Chapter 1102
"It's just the two of us, so don't play dumb." Zheng Da said, "I'm not afraid to tell you the truth. Jiang Wenzhang has a very powerful trait that can make people involuntarily reveal their secrets to him. With Mr. Kang backing him up, even Gong Jiaji can't compare to him. Once we return to Xiaohe City, there won't be any room for you or me... How about we join forces, split the Subclass Stone fifty-fifty, and pretend nothing happened when we get back!"
Xu Huo wouldn't admit to anything. He smiled slightly and said, "This is a conflict between you Xiaohe City people. It's not appropriate for an outsider like me to interfere. I still have companions in Xiaohe City. If Mr. Jiang dies, and you shift the blame onto me in front of Mr. Kang, that would just cause me trouble."
It was clear these two had already coordinated.
"What Subclass Stone..." he continued. "Tempting me, an outsider, with heavy rewards to deal with Mr. Jiang on your behalf—Mr. Zheng, that's not very honorable of you."
Seeing that Xu Huo was unmoved, Zheng Da had no choice but to say, "Even if you want to let him off, I'm afraid he won't let you off. You'll have to return to Xiaohe City sooner or later anyway. Saving him would be a waste of effort."
"I and my companions are merely passersby in Xiaohe City. I won't pretend to understand all the principles, but I do know the meaning of 'mind your own business.'" Xu Huo stood his ground, showing no intention of letting him leave.
Zheng Da had no choice but to turn back and climb into the tree again.
The night passed peacefully. At dawn, the group, clearly all having rested poorly, continued on their way.
Zhou Yuanzhu still ate some mushrooms along the way, but her hunger symptoms didn't ease. She kept eating throughout the journey, almost consuming all the food she had brought.
Along with the hunger came deep fatigue. She slumped on the aircraft, wailing, "If I get any hungrier, I'm going to start eating people..."
"Aren't you guys hungry?" she asked Wang Mo and the others.
But Wang Mo and the others looked at Xu Huo—this man who even used an umbrella to shield himself from the rain while eating. "Isn't he not hungry either?"
"He didn't get rained on," Zhou Yuanzhu said casually, then pressed Wang Mo about how they suppressed their gluttonous urges.
"You'd be fine if you ate Xiaohe City's food," Jiang Wenzhang interjected. "Our water goes through special filtration. Drinking it can alleviate hunger to some extent—at least you won't end up eating like this."
He pointed at Zhou Yuanzhu's noticeably bulging stomach.
Zhou Yuanzhu was almost giving up on herself. She stuffed another handful of mushrooms into her mouth. "Isn't this eating?"
Jiang Wenzhang and the others turned their heads away expressionlessly.
Xu Huo stepped forward and patted her face. "Still lucid?"
"Not lucid. Almost starving to the point of losing my mind..." Zhou Yuanzhu forced a weak smile. "Give me some of your food. I'll trade you with potions."
It wasn't that serious.
Xu Huo gave her a bag of dried meat and said to the others, "She's in bad shape. How about we take a break?"
"Another break?" Zheng Da frowned. "We've been resting for half an hour almost every hour of travel. At this rate, when will we ever get back?"
"Didn't you say you could contact Xiaohe City to send a vehicle?" Xu Huo asked. "Haven't we entered communication range yet?"
Jiang Wenzhang checked his communicator again. Confirming it was fine, he turned to Wang Mo. "Check if your communicator is broken."
"Communicators don't break," Wang Mo said without looking up, fiddling with his unfinished mechanical toy car. "But weather can affect communication range sometimes. Look at that black cloud on the horizon—there's a heavy storm coming."
Hearing "heavy storm," Zheng Da and the others perked up.
"Heavy storms might attract mutant swarms," Jiang Wenzhang said grimly. "Some mutated animals love heavy rain. They chase rain clouds when it pours and never stop running."
"The wind is blowing toward us," Zhou Yuanzhu said weakly, licking her finger and holding it up. "Looks like the rain cloud is pretty big. Maybe we shouldn't rush ahead. Finding a place to take shelter would be wiser."
Wang Mo used professional tools to measure the wind speed and confirmed, "It'll rain here in less than half an hour. Better to take a detour."
With things as they were, what else could Jiang Wenzhang and the others say? They estimated the rain cloud's area and tried to go around it. But after walking a while, they found that the rain cloud they'd gotten closer to was still thickening in patches, looking like it would cover half the sky.
From their position, they could already see the curtain-like black rain through binoculars.
"We can't go around it. We'll have to turn back," Xu Huo said. The area around them was an endless plain, with shelter only by the big river.
The group hurried back to the river. On the way, Xu Huo stayed behind to look after Zhou Yuanzhu, while Jiang Wenzhang and Zheng Da walked ahead. They exchanged knowing glances and quickened their pace.
Returning to the riverbank at top speed, the moment they entered the woods, Jiang Wenzhang and the others scattered in different directions, giving Xu Huo and Zhou Yuanzhu no time to react.
"They're running!" Zhou Yuanzhu shouted.
"I was hoping they would," Xu Huo said calmly. "I never planned to kill them anyway."
Zhou Yuanzhu looked at him doubtfully. "I can tell you've been deliberately delaying our return. What's the point of that?"
"I want to verify something," Xu Huo said without elaborating. He took out the location item "Only Entrance." "There's a heavy storm coming. Let's take cover first."
The rain clouds hadn't even caught up yet, but a torrential downpour had already started over the woods, roaring loudly.
Xu Huo looked outside. The rain had nearly darkened the sky. Looking out, everything was pitch black—he couldn't even see the nearby grass and trees. It also stirred up many poisonous insects.
Zhou Yuanzhu set up a laser item that could release electric currents at the entrance. She clapped her hands and said, "Fly swatter. Anything that comes in gets electrocuted."
No sooner had she spoken than a poisonous snake trying to sneak in through a corner triggered the electric grid and was instantly charred black. She picked up the snake and grinned. "Perfect for an extra meal."
Xu Huo rested about ten meters from the entrance. Seeing this, he said, "It won't fill you up and carries the risk of poisoning. Just eat some dried meat."
Zhou Yuanzhu was also troubled. "I suspect the Xiaohe City people definitely have other ways to suppress gluttonous urges. That talk about filtered water is probably an excuse. I drank that water yesterday morning too—it was completely useless."
Xu Huo checked the time again, leisurely ate a piece of compressed biscuit, and asked her, "Didn't you feel particularly hungry that night in Xiaohe City?"
"Of course I was hungry..." Zhou Yuanzhu recalled the details. "But I was already hungry when I went in. Seeing such a huge spread of good food that I couldn't eat—it's only natural to feel extra hungry."
"Is there a problem with that?"
"Whether there's a problem or not, I don't have a definite answer yet," Xu Huo said. Because he hadn't felt anything unusual that night in Xiaohe City. The only comparison he could make was with Tan Qi, but Tan Qi had left with the vehicle early the next morning. So he would need to get close to Xiaohe City again to find out.