“Get up! Get up!” Two star pirates held quantum guns in their hands, pounding on the gym doors with the butts of their weapons.
The people inside the gym jumped in fright. Some of the more timid children were so scared that they started crying.
“Form two lines and follow us off the starship. Move it!” the star pirate barked.
Cheng Li leaned closer to Yuan Mu. “Tighten the waistband of your pants a little.”
Yuan Mu thought he had misheard and looked at her in confusion.
“Hurry up,” Cheng Li urged.
Yuan Mu lowered his head and actually tightened his waistband, his ears turning bright red. But Cheng Li’s attention remained fixed on the star pirates, and she never noticed.
“Done,” Yuan Mu said in a muffled voice.
Hearing that, Cheng Li didn’t even look at him before crouching down in front of him. “Get on.”
Yuan Mu skillfully climbed onto her back and wrapped his arms around her neck. Cheng Li first grabbed one of his pant legs and pinned it between her own legs, then hooked the other one over as well. After catching it, she bit down on the fabric and, relying on her mouth and her one intact left arm, struggled to tie the two pant legs together into a knot.
“There. This way you won’t keep slipping down all the time, and your arms won’t get tired so easily,” Cheng Li said.
Yuan Mu’s heart felt both sour and aching. They had known each other for less than a month. From beginning to end, he had never once given her a pleasant expression. Now that they had been captured by star pirates, even if she abandoned him, he would not have blamed her. After all, she could barely protect herself.
But she hadn’t.
These past few days, she had taken very good care of him.
Why?
They were nothing more than a business marriage without the slightest trace of affection.
Cheng Li carried Yuan Mu on her back as they followed the crowd off the starship.
The moment her feet touched the ground, her heart sank.
This was the worst place she had ever seen.
It was even worse than the apocalypse in her previous life. Back then, the apocalypse had been dangerous, and death could come at any moment, but at least the environment itself had still been livable.
But this place…
How should she describe it?
The land was barren, vegetation nearly nonexistent. As far as the eye could see, there was not a single plant. There were no animals, no traces of human life, no visible water source. Even the oxygen in the air was thin and sparse.
This was clearly a wasteland.
Was the entire planet like this, or just this region?
Cheng Li asked Yuan Mu behind her and received the answer, “This isn’t a planet suitable for human habitation.”
Understanding dawned on her. The entire planet was like this.
The star pirates led them several hundred meters forward, and soon an endless stretch of gray-black mountains appeared in their field of vision.
Not far from them were also several massive piles of things Cheng Li could not recognize.
“You’ve got two hours to build yourselves a place to live in for the next few months, maybe even years. Two hours later, every single one of you will be heading to the mines. Anyone who can’t mine has only one outcome: death.” The star pirate’s tone was vicious, and toward the end, his gaze lingered on Cheng Li and Yuan Mu for several seconds.
“The countdown starts now!”
The crowd instantly scattered, all rushing toward the piled-up materials. Seeing this, Cheng Li also ran forward and said to Yuan Mu behind her, “Tell me what we need, and I’ll carry it.”
Cheng Li only had one arm, and she was carrying Yuan Mu on her back. Yuan Mu listed more than a dozen items in one breath. She memorized them one by one, then casually grabbed one of the items and headed toward the area the star pirates had designated for building shelters.
She set the materials down, then untied Yuan Mu from her back. “Wait here. I’ll go get the rest.”
Yuan Mu gave a quiet hum and watched her hurry away. Missing an arm made it especially difficult for her to maintain balance, so her body swayed far more noticeably as she ran.
To be honest, the posture looked a little awkward.
But in his eyes at that moment, it was unbelievably adorable, so much so that many years later, he still could not forget this scene.
Most of the materials were metal, while some were made from unknown substances. No matter the type, none of them were light.
The metal pieces were manageable. For Cheng Li, they posed little difficulty since she could control their weight. But for the other materials, she could only rely on physical strength.
Sometimes she carried them in her arms, sometimes on her back. Even so, she was not much slower than the able-bodied people around her. The star pirates’ gazes swept over her from time to time, and she suspected that the moment she slowed down or showed signs of failing, they would kill both her and Yuan Mu on the spot.
To survive, she could only grit her teeth and push herself harder.
Yuan Mu was working too.
After all, he had once been the First Seat of the First Military Academy. His abilities in every aspect were exceptional. Assembling a simple shelter was an easy task for him.
At this moment, he forgot all about embarrassment. Relying on the strength of his arms, he moved across the ground, even using his hands to support himself as he leaped around, searching through the pile of tools Cheng Li had brought back for the ones he needed.
By the time Cheng Li had finished hauling everything over, he had already assembled most of the structure.
“I observed the ground and the rocks here. My guess is that this place gets strong winds regularly, probably no weaker than force six or seven. We’ll need to drive support stakes into the ground, and they should go deep,” Yuan Mu said, his expression grim.
“It’s fine. You hold it steady, and I’ll swing the hammer.” Cheng Li gritted her teeth, inwardly lamenting why it had not been her left arm that was lost instead. Her right arm had always been stronger and easier to use.
Yuan Mu could not bring himself to say, “I’ll do it.”
Without his legs, his upper body was heavy while his lower body was too light. He could not even sit steadily, let alone swing a hammer.
At least, not right now.
It seemed he needed to adapt to living without his legs as quickly as possible.
“I’ll test the accuracy first.” Cheng Li gripped the hammer and struck the same spot several times. “Alright, that should do it.”
Yuan Mu gave a quiet hum and struggled to steady the iron stake with both hands. Cheng Li stood beside him. In his current state, he only reached her waist, forcing him to look up at her.
Cheng Li lifted the heavy hammer with her left hand from the ground, swung it in a broad arc, and brought it crashing down onto the stake.
Clang!
The iron stake sank slightly into the ground.
“This ground is ridiculously hard,” Cheng Li complained.
Yuan Mu pressed his lips together and said nothing.
Not far from them, two men were also building a shelter.
“Technology’s already so advanced, so why are these star pirates making us build houses like primitive people?”
“Who knows. Maybe they just enjoy watching us look stupid like this!”
Primitive person Cheng Li: “………”
By the time Cheng Li had driven in two stakes, she was already exhausted. Blisters had formed on the palms of her hands, hands that had clearly never done hard labor before.
Sweat slid down her cheeks and dripped onto Yuan Mu’s face. In the past, with his germophobia, he never would have tolerated it. He probably would have washed his face three times before feeling satisfied.
But now, his hands remained firmly gripping the iron stake. He did not even bother wiping it away.
“Young Master, Young Madam, so you were here. I’ve finally found you.”
Uncle Zhao looked overjoyed. Seeing the miserable state the two of them were in, his eyes instantly reddened.
Cheng Li stopped and looked toward Uncle Zhao apologetically. “There were too many people. We were in a hurry to build the house, so we didn’t go looking for you.”
Wasn’t it crowded? A single starship carried thousands, even tens of thousands of people. Finding someone in all that chaos was no easy task. Besides, with the two of them being burdens in their current state, it was better to figure out how to survive on their own. Otherwise, even if Uncle Zhao was willing to help them, the star pirates would never allow it.
With Uncle Zhao joining them, the shelter had to be made larger. Cheng Li continued hauling materials while Uncle Zhao and Yuan Mu drove the support stakes into the ground. Once all the stakes were set, Cheng Li had also brought back everything they needed. She and Uncle Zhao worked together to build the shelter while Yuan Mu handled assembling the parts. With Uncle Zhao helping, their efficiency improved considerably.
The moment the two hours were up, the star pirates immediately blew their whistles.
“Gather up!”