Central Station.

Station Chief's Office Building.

Before the off-road vehicle had even come to a complete stop, Ding Yishan had already pushed open the car door and jumped out, his entire body wrapped in a thick, suffocating smell of smoke.

Jiang Chuan followed closely behind carrying a document bag, and the two men hurried up the stairs with quick steps, rushing all the way to the third floor.

After unlocking the office door, Ding Yishan headed straight for the corner refrigerator, pulled open the door, and grabbed four bags of nutritional paste.

Unlike the ordinary varieties available on the market, all the nutritional paste in the refrigerator came in blue packages.

Their nutritional value was ten times that of ordinary nutritional paste, with many anti-fatigue components added. Normally, drinking just one bag could sustain half a day of high-intensity work.

Now, all four bags went down his throat with gurgling sounds.

After finishing them, he finally covered his lower abdomen and let out a long breath. His whole person seemed to have had his bones extracted, collapsing heavily into the wide office chair.

"Too chaotic."

Rubbing his throbbing temples, Ding Yishan's voice was full of exhaustion.

After the celestial anomaly, the troubles encountered this year were simply more than the past five years combined.

Especially in the recent month.

He Fei's death, the Stand-In Starfish invasion, the arrival of the Void Mist, and now a Wish-Guarding Transcendent had emerged.

With frequent impacts from various events, the inspection station didn't even have time to organize and file the previous incident before the next crisis was already smashing down before their eyes, without even a moment to catch their breath.

And what was even more ridiculous was that a trainee inspector could actually be the first to discover traces of a Wish-Guarding Transcendent?

Ding Yishan couldn't help but sigh.

Since the inspection station's establishment to this day, there had never been such a record, and there would very likely never be one in the future either.

The Cheng family had once again brought "surprises" to the inspection station.

Fortunately, as station chief, he had said at the meeting a few days ago that they should focus on cultivating new personnel, otherwise he really couldn't save face now.

And for the sake of this "Walker."

During the day, the inspection station had practically turned upside down. Senior inspectors held emergency meetings, arguing about everything from ability analysis to potential threats until people's heads ached.

The third-term and second-term inspectors who weren't on duty had run their legs off, leading teams to conduct carpet searches in the buffer zone, not daring to miss any corner.

In the afternoon, as intelligence was further transmitted and verified, Happiness City's upper echelons held another relay meeting.

From migration population estimates and material allocation plans to defense fortification expansion and migration support plans.

Item by item was voted on, taking nearly four hours in total, more than twice as long as the reconstruction meeting after the substitute starfish outbreak.

Moreover, this was just the preliminary meeting. There would need to be at least three to five more specialized meetings to finalize all the detailed rules.

As for whether to give up on taking in this wave of migration, not a single person mentioned it from beginning to end of the meeting.

This was simply a windfall from heaven!

How many sanctuary cities fought tooth and nail to compete for population and resources, yet Happiness City happened to encounter such an opportunity after the infection wave.

Never mind five hundred thousand, even if it were one million, they'd grit their teeth and swallow it down!

However, while the upper echelons could make decisions easily, the lower levels would have to run their legs off to execute them.

Jiang Chuan opened the bulging document bag and placed stacks of resolutions signed with names on the table, unable to help clicking his tongue, "Sir, we need to prepare for at least seven hundred thousand people at minimum. How can the buffer zone accommodate so many? We can't have them sleeping on the streets, can we?"

"Even if it can't accommodate them, it must. Even if our bellies burst, we must swallow them!"

Ding Yishan spoke, his voice hoarse, "Autumn is coming soon. If we take in these people, Happiness City's scale can double. If we miss this opportunity, where will we find another like it?"

"But..."

Jiang Chuan was stunned, "Even if the inspection station operates at full capacity, it can process at most ten thousand people per day for border entry, and this state can't be sustained for long. Personnel fatigue, simplified procedures, the probability of infected entities mixing in will become higher and higher. If several really slip through, the consequences..."

"That's why we can't let the inspection station operate at full capacity."

Ding Yishan interrupted, pondering for a moment before pulling out a document from the pile, "Don't look at those others for now, look at this first."

Every document on the table bore red stamps, recording plans that had passed through major meetings, been screened, voted on, and deemed worthy of further evaluation.

As for those impractical proposals, they had been directly rejected, not even qualifying to appear on paper.

Jiang Chuan took it, his gaze falling on the title.

