While headquarters was struggling with grain and petroleum coke, the Ability Administration, located in the vast Siberian plains, found itself at a loss, clearly unable to resolve the current predicament. They were in Tyumen, a city famous for its oil fields, the Tyumen Oil Fields. It could be said that this was the largest city east of the Ural River, with a decent heavy industry and numerous banks.
Xiao Sheng and his companions had been in Tyumen for over a year. They had come on a mission: to open up the oil pipeline. They had initially expected to do little more than kill zombies, and once the zombies were dealt with, the pipeline would be cleared. The mission accomplished, they would once again be heroes renowned throughout the land.
Originally, China imported oil from Russia, with nearby extraction and transport from Okha. During the Qing Dynasty, this area had belonged to China. However, with the advent of the apocalypse, the number of zombies and mutated beasts on Sakhalin Island became overwhelming. Furthermore, being in the Far East, Russia could not spare attention. Thus, two years later, there were practically no living people left on the island. Without manpower, oil extraction was impossible. Consequently, the Ability Administration had to relocate to Tyumen. Although it was farther, a considerable distance compared to the journey from Karamay to Yanjing, a pipeline had already been constructed here, and there was no shortage of manpower in the vicinity.
Therefore, as long as the crisis in Tyumen could be resolved, oil could be continuously transported to the northeast, utilizing Russia's pipelines to achieve the goal of oil transportation. The funds required would be headquarters' problem, whether purchased with gold and silver or exchanged for grain, it was all acceptable.
As a result, after Deputy Captain Xiao Sheng arrived in Tyumen with over twenty ability users, they discovered that all the zombies in Tyumen had already been killed. Siberia was sparsely populated, so even the large city of Tyumen had only half a million people. In China, this would be equivalent to the population of ten ordinary small towns.
With heavy firepower, the half a million zombies were quickly eliminated.
However, the difficulties had only just begun. For the sparsely populated Tyumen, the zombie threat was minor. Tyumen's most severe problem was the lack of food!
Originally, in the vast Siberian plains, a place so suitable for crop cultivation, starvation was almost unimaginable. Especially since operations here had long been mechanized. Large agricultural machinery was used for sowing, spraying, harvesting, and processing, minimizing labor costs. Although only one crop season was possible per year, the abundance of plains meant there was no shortage of grain.
Yet, to everyone's surprise, Tyumen also experienced a food shortage. The city had only fifty thousand inhabitants, not a large number. However, a significant portion of these people were workers. While there was enough manpower for oil extraction and the city walls, four to five meters high, could withstand ordinary mutated beasts, the food shortage necessitated venturing out to find sustenance.
A food shortage was one thing, but the Ability Administration's primary need was oil, and as long as oil extraction could resume, that would suffice!
However, the process of oil extraction was also not going smoothly. The areas around Tyumen were all plains, with farmland and forests. Siberia's forests covered the largest area in the world. With forests came space for mutated beasts to survive, and the food for these mutated beasts mostly came from humans.
Siberia had a large population of brown bears. The internet often joked about the fighting prowess of Russians, capable of subduing brown bears with their bare hands, but this was mostly jest. Believing it would be foolish, as people were attacked by brown bears and reported in the news every year.
Brown bears, as wild animals, frequently rummaged through garbage dumps for food, especially when food was scarce in the forests during winter. They had to find sustenance in human refuse to avoid starving.
As a result, with the increase in mutated beasts in the forests, food became even more insufficient to support the animals' consumption. This led not only brown bears but also wolf packs and badgers to venture out. The individual mutated animals had grown considerably larger, appearing like lions and tigers from a distance.
While wolf packs were recognized as carnivores, they did not exclusively consume meat. For a species to survive, it always adapted to its environment, eating whatever was available. Thus, both wild boars and wolf packs began to raid farmland, devastating crops.
Corn was plucked and eaten by brown bears before it could ripen, and wild boars burrowed into sweet potato fields, uprooting the soil. A single wild boar could ruin several acres of farmland. To prevent crops from being eaten, Tyumen dispatched guards to protect the fields. However, the cunning mutated beasts learned to create diversions, making noise in the east while the main force ravaged crops in the western fields.
Miners also needed to eat. Not extracting oil would not kill them, but not eating would lead to starvation. Consequently, the plan to extract oil in Tyumen was temporarily shelved.
Xiao Sheng, leading the Ability Administration personnel, ventured deep into the forests to resolve the trouble, killing any animals they encountered. Xiao Sheng, Jin Zijue, and Zhang Zi were all fifth-tier ability users; killing mutated beasts was a simple matter for them.
For a time, the animals in the forests near Tyumen were wiped out. The hunted prey was sufficient to sustain their operations for a period, and the workers finally agreed to resume work. However, upon arriving at the mine, they discovered that the area around the original mine had been riddled with holes dug by mutated marmots. The ground was covered with dense openings, resembling a beehive.
Around the mine, the soil was extremely loose. The original mine had collapsed. As for the machinery, it had all rusted. In just over a year, the steel machinery was no longer usable.
"No, we have to choose other locations to drill wells. This area is no longer usable. We must choose other places to drill. But rest assured, Tyumen may lack other things, but there is definitely plenty of oil!" an old Tyumen miner replied to Xiao Sheng.
