Chapter 209: Exchanging Supplies
Lu Weiyi thought for a moment, took out a bead core, and placed it in Li Zhuang’s hand. “Try your best.”
As if it was a last-ditch effort, Li Zhuang forced his body to absorb it fully as Lu Weiyi spoke. The bead core disappeared rapidly.
Energy burst through the shackles, scattering wildly then instantly contracting.
Li Zhuang opened his eyes, took a deep breath, and smiled amid the eager gazes, “Upgraded.”
Everyone cheered, asking what it felt like after reaching A-level. Even after three people left to eat, the excitement hadn’t faded.
Lu Weiyi sat on the roof keeping watch, listening to the lively noise below, holding a crystal core with no color.
Unlike other crystal cores that usually showed some color, this was a purely colorless core, like a transparent glass body containing nothing. Yet upon careful feeling, it was filled with overflowing energy.
This was a human mental-type crystal core — the one from Liu Dali’s mental-type bodyguard.
Normally, mental-type ability upgrades were very slow. Lu Xi took nearly five months to reach B-level, and Lu Weiyi’s previous life took almost four months to go from C to A.
Now Li Zhuang was already A-level, but Lu Weiyi wasn’t even mid-A level yet, despite his daily heavy consumption and daily replenishment of crystal cores to the limit.
Although higher levels upgrade more slowly, at this rate they might surpass him sooner or later. Especially now that the beginner-level crystal cores had little effect on him.
Strength determined status. His ability had always been the strongest in the team, so he had never felt he was dragging down Zhuang Mingxu, Zhuang Ai Yi, Lin Yimu, or Lu Xi — three ordinary people and one slowly upgrading ability user. But if his strength declined, though his voice might not weaken, his confidence would inevitably be affected.
Who knows if one day someone might think he’s dragging down the team by bringing along four burdens?
“What are you thinking about?” Li Zhuang’s voice sounded as he grabbed the edge of the eaves, jumped up, and sat beside him.
Lu Weiyi quickly collected the crystal cores and stored them in his space. In the yard, Antonio was already focused on the spotlight, continuing his “work,” with the clanging sounds ringing through the chilly moonlit night.
*
The vehicle was not much different from the blueprint Antonio had drawn.
Just as they were excitedly arranging everything, there was a knock at the door outside, followed by a voice shouting, “Are you up? I’m here to take you away.” It was the voice of Zhuzhi—the man who firmly refused to let them in last night.
“We’re coming,” Xu Sa went to open the door. Outside were the two men seen last night: Zhuzhi and the soldier who had escorted them back.
“Not early,” Zhuzhi came in, cautiously watching them, and said again, “I’m here to take you away.”
“We’re already packing,” Xu Sa replied, then asked, “By the way, big brother, when I came over yesterday, I think I heard sheep bleating in the village. I wanted to ask, does anyone here raise sheep?”
“No,” Zhuzhi replied warily.
“No, big brother, I’m not trying to do anything. It’s just that my kid has no powers and can’t eat outside meat. I heard the sheep yesterday and wanted to ask if your sheep are for sale? We’re not short on supplies; we just want to buy some. We can trade if you need something. Nobody’s trying to take advantage of anyone, right?” Xu Sa took out two cigarettes from his pocket, lit one himself, and offered the other two.
He continued, “In these times, after more than half a year, the things around the village must be limited. Saying you don’t lack anything can’t be true. We came from the city, so we have a wide variety of supplies. Let’s see if we can trade something. Isn’t it just for convenience?”
“If you don’t need anything, then leave quickly,” Zhuzhi frowned so tightly it looked like he could crush a fly. He waved away the cigarette Xu Sa offered and said coldly.
Seeing this man was stubborn, Xu Sa didn’t waste time on him and turned to the soldier behind him. “Big brother, can you take us to see the village chief? Surely not every household in such a big village has everything they need?”
“I…”
“No,” the soldier started to say, but Zhuzhi’s eyes widened as he stared hard at Xu Sa and shouted sharply, “You’d better leave now. If you don’t, I won’t be polite.” He seemed to want to use his powers against Xu Sa.
This reaction seemed a bit extreme. Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked over.
“Xu Sa, forget it,” Lu Weiyi said. There must be other places that have what we need. No need to force it here.
Xu Sa nodded, saying no more.
After making the beds, Lu Weiyi stored both trucks from the yard into his space. The group headed out.
Passing Zhuzhi, Lin Yimu carried a 50-pound bag of rice and placed it by his feet. “This is last night’s lodging fee. Thanks for letting us stay.”
No matter their attitude, if they had rested in the wild last night, they wouldn’t have been so at ease.
While Zhuzhi was stunned, Lu Weiyi had already taken the trucks out again, lifted Zhuang Mingxu, who was in a wheelchair, onto one of them, and the others gradually got on.
