Thinking of this, a layer of cold sweat broke out over Yan Changfeng’s body. Her hands and feet felt ice-cold. Her biological emergency evasion instinct gave her an urge to turn and run, but it was almost her turn in line. Leaving abruptly now would only draw more attention to herself.
“I only picked this much trash today. I don’t know how many Star Coins it’ll sell for,” the middle-aged woman said, looking distressed.
Yan Changfeng looked at the woman’s half-filled sack, and an idea came to mind. “Auntie, I just remembered I have an urgent matter to attend to at home. Could I trouble you to sell this trash for me? I only need 800 Star Coins for it.”
She had just glanced over and estimated that these metal materials were worth about 1,000 Star Coins.
Yan Changfeng didn’t dare ask for too low a price for fear of making the middle-aged woman suspicious, but she couldn’t ask for too much either. She had to settle for a middle-ground price.
The middle-aged woman looked at the sack of metal materials, stunned by this windfall. “Really? But it’s almost our turn.”
Yan Changfeng explained, “There are still nearly thirty people ahead of us. It’ll take at least a star hour. Something happened at home, and I have to get back immediately.”
“Alright, I’ll transfer the Star Coins to you.”
Yan Changfeng revealed the wristband on her arm. Once she confirmed the Star Coins had arrived, she handed the sack to the middle-aged woman. She then pulled her windbreaker tight and blended into the departing crowd to leave the recycling station.
It wasn’t until she was a kilometer away and could see almost no sign of guards that Yan Changfeng’s tensed nerves finally relaxed slightly. But now was not the time to be complacent.
She remembered what the child had said—many people were already being blocked at their doors for testing, and a cordon would be set up tonight.
Setting up a cordon meant they were determined to find someone.
The garbage dump was no longer safe.
Yan Changfeng immediately ran toward the unsafe building. When she arrived, she had seen vehicles heading that way. She estimated they hadn’t arrived yet, and she still had time to retrieve the remaining nutrient solutions before fleeing.
By the time Yan Changfeng reached the unsafe building, an off-road vehicle was already parked near the nearby buildings. It was the same model she had seen in No Man’s Land yesterday, and her heart sank further.
Fortunately, those people hadn’t yet searched the area where she was staying.
Yan Changfeng headed up the stairs. The entire building was silent, save for the sound of her own footsteps. Occasionally, there was the creak of a door opening, but it quickly returned to silence.
At the corner, her straw mat and rags were still where she had left them. The nutrient solutions wrapped in the rags were untouched. Yan Changfeng tucked them into her pocket. The medicine bottles were specially made, so she didn’t have to worry about them breaking during her escape.
Yan Changfeng stood up to leave, but as she turned, she caught sight of an extremely faint point of light in the corner of the wall. Had it not been for her Spiritual Eyes, she never would have noticed it.
The hair on Yan Changfeng’s body stood on end. Fear, tension, and alertness collided within her. In an instant, several thoughts and possibilities flashed through her mind. Her Spiritual Eyes instinctively expanded to the extreme, and the entire building seemed to be reconstructed in her mind. In a split second, she saw the people hidden in various blind spots.
A Rat-eyed Man was in the adjacent room, watching her through a monitor. “It’s her! That’s her! She must be the person you’re looking for!”
The image in her mind only lasted for a single breath before Yan Changfeng felt a splitting headache. She endured the discomfort and slowly walked down the stairs. The people in the shadows were still observing her. The reason they hadn’t attacked directly was likely because they wanted to capture her alive.
She could only gamble. She had to get as far down the stairs as possible before they realized she knew, otherwise, she had no chance of escaping from this high up.
After descending a few more floors, the pain in her head subsided significantly, and her Spiritual Eyes gradually began to function again. The pitch-black hallway appeared as bright as if an incandescent light had been shone through it, and the surveillance camera hidden in the corner stared right back at her.
Yan Changfeng: “…”
The next second, Yan Changfeng smashed through the window next to the stairs and jumped down. At the same time, three men in black clothes rushed out of the adjacent room, watching helplessly as she leaped from the window.
“After her!”
Yan Changfeng had jumped from the third floor. Although her physique had been enhanced once and was far superior to her previous “bean sprout” body, it was still a fall from a three-story height. She felt the bone in her right arm snap.
Fortunately, aside from her arm, she had no other injuries.
The people passing by were startled by the commotion, and screams rang out. Footsteps echoed from the entrance of the building behind her. Yan Changfeng looked at the off-road vehicle parked at the door, and without hesitation, she kicked open the window and jumped inside.
Yan Changfeng didn’t know how to drive. She had barely even seen such a thing before, only having read about them in old books. She could only rely on her intuition and the knowledge she had gleaned from those books to stomp on the accelerator.
With a roar, the car lunged forward.
As it turned out, you couldn’t rely on luck for things you didn’t know how to do. Before the car had even traveled a few dozen meters, it slammed head-first into a nearby tree.
The tree was knocked crooked, the front of the car was crumpled, and Yan Changfeng was thrown out.
