Chapter 293 - Lair (2/2)

“A lair?”

Meng Chao sucked in a sharp breath.

Lairs were a unique form of buildings built during the bloodiest and darkest era half a century ago in Dragon City.

It could be said that the people in them were a unique social organization, which had a small but complete world of their own.

Back in the day, the streets and alleys of Dragon City were filled with zombies.

There were also citizens who carried the zombie viruses, but did not turn into zombies themselves. Instead, the zombie virus unlocked the seals in their genes, and they awakened to supernatural powers, which turned them into superhumans.

Unfortunately, the first-generation of superhumans did not have any method to cultivate spirit energy, so usually, once they awakened, they soon experienced spirit energy deviation. Their brains were damaged by rampaging spirit energy, and their personalities became twisted and ruthless, which meant that they turned into human-shaped beasts who did not regard the law with any importance.

Besides them, there were also monsters here and there who tore through the barrier of space to invade Dragon City. Together with zombies and the deviated superhumans, they turned Dragon City into a bloody forest which only operated on the law of the jungle, and the people in it lived under the constant threat of death.

To fend against all that, the citizens had to gather together.

They would block off all the entrances and exits of their residential area and even cover the windows. They only left tiny embrasures for themselves.

Then, they used sharp reinforced bars to turn the outside buildings into steel porcupines.

The modern residential areas turned into dock forts of ancient times.

If they did not have enough living space in the residential area, they solved it by digging underground tunnels and dividing the existing floors on the surface to smaller parts.

A skyscraper with forty floors and the space between floors of more than three meters would usually gain seven or eight floors underground, and the floors on the surface divided into fifty or sixty levels. Each room would be as narrow as an insect’s nest, but it would be good enough to ensure the survivors’ safety.

Gradually, the survivors from different dock forts merged their dock forts together once they connected the underground tunnels between them as they continued digging underground.

The nest-like buildings were then turned into lairs. They were the symbol of humans maximizing the space available to them and the only safe haven during the bloody and dark era.

They were also the last home that everyone worked together to protect, because there was nowhere else to go.

During the peak of the dark era, Dragon City had Ten Great Lairs, and 80% of the citizens stayed there.

At that time, those who dared leave the lairs and wander around outside were either zombies, out-of-control superhumans who experienced spirit energy deviation, well-trained fighting squads from various companions, Battle God Lei Zongchao, Female Battle God Su Jianqing, War God Wu Tiedao, and other such peerless fighters.

But lairs had their own problems.

The buildings were scattered all over the place, and the people built them without caring about the location. It was impossible for them to pass any sort of hygiene and fire protection laws, which meant that fires broke out quite often.

Narrow spaces were also a violation toward human rights. If anyone stayed in one for a long time, their minds would definitely become twisted. Countless people became ruthless, and the lairs turned into a heaven for crimes.

The people living in lairs had to fight against the catastrophe of their world ending right in front of them and the threat of law collapsing around them, so they huddled together and protected each other. They formed all sorts of organizations and gangs. Hence, they usually only cared about the code of brotherhood and not the law. Of course, at that time, there was no longer any law.

When a citizen living in a lair killed someone, they would just hide deep in the lair, because it was like a maze. If anyone tried to find them, it was the same as trying to find a needle in a haystack. It was practically impossible.

Hence, Battle God Lei Zongchao used his peerless and incredible power to intimidate the nine great companies at that time. He also helped War God Wu Tiedao build the Red Dragon Army. After that, he built the Survival Committee and announced brand new laws. Once societal order was reestablished, the Survival Committee’s first task was to change the lairs and restore their hometown to the point where it looked like a city again.

Over the course of the twenty years spanning through the Great Expedition Era and Great Construction Era, Dragon City went through devastating changes.

Countless small residential areas like Blessed Heavenly Garden were built. They might be simple, but at the very least, they gave humans their basic dignity.

The buildings in them were old, noisy, and cramped now, but in those years, countless lair citizens went after them like hungry tigers. Even if they queued up for them, these “luxurious apartments” were not something that they could easily get.

As more lair citizens moved into new residential areas and the Survival Committee proved that they did indeed have enough power to help the citizens fight against the threat of zombies, monsters, and the out-of-control superhumans, the lairs were disassembled and modified into new commercial and residential areas.

Seven of the Ten Great Lairs disappeared like that

But due to lack of time and money as well as other factors, there were still three lairs left.

The citizens who stayed in the lairs either suffered from physical disabilities or had other reasons. They could not look for suitable jobs in the outside world nor pay the rent in public renting houses.

Some of them had also gotten used to their surroundings, since they had lived in the lairs for their entire lives. They were like insects who were used to their own nests.

Some of them, however, had committed crimes in the outside world and were afraid of being subjugated by the Survival Committee and the Supernatural Tower, which was why they decided to rush into danger and flee into the depths of the lairs.

Though there were also some who stayed there because they were paranoid and believed that the apocalypse was right around the corner. They did not believe the Survival Committee and were certain that Dragon City was going to collapse sooner or later, so they treated the lairs as their final fortress.

There were also those who had crazy ambitions and wanted to use the chaotic environment in the lairs to conduct all sorts of illegal experiments, and many of the people Meng Chao had ran into in the life science forum in the deep web were from the lairs. Once they created brand new martial arts, they would wander about the lairs in search of fearless and ignorants lab rats for their experiments.

In any case, the purpose of the lairs had changed throughout the years. In the past, they were safe havens for survivors, but now, they were lawless places that sheltered evil people.