Soon after, winter arrived with heavy snowfall. The Siberian winter was as one might expect. The ground was frozen, making drilling extremely difficult. The snow on the ground reached fifty centimeters deep. At this point, brown bears in the mountains began to hibernate, and human activity also decreased. People could only stay indoors to keep warm. Siberia might lack other things, but timber was plentiful. The members of the Ability Administration spent the entire winter indoors.
While these individuals were spending the winter in Siberia, Qin Kewei gathered some of the remaining personnel from the Ability Administration and headed to the Pacific Basin in the Southern Hemisphere to search for meteorites.
It was summer in the Southern Hemisphere, and aside from the dangers encountered at sea, it was quite comfortable. At that time, Xiao Sheng and his group also considered the mission to salvage meteorites to be a good one.
Unexpectedly, fleets from around the world suffered heavy losses at sea. Not only did they fail to find meteorites, but they also lost almost all their personnel.
After the winter ended this year, Xiao Sheng immediately urged the oil companies to expedite oil extraction, otherwise, the domestic oil shortage would become critical. Winter had now arrived, the snow outside had melted, and the ground was no longer frozen, allowing for oil extraction to commence.
However, Tyumen had only fifty thousand people left, and among them were many women and children. With spring arriving, it was imperative to start farming quickly. If they didn't farm, there would be no food!
"My dear friend, you absolutely cannot force us to extract oil! We can only eat rye bread now. If we miss the planting season, we won't even have rye bread to eat!" This was the response Xiao Sheng received.
Upon hearing this, Xiao Sheng was on the verge of going mad. He had been in Siberia for nearly a year, doing nothing but killing mutated beasts, and he hoped to send oil back to the country as soon as possible. However, the miners here wanted to farm. If this procrastination continued, problems would arise again.
Days passed, planting was completed, and the company's engineers finally began planning where to drill wells.
After hanging up a call from headquarters, Xiao Sheng immediately convened his companions from the Ability Administration and stated the current situation plainly: "Brothers and sisters, headquarters is very displeased with our progress in completing the mission. If we still cannot complete the mission in a short period, we may be recalled!"
"It's good to be recalled. I don't want to stay in this godforsaken place at all. The winters are deadly cold, and we have to go into the mountains to kill mutated beasts, and also figure out how to solve these people's food problems, and it's not over yet! Now headquarters is rushing us every day, as if we are deliberately not completing the mission. They think we are very incompetent, right? Then replace us!" Jin Zijue was the first to express his displeasure upon hearing this. He had worked so hard, and now Beijing had so many opinions, making things difficult.
Jin Zijue was dissatisfied and directly voiced his inner feelings, which a large portion of the group also felt.
Everyone had come to Siberia with the intention of completing the mission. However, headquarters, without inquiring about the difficulties, kept asking why the mission couldn't be completed, treating them as if they were not human. The group was clearly reaching their limit.
Xiao Sheng quickly explained, "Isn't it because headquarters values us? We need to consider headquarters. Let's persevere a little longer. As long as we can send oil back to the country, we will be great heroes!"
Jin Zijue did not appreciate these words. Instead, he directly asked, "Didn't they say that Beijing has established a new organization of ability users? First, they formed the Heavenly Chosen Bureau to share our power, and then they formed the Heavenly Dragon Bureau to check us. Do they think we, these commoners recruited from the grassroots, are incompetent? Then it's simple, let us go back, and let the people from the Heavenly Dragon Bureau handle it!"
Upon hearing this, everyone immediately agreed. Chai Kefu also directly replied, "Deputy Captain, it's not that we are not working hard, but that our strength is insufficient. We may have been overestimated. Didn't Ke Yiming also send word saying we were being praised to death? Then there's no need to force ourselves. Let the Heavenly Dragon Bureau figure it out!"
As Xiao Sheng listened to his subordinates' increasingly outrageous remarks, he was convinced that this mission would be a failure. He could no longer hold back and said, "Enough! Now you find excuses to retreat when facing difficulties. If you can avoid it this time, what about next time? And the time after that? Do you want to be cowards for your entire lives?"
The crowd looked displeased, clearly unconcerned by Xiao Sheng's reprimand. If they took completing the mission too seriously, they would be truly foolish. Headquarters was already trying to control them; if they couldn't see that, they were truly stupid.
Xiao Sheng took a deep breath and said, "If you believe you are replaceable, then you have truly given up on yourselves. Now I can tell you some breaking news: the Heavenly Dragon Bureau has been severely crippled. Shen Feng is not dead; he returned from the sea, killing over twenty ability users! Therefore, in China today, we are the only ones who can complete this mission!"
The crowd was stunned into silence upon hearing this news, clearly not expecting such an event. Had the Heavenly Dragon Bureau's ability users been more than half killed? Was Shen Feng that powerful?
Seizing the opportunity, Xiao Sheng continued to encourage the group, "So, our Ability Management is still the strongest organization in China. If we fail to complete the mission at this time, then no one else in China can complete this arduous task!"
The crowd was still in shock and hadn't recovered. They had been disheartened multiple times by the successive news of new ability user organizations being formed, feeling they were not being recognized. Yet now, they themselves had become the hope of headquarters!