The two men kept their eyes straight ahead. They didn’t even need to exchange a glance, simply waiting quietly.
Bai Mingxi was just thinking that if he told the brothers back at Dawn Base about everything he had witnessed today, they would be so shocked their eyeballs would practically fall out.
Thinking of Dawn Base inevitably reminded him of Xiao Ziran, and a sour feeling rose in his heart.
In fact, before the apocalypse, Chu Tian and Bai Mingxi had heard plenty about scenes like the one they had just witnessed. Although they had never participated in such things, stories of similar affairs had always circulated within their social circle as gossip and jokes.
The two of them had become lifelong best friends because they shared similar temperaments. Naturally, they had always held such things in the utmost contempt. Later, Chu Tian had found an opportunity to escape that circle and run off to S City, and Bai Mingxi had immediately followed him.
Just as they had settled their thoughts on the past, the business inside the room finally came to an end. With a creak, the door slowly opened.
The person who opened it was a woman. Her face was flushed, her hair was still disheveled, and she wore a thin silk nightgown draped over her body. Several patches of skin showed faintly through the fabric, tinged with a reddish hue.
Her steps were somewhat unsteady. From the moment she opened the door, she kept her head lowered. Chu Tian and Bai Mingxi merely glanced at her a few times before entering the room without looking sideways.
The room was furnished like an office, except that the sofa in the reception area was somewhat disheveled. Several objects that looked completely out of place in an office environment lay beside it, bearing traces of blood.
An unpleasant smell filled the room. They had probably sprayed perfume to cover it up, but all it had done was make the air even more pungent.
Apart from the brief glances they had given her when entering, neither man looked at the woman by the door again. However, after secretly raising her eyes and seeing Chu Tian and Bai Mingxi’s faces clearly, the woman’s eyes widened in shock.
She quickly suppressed her emotions, though. Keeping her head lowered, she walked out of the room and closed the door behind her.
It was them! They were still alive! And they still looked so clean and full of vitality.
Compared with when she had first met them, they had become even more outstanding and conspicuous!
The woman’s heart was filled with complicated emotions. Why was it that, despite everyone living through the same apocalypse, people’s fates could be so vastly different?
Inside the room, a middle-aged man sat upright behind the office desk.
He had already tidied himself up and was sitting straight-backed. His skin was very fair, his manner refined and scholarly, and his appearance was the sort that could easily inspire goodwill.
If not for the traces and odors still lingering in the room, Bai Mingxi would almost have suspected that everything he had heard outside the door had been an auditory hallucination.
“Greetings, Mr. Gu.” Chu Tian bent forward slightly as a gesture of respect. “My name is Chu Tian. I’m honored to have received your invitation. May I ask what you wish to discuss with us?”
This man looked like the very picture of a respectable scoundrel, the sort who would probably appreciate such formalities. They only knew that he was the second-in-command of this base, and had no idea how to address him. So Chu Tian had simply called him “Mister.” In ancient times, the title “Mister” was used for learned and respected people. The other man should understand the implication.
Mr. Gu seemed pleased by the address. He then turned his gaze toward Bai Mingxi.
Bai Mingxi immediately introduced himself. “Bai Mingxi.”
Only then did Mr. Gu nod and speak.
“Young Master Chu and Young Master Bai, I must apologize for inviting you here so abruptly today. I hope I haven’t caused either of you any alarm.”
“You’re too courteous, Mr. Gu. To receive an invitation from such an esteemed person when we’ve only just arrived is a great honor.” Chu Tian exchanged pleasantries with a faint smile, though inwardly he felt somewhat annoyed.
Then he couldn’t help mocking himself. This was, after all, what his life had originally been like. He had never expected that after hiding away for a few years, he would return and find himself unaccustomed to it.
“I am an unworthy man who was entrusted with a heavy responsibility in a time of crisis and appointed Administrative Executive Director of this city. I did indeed invite you here abruptly because there is something I wish to discuss.”
Seeing that Chu Tian and Bai Mingxi kept addressing him simply as “Mr. Gu,” he apparently thought they hadn’t fully understood his position, so he took the opportunity to clarify it.
Once he said that, Chu Tian immediately understood.
Administrative Executive Director meant he was the highest-ranking official in charge of administration. It seemed that Liming Base had separated military and civil governance. The person in the top position on the military side would therefore be the one who controlled the army.
“However, I heard that when you entered the city, you were accompanied by more than just the two of you…”
Mr. Gu continued.
“Oh, that’s right. There are five of us in total. We were passing through this area and thought we’d stay here for a few days to rest before continuing our journey. Since we were invited here, we should naturally have come as a group. However, we have a child, two pets, and another person who, despite being an adult, has the intelligence of a child. Those three can be rather troublesome. We were afraid they might cause some breach of etiquette if they all came along, so we left them waiting in the outer courtyard and had another companion stay behind to look after them.”
Chu Tian’s explanation sounded perfectly reasonable. There was nothing in it that could be used against them.
After receiving this explanation, Director Gu quickly moved on. After all, he only needed one person capable of making decisions to have a conversation with.
“May I ask whether you two young gentlemen came from Capital Base?”
As he asked this question, a sharp glint appeared in Director Gu’s eyes.
