Chapter 15: Broadcast from Cloud City Affiliated High School
Countless gray moths fluttered around her, wings beating, and gray dust fell from the air. In a daze, Xu Zhi felt that she was a little closer to the candlelight floating far above in the air.
This change in distance was actually hard to perceive with the naked eye, but for some reason, Xu Zhi just felt she was a little closer.
She instinctively wanted to take a few more steps forward, to get closer, but in that instant, she immediately recalled the repeated warnings she had given herself before consuming the core: to stay rational.
Xu Zhi broke free from the trance-like desire to move closer, only to realize she was standing in a gray floating tower. The ground beneath her feet was made up of countless moth carcasses. If she had taken another step forward, she would have fallen from the air.
It was only when Xu Zhi fully woke up that she snapped out of the dreamlike illusion.
Looking back at the scene, Xu Zhi couldn’t empathize with the previous version of herself, wondering why she had been so fascinated by that candlelight.
“That was really dangerous.”
Xu Zhi habitually rubbed her temples, calming her thoughts before picking up the book on the table to continue reading.
However, she hadn’t even read for half an hour when strange sounds suddenly came from outside. Someone was shouting through a loudspeaker, the sound distant and unclear, but it was getting closer, resembling the public announcements made by neighborhood committees in the past.
Had this been half a month ago, it wouldn’t have been an unusual sound, but now, it was a bit eerie.
“Who’s so bold?”
Most of the humans still alive were keeping their heads down, so who would dare to be so flamboyant? Unless… they weren’t human.
Xu Zhi raised an eyebrow, put down the book, and walked over to the window. She didn’t open the window, but leaned in to listen carefully.
The sound of the loudspeaker grew clearer. The speaker was indeed approaching the old residential area, and Xu Zhi could make out the content being broadcast.
“Attention all surviving citizens! We have been abandoned in this city. There is no water, no electricity, and there are threats from mutated animals and monsters. Humans cannot survive alone!”
“Teachers from Cloud City Affiliated High School, together with the remaining students, have established a survivor base. The school cafeteria has sufficient food reserves, and the students have abilities to go out and search for supplies to protect everyone!”
“Cloud City Affiliated High School welcomes every living human. No fees will be charged. We hope that everyone who hears this broadcast understands that in times of crisis, we must support each other!”
This message was repeatedly broadcasted, and after the vehicle carrying the loudspeaker slowly drove a circle around the neighborhood, it left, likely heading to another publicity location.
“Heh.” Xu Zhi let out a short, mocking laugh.
This wasn’t a survivor base; it was clearly a trap set by evil spirits.
But perhaps someone would still fall for it. After all, the disaster had only happened less than a month ago, and many people were still hiding at home, not having adjusted their mindset. Hearing such a broadcast, some fools might think it’s a lifeline.
This broadcast was targeting those who were overwhelmed by fear and longed to join a group of humans.
Even if someone wasn’t that foolish under normal circumstances, staying in the mist for too long could influence their mind, leading them to overlook the danger and blindly pursue the false sense of security promised by a so-called survivor base.
In fact, those who stayed home after hearing the broadcast and didn’t go to Cloud City Affiliated High School were likely the ones who could still maintain some rationality in the mist.
“So these madmen want to harvest those who can’t fully maintain their sanity but are still somewhat normal?”
Xu Zhi felt uneasy, as she couldn’t understand why these madmen had such a strong desire to kill normal humans. What would they gain from killing them?
Or was it that they had simply gone insane from the mist and wanted to kill for no reason? But then, what happens after they kill these people?
She didn’t believe these madmen would spare any other surviving humans.
Xu Zhi, of course, had no intention of saving anyone, nor did she care about those who fell for the trap. She was just irritated by the fact that there were mutants gathering in the city center for an unknown reason while a group of madmen was nearby, hunting humans.
This was unacceptable!
Xu Zhi’s expression darkened. She thought to herself that she had to find an opportunity to eliminate these madmen.
She couldn’t keep running; wherever she went, it would just be within this locked-down city.
And counting on someone else to solve this problem was a pipe dream.
Xu Zhi knew better than anyone that in this world, she couldn’t rely on anyone but herself.
“Let me think.”
She quickly assessed the current situation and realized that her only advantage was her familiars. If she wanted to deal with the madmen at the affiliated school, she would likely have to rely on her familiars.
But she only had two familiars, and she wasn’t sure how many madmen there were.
Xu Zhi blinked, and a preliminary plan began to form in her mind.
“Tomorrow, I’ll negotiate a new deal with the neighbors upstairs.”
Her idea required the other party’s cooperation to succeed.
Her actions couldn’t be delayed too long, as she wasn’t sure whether these madmen were simply killing for the sake of it, or if they had some other purpose.
If they could grow stronger by killing, leaving them unchecked would only make the situation more troublesome.
“Sigh.” Xu Zhi sighed.
The only comfort right now was that familiars gained evolution points from killing these madmen, and quite a lot at that.
However, they didn’t seem to drop attribute cores, or perhaps the ones they had killed so far hadn’t reached the level to drop cores?
“Maybe I can figure that out as well.”
If they dropped cores, Xu Zhi would feel a bit better.
Having made up her mind, Xu Zhi stopped paying attention to the situation outside and continued to read after refining her plan in her mind.
By the time night fell and the second round of hunting for her familiars was over, she checked their spoils and found that they had brought back six cores this time.
Four of them were from Yi’s hunting, while Gouzi had only brought back two.
This was understandable, as mutated animals that were too weak didn’t drop cores.
However, among the six cores, not all were [Blade] or [Moth]; there was also a pale pinkish core.
“A new attribute?”
A new attribute at this point was less useful to her than another [Blade] attribute core.
Right now, the new attribute would only be useful for gaining knowledge and stockpiling it for her spiritual body. What disappointed Xu Zhi more was that neither of her familiars had enough evolution points to level up. The three [Blade] cores brought back weren’t enough to level up Yi by one.
“It looks like I can only hope to find a black fruit tomorrow.”
