Chapter 19

Before leaving the Linghu Wetland Park, Chu Guang first took Ye Shi to the mutated leech nest near the parking lot.

"Those mushrooms, we found them inside there." Ye Shi pointed to the damaged concrete pipe not far ahead.

"Fortunately, you didn't go in."

Chu Guang patted Ye Shi on the shoulder.

"Let's go."

"That's not our target today."

It's said that leeches can be used in medicine, but whether mutated leeches can be is unknown.

The two carefully avoided the mutated leech nest, bypassing the lush vegetation and concrete ruins, trying to stay in the sunlight as much as possible.

They walked east for a while.

Looking at the elevated bridge and residential buildings ahead, Ye Shi, who was walking beside Chu Guang, couldn't help but ask.

"Aren't we going hunting?"

"Yes."

"Then why are we getting farther from the forest?"

"The forest is ahead."

"?"

Chu Guang didn't explain further, silently taking off the iron pipe rifle from his back, loading a bullet into the chamber, and his demeanor changed.

Not far away was a broken elevated bridge.

The concrete pillars, covered in moss, hid the marks of time under the shadows of green plants.

A rat as big as a washbasin licked the mud in the sewer pit, and upon discovering the two intruders, it quickly darted into the nearby grass.

Ye Shi lifted his head, his pupils dilating, a hint of shock in his eyes.

He saw that behind the broken elevated bridge, there were tall buildings covered in vines and moss. Thick roots had broken through the cracked concrete ground, and tree trunks had grown up in the middle of the road, overturning cars and bus stops that had long turned to rust.

This green hell was teeming with life, yet it also harbored the deadly threat of devouring everything.

The world before his eyes was so shocking that every frame seemed like a post-apocalyptic work of art, to the point that Ye Shi almost forgot this was a "game world."

At this moment, he finally understood the meaning of Chu Guang's words.

This is the real forest...

"Be careful from here on out."

Chu Guang said, opening the safety of his iron pipe rifle and advancing step by step.

Although this area was only the northern outskirts of Qingquan City, far from the city center, they still couldn't let their guard down.

High-rise apartments, sewers, vertical gardens, parking lots, drone hives, CNC planting towers, maglev stations, and behind every window...

All these man-made wonders, after being abandoned by civilization, had become natural greenhouses and nurseries.

After the nuclear war, this land indeed experienced a long winter, but it lasted for less than half a century.

The power of nature had changed everything.

The first to fall were the high-rise buildings, with moss starting to grow on the shaded sides, eventually covering the entire structure.

Even the non-high-rise buildings were not spared.

In the years of human decline, just a few heavy rains and a hot summer were enough to turn this place into a paradise for fungi and flowering plants.

They provided abundant food for wild animals.

After the city's drainage system failed, the freshwater resources in the city were even more abundant than those of Linghu Lake.

Wild animals and out-of-control domestic animals began to migrate from the forest, lakeside, and farms to the more comfortable urban environment, evolving into fierce, bloodthirsty mutants under the influence of radiation, genetic weapons, and time.

They were collectively known as mutants!

Of course...

The danger here was far from just that.

Walking cautiously along the street, the surroundings were quiet. Just as Ye Shi was wondering where the mutants had gone, Chu Guang's voice came from beside him.

"There's something."

Chu Guang suddenly stopped in front of a scrapped car.

Ye Shi immediately came to his senses, stopping and looking around nervously, but he saw nothing.

"What's going on?"

Chu Guang's expression was serious.

"There are signs of survivor activity."

"Other survivors?!" Ye Shi was taken aback, lowering his voice to match Chu Guang's but unable to hide his excitement, "Are they the original inhabitants of the wasteland?"

Finally, he was going to meet other NPCs!

He had been waiting for this moment for a long time!

Chu Guang glanced at him, knowing what he was thinking.

"You don't need to be so excited; this isn't something to be happy about."

"Why?"

"Because in a place like this, strangers are more dangerous than mutants."

Without further explanation, Chu Guang squatted down and found a string of soda cans tied together with wire behind the scrapped tire.

The aluminum cans were split open, the edges looking as if something had exploded, and there was still a faint smell of rotten eggs.

"Excess sulfur in the gunpowder, and also nails and metal pieces..."

Chu Guang frowned.

Mutants?

Or raiders?

Ordinary survivors wouldn't set up tripwire mines near their settlements.

Such things wouldn't harm the mutants with their keen sense of smell, meaning they were meant for humans.

From the lingering smell, the explosion must have happened recently, no more than five hours ago, possibly even less.

Chu Guang turned around and asked.

"Did you hear an explosion from the east when you came up from underground?"

Ye Shi shook his head nervously.

"No."

"You wait here."

Seeing Chu Guang put down the soda cans and stand up, Ye Shi asked nervously.

"What are you going to do?"

"Scout the situation ahead."

"I can go with you—"

"You, stay here."

Ye Shi wanted to insist, but Chu Guang's gaze made him swallow his words, and he slowly nodded.

The authority of the admin made him feel that this man was not joking; he might really be kicked out of the game...

Chu Guang instructed Ye Shi to hide beside the scrapped car.

Chu Guang put away his gun, pulled out the sharpened steel pipe from his back, and quickly slipped into a building on the side of the street.

Although he had planned to use this player as bait, the situation had changed.

The others were survivors, and they were likely raiders or a mutant tribe. The bait had lost its meaning and would only alert them.

Chu Guang's expression was serious, and he gripped the steel pipe tightly.

This place was at most 1 kilometer from the Linghu Wetland Park, too close to Shelter 404!

Especially now that the players were busy with production, the dust and noise, even partially blocked by plants and concrete obstacles, would eventually be discovered by the people here.

Leaving these dangers was a hidden threat.

