Outside the window, a catastrophic apocalyptic rain poured down over the earth. Inside the vehicle, a bright lamp illuminated a table filled with steaming, delicious food, accompanied by the presence of a loved one. Under such circumstances, anyone would find this scene warm and full of happiness.
Consequently, any uninvited guests who dared disrupt this atmosphere were met with an even greater sense of loathing.
It was at this exact moment that Chang Xinqian made her appearance.
In fact, Chi Zheng had already sensed her approach the second she walked toward the door, but he didn’t move. The vending cart was Lin Xia’s ability, and it couldn’t be kept a secret forever. Moreover, the members of the other squad posed absolutely no threat to him, so he figured he might as well see what they wanted.
Chang Xinqian had clearly come prepared. She had meticulously dressed herself up, carrying the full presence of an elite ability user.
However, the moment she opened the door, she froze.
What was going on here?!
Why on earth was there a street vending cart parked on the rooftop?!
Furthermore, this cart actually had electricity? It could light up?!
One had to know that power had already been cut throughout the entire Fourth District. Could a crappy iron cart like this actually be equipped with a storage battery? She had been wondering why those two boys stayed outside and refused to return to the warehouse; as it turned out, they had gotten their hands on something good and wanted to keep it all to themselves.
Thinking this way, Chang Xinqian’s eyes burned with even greater fervor.
She composed herself, stepping forward with a stride that was as composed and elegant as possible.
It was a stroke of luck that a rain canopy had been installed over this section of the warehouse rooftop. Otherwise, given the torrential downpour, Chang Xinqian would have been drenched like a drowned rat the moment she took a single step, leaving her with no dignity to speak of.
She reached out and knocked on the door of the vending cart.
Lin Xia poked his head out.
“Can I help you?”
“I want to talk business with you.”
“We don’t have enough lobster for ourselves. Not selling.”
Chang Xinqian: “…”
She forced herself to maintain her smile.
“It’s not about the lobster. It’s about this.”
As she spoke, she produced a bottle of packaged water.
“A spatial ability user joining your squad—are you interested?”
A spatial ability user?
Lin Xia looked at her with curiosity.
He had vaguely heard that there was a spatial ability user in the neighboring squad, but he had never actually seen how a spatial ability user manifested their power.
So it was just like a magic trick, whipping things out with a sudden swish!
Chi Zheng was a bit displeased by the way Lin Xia was looking at someone else. He pulled him back inside and shut the window display directly.
Chang Xinqian: “…”
Refusing to give up, she knocked on the vehicle door again.
“A 100-square-meter personal portable space, loaded to maximum capacity with all kinds of supplies, in exchange for a spot to escort me to the Capital District?!”
“We’re not going. Not interested,” Chi Zheng’s voice drifted out coldly. “Beat it, quickly.”
It was already impossible for them to allow an outsider to join them in the first place, let alone now that Lin Xiaxia had awakened a vending cart that could shield them from the wind and rain. Who cared about some 100-square-meter space?
Chang Xinqian was nearly thrown off balance by her sheer anger.
Ever since she awakened her ability, who hadn’t coddled and catered to her wherever she went? Countless ability squads practically begged her to join them, yet these two boys were utterly blind to her value!
“Sorry, we’re not heading to the Capital District.” Lin Xia poked his head out again.
He felt that Chi Zheng’s tone just now had been quite rude, so he came over to smooth things over himself.
“There are only two of us, and the vending cart doesn’t have its own power source. It requires someone to push it along. We really can’t travel to a place that far away.”
“Your previous squad has decent capabilities. It’s safer for you to go with them.”
Chang Xinqian hadn’t expected the detail that the vending cart required manual pushing. Upon hearing this, her eyes darted back and forth.
“Then we can look for a vehicle. I know of a logistics center that has every kind of vehicle imaginable inside.”
“Do you know about the Ring Star Project? The Alliance Academy of Sciences discovered a new habitable planet and is currently recruiting new immigrants. As long as you can get selected, you can secure a ticket to the new colony planet.”
