Chapter 20: Location of Mutant Humans
Before leaving Linghu Wetland Park, Chu Guang brought Night Ten to the mutant leech nest near the parking lot.
"We found those mushrooms there." Night Ten pointed to the broken concrete pipe not far ahead.
"Good thing you didn't go in." Chu Guang patted Night Ten on the shoulder and continued on, "Let's go. That’s not what we’re here for today.”
Apparently, leeches could be used as medicine, but he didn’t know if mutant leeches had the same effect. The two carefully avoided the mutant leeches’ nest, the lush vegetation, and the concrete ruins. They walked where the sun shone as much as possible.
For some time, they continued to head east.
Looking at the viaducts and residential buildings up ahead, Night Ten, who was following Chu Guang, couldn't help but ask, "Aren't we going hunting?"
"Yes."
"Then why are we going further and further away from the forest?"
"The forest is in front of us."
"?"
Chu Guang didn’t explain any further. He silently took the iron barrel rifle off his back and loaded a bullet into it as his aura changed instantly.
There was a broken viaduct near them. The traces of time on the moss-covered load-bearing concrete columns were hidden in the shadows of green plants. A mouse as big as a washbasin was drinking muddy water from the gutter and stone pit, and when it noticed two uninvited guests, it rushed into the depths of its hiding hole.
Night Ten’s head jerked, his pupils dilated slightly, reeling back in shock. Behind the broken viaduct were tall buildings covered with vines and moss. Thick roots pierced the cracked concrete ground and tree trunks rose up through the middle of the road, overturning cars and bus stations that had long since been turned into iron slag. In the hell of greenery, there was a sense of vitality, along with a hidden murderous intent that wanted to swallow everything in its path.
The world he was seeing was too shocking, every frame looking like an artist’s realistic interpretation of a post-apocalyptic world. So much so, that Night Ten forgot that he was still in the game world.
It was then that he finally understood what Chu Guang had meant. That was the real forest.
"We have to be careful from here on out." While he spoke, Chu Guang released the safety catch on his rifle and took one step at a time. Though they were only in the northern outskirts of the Clearspring City and far from its core, they couldn’t drop their guard.
High-rise residential buildings, sewers, three-dimensional gardens, parking lots, drone hives, CNC planting towers, magnetic levitation stations, and many more structures could be seen. At least, what remained of them… Those man-made miracles had become natural greenhouses and seedbeds after being abandoned by civilization.
After the nuclear war, there was a long, cold winter that ravaged the land, but it only lasted half a century. Even so, nature had reclaimed everything.
The first to fall were the high-rise buildings. Moss crept up along the walls as it eroded everything in its way. It eventually covered the massive structures. The smaller buildings weren’t spared, either.
In all those years of human decline, a few instances of heavy rains and a sultry summer made that place a paradise for the barbaric growth of fungi and angiosperms, which provided ample food for wild animals.
After the drainage system was paralyzed, urban freshwater resources were even more abundant than the lake beside the wetland park.
Wild animals and out-of-control poultry began to migrate from forests, lakes, and farms to cities with a more comfortable environment to live in. Under the triple effect of radioactive materials, genetic weapons, and time, they evolved into fierce, bloodthirsty creatures.
They were collectively called mutants, but of course, there were things much more dangerous than mutants where they were.
They walked cautiously along the side of 76th Street for a while, and the surroundings were quiet. As Night Ten was thinking about where the mutants had gone, Chu Guang's voice suddenly sounded in his ear, "We’ve got a situation on our hands."
Chu Guang suddenly stopped in front of a scrapped car. Night Ten recovered immediately and stopped as he looked around nervously. Unfortunately, he saw nothing. "What’s going on?"
Chu Guang looked solemn while whispering, "There are traces of survivors."
"Other survivors?!" Night Ten froze, he lowered his voice like Chu Guang, but couldn't hide the excitement in them, "Are they the indigenous people of the wasteland?"
Finally! He was going to meet other NPCs! He had been waiting for such a long time for that to happen!
Chu Guang glanced at him, knowing full well what he was fantasizing about. He quickly doused Night Ten’s enthusiasm. "You don't need to be so excited, this isn’t something to be happy about."
"Why?"
"Because in a place like this, strangers are more dangerous than mutants," Chu Guang sighed.
Without explaining further, Chu Guang knelt down and found a string of cans tied with wire behind the scrapped wheels of the car. The aluminum can had opened outwards, looking like something had exploded from the damaged section. There was still a faint smell of rotten eggs. "Excessive sulfur gunpowder, as well as pushpins and iron pieces..." Chu Guang frowned.
Were they mutant humans, or were they marauders? Generally, survivors wouldn’t deploy tripwire mines near settlements. It was hard to hunt mutants with their sensitive sense of smell with strong-smelling bombs that were made of sulfur. The only things they were prepared against were other humans…
Judging from the residual scent, the explosion couldn’t have been long ago. It had been at most five hours. Turning his head, Chu Guang asked, "When you left the shelter, did you hear an explosion coming from around here?"
Night Ten shook his head nervously. "No."
"Wait for me here." Chu Guang put down the can and got up. Looking at him, Night Ten anxiously asked, "Where are you going?"
"Checking the situation ahead."
"I can go with you…"
"You stay here."
Night Ten wanted to insist, but after seeing the look in Chu Guang's eyes, he stopped and nodded slowly. The pressure from this man’s eyes made him feel that the NPC in front of him wasn’t joking. Maybe he would really be kicked offline if he failed to follow instructions.
After telling Night Ten to hide next to the old car, Chu Guang put away the gun, pulled out the sharpened steel pipe from his back, and quickly sneaked into the building to the side of the street.
Although he had originally intended to use the player as bait, the situation had changed. He was facing other survivors, most likely marauders or groups of mutant humans. There was no point in baiting them as it would only cause them to raise their guards.
Chu Guang's expression was solemn as he tightly clenched the steel pipe in his hand. He was at most a kilometer away from the nursing home, but that was if he ran in a straight line. They were far too close to Shelter 404 at the moment. Especially since the players were busy producing cement. Even if the smoke and noise they made were dampened by plants and concrete barriers, they would be discovered by others sooner or later.
He was facing a hidden threat, and Chu Guang was ready to eliminate it completely. Once he judged that this other party may pose any sort of risk to them, he would act without hesitation.
In the ten-story building along the street, there was only a narrow safe path he could traverse. It was also covered in a thick layer of moss. Fortunately, there were no particularly dangerous mutants there.
After he made it to the fifth floor, a few fat mutant rats scurried about. Bolstered by