[Outer City Expansion Plan (Draft)]

After quickly scanning several lines of content, he raised his eyebrows slightly. The draft plan was to designate a new area outside the buffer zone perimeter and gradually expand to build an outer city to accommodate the incoming migrants.

It would adopt a model of "first register information, then designate temporary residential points, then distribute in batches," gradually breaking down and stabilizing the personnel, finally processing them through the inspection station in batches to enter the buffer zone.

"This is... planning to create another buffer zone outside the buffer zone?"

"It's just a draft, just take a look."

The anti-fatigue components in the nutritional paste began to take effect, and Ding Yishan's voice became gentler, "We definitely can't let everyone rush in all at once. The supercomputer has simulated it, the current carrying capacity limit of the buffer zone is 647,000 people. One more person could cause major problems. And it's not the kind of small trouble where material supply is difficult to maintain, it's the kind of big problem that could explode the entire buffer zone!"

"But now we don't have time to build slowly. The migration teams are already on the road. The first batch of forty thousand people will arrive as early as the day after tomorrow, and starting from this batch, there will only be more and more."

"Many people have proposed to first use barbed wire to circle out areas outside, set up simple shacks to stabilize the people, while simultaneously transferring materials, pulling electrical lines, using work-for-relief programs, utilizing the migrants to build while collecting them. Once the outer city's framework is established, they can be distributed to the buffer zone in proportions."

Jiang Chuan's fingers gripping the document tightened, "But the outer city has no defensive fortifications. What if fog passages appear? And with so many people, there will definitely be plenty of infected entities too."

"The Blood Dragon Corps will shrink across all fronts. All retired soldiers and guard personnel will be conscripted to rush to the front lines. Plus the Cross Legion will also allocate half their people to build a defensive perimeter on the outside."

Ding Yishan said while thinking, "There are definitely risks, but it's better than having hundreds of thousands of people blocked outside. If real chaos breaks out, never mind the buffer zone, even the inner city would suffer along with it."

"Additionally, while this plan looks risky, it's really a solution born of necessity. What needs to be negotiated now is how to build, how to stabilize people, how to ensure risk reduction, these are the most crucial issues."

Ding Yishan fired off questions like a machine gun, his gaze falling on Jiang Chuan's face.

Jiang Chuan was completely stunned, his brain stopped working for a moment, and finally showed that familiar blank expression.

Like a defense communicator that suddenly crashed while being operated.

Ding Yishan sighed inwardly. Asking Jiang Chuan about such matters was still too demanding. Even if he were to think about it himself, he'd have that irritable feeling of his brain about to explode with no idea where to start.

"Go rest first. I need to continue organizing these proposals. There's another major meeting tomorrow morning."

"Yes, sir!"

Jiang Chuan suddenly snapped back to attention with a jolt, woodenly turning to walk out the door.

Despite being a half-step transcendent, his steps carried a hint of stumbling.

However, just as Ding Yishan lowered his head to begin reviewing the proposals, knocking sounds rang out again.

"Come in."

The door was pushed open, and Jiang Chuan walked back in.

"What is it?"

"Sir, regarding Inspector Cheng, should we notify him of this information?"

"Notify him?" Ding Yishan habitually frowned, "A trainee knowing..."

The words suddenly stopped at his lips.

Under Jiang Chuan's gaze, Ding Yishan's brow gradually relaxed, revealing a thoughtful expression.

Moreover, this thoughtful look started out faint, but became intense within seconds.

"Fine, notify him."

"Then I'll..."

"Come here, you sit in my seat and notify him for me." Ding Yishan stood up, yielding the wide office chair.

"Ah?"

"Nothing special, I'm suddenly curious whether our Inspector Cheng will have any constructive opinions after learning about these matters."

Ding Yishan deliberately emphasized the words "Inspector Cheng," a hint of unfathomable meaning flashing in his eyes.

"Come on, aren't you familiar with him? You won't even dare help me ask a question?"

"I..."

Jiang Chuan was still somewhat bewildered, "Sir, are you being serious, or..."

"Would I be joking?"

Ding Yishan made a gesture of invitation, turned around and pulled over a lounge chair from the side, settling in comfortably by the window, gazing out at the inspection station's lights, "I've already let you sit in the station chief's position, so consider yourself the station chief and ask away openly."

Heh, interesting!

After his thinking opened up, Ding Yishan shook his head with a smile.

Since this kid could discover a Wish-Guarding Transcendent, it showed he was someone bold and careful.

He had already said at the major meeting that they should cultivate young people, so testing him now was quite normal.

