Originally, Xiao Ziran had intended to maintain an attitude of cooperation and peaceful coexistence toward the surrounding survivor bases. However, when it came to Tianze Base, honestly speaking, he had nothing but contempt for Cai Yuanhan’s conduct during the great disaster in J City.
Furthermore, Thunder Lion, the second-in-command of Tianze Base, was also someone who gave Xiao Ziran a headache just thinking about him.
It wasn’t that they were particularly powerful. It was hard to explain, but this person was as annoying as a cockroach. It was like having a cockroach hiding in your house. You wouldn’t see it most of the time, and it seemed harmless enough. But at critical moments, it would come crawling out to cause trouble. Yet you couldn’t find a good enough reason to turn your entire house upside down just to hunt it down and kill it.
That was more or less how Xiao Ziran felt about Thunder Lion.
Therefore, Xiao Ziran’s consistent attitude toward Tianze Base was to ignore them while maintaining a degree of wariness. If you didn’t provoke me, I would pretend you didn’t exist. If you dared to come looking for trouble, I would show no mercy and beat you mercilessly.
So far, aside from making frequent inquiries about Dawning Base, Tianze Base hadn’t taken any other action. Even so, that was enough to disgust Xiao Ziran for quite some time. He didn’t want to bring up Tianze Base at all, so Ouyang Jing had handled that part of the explanation.
As for the other small bases, they had all sent people to exchange supplies and conduct other transactions. Dawning Base had treated them all amicably.
After hearing the news about Tianze Base, Chu Tian couldn’t help sighing. He expressed a similar sentiment to the one Ouyang Jing had voiced before: Those few flies really knew how to survive! Who knew what Heaven was thinking?
Since nobody particularly wanted to talk about Tianze Base, the conversation returned to crystal cores and the concentrate.
The reward and circulation systems for crystal cores would now be officially implemented. Purified crystal cores would be distributed to the ability users below as rewards for various measures and achievements.
The method of using crystal cores would be made public, but the core secret—that crystal cores needed to be purified, along with the method of purification—would remain in the hands of Dawning Base’s upper management.
The widespread adoption of crystal cores would rapidly increase the strength of the ability users affiliated with Dawning Base.
At the same time, Dawning Base would open its warehouses and release a batch of supplies to promote the circulation of crystal cores, officially designating them as Dawning Base’s currency.
These detailed regulations had been drawn up long ago. Xiao Ziran had simply been waiting for the right moment to introduce them.
Following Chu Tian’s suggestion, all the original team members would switch to using the concentrate instead of crystal cores. Afterward, Xiao Ziran would find suitable wording to explain the situation to the senior personnel without revealing the existence of the concentrate.
Then there was the matter of awakening abilities. Several members of the original team were still ordinary people. Chu Tian would speak with them individually later, and they could voluntarily try to awaken their abilities.
If Chu Tian was right and the ability awakening rate could reach one hundred percent, the method could eventually be used to expand the population of ability users.
After that, there were still various details to discuss. The three of them gathered together and embarked on another lengthy discussion.
After welcoming Chu Tian and Quan Xiaoyu back, everyone returned to their respective duties. After all, Dawning Base was currently in a period of vigorous development, and every department was short of people.
Even Bai Mingxi hadn’t managed to exchange more than a few words with Quan Xiaoyu before he was immediately dragged away by work.
Quan Xiaoyu and Li Nan arrived at the training ground. The first things they saw were Xiao Yu and Xiao Ning, now as big as tigers. The two creatures darted around the training ground, occasionally scratching at one person or rubbing against another. The ability users training there showed them extraordinary tolerance and affection.
Nowadays, they were just like large domestic cats: proud, aloof, and harmless.
The two were playing in the middle of the training ground when they suddenly caught sight of Li Nan. They immediately came bounding toward him.
“They’ve grown so big!” Quan Xiaoyu exclaimed. “And yet they’re still so fat.”
The two creatures had been racing over, eager to pounce on Li Nan and beg for affection. But the moment they heard Quan Xiaoyu say fat, they stopped in their tracks and turned their heads in unison to stare at him.
At first, their eyes held a trace of confusion. They carefully sniffed the air, and when they looked at Quan Xiaoyu again, their eyes were already shining with excitement.
They hadn’t seen him for four months and had nearly failed to recognize him. Fortunately, they still remembered his familiar scent. In the past, Quan Xiaoyu had always been the one who could produce the most food from his pockets.
And so, these two gluttons immediately switched their target from Li Nan to Quan Xiaoyu.
Just as they were about to pounce on Quan Xiaoyu, Xie Mingxuan suddenly let out a roar and charged forward.
Despite their chubby bodies, Xiao Yu and Xiao Ning had extremely quick reflexes. One twisted aside to dodge, then both turned around and lunged straight at Xie Mingxuan.
In the blink of an eye, one man and two beasts were locked in combat.
As it happened, Xie Mingxuan had always lived on a diet of mutated beasts. Now there were two living, breathing mutated beasts right in front of him, and they had even made what looked like an attack on Quan Xiaoyu. Naturally, he wasn’t going to stand for it.
Xiao Yu and Xiao Ning, meanwhile, had hunted all over the place with the ability team ever since they were young. They were practically the team’s beloved mascots. Although they hunted mutated beasts as well, the creatures they killed most often were still zombies, and they were extremely sensitive to the presence of zombies.