“So don’t daydream about the Alliance managing disaster relief and reconstruction. It’s impossible. Right now, all resources are being directed to secure the Capital District. If the three of us travel together, I can guarantee you won’t have to worry about food or drink. With your combat strength, a three-person team will definitely be able to secure those tickets!”
Chang Xinqian spoke with great agitation, but unfortunately, Lin Xia had absolutely no interest in any project.
He consistently felt that the Alliance authorities wouldn’t be so kind as to openly recruit new immigrants globally. More likely than not, they were sending people to act as lab rats.
He even kindly offered a few words of caution to Chang Xinqian, which caused her face to flush completely red with rage.
Damn it, these two boys are blind to true worth. They deserve to be trapped in the Fourth District for the rest of their lives!
Chang Xinqian stomped away in a furious huff, slamming the rooftop door so hard it made a mountain-shaking racket.
Lin Xia felt rather helpless as well.
He hadn’t intended to pour cold water on her dreams on purpose; it was simply that the Alliance had committed too many wretched deeds in the Fourth District, and their credibility had long since dropped to zero.
For instance, the endless string of various pollution accidents over the past few years, as well as the diverse corruption scandals surrounding successive municipal governors. Even the Academy of Sciences had been secretly…
Huh? What had the Academy of Sciences been secretly doing?
Lin Xia’s mind suddenly went blank. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t remember it at all, and the more he thought about it, the more his head throbbed.
“Chi Zheng, I’m feeling a bit unwell. I’m going to sleep for a bit.”
Chi Zheng frowned. He felt Lin Xia’s forehead, squeezed his hand, and even checked his eyelids, finding nothing unusual with his vital signs.
However, his complexion was indeed very poor. Thus, Chi Zheng laid out the bedding, tucked him in securely, and kept watch by his side.
“Go to sleep. If anything happens, I’ll wake you.”
“Mm.”
With him by his side, Lin Xia fell asleep with complete peace of mind.
A few minutes later, shadows began to gather, wrapping the person along with the blanket into a cocoon. From time to time, golden flashes of lightning coursed through the shadows.
Golden ripples also surged along the edges of Chi Zheng’s pupils. He seemed to have detected something, and his eyes slowly turned toward a specific location, a sudden burst of ferocity flashing between his brows.
Inside the warehouse separated by just a single wall, Chang Xinqian held up a lighter. The dancing flame flickered unpredictably, and what materialized within the core of the flame was precisely Lin Xia’s sleeping face.
What an exceptionally beautiful child. Too bad his judgment is so poor.
Chang Xinqian let out a cold sneer.
This was her second capability.
The lighter was the materialization of her spatial ability. As long as she could map out a target, she could project her ability over, utilizing spatial rules to extract the opponent’s energy and claim it for her own use.
She had already drained many people using this method, with the exception of water-system ability users. The spatial flames could not map out the reflection of a water-system ability user, but she had secretly observed Lin Xia and knew he was merely a physical enhancer.
Assholes, what you rejected wasn’t just some ordinary spatial ability user!
Chang Xinqian opened her five fingers to cup the flame, preparing to activate her ability. Unexpectedly, in the very next second, the image within the flame suddenly changed, and she found herself completely unprepared as she locked eyes with a pair of golden, vertical pupils.
“Have you seen enough?”
A chilling voice echoed from right above her head.
Chang Xinqian’s entire body went rigid as she slowly lifted her head.
Then, the lighter dropped onto the ground with a clack. Someone tried to scream, but the entire space was enveloped in shadows, preventing both light and sound from penetrating through.
Chang Xinqian’s very existence was being erased.
“Chi Zheng… don’t cause trouble…”
Inside the vending cart, Lin Xia tossed and turned, murmuring a faint phrase under his breath.
The shadows paused, suddenly receding like a tide. A slender hand picked up the lighter and gave it a gentle squeeze. The casing, which originally couldn’t be touched by normal means, dented and collapsed before finally bursting like a bubble with a soft pop, shattering completely.
When Chi Zheng returned to the vending cart, Lin Xia was happily snoring away.
