Chapter 1074: Time Sword
Zhou Yuanzhu slapped the person away, her face cold as she said, "If you want to die, go find a place to die yourself. Don't make me take the blame for this!"
The woman tried to pester her again, but Zhou Yuanzhu twisted her arm and pressed her to the ground, pointing at the corpse ahead. "If you really want to die, go take a bite! Go on!"
The woman looked at the pitch-black corpse and instinctively turned her head away. Perhaps realizing her death wish wasn't so resolute, she collapsed to the ground and started crying once she was released.
"Give them some food," Ruan Qiyan said.
Zhou Yuanzhu was a bit annoyed, but seeing Uncle Guan nod, she suppressed her anger and handed out food to them one by one. Ruan Qiyan himself had brought a bucket of milk, which he heated up and distributed in small cups to each of them, then poured two large cups for Xu Huo. "Mr. Xu, you have a baby with you. You'll need the milk."
Xu Huo climbed down from the shelter, thanked him, and opened the door to hand the milk to Tan Qi.
"It's been so long, and 114 still hasn't come back," Ruan Qiyan said, sighing as he looked in the direction the robot had left.
Xu Huo pointed at the time. "If it can't find the place, it'll return after dawn."
Ruan Qiyan nodded and casually started chatting with him.
He seemed like someone who wouldn't say a word even if beaten with three sticks, but once they got familiar, he turned out to be quite talkative. During their conversation, he specifically explained the difference between the Holy Sword Society and the Holy Sword Society.
After the original Holy Sword Society split, the core members divided into two factions. One faction adhered to the founding principles of the Holy Sword Society—while opposing the game, they never attacked Game Government bases or other district governments without reason, and they had strict standards for recruiting members, usually requiring someone with a certain position within the society to submit a name.
The other faction was extremely radical. As long as it could strike at the Game Government, they would stop at nothing, disregarding good and evil. Sometimes their methods were cruel and despicable, and anyone with a Swordless Token could basically become a member at the Holy Sword Society's strongholds, even cannibal players.
Because the radical faction cast a wide net and loved to fish, and their top players enjoyed showing off, they developed better and gained more fame than the orthodox faction. As a result, whenever someone mentioned the Holy Sword Society, they thought of that anti-government organization with vile methods that dared to confront the Game Government at any cost, rather than a healthy, lawful organization like a player association.
Of course, even the original Holy Sword Society wasn't necessarily legal in the eyes of the Game Government.
"In simple terms, your goals are the same; you've just chosen different paths," Xu Huo summarized.
"But they've taken the wrong path," Ruan Qiyan said. "The original purpose of the Holy Sword Society was to allow the weak to live better lives. They not only bully players but also don't spare ordinary people, bringing disaster to the weak. How is that any different from the Game Government?"
"From a certain perspective, they've succeeded," Xu Huo said.
Ruan Qiyan was silent for two seconds before speaking again. "That's why we modified the Holy Sword Society's emblem and token."
"Originally, the emblem was a sword, with different levels distinguished by the number of swords and the color of the token. That sword was modeled after a super item stored in the Game Government, deliberately crafted with battle scars by an Artificer to symbolize the will to fight. Now we've erased the battle scars and changed it to a watch face."
He took out a silver token, half a palm in size, oval-shaped. The long sword serving as the emblem was crowded with watch faces of various sizes. The most prominent one in the middle matched the starting time of the A1 wormhole point's star on Xu Huo's prop watch.
"This is the star's starting time," Ruan Qiyan said. "It represents that the Holy Sword Society's will can only be proven by time."
Xu Huo could tell that when he said these words, he harbored a noble ideal and firmly believed in his own principles.
"Then I wish you success."
"Mr. Xu, don't you want to join the Holy Sword Society?" Ruan Qiyan asked with enthusiasm. "I can tell you're someone who's cold on the outside but warm on the inside. Otherwise, you wouldn't have saved those two children!"
"I admire your determination, but please allow me to decline," Xu Huo said. "I prefer to go it alone."
Ruan Qiyan wasn't good at persuasion, so he sighed in disappointment upon hearing this. "Our philosophies differ."
Xu Huo smiled and didn't say anything more.
Since no one felt like resting anyway, after eating, the group got up and continued their journey.
Using insect repellent to clear the way, they successfully left the territory of the land jellyfish.
However, as they moved forward, the grass grew sparser, the ground began to crack, sand and dust increased, and even the air became murky.
"This rain is useless," Chi Minghong said, catching a couple of drops and rubbing them. "This rain is sticky. What's in it?"
"The item test shows it contains tiny mineral particles and plant components, but I don't know what plant those flocculent filaments come from," Zhou Yuanzhu said. "We haven't seen any similar plants along the way."
"The cracked area I encountered first had several mountain-like structures shaped like volcanoes," Xu Huo said. "They all erupted from deep underground. It doesn't look natural, but it's very deep down there, so I didn't go down to check."
"The rain is heavier over there."
Earlier, they had speculated that their abnormal hunger might be caused by the black rain. After walking so far without finding any traces of human habitation, Uncle Guan couldn't help but say, "Maybe this is a district that was abandoned by humans a long time ago."
"I don't know what came out from underground, but if the black rain causes hunger and large areas of land can't support plant growth, human extinction is only a matter of time. Probably only those resilient mutants could survive."
"Mutants need to eat too," Chi Minghong said. "From what we saw yesterday, without enough food, they couldn't sustain such numbers. There must be a place here with abundant resources; we just haven't found it yet."
"Anyway, we've got nothing better to do. If we find it, we win; if we don't, we lose nothing!"
That seemed to make sense.
But reality is often crueler than imagination. Half an hour later, everyone was severely dehydrated, especially the girl who had bitten someone. She was in the worst condition and even started hallucinating.
"We can't just drink water freely. Maybe we should go back and try another direction," Lin Qiao said.
"We don't have any other choice," Xu Huo said. Mutants wouldn't leave without reason, so their nest was likely to the west. The south was the cracked area, leaving only the east and the slightly safer-looking northeast.
They were currently heading northeast. If this direction didn't work out, they would have to cross the cracked area or take their chances in the area where the mutants lived in groups.
In this situation, even the players found it frustrating.
Uncle Guan and the others stopped caring about getting wet in the rain. They drank half a bottle of water and took off their protective suits to cool down. Zhou Yuanzhu said, "I'd rather fight mutants than suffer through this miserable life!"
Xu Huo was using his binoculars. When he looked at the three o'clock direction, he stopped and chuckled lightly. "Here's our chance."
(Chapter End)