Of course, Ding Yishan wouldn't admit that deep down, he had developed some unfounded expectations about the Cheng family again.

He wanted to see what this Inspector Cheng, who could cause major disturbances even during his trainee period, could say when faced with this mess involving hundreds of thousands of migrants.

"That's right, it's five hundred thousand!"

As soon as Jiang Chuan finished speaking, he immediately added, "Five hundred thousand is just the predicted number. The specifics depend on the Walker's route."

"According to the latest intelligence analysis, the people affected by Xinghuo far exceed six hundred. The currently counted numbers have already exceeded ten thousand, and the Walker's ability goes far beyond simply inducing motivation. It's more like strengthening humans' expectations for 'change.'"

"Expectations for change?"

Cheng Ye repeated this, pondering, "Could it amplify the potential benefits that change might bring while weakening risk assessment?"

"Yes, you guessed correctly."

Jiang Chuan was somewhat surprised, instinctively turning to look at Ding Yishan.

The latter sat expressionlessly in the lounge chair, only lightly nodding to indicate he should continue.

"After being affected by this influence, combined with the survival pressure brought by the Void Mist, the migrants will believe that Happiness City is their only path to survival. This belief becomes infinitely strengthened, so even knowing there might be dangers ahead, they'll rush over regardless of everything. Therefore, the actual numbers could very well exceed five hundred thousand."

"More than five hundred thousand?"

Although Cheng Ye lowered his voice, a hint of obvious shock could still be heard.

He couldn't help but be shocked.

This was no longer a question of whether the inspection station was busy or not, but involved the systemic stability of all of Happiness City.

Because even if the inspection station operated at full capacity, it couldn't digest such a massive flow of people.

Moreover, don't forget that the Void Mist hadn't left, and unpredictable chaos could occur at any time.

With so many people staying outside the buffer zone, any little riot would require force to suppress?

As soon as gunshots rang out, Happiness City's reputation would be completely ruined, and they could never again expect new personnel or merchant convoys to come.

"Can't the Walker be eliminated?"

After speaking, Cheng Ye corrected himself, "Since we've already grasped his whereabouts, can we find a way to guide him toward other areas? Even just slowing the migration pace would help."

Population influx was actually a good thing.

But five hundred thousand, or even more, far exceeded Happiness City's carrying capacity.

However, if they could guide the Walker's route of advance, keeping the daily migration numbers controlled at five to six thousand, at most ten thousand people, it would give Happiness City buffer time.

"This..."

Jiang Chuan's voice hesitated, and he quickly looked toward Ding Yishan.

The latter showed a thoughtful expression, made a silent gesture, and immediately said, "Continue using this morning's excuse and tell him about the Wish-Guarding Transcendent's characteristics."

"Yes."

Jiang Chuan nodded lightly, quickly pulling out a folded note from his pocket with several lines written on it.

The phone went quiet for over ten seconds.

Just when Cheng Ye thought the Void Mist had covered the area again, interfering with the signal.

Jiang Chuan's voice came through again, like reciting from a textbook, his tone suddenly becoming fluent:

"Inspector Cheng, since there has never been a trainee inspector in the inspection station's history who could come into contact with such events, there are currently no corresponding handling procedures..."

"But considering that you are the first discoverer of the Wish-Guarding Transcendent and secured valuable response time for Happiness City, the inspection station has decided to temporarily elevate some of your clearance privileges to third-term inspector level. I will shortly send a batch of materials to your defense communicator. Please watch for them."

"Additionally, this batch of materials involves highly classified information. Please ensure that only you view them and absolutely cannot leak them to any unrelated personnel."

"Alright, thank you."

Cheng Ye let out a long breath, his anxious heart settling slightly.

This feeling of being wrapped up in the unknown was too terrible. Being able to obtain some inside information meant he wouldn't have to bump around like a headless fly.

"Regarding eliminating the Walker, we currently cannot do it, or rather, no sanctuary city in the wasteland can do it, because the characteristic of Wish-Guarding Transcendents is that they are born from wishes, and if the wish doesn't perish, the body won't disappear."

"Hmm?"

Cheng Ye couldn't help but widen his eyes. Didn't that mean... the Wish-Guarding Transcendent was immortal?

"Yes." Jiang Chuan seemed to guess his thoughts and continued, "In simple terms, it's an immortal body. Even if we could eliminate him, after some time he would reconstitute his form somewhere else. But after resurrection, he would target our Happiness City as a revenge target, bringing massive infection waves. In the past, two super sanctuary cities have already been destroyed because of this."

