Chapter 878: Chapter 111: The Farmer and the Snake
Cheng Ming wanted to nod, but he suddenly realized that his body was also in a state of stasis and couldn’t move at all.
"I want to make a trade with you." The young girl looked at Cheng Ming with a half-smile, "Of course, you can choose to refuse."
"What trade? If I refuse, what will happen?" Cheng Ming thought.
The girl seemed to read Cheng Ming’s thoughts, turning to look at the group of frenzied people in the aisle of the carriage and said, "If you refuse, I will leave, and everything here will return to normal. Before long, you’ll become one of them."
She only answered Cheng Ming’s second question and didn’t mention a word about the first.
"You only need to tell me," the girl continued, "accept or refuse?"
...
...
Nanhua Town mine, edge of the collapsed area.
"According to the drone’s measurement results, the concentration of spores within the collapsed area has increased by seven percent, and the dispersion area has increased by 0.2 percent," Candle Dragon said, "besides that, there’s even worse news."
"What bad news?" Sun Hang squatted on a large stone, holding a newly opened pack of compressed biscuits in one hand and a half bottle of mineral water in the other, chewing as he asked.
"When the parasitic spores just began to spread, only animals were affected. But after eleven hours, plants in the collapsed area also showed signs of being parasitized," Candle Dragon said, "Look at these photos."
Candle Dragon handed the drone’s operation terminal over, and Ya Qiaoxi, who had just arrived, also joined in.
These photos were taken by the drone hovering above the pit, with several outlines of shrubs within the collapsed area highlighted in red dotted lines by AI. It was clearly visible that the surface of these shrubs had a large amount of white, web-like mycelium attached, but the shrubs themselves did not seem to have significantly changed.
"I think just doing these experiments is meaningless," Ya Qiaoxi said, "These animals and plants have no protective measures and are easily parasitized by spores. You should try if the protective suits commonly used by hunters can withstand the corrosion of these spores... if even ordinary protective suits can’t hold up, then not to mention hunting the large Cordyceps underground, even entering this pit would be a problem."
"Both Candle Dragon and I have means to isolate the external environment, so we didn’t bring protective suits. Xue Yue is very important to me, so I can’t let her take risks. The only one who can conduct this experiment seems to be..." Sun Hang divided half of the compressed biscuit to Xue Yue standing beside him, while looking up and down at Ya Qiaoxi, who was already fully geared up with protective clothing, only lacking a helmet.
"I’m not going," Ya Qiaoxi crossed her arms and took a step back, "After all, I’m not involved in your task... Compared to the bounty, I still think my own life is more important."
"That settles it," Sun Hang shrugged.
"..." Ya Qiaoxi glared at Sun Hang in frustration. She had only kindly suggested, but almost got herself into a pit.
She returned to the off-road vehicle, took another bottle of water from the trunk, and was about to unscrew the bottle cap when she suddenly saw a solitary figure limping towards them in the wilderness.
"Someone’s coming!" Ya Qiaoxi immediately shouted to Sun Hang and the others.
"Who is it? Is it someone from the other two convoys?"
"No... She’s coming from the direction of Giant Hill!" Ya Qiaoxi hurriedly picked up binoculars, "Seems like someone from Sea Buckthorn Rose... She’s quite seriously injured."
"Is she alone?" Candle Dragon asked.
"She’s alone," Ya Qiaoxi nodded.
This expanse of wilderness was wide open, with no places to hide.
Sun Hang turned his focus to that figure, and the view zoomed in instantly.
The survivor was a member of Sea Buckthorn Rose, the female hunter with the codename "Suyue."
The moon-white cheongsam she wore was now nothing more than a torn mass hanging on her, and the underwear inside was severely damaged, barely covering the crucial areas.
Her fair skin was covered with abrasions and bloodstains, her right arm drooped limply, and all four fingers except the thumb bent towards the back of her hand at an impossible angle, with bruising causing the upper half of her palm to swell like a purple-black dumpling.
Her left hand clutched a bloodstained backpack tightly, her long black hair was disheveled, draped behind her.
The pair of high heels matching her cheongsam had been replaced with a pair of tall black tactical boots, which were much larger than her calves, clearly indicating the shoes originally belonged to a burly adult male.
Though the shoes didn’t fit well, they were certainly better than her previous pair—those high heels were fit for attending banquets or tea parties, or short walks on paved urban roads. In the harsh terrain of the Gobi Desert, wearing such shoes would be worse than going barefoot.
Sun Hang didn’t believe Suyue would come to such an action without any equipment, perhaps it’s because she didn’t have time to gather her equipment, forced to grab someone else’s shoes... maybe these tactical boots were taken off a dead man’s feet.