Earlier, Xie Mingxuan’s presence had caused them to hesitate when they approached, which was why they had failed to recognize Quan Xiaoyu right away.
The ensuing battle was practically a fight to the death, leaving Quan Xiaoyu and Li Nan frantic with worry.
They desperately didn’t want either side to get hurt.
“Stop!”
The two shouted simultaneously.
But the fighters were so caught up in the battle that they weren’t about to heed the call anytime soon. With no other choice, the two rushed forward. Quan Xiaoyu forcibly threw himself into the fight and separated the opposing sides.
Neither side dared to hurt Quan Xiaoyu, so the battle paused for an instant.
Taking advantage of that brief opening, Li Nan rushed over as well. He grabbed Xiao Yu and Xiao Ning by the scruffs of their necks, one in each hand, and scolded them, “No fighting! He’s not an enemy!”
Xiao Yu and Xiao Ning could fully understand what Li Nan was saying. Although they were still unwilling to give in, they continued to glare at Xie Mingxuan and threateningly swiped their claws in his direction. Nevertheless, they finally stopped attacking.
Meanwhile, after breaking up the fight, Quan Xiaoyu lunged forward and wrapped his arms around the agitated Xie Mingxuan.
“They’re not prey! You mustn’t hurt them!”
His tone was unusually stern. Although he successfully stopped Xie Mingxuan from attacking, Xie Mingxuan immediately felt wronged.
His intelligence was currently equivalent to that of a three- or four-year-old child. He had clearly rushed over to protect Quan Xiaoyu, yet he had ended up getting scolded.
Zombies didn’t cry, but the remnants of human instincts in his memory made him start whimpering, as though he were sobbing.
There was nothing Quan Xiaoyu could do. He also felt that he had been too harsh in the heat of the moment and had forgotten that Xie Mingxuan was now little more than a child. He could only try his best to comfort him.
The training ground was an open area, and the scene attracted surprised glances from everyone nearby.
Nobody knew how the strange man, whose entire body was wrapped up tightly, had ended up fighting with the two battle pets. But everyone had heard him start sobbing loudly after being stopped.
Judging from his voice and build, the strange man was male. Yet seeing a grown man openly whimpering and crying in public for some inexplicable reason was certainly enough to astonish people.
Quan Xiaoyu hurriedly led Xie Mingxuan toward the back to prevent others from discovering his true identity. It seemed the visit to the training ground would have to wait for another day.
The moment Quan Xiaoyu turned around, he ran into a group of children led by Lian Bingbing.
Without exception, all the children’s eyes fell on Xie Mingxuan.
“Come with me.”
Lian Bingbing glanced at Xie Mingxuan, then at Quan Xiaoyu, before speaking.
Quan Xiaoyu recognized these children. He had even provided them with water from his spatial storage before.
Given the current situation, he had no choice but to nod and follow the girl into an indoor training hall.
“This place was built specifically for us. It’s exclusively for our use, and nobody else comes here,” Lian Bingbing explained indifferently.
Quan Xiaoyu nodded and breathed a sigh of relief. Now that they were shielded from the curious stares outside, he felt much better.
Xie Mingxuan had also stopped crying by now. He stared curiously at the group of children, baring his teeth at them.
“He isn’t human.”
Lian Bingbing stared at Xie Mingxuan for a few seconds before stating this with certainty.
Quan Xiaoyu felt a little awkward. Lian Bingbing had phrased it as a statement, not a question. Being seen through at a glance by a child, yet being unable to immediately admit it, was incredibly awkward!
At that moment, Li Nan, having finished calming down the two gluttons, came running in as well. He was a regular here and knew his way around.
“You’re terrible at lying. That’s awful,” Lian Bingbing judged, looking at Quan Xiaoyu with an expressionless face.
Li Nan had just reached Quan Xiaoyu’s side when he heard this. He immediately explained, “He just doesn’t want to deceive everyone.”
In fact, Lian Bingbing had countless arguments she could have used to refute him. But after glancing at Li Nan, she decided not to pursue the matter. Instead, she looked Quan Xiaoyu in the eye and said, “Don’t worry. He isn’t human, and neither are we.”
Quan Xiaoyu froze.
Li Nan, however, immediately understood what she meant and hurriedly said, “You are human! You’ve always been human! Those people who conduct filthy experiments and engage in those disgusting transactions are the ones who don’t deserve to be called human!”
The girl smiled at Li Nan. She liked the way he was so eager to defend her. People often spoke of having an innocent, pure heart, and she could always see that quality in Li Nan.
“Strictly speaking, we have the genes of zombies and mutated beasts in our bodies, so we’re no longer purely human. According to my predictions, we’ll lose the ability to reproduce because of this. Even if we can have offspring, we have no idea what kind of monsters might be born.”
The girl explained calmly. She displayed no particular emotion, as though she were solemnly explaining some piece of common knowledge rather than discussing her own situation.
“Little girl, that’s a rather dangerous way to think.”
At that moment, the training room’s door opened once more, and three people walked in side by side.
The speaker was Chu Tian, whom Xiao Ziran and Ouyang Jing had brought to the training ground after they finished discussing matters.