Following the road, after a short while, they arrived at the exit, which was like the entrance — a wall without a gate, topped by a small room. A teenage boy poked his head out. “Are you leaving?”
“Yes.” The temperature had dropped sharply; ordinary people now only stayed in the truck compartments. Ning Yuan was driving.
“Wait a moment. My uncle went to the bathroom. I can’t open this wall,” the boy said.
“We’ll open it ourselves,” Wu Yue in the passenger seat said, then opened a door in the wall. The truck drove forward, and he met the boy’s surprised gaze. “Don’t worry, we’ll fix it for you.”
“No—”
“Wait, wait… let them wait…” came a breathless shout from behind.
“You can’t leave,” the boy immediately became alert, quickly grabbing a gun from the room and pointing it at Wu Yue. Young but fierce and wild, like a ferocious wolf pup.
Ning Yuan stopped the truck. At the back, Xu Sa opened the door and looked at the soldier running over. “Big brother, what’s wrong?”
“Our village chief… wants you to wait…” the soldier gasped, “Wolf pup, put… put the gun down.”
The boy didn’t understand but lowered the gun, curiously scanning the group.
Xu Sa looked at Lu Weiyi in the truck.
Lu Weiyi thought for a moment, nodded, and picked up the walkie-talkie. “Back up a bit. Wait.”
“Is the village chief wanting to see us?” Xu Sa jumped out and tried to talk with the soldier.
“You wanted to buy livestock, right? The village chief wants to know how many you want to buy, what supplies you have, and what price you want to pay,” the soldier said directly.
“Ah, well, supplies now definitely vary in price. Let’s talk in detail and set a price both sides agree on,” Xu Sa said with a smile. “Big brother, besides sheep, what other livestock do you have? Are there many?”
The two talked back and forth, and soon the stern-faced Zhuzhi rode over on a bicycle with the old village chief.
The soldier told the old chief what he’d learned, and the old chief looked at Xu Sa. “Every household in our village raises livestock. There are some, more or less. It depends on how many you want.”
“You name it, we want it. Chickens, ducks, pigs, cows, sheep, everything,” Xu Sa said.
The village chief’s brows twitched, his sharp eyes fixed on Xu Sa. “Do you have that many supplies?”
“Don’t worry, village chief, we definitely won’t shortchange you,” Xu Sa said.
The village chief was silent for a moment, then said, “We want medicine, salt, and crystal cores.”
Xu Sa raised an eyebrow. “…Okay, but village chief, things like medicine and salt are rare everywhere. Different medicines have different values. You know, if it’s regular medicine found in pharmacies, the price might not be high, but prescription drugs that only hospitals have definitely won’t be cheap.”
“How do you want to set the price?” the old village chief asked.
“That depends on the medications you need. You give me a list of the required medicines, I’ll assess their value, and then we can negotiate. How does that sound?” Xu Sa said.
Having reached a preliminary agreement, the more detailed matters had to be discussed further, so the group returned to the place they stayed the previous night.
It wasn’t far, so Xu Sa didn’t get in the car on the way back and instead walked with the village chief, chatting about the village. The village chief also explained Zhuzi’s attitude in more detail, “You’re not the first group to pass through our village. There were others before you, but most weren’t friendly. Some tried to steal, others tried to attack us. Zhuzi’s younger sister was almost assaulted once. He’s just afraid of those things happening again, so he’s always very wary of outsiders.”
“That’s human nature. In times like this, everyone has to stay alert. It hasn’t been easy for us either on the road,” Xu Sa said, blending truth with fiction as he recounted their journey.
“You’ve encountered mutant rats and snakes?” Junzi’s serious face was full of surprise.
“Yes. The largest rat king reached up to my calf, had abilities, and they moved in swarms. The entire village was overrun, and when they attacked, it was like a dark tide. Many villagers looked like they’d been chewed down to bones,” Xu Sa said, both to warn and inform. “And there were mutant snakes too—thigh-thick and two to three meters long. We even met friends who got stung by mutant bees, the size of a fist and extremely venomous. People died instantly. Has your village not encountered these things?”
“We have,” Zhuzi replied solemnly, having been quietly listening. “Two months ago, we had mosquitoes the size of a child’s fist. The bites caused extreme swelling, high fever, and seizures. Medicine didn’t help. Some didn’t survive.”
“How did you get rid of them?” Xu Sa asked eagerly—this was valuable experience.
“The village burned mugwort every day in every household to drive them away.”
“Did it work?”
“A little. It only got better after the weather turned cold,” the old village chief said with a sigh, hands behind his back. “Don’t know how we’ll survive when it gets hot again next year.”
The topic of unknown mutated animals dampened the mood. It was Junzi who broke the silence, “So how did you handle the ones you ran into?”
