Chapter 9 - Treasure
Chapter 9: Treasure
After several missions, the team members could coordinate well with one another. It’s just that Zhang Zhiyin had no opportunity to practice his ice ability, as the three nuclei he obtained through the missions being was used to upgrade the precision mutation in order to cover it up from outsiders’ eyes and ears. Now that his precision ability was at Level 1, and his ice ability was still at the primary level. His ice balls could only be melted into water for consumption. It had no actual attack power.
About ten days later, they were given another mission. There was a riot of zombies in the southwestern part of the base, and they needed to find out the cause.
Several people boarded a special patrol car and drove to their destination. As the site of the incident was relatively close to the base, it was often cleaned up, so there weren’t many zombies there. However, occasionally, there would be encounters with some zombies that were very manic, like they were injected with chicken blood as they rushed at them. Their strength and speed would often be greatly improved more than usual.
Zhang Zhiyin and Li Shuifeng handled left and right respectively, They were responsible for searching abnormal conditions along the way.
Zhang Zhiyin suddenly remembered that he had also done an important branch task in the vicinity of the game. The task publisher was one of the people in charge of the West District of Base No. 1 at that time. The main idea of the task was that his elder brother was a small team leader in the early stages of the apocalypse and in one mission, they lost their whole team and unfortunately, his brother died. For so many years, he found difficulties in letting go of this knot in his heart, hoping that the player could help him to look for clues of that year at the accident site.
Zhang Zhiyin remembered that the last clue of the task was not found. He only found a unique metal hawk necklace and took it back with him. The person in charge was very excited to say that it was his brother’s personal necklace and gave a lot of rewards to the players.
Thinking until here, Zhang Zhiyin casually looked to the left and glanced at the scene reflected in the rearview mirror – sitting in the co-pilot’s seat, captain uncle smartly unfastened the two buttons near the neckline, revealing knots of muscles and a unique, hawk-shaped metal necklace on his chest.
Zhang Zhiyin: “…”
Captain… To the southwest of the base to do the task… The whole team vanished… Hawk necklace… Wouldn’t it be so coincidental?
“Captain,” Zhang Zhiyin looked at the uncle, “I don’t think the situation is right. Shall we go back today and come back when we have enough equipment with other teams as a backup?”
Uncle captain hesitated. As someone who experienced the severe hardship of many large and small tasks and a Level 3 ability user, he could also sense a hint of danger, but he could not tell the source of this feeling, and it was not good to go back without anything.
“Let’s assess the situation more first.”
As soon as the uncle captain uttered his words, he no longer waited for Zhang Zhiyin to continue but listened to Li Shuifeng saying, “Look, that’s probably what we’re looking for.”
Only to see a plant as tall as half a human with a light blue fruit as big as a fist on it. All the zombies were ten meters away from the plant and did not dare to approach it.
With the arrival of the end of the world, animals and plants and even some common objects were affected and developed a mutation. Some became very aggressive, while others could be used by people, and had wonderful effects.
“I, Lao Ma and Da Hu will see what it is. You all stay in the car, evacuate immediately if anything goes wrong.”
In the world of <Tomorrow>, it was like the game. Everyone might master several special “life skills” and improve their proficiency through constant use. The life skills of Lao Ma were very special. They were appraisal techniques, currently, he could see the attributes or effects of some low-level items.
Lao Ma suddenly burst out a cry of surprise: “Able to grant an ordinary enhancement ability user with a water ability as their second ability! Goddess!”
The uncle captain suddenly changed his expression when he heard the words. He took out the storage box and put the blue fruit into it. This thing was too magical and important. Even if there were difficulties, he must now take the risk of bringing it back to base.
The moment he picked the fruit, the zombies that originally had been wandering around, not daring to come near, were suddenly surrounding him.
His sixth sense made the captain turn around quickly to avoid green and sharp dried claw. Behind him, was a tall blue-green zombie about two meters in height that emerged out of nowhere.
The captain felt weak after only exchanging blows for three rounds. He spat and hatefully said, “It’s a poisonous zombie, watch out for his claws. Damn it, it might even have a speed mutation.”
Hu Zi and Lao Ma were cleaning up the zombies around them, and they came back to the captain who was entangled with the poisonous zombie. The other two ability users left behind also rushed out of the car, trying to help the captain and the two open up an escape route.
“Its level is much higher than us! We can’t hurt it at all!” Cried Hu Zi in despair.
As someone with a strength mutation, the captain chopped the poisonous zombie with his special steel knife. But it was just like chopping on an iron plate, it only left a pale white scratch on the zombie.
“Run to the car and try to get rid of it,” the captain roared. But in fact, in his mind, he knew that the chances of success were very small, because the speed of this poisonous zombie was too fast, far exceeding theirs.