Hmph! Capital Base may have been divided among several major factions, each governing its own territory, but they still possessed the most advanced secrets available. And they had absolutely no intention of sharing them with other bases.
They had continually sent people out to gather information, but all they had obtained was vague news that crystal cores could improve ability users’ powers.
Chu Tian and Bai Mingxi both spoke standard Mandarin with a northern official accent, so naturally, people assumed they had come from the capital.
Although Liming Base maintained frequent contact with Capital Base, most of that interaction involved exchanging various supplies. They had never managed to reach the other base’s core leadership. Now Chu Tian and his group had appeared so conspicuously that they naturally drew considerable attention.
What Director Gu had never expected, however, was that when he asked the question, Chu Tian and Bai Mingxi would shake their heads together.
“We didn’t come from Capital Base. On the contrary, we’re on our way there,” Chu Tian replied with a faint smile.
Director Gu was startled. This was an answer he hadn’t anticipated, and the speech he had prepared suddenly escaped him.
Chu Tian, however, remained composed.
“We’re originally from the capital. We came all the way from the south and are now heading back to Beijing to see whether our relatives are still alive.”
Director Gu was startled once again.
The south?!
No one had arrived from the south for several months! The entirety of T Province had become a world of monsters. It was an extremely dangerous place!
He recalled the report from the city gate: these people had arrived in a high-end off-road vehicle, looking completely composed and well-equipped. His astonishment made him regard them with even greater respect.
“The south? Which city did you come from? What is the situation down there now?” Director Gu asked hurriedly.
He was also a southerner who had fled north with the army, so naturally, he was concerned about the situation in the south.
“We came from S City. Almost all the cities in the south have been overrun by zombies. Most of the survivors have now taken refuge in the countryside, where they’ve established bases of various sizes, scattered here and there. None of them are as large as this place, though,” Chu Tian answered.
Every word was true. Almost all the cities in the south had been destroyed, with huge numbers of zombies remaining inside. They were no longer habitable.
Both Dawn Base and Tianze Base had been established around small towns that already existed before the apocalypse. They had reclaimed the surrounding land and rebuilt their settlements from scratch.
Liming Base, on the other hand, had clearly been established within a city. These cities had remained relatively intact. Once the zombies were cleared out, the survivors could rebuild and reinforce the defenses.
“How did you make it through T Province? That place has already…”
“That’s right. It has become a domain ruled by mutated plants and mutated beasts.” Chu Tian nodded. “Even the zombies don’t dare enter that area lightly.”
“But—”
Chu Tian changed the subject, smiling with a hint of slyness.
“We have a Beast Tamer! Combined with my mutated ability, we don’t need to fear mutated beasts. As for the mutated plants, once you figure out their patterns, you just need to avoid them carefully. If you really can’t get around them, then all that’s left is to fight. We have a high-level fire-type ability user, and fire happens to be quite effective against those things.”
Those few sentences from Chu Tian actually contained a tremendous amount of information. An old fox like Director Gu could naturally extract plenty of details from them.
For example, the young man before him possessed a mutated-type ability. There was also a fire-type ability user among the group. With a Beast Tamer accompanying them, traveling through T Province would be much safer. And T Province had become so dangerous that even zombies could barely survive there.
Director Gu remained silent for a moment, digesting this string of revelations.
He had initially been a little disappointed that these people hadn’t come from Capital Base.
“Not only that, but we also brought a piece of news from the south that we intend to deliver to Capital Base,” Chu Tian added, smoothly dangling the bait.
“What news?” Director Gu immediately asked, his expression turning serious.
This time, however, Chu Tian didn’t answer at once. Instead, he smiled meaningfully.
Director Gu suddenly understood.
This man named Chu Tian was holding onto the information and waiting to see how much he could get for it!
So he immediately changed his approach.
“I wonder what the news Young Master Chu has concerns?”
Chu Tian simply smiled and said four words.
“Crystal cores. Leveling up.”
Director Gu became instantly excited!
They had gone to great lengths to obtain only the information that ability users’ advancement was related to crystal cores. They had only recently begun collecting them. Yet with just four words, Chu Tian had identified everything they currently knew.
It was obvious that Chu Tian knew much more, and there was a very good chance he possessed exactly the information they were desperately eager to obtain. If so, this news was certainly valuable.
Thinking this through, he also immediately understood why Chu Tian had deliberately made such a conspicuous entrance.
Originally, he had assumed that these young masters from the capital had come out to enjoy themselves because they admired the reputation of the Spiritual Healing Center.
But now he understood. They had deliberately drawn attention to themselves to lure in a “big fish” like him, hoping to sell the information they possessed.
Liming Base was the closest major base to the south, so they had come here first. If they couldn’t find a buyer here, they would continue to Qiguang Base and might even go all the way to Capital Base. As long as they knew more than the bases themselves did, they could command a price.
And now, they had appeared right in front of him at their very first stop.
This was his opportunity!
Once he had figured all this out, Director Gu’s heart began to churn with excitement. His fingers trembled uncontrollably for an instant.
To be the first to master the method of advancing one’s abilities!
He was an ability user himself, enjoying all the prestige and privileges his powers brought him. If he could keep increasing his abilities without limit and surpass everyone else, he would be able to remain at the very top of the pyramid forever, enjoying supreme and boundless power.