He curled over like a cat, slipping his hand under the blanket as he buried his face into the nook of Lin Xia’s neck, his sharp canine teeth gently brushing past the delicate outer ear.
“Stop it.”
He was pushed away slightly, making him a bit dissatisfied, the golden light flashing along the edges of his vertical pupils.
He had done exactly as he was told, so shouldn’t he receive a reward?
But in the end, he didn’t dare say anything. The shadow mass bundled itself tighter, holding the person aggrievedly as he fell asleep.
The next morning, the two of them located an assault boat.
By this time, the water level had already risen past the second floor, and days of heavy rain had completely devastated the city. Lin Xia sat at the stern managing the steering, while Chi Zheng stood at the bow holding two fire axes, clearing away the various obstacles washed over by the water one by one.
Naturally, what needed to be cleared wasn’t just debris, but also the mutant creatures lurking beneath the water.
Clang!
Chi Zheng’s fire axe struck a hard outer shell. It was a two-meter-long mutant lobster, its carapace covered in fluorescent green nodular growths, charging aggressively toward the assault boat.
Lin Xia swerved the steering wheel sharply, and the massive claws scraped past the hull by a hair’s breadth. Chi Zheng seized the opportunity to leap onto the lobster’s back, bringing both axes crashing down fiercely onto the joint connections. Seething with rage from the pain, the lobster tried to hurl Chi Zheng into the water even at the cost of sustaining injuries. However, it had clearly underestimated its opponent’s strength. Within just a minute or two, Chi Zheng cleanly and decisively ended the battle, hacking the lobster into two segments.
“Crystal core.” He fished a yellow crystal core out of the foul-smelling water with a look of disgust.
“This piece of junk isn’t edible; it can only be used as firewood.”
Lin Xia tried holding the crystal, but he didn’t feel the electric shock-like sensation he had gotten from the deep blue crystal core before.
Refusing to give up, he drew the triangular blade and stabbed it a few times, but there was still no reaction.
“What’s wrong?” Chi Zheng asked.
Lin Xia then recounted what he had experienced yesterday.
“It might be because of the Lobster King,” Chi Zheng said thoughtfully as he looked at the lobster carcass bobbing up and down in the water.
“The one we killed yesterday was a Lobster King. Although its tier wasn’t exceptionally high, it counts as a top-tier existence among mutant lobsters. Its crystal core is different from ordinary mutant lobsters.”
“Let’s look for a few more King-tier mutant beasts next time to test it out.”
Hearing him put it that way, Lin Xia didn’t take it too seriously.
Were King-tier mutant beasts some common commodity found all over the streets? How could they be encountered that easily?
The top priority right now was still to go to the supermarket to retrieve the files. While evading the lobster just now, they had accidentally bumped into something, and the assault boat was already damaged. They needed to enter the supermarket’s shopping area before the boat sank.
Fortunately, the central supermarket was only one intersection away from the warehouse, and the windows above the third floor were still accessible above the water surface. The manager’s office had already been broken into, and the inside was ransacked into a complete mess. The survivors who broke in earlier had hauled away everything useful, leaving behind only some useless corporate documents, which happened to play right into Lin Xia and Chi Zheng’s hands.
They very smoothly located the freight storage contract of the Tophet Star Company.
“As expected, Canary City is listed,” Chi Zheng nodded. “Red Fruit City, Xihu Town, Haideba City… they are traveling along Route 34.”
A sudden flash of inspiration hit Lin Xia. Just as he was about to say something, he suddenly felt the floor beneath his feet shake violently.
Before he could figure out what was happening, human screams and the roaring of waves echoed from outside the window.
“Something is coming!”
Chi Zheng decisively stowed away the documents. “We’re leaving through the roof.”
Lin Xia was just about to ask what was going on when, in the next second, he saw a massive centipede violently burst through the water. Countless pairs of legs rained down like arrows, easily overturning several assault boats belonging to the survivor squads.
Chi Zheng scooped him up in one swift motion.
“No time to explain, let’s run!”