"As for guiding the Walker to other places, that's even more difficult."

Jiang Chuan's voice continued, "The behavioral logic of Wish-Guarding Transcendents follows no discernible pattern. Once they detect human interference, they immediately enter an indiscriminate berserk state. Then it wouldn't just be a migration wave problem, but far more trouble."

Good grief!

Can't kill it, can't touch it, can't manage it, buffs stacked to the max, untargetable, right?!

This ghostly thing might not pose much direct threat, but its difficulty level had already far exceeded that of mother sources!

It was truly the real version answer.

Cheng Ye even had a thought: if he encountered certain dead-end situations in the future, could he actively transform into a Wish-Guarding Transcendent?

"Now, to deal with the migration wave, Happiness City has already initiated a round of discussion meetings, coming up with quite a few constructive opinions and some drafts. Inspector Cheng, after your clearance elevation, you're entitled to know about these things. Do you need me to read them to you? The inspection station is also collecting opinions from inspectors to modify unreasonable aspects of the drafts so they can be promoted and implemented as soon as possible."

"There are already drafts?"

Cheng Ye's heart skipped a beat, and he suddenly raised his eyebrows, sitting down on the edge of the bed.

Quite impressive.

Happiness City's response speed was indeed fast. From morning to evening, just a few hours, and they had already progressed to this stage.

However, connecting this to Jiang Chuan's suddenly fluent speaking pace and the current tentative inquiry.

Cheng Ye understood in his heart and couldn't help but reveal a slight smile, nodding lightly, "Then please trouble you. I happen to be free right now."

"Alright, I'll read you several drafts that have execution possibilities first."

Not having to think, just mechanically reciting from a script was undoubtedly great enjoyment for Jiang Chuan.

His speaking pace became increasingly fluent, even carrying several tones of inflection.

"Work-for-relief to build an outer city?"

Cheng Ye thought quietly, his fingertips lightly tapping on the bedsheets, extracting key terms from the draft.

This line of thinking was quite good. It both solved the migrant settlement problem and could stabilize people's hearts through labor. But the key issue was...

"Can Happiness City provide the materials needed to build an outer city?"

After speaking, Cheng Ye added, "I'm not referring to temporary supplies like tents and nutritional paste, but construction base materials, cement, steel reinforcement, and various basic construction materials."

Hmm?

Jiang Chuan was stunned. He had thought Cheng Ye would first ask how to ensure migrant safety, or whether the distribution mechanism was reasonable. He hadn't expected his first question to directly target the most practical material bottleneck.

Ding Yishan, who had been reclining in the lounge chair with half-closed eyes, straightened up slightly upon hearing this, a glint of interest flashing in his eyes.

He nodded lightly, held up one finger, then clenched it into a fist.

Having followed Ding Yishan for so many years, Jiang Chuan immediately understood, cleared his throat and answered, "This is possible. All the construction materials Happiness City produced this summer haven't been traded externally and are all stockpiled in warehouses. They can completely meet the construction needs of the outer city's first phase. Subsequently, the industrial zone will shift to full production, and as long as sufficient time is given, the material gap can absolutely be filled."

Hiss.

This wasn't the small-scale affair of Tianyuan Community's few thousand people, but large-scale construction involving at least five hundred thousand people as a baseline!

Happiness City actually had such substantial resources?

Cheng Ye's eyelids twitched. Since it could meet construction needs, this draft had real practical significance.

For Happiness City's future development, it definitely couldn't be limited to the small buffer zone.

Like Xinghuo Sanctuary City, it would need to designate different-level areas for risk segmentation.

Happiness City's current scale couldn't yet support such complex layouts, but building an outer city first as a transition was completely feasible.

However, Cheng Ye's brow furrowed slightly again.

The difficulty of work-for-relief programs had never been the "work" and "relief" themselves, but how to ensure fairness.

With hundreds of thousands of people working simultaneously, how should each person's contribution be measured?

Some places build quickly, others slowly, and everyone wants to crowd into good locations, so what then?

Or to put it more practically, the terrain outside the buffer zone had high and low areas, with safe zones close to defense lines and naturally dangerous areas far from defense lines.

Everyone wanted to crowd into safe places, so who would go to dangerous areas for construction?

"Inspector Cheng, if you have any suggestions, please tell me freely. I'll record them and submit them to the station chief for review."

