving hidden troubles, I have ordered Chen Rui to secretly eliminate these individuals using drones, with their bodies also being properly buried."

"The ’expel-eliminate’ method has proven effective, strongly deterring the negative atmosphere in the camp and greatly contributing to establishing team prestige.

However...

From my observation, there are still small groups of ’basic labor force’ secretly banding together, with some even secretly collecting protection fees.

Since work points are recorded on our servers, not as physical currency, the payment of protection fees has evolved into a more covert form of ’forced gifting.’"

"Due to the harder work and relatively low rewards, the ’basic labor force’ generally holds a hostile attitude towards the ’Holy Light’ management team and the privileged survivors, not cooperating with our investigations."

At the end of the email, Zhou Qingfeng candidly described some thorny issues faced in team management and sought advice from the more experienced Xiao Jinlang on effectively identifying the ’bad apples’ within the team.

"Because the ’basic labor force’ needs to go out scavenging every day, it is challenging to control their contact with external survivors.

Among the expelled, there are those who attempted to secretly bring weapons back, with some confessing during interrogation that ’bringing weapons’ was just to fish in troubled waters, while others admitted that external survivors attempted to recruit them.