She tumbled several times before crashing into a garbage pile. A nauseating stench of rot surrounded her, and some unknown trash began to leak acidic fluid onto her overcoat.
Outside the garbage pile, the men in black had already caught up, but they didn’t notice Yan Changfeng buried in the trash. Instead, they assumed she had run into a nearby building and rushed up the stairs to catch her.
Yan Changfeng didn’t know whether to feel lucky or lament her terrible misfortune.
Holding her breath, she peeked through a gap in the trash. Once she confirmed all the men in black had entered the building, she carefully pushed the trash aside and crawled out.
A person nearby picking through the trash was startled.
“Holy shit, how is there a person in there!”
“Stinks like hell. Probably got drunk and fell asleep in the trash.”
“God, what is that smell?”
It wasn’t just those people who couldn’t stand it; Yan Changfeng herself couldn’t bear the odor. She quickly discarded her acid-soaked overcoat, and the stench on her body faded slightly.
She knew she couldn’t stay here. Once those people found nothing, they would quickly emerge from the building and search the garbage pile.
Thinking of this, Yan Changfeng turned and ran deeper into the garbage dump. She checked the time on her wristband. There was still half a star hour before the garbage truck returned to the city area. She still had time.
The garbage trucks traveling between the garbage dump and the city area always arrived at fixed times to dump trash before returning.
Now that the entire garbage dump was blocked, the only way Yan Changfeng could think of to evade the search was to secretly hide in a garbage truck and follow it to the city area.
By the time Yan Changfeng found a garbage truck, the dumping phase was mostly complete. She glanced at the garbage truck whose rear compartment was about to close and immediately abandoned the idea of hiding inside.
Setting aside the question of how she would get out once she reached the city area, the smell inside would likely cause her to faint before she even got there.
Yan Changfeng narrowed her eyes. The sound of the men in black searching had already reached her. She immediately crawled under the garbage truck and gripped the frame of the chassis with her left hand.
The men in black searched the area for a while before moving on to another location.
Soon, the garbage truck started up. As Yan Changfeng had expected, the guards at the cordon only performed a cursory check before letting it pass.
The garbage truck swayed and bumped along the way, nearly turning Yan Changfeng’s brain into mush.
Upon reaching the outskirts of the city area and ensuring she was far enough from the garbage dump, Yan Changfeng took the opportunity to let go and rolled into the bushes by the side of the road.
She lay there for a few moments, panting, until the ringing in her head subsided. Then, enduring the pain all over her body, she crawled up from the ground.
Her dislocated right arm was still throbbing. In her haste to escape, she hadn’t had time to check her injuries. Now that she could finally breathe, Yan Changfeng gritted her teeth and set the dislocated arm herself before tearing a piece of cloth from her clothes to make a simple sling.
Although she looked wretched, she hadn’t sustained any injuries more serious than the newly set arm.
Yan Changfeng looked around. She wasn’t far from the city area, and it would take about ten minutes to get there on foot. There were plenty of hotels near the city area; she could find one to stay in first.
As for whether the people searching the garbage dump would come to the city area, Yan Changfeng wasn’t too worried. The area covered by the garbage dump was so vast it would take them a month to search it all. She had time to figure out a way to leave.
With the immediate danger gone, Yan Changfeng’s tensed nerves relaxed slightly. She wrapped her remaining undergarment tightly around herself and shivered.
As the saying goes: a person won’t always be unlucky, but when they are, it’s downright inhuman.
Yan Changfeng hadn’t been walking for more than a few minutes when a wolf’s howl echoed nearby.
It was possible to encounter wild beasts that had escaped from No Man’s Land, as there was more than one hole in the barbed wire fence. Beasts occasionally wandered out by accident, but the chances of encountering one were minuscule, no different from winning the lottery.
Yan Changfeng was about to pull out her dagger in frustration, but the wolf’s howl gradually moved away from her, as if it were chasing someone else.
Since it was none of her business, Yan Changfeng put her dagger away and continued forward.
She had only taken one step when a sound like a child’s crying reached her ears.
Yan Changfeng froze for a moment and cursed under her breath.
“God damn it!”
She pulled her dagger out again and ran toward the sound of the crying.
When Yan Changfeng arrived, a little girl around ten years old, wearing a pink, puffy dress, was sitting on a tree branch, wailing loudly. Under the tree, two wolves were circling, watching her intently.
Their silvery-white fur seemed to emit a cold chill under the moonlight. Their mouths were open, revealing sharp fangs, and their golden vertical pupils were fixed on the little girl in the tree.
Sensing Yan Changfeng’s approach, the two Silver Wolves turned warily. One of them let out a roar and lunged straight at her, its fangs reflecting the cold light. A single moment of inattention would mean a torn throat.
Under the influence of her Spiritual Eyes, the Silver Wolf’s speed slowed significantly. Yan Changfeng kicked out hard, striking it squarely in the neck. At the same time, her dagger lashed out, leaving a trail of blood in the air. The once terrifying Silver Wolf let out a scream and struggled on the ground, blood spraying from its neck.
The other Silver Wolf hesitated for a moment before also pouncing, meeting the same fate as its companion.