Chu Guang was prepared to kill.

If he judged that the other party posed a threat, he would strike first without hesitation.

The ten-story building had a narrow safety passage, covered in moss.

Fortunately, there were no particularly dangerous mutants here.

On the fifth floor, there were a few fat mutated rats, possibly feeling they had "strength in numbers," daring to bare their teeth at Chu Guang.

If he had turned his back, they would have pounced, but this unexpected visitor showed no fear, making the naturally timid rats hesitant, only daring to make threatening gestures and hiss.

Chu Guang, used to such scenes, said nothing and thrust the steel pipe forward, impaling the nearest mutated rat and killing it instantly.

Seeing this, the other rats scattered, fleeing into the shadows of the building entrances.

"Looks like it's not a rat nest."

"There should be about ten to twenty of them..."

Any more, and they would be difficult to handle.

A group of mutated rats would be a challenge even for fully armed mercenaries, let alone someone with just an iron pipe rifle.

Chu Guang sighed in relief, shaking the steel pipe to remove the dead rat and the blood.

He went directly to the tenth floor.

Chu Guang used the steel pipe as a crowbar to pry open the rusted door and entered the rooftop.

The wind was strong on the rooftop.

He walked to the rusted water tank and looked eastward at the residential area, confirming his suspicions.

In the open space between the concrete buildings stood a wooden camp, covered with rags and construction debris to block the view.

Survivor camps in the wasteland were generally of two types: one lived in pre-war buildings that hadn't collapsed, and the other built new shelters on ruins or open ground, depending on the surroundings.

Raiders living in the city usually stayed in buildings and rarely built such primitive shelters and defenses.

Only mutants, averaging two meters tall and weighing over 300 pounds, would build such wooden huts when there were existing buildings available.

The wooden stakes at the camp's entrance were sharpened, resembling the fangs of beasts, with severed limbs and corpses impaled on them, and the ground was covered with dried blood.

They ate anything.

Not just fungi, plant fruits, or the meat of mutated flies, rats, and cockroaches.

Their favorite food was their former kind—

Two-legged humans.

Scanning the streets, Chu Guang indeed saw a mutant sentry with a metal longbow on the rooftop of a shop at the end of 76th Street.

The green skin resembled the orcs in fantasy movies, and they were indeed as strong, savage, and brutal as orcs.

Standing two meters tall with muscular bodies, they wore armor made from scrap metal, with a "Buy One Get One Half Off" sign still visible on a chest plate.

The two outward-facing steel bars on their shoulders were taken from a bicycle, effective in blocking slashes and blunt force attacks, trapping saws or axes.

Quite cyberpunk.

If Chu Guang and Ye Shi had continued, they would have encountered the mutant sentry at the intersection!

A chill ran down his spine.

Chu Guang's Adam's apple moved slightly as he shifted his gaze to the mutant camp in the residential area.

Due to the many obstacles, he couldn't see how many were inside, but based on the camp's size, he estimated there were between twenty and thirty mutants.

"A small mutant settlement..."

Chu Guang's expression grew more serious.

These were not to be underestimated!

Almost simultaneously, a light blue system notification appeared in his field of vision.

[Quest: Eliminate the mutant tribe on 76th Street

Type: Side Quest

Reward: 200 Reward Points]

Wait—

Quests can be triggered outside the shelter?

Chu Guang was surprised, trying to call up the system, but there was no response.

The light blue notification disappeared as if it had never been there.

It seemed the system could only be opened near the shelter, but quests could be triggered anywhere outside.

However...

200 reward points were quite impressive.

Without hesitation, Chu Guang put away his weapon, turned around, and quickly left the area with a bewildered Ye Shi.

200 reward points!

A side quest to summon a hundred players only gave 100 points, so this reward of 200 clearly indicated the task wasn't easy.

There might be a trap inside!

Chu Guang wasn't stupid.

He wouldn't fall for such an obvious trick.

"Admin, what did you see?" Ye Shi, panting and resting with his hands on his knees, couldn't help but ask as Chu Guang finally stopped.

Chu Guang answered casually.

"A mutant camp."

"Are we... just leaving?"

"Or what, fight them? Get thrown into a pot of oil?" Chu Guang glanced at him, "Think with your head, we only have one gun."

And only one person who could fight.

Ye Shi shut up.

He hadn't thought it through, treating the mutants as NPCs in the game. Now, hearing the admin, he realized the mutants were likely hostile forces.

And they ate people...

Ye Shi noted this information, planning to share it with other players when he returned.

"Provoking those beasts now isn't a good idea. We need better preparation and concentrated strength to eliminate them once and for all."

Chu Guang grumbled as they walked away.

"Damn, the mutant camp is right on 76th Street, directly opposite the east gate of the park."

"Whatever, we need to be careful!"

...

The original hunting route had to be changed!

Chu Guang led Ye Shi around 76th Street, walking north along the elevated bridge for about a mile, and found an abandoned construction site.

The site was large, likely a new housing project, with one building reaching about 17-18 floors, and other pits for foundations.

Most of the construction equipment was scrapped, and a crane had fallen onto the unfinished building, forming a slope.

The building's quality was good.

Even the crane was knocked over by the nuclear blast, but the concrete structure only had a small gap, with no damage to the main structure.

The steel on the site was rusted, and the cement in bags had deteriorated and could no longer be used.

However, Chu Guang found a large amount of unused grayish stones, which he recognized as limestone, mainly composed of calcium carbonate, perfect for making cement.

"Good stuff!"

Chu Guang was delighted, marking the location on the map.

Turning all this limestone into cement would be enough to build two buildings.

As long as Lao Bai unlocked the technology to produce calcium carbonate cement, they wouldn't have to worry about cement materials for a long time!