Zombie Apocalypse: Creation

An hour later...

As Xiaoyun stood on the stage, all of the soldiers were already standing in the training field, waiting for the announcement.

Everyone knew what was upcoming, as the whole town already knew the military was going to undergo a massive change.

"Good morning everyone. I hope you all enjoyed your break and spent your time wisely.

Today, I'm here happy to announce, as the commander-in-chief of the emergency National Reclamation government..."

Xiaoyun paused for a second, then continued.

"Comrade Yezi and Comrade Yiming will be promoted to the rank of General."

The crowds of soldiers instantly started clapping, with Yiming's soldier clapping even louder than everyone else.

"They will be leading a Corp, one focused on the East and the other focused on the West.

Specifically, Yiming will focus on Dongguan and Shenzhen. Yezi will be focusing on Zhaoqing and Jiangmen."

The soldiers held their breath, waiting for Xiaoyun to finish, as this was going to be their upcoming deployment.

"Under Yiming's corp, Colonel Zhen Ren, Colonel Li Miao, Colonel Fei Gan, Colonel Li Qing, and Colonel Yan Lin will be transferred to his command."

Almost all of Yiming's officers looked a little excited, as if they were expecting Xiaoyun to assign them to Yezi instead.

"Under Yezi's corp will be Colonel Han Bang, Colonel Ningjing, Colonel Mingxu, Colonel Tan Pi, and Colonel Bai Bing."

The soldiers under that Colonel let out a sigh of relief as they were assigned to the easier groups with Yezi.

Except for the three newly promoted Colonels, who were completely caught off guard by the promotion.

"Mingxu, you're a colonel now!" Ningjing excitedly yelled out loud as everyone started clapping.

"Thank you, commander!" All three of the newly promoted Colonels yelled back.

"You all earned it... Ahem, there will also be a newly formed Independent motorized Division led by Lingang.

His Division will be stationed in the North towards Qingyuan as the main defensive position until further notice."

Lingang looked disappointed, but he didn't complain, knowing the strategic value of holding towards Qingyuan in the north.

Just as everyone thought the announcement was over, Xiaoyun finally dropped the bombshell news.

"One last announcement... Everyone below the rank of Colonel will be reshuffled into different units."

Xiaoyun stepped down the stage, leaving no time for people to react, as Yezi and Yiming both started clapping.

Everyone started clapping as well, but their head was confused by what Xiaoyun meant by the reshuffle.

As the soldiers waited for an explanation, several people from the logistics office stepped up to the stage with stacks of paper.

"For the names that we called out, please come up and get your relocated unit placement."

With more and more names from Corporal ranks leading the Platoon to the Lieutenant Colonel leading the brigades, a line began to form.

More people from the logistics department came up to the stage, and they passed a piece of paper to each of them.

As each person received the paper, they finally understood what Xiaoyun meant by reshuffling.

They were now working with completely different units or even completely different commanders above them.

Even Yiming's soldiers who came with him were being broken up into other units, some even moving all the way to Yezi's group.

The only ones who didn't undergo too much reshuffling were Ningjing and Bai Bing, who led the army's Female Divisions.

"Yezi, how many women serve in the army?" Xiaoyun suddenly asked as the three of them watched the soldiers starting to get into formation.

"About 20% of the army is women... But if we are to count the logistic department, then around 50%."

"That's a drastic drop..."

Xiaoyun murmured as he remembered the army used to be almost 50/50 in terms of gender makeup.

"Well, most of them took the option to retire when offered or when the logistics department became a thing."

---

By the time the unit had gotten to know each other, it was almost noon.

Unable to host so many soldiers in one training field, Xiaoyun sent Yezi's corps to begin heading towards Foshan to practice clean-up.

Meanwhile, Yiming's corps was sent on its way to Guangzhou to practice at their training field before going to Dongguan.

Only Lingang's Division remained, and it also went off a few hours later to give his soldiers more time to practice with each other.

With the training field almost empty, besides the logistics department and security guards, Xiaoyun felt a little empty.