As Jiang Chuan spoke, he suddenly had an inspiration, "The station highly values cultivating the younger generation of inspectors. If you can make contributions to this matter, when you want to get promoted in the future, many conditions could definitely be waived appropriately."

Hmm?

Ding Yishan looked at Jiang Chuan with surprise, then shook his head with a smile.

Sitting in the office chair, he really considered himself the station chief, didn't he?

But this was fine too. Having him say these things to Cheng Ye was smoother than speaking himself.

"Let me think..."

Realizing this might again be a test for advancement, Cheng Ye cast aside distracting thoughts and his brain raced.

Like his conversation with Downs last time, without more information to support him, this was another armchair strategist session.

The most crucial aspect of armchair strategizing was demonstrating overall perspective.

As long as he grasped the big picture, details could be slowly deliberated and perfected through collective effort.

The phone suddenly fell silent.

After a full four to five minutes, Cheng Ye finally spoke thoughtfully, "Jiang Chuan..."

"Inspector Cheng, please speak. I have a pen in hand. Just tell me and I'll record."

"Good."

Cheng Ye began, "The outer city construction draft can be implemented, but two issues must be determined first: First, should we build an outer city structure similar to the buffer zone, or a distribution structure similar to Xinghuo? Second, regarding the material allocation system during construction, should it be distribution according to work, or distribution according to progress?"

Two consecutive questions again exceeded Jiang Chuan's knowledge range.

He instinctively turned to look at Ding Yishan, but saw that Ding Yishan was also deep in thought.

After more than ten seconds, he gestured for him to press the mute button, "Ask him about the pros and cons of both structures, ask him about the pros and cons of allocation systems."

"Understood."

Jiang Chuan quickly relayed the questions, and this time Cheng Ye's answers came quickly and clearly.

"An outer city structure similar to the buffer zone would create divisions between core areas and peripheral areas, which involves serious allocation conflicts. If the first batch of migrants gets assigned to safe and convenient core areas, while subsequent arrivals can only go to remote peripheral areas, fairness becomes impossible to discuss. It would easily immediately ignite opposition between areas, and when that happens, it couldn't be suppressed."

"A distribution structure similar to Xinghuo could avoid this point. Each area would be a relatively independent core area without clear hierarchical divisions. Issues with terrain differences and safety distance problems encountered during construction could also be balanced through material allocation. For example, reducing material quotas for areas close to defense lines while giving additional rewards to areas far from defense lines. This way, it could both guide personnel flow toward the periphery and promote balanced construction of the entire outer city, avoiding the situation where one side is saturated while the other is barren."

"As for allocation systems..."

Cheng Ye's speaking pace slowed, "The advantage of distribution according to work is that it's intuitive, making it clear at a glance who works more or less, maximally stimulating individual initiative. But the disadvantages are also obvious: outer city construction isn't a solo effort. Building a wall requires people mixing mortar, carrying bricks, and setting up scaffolding to cooperate with each other. If everyone just focuses on their own work, it easily becomes everyone doing their own thing like scattered sand, and overall efficiency would actually decline."

"Distribution according to progress is the opposite, more suitable for team collaboration. For example, assign an area to a construction group, stipulate completing a section of defensive wall within three days, and upon completion, distribute materials per person, with bonuses for exceeding targets. This forces everyone to band together, but problems can also arise. If there are slackers in the group and there aren't sufficient surveillance and punishment systems, it easily creates situations where one person slacks and the whole group suffers, slowing overall progress."

"And this point is particularly difficult to measure. If we devolve surveillance authority, they might only want physically strong people, kicking aside women, children, and the elderly, creating new inequities. If we retrieve surveillance authority, facing a scale of hundreds of thousands of people, the workload would be so large we simply couldn't handle it."

Jiang Chuan's pen tip moved across the paper with scratching sounds.

What Cheng Ye said was very straightforward and he could understand it, but thinking deeper was somewhat difficult.

It seemed like there was no perfect choice, whichever was chosen would have unsolvable troubles and problems.

"Is there any middle-ground approach?"

After finishing his notes, without waiting for Ding Yishan's signal, Jiang Chuan couldn't help but ask.

"Yes!"

This question was too simple for him, this promoter of new concepts. Saying it wouldn't feel out of place at all.

Cheng Ye changed direction and said decisively, "Establish an area responsibility contract system, clearly assigning area tasks to individuals, with all gains and losses borne by the contractor, while simultaneously establishing clear targets and graded rewards and punishments, making them directly responsible for results!"

[NEXT CHAPTER]