There were only seven members in the team. Among them, Zhang Zhiyin and Li Shuifeng, who were precision ability users, only have the fighting power of ordinary people, so they could only exert their ability advantage and shoot with guns while hiding in the car.
But it didn’t work at all. The removal of the blue fruit was like lifting some kind of ban on the zombies here, and there was a flood of zombies that the team didn’t know where they were hiding previously as if there were something that attracted them.
The two rescuers who had just gotten out of the car were quickly separated by the zombies. The captain and the two tried to get closer to the car, but their efforts did not seem to have any effect.
Zhang Zhiyin ran to the driver’s seat with a gun and drove to the direction of the captain. The car was specially modified and hit many low-level zombies along the way.
After a lot of fighting, the number of low-level zombies had been reduced, but the price was also huge – the two rescuers team members had long disappeared, Hu Zi’s arms were severed by the poisonous zombie. Lao Ma and the captain were also injured. Fortunately, they were only three steps away from the door.
“Go down to fetch them. We couldn’t shoot at that angle.” Zhang Zhiyin jumped out of the car with a gun and said to Li Shuifeng in a hurry.
“Go ahead, I’ll stay in the car.” Li Shuifeng responded. His expression was calm. It was calm from the beginning to the end.
Zhang Zhiyin took a gun to clean up the low-level zombies near the car door while standing at the car door to release a sniper’s shot at the poisonous zombie. During the cleaning, his right arm and right leg were bitten, but the pain and wound were within his tolerance.
When Lao Ma saw an opportunity arose, he rushed towards the car. Hu Zi and the captain moved to this side as they fought with the poisonous zombie.
Suddenly, Lao Ma stopped.
A green, dry, sharp hand pierced his chest from behind him. Red blood splashed out.
Lao Ma’ss body slowly fell down and his eyes were still looking at the opened door.
Hu Zi let out a hoarse howl. He shouted, “Captain, go! I’ll delay this monster!”
Zhang Zhiyin suddenly realized what Da Hu was going to do.
Da Hu was a wood ability user. The wood ability had a skill of controlling enemies. It could churn out life vines by burning his own life force. It could entangle opponents much higher in level than himself. In the game, the so-called burning of “life” was just to reduce the amount of blood (HP); in this world, burning of life might really reduce your life.
For the first time, Zhang Zhiyin hated that he was useless, hated his shortcomings. He watched his teammates fall in front of him, but there was nothing he could do.
Green, vibrant vines sprouted from the Da Hu’s chest, it sprouted rapidly and twined around the poisonous zombie. The poisonous zombie was tearing away with its sharp claws, but it could not break away for a moment. It struggled and roared angrily at the spot.
The uncle captain did not hesitate anymore and rushed to Zhang Zhiyin.
During this period, a group of zombies surrounded the door of the car, Zhang Zhiyin had to shoot with his best effort to clear the zombies, while holding out his hand to grab the uncle.
With only one step to go, the captain suddenly froze, just like Lao Ma.
His face was green and pale, and his hands and feet quickly became stiff. The zombie was poisonous and the captain had long been poisoned by it.
The uncle saw himself in Zhang Zhiyin’s eyes. Little by little, he painstakingly pulled out the box containing the blue fruit and handed it to Zhang Zhiyin, his black eyes were full of trust and faith. Slowly and arduously, he said, “Give it to the base… If the secret of this fruit could be discovered and mass produced, all ordinary ability users can have a second power… Resistance to the end of the world, humanity’s renaissance… There will be more hope…”
After entrusting it to Zhang Zhiyin, the captain uncle fell back slowly as if all of his wishes had been fulfilled.
When the vines disappeared, the poisonous zombie rushed to the direction of the car. The zombies nearby also came, surrounding them.
Zhang Zhiyin finally took a look at the unique hawk necklace and jumped into the car without hesitation. The body of the modified car was very high. He stepped on the car with his left leg, and his right leg was still outside. Suddenly he was unable to exert his strength due to the wound in his leg.
Then Li Shuifeng appeared at the door.
“Pull me up.” Zhang Zhiyin quickly reached out to him and looked at him.
Sure enough, Li Shuifeng also extended his hand to him.
But he grabbed the small box with the blue fruit that the captain had so desperately entrusted to him.
Then he raised his right leg, very calmly, and kicked Zhang Zhiyin out of the car without hesitation.
Outside the car, there was a group of zombies that were coveting him like tigers.
As he fell to the ground, Zhang Zhiyin’s eyes were still full of disbelief.
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Li Shuifeng drove away and saw in the rearview mirror that his last teammate was surrounded by the zombies, and gradually disappeared into the field of vision. Finally, very slowly, he revealed a smile.
On his left hand, there was a small, inconspicuous box.