Espeically with both Yiming and Yezi going, it just felt a little weird not to see them being around.

Having nothing much to do at this point, Xiaoyun headed over to the administrative office to pitch an idea to Yuqi.

"Look who decided to show up... You finished the military reform?" Yuqi asked as she remained in her seat.

"Yeah, just finished sending them on their merry way... Hey Qiqi, do you know how many people are in the military?"

Xiaoyun suddenly asked as he took a seat across from her, waiting for her to respond.

"How am I supposed to know? Look it up yourself."

Xiaoyun didn't hesitate as he turned Yuqi's laptop to his side before opening the statistic document.

After searching for a bit, he finally found the exact number employed by the military.

"300,000 employed by the military... Damn, that's a pretty low number——"

"What do you mean low? That's like almost 25% of the population in the military."

Yuqi argued as she finally put her work down to look over to Xiaoyun, who seemed to be scheming something.

"Well, only 250,000 people are active soldiers. The other 50,000 are in the logistics department or working in the military factories."

"Just get to the point."

"Fine. Well, Yezi and I had planned to have militias to defend their cities rather than the soldiers."

"Yeah, I know that. Didn't you already allocate the war bond's money for that?"

"About that... We already have them hired—5,000 militias for each city for self-defense."

'Okay... Wait, let me guess, you wanted to expand the military again." Yuqi questioned as she realized what he was trying to imply.

"Oh my Qiqi, you read my mind like a book. How did you know I was about to ask that?"

"It's too obvious. And no, I'm not going to fund that either. You're going to come up with the money yourself."

Xiaoyun fell into silence, knowing he couldn't do another round of war bonds without draining the money supply against consumer goods.

He couldn't just print more food stamps either, as inflation was already starting to rear its ugly head again.

However, he found a statistic that allowed him to double down on the computer.

"Yuqi, have you read the unemployment rate in Guangzhou? It's almost fifty percent," Xiaoyun pointed out.

"That's what I've been trying to solve for the past few weeks. There's just not enough jobs for people over there..."

As Yuqi replied to Xiaoyun, she suddenly realized the answer was right before him.

"It's the perfect time to expand the military. We can have them do something rather than just giving the bare minimum to them for free."

After a short silence, Yuqi finally accepted Xiaoyun's proposal. But still, she had one concern.

"How are you going to feed these soldiers? We don't have enough food to support them in full-time training.

The food from Foshan is barely enough to keep them away from starvation."

"Trust me. I got this. You don't have to worry about the food. Just allocate some of the funds over to pay their salary."

Seeing Xiaoyun looking so confident, Yuqi had no choice besides putting her trust in him.

"Fine. I can allocate half of the budget intended to address the unemployment there.

You better spend it wisely, or else I'm going to disband it faster than you can hire it."

"Of course."

---

After getting the funding needed, Xiaoyun immediately drove over to Guangzhou alone.

Arriving at the administrative building of Guangzhou, he showed the mayor the plan and the order to withdraw food stamps from the bank.

With no time to waste, Guangzhou's mayor immediately gathered his entire office to advertise the job opportunity.

Meanwhile, Xiaoyun drove straight back to the training field in Luoping before heading towards one of the military storage units.

After giving all of the storage guards an early day off, Xiaoyun headed inside, only to see that only one-fifth of the space was full.

"Geez, they really did take all the food with them," Xiaoyun murmured as he thought back to Yezi and Yiming's request.

As he stood in the empty area, he began creating crates of canned food out of thin air and arranging them in an organized stack.

Almost after spending two hours non-stop creating the food, Xiaoyun was finally done with the first storage unit.

Next, he headed to the second storage unit and filled it with food again until the night shift guards came by.

"Ahem, watch the stuff inside carefully, okay? A few trucks just came over to unload more food from Foshan."

"Yes, sir!"

The five guards watched Xiaoyun walk away, his head slightly tilted as if he had a headache.

"Fuck... I overdid it." Xiaoyun thought to himself as he began to head back home.

He could feel his body completely drained as if his ability had come to a complete halt.