Yan Changfeng looked up at the little girl in the tree. The girl seemed terrified; the area around her eyes was red, and tears were still welling up, as if she were ready to burst into another round of crying at any moment.
Meeting Yan Changfeng’s gaze, the little girl shuddered and gripped the tree trunk even tighter.
Yan Changfeng didn’t immediately rescue the girl from the tree, giving her some time to calm down while she knelt and efficiently skinned the two Silver Wolves.
The meat of a Silver Wolf was mediocre and likely wouldn’t sell well, but the pelts were quite valuable.
Jiang Xiaoyu continued to sob quietly, but her gaze shifted to Yan Changfeng, who was busy working below. She wiped her tears, then turned the wristband of her light brain and scanned the surroundings thoughtfully.
…
After finishing her work, Yan Changfeng looked up toward the little girl again. Her pupils suddenly constricted, and alarm bells went off in her head.
The girl was clutching the tree trunk with one hand, her legs flailing in the air as she tried to climb further up. But her legs were clearly too short, and her hand was slipping down the trunk. She was about to fall, yet her face was flushed red as she stubbornly refused to call for help.
Without thinking, Yan Changfeng’s body lunged forward. She stepped onto the tree trunk and caught the little girl.
Even though she was nearly fuming with frustration, Yan Changfeng couldn’t bring herself to scare the child. She softened her tone and asked with a stern face, “Are you hurt anywhere?”
The little girl blinked and shook her head, then suddenly scrunched up her face.
“Sister, you… ugh, you smell a bit bad.”
Though she knew she shouldn’t get upset with a brat, Yan Changfeng’s expression cracked for a moment. She set the brat on the ground. “Where is your family?”
“I… I…” The little girl’s eyes darted around as she stammered, “I’m lost. Sister, can you take me back with you first?”
Yan Changfeng said coldly, “No.”
“Why?”
“I don’t even have a place to stay myself. How can I take you in? Stop causing trouble and go home.”
Yan Changfeng felt her head growing heavier. Now that the pressure of life and death had lifted, the aftermath of exhausting her mental power was setting in. She wanted nothing more than to find a safe place and sleep soundly.
The most she could do was wait until the girl’s family came to pick her up.
To Yan Changfeng’s surprise, the little girl was incredibly stubborn. She insisted she was lost and wouldn’t change her story. Even when asked for her family’s contact information, she remained silent.
Don’t ask—if you do, she’s just a child with a bad memory.
Fortunately, this wasn’t her own child, or Yan Changfeng would have definitely slapped her.
Left with no other choice, Yan Changfeng, carrying the two wolf pelts and followed by the young girl, found a decent-looking hotel. To save money, she only opened one room.
Seeing the remaining balance of 900 Star Coins in her account, she felt a pang of regret.
Fortunately, after the Normal Skill Card Pool was opened, the system stopped automatically deducting Star Coins from her account. Otherwise, she would be out on the streets by now.
Along the way, Yan Changfeng tried to get the address of the girl’s family, intending to offload this troublesome burden first thing tomorrow morning. But the little girl wasn’t stupid. Aside from learning her name was Jiang Xiaoyu, Yan Changfeng didn’t get a single word out of her.
Yan Changfeng gritted her teeth. “You’re going to be a real pro at handling intelligence one day.”
Jiang Xiaoyu blinked. “Sister, what are you talking about? I don’t understand.”
Because she had consumed so much energy, Yan Changfeng painfully drank two nutrient solutions for dinner. Seeing Jiang Xiaoyu’s longing gaze, she softened for a moment and handed her one. As she gave it to her, she warned, “I’m selling this to you. Remember to pay me back when you get home.”
On this Trash Star, people struggled just to survive; no one had the luxury of wearing pretty dresses. One look at Jiang Xiaoyu’s clothes told her she wasn’t from an ordinary family.
Jiang Xiaoyu took the nutrient solution and gulped it down in a few swallows. She licked the last two drops from her lips and stared at the remaining three, her eyes full of longing. Yan Changfeng quickly hid the nutrient solutions in her shirt.
“Sister, your nutrient solution tastes better than any I’ve had before. Where did you buy it?”
Yan Changfeng replied, “It’s an ancestral recipe. One bottle costs ten thousand Star Coins. Remember to pay me back when you get home.”
She calculated in her head: one card draw cost ten thousand energy, and ten thousand energy was equal to ten thousand Star Coins. Therefore, one nutrient solution was worth approximately ten thousand Star Coins.
The system was definitely robbing her.
Hearing Yan Changfeng’s words, Jiang Xiaoyu was clearly disappointed. She curled herself into a ball and tucked herself into the covers. After a while, she felt something was wrong and poked her head out, shifting over to make room for Yan Changfeng.
“Sister, let’s sleep.”
Yan Changfeng: What an inversion of roles.
Exhausted of mental power, Yan Changfeng didn’t have the energy to argue with Jiang Xiaoyu. She just wanted a good night’s sleep. As for everything else, she would leave it for tomorrow. She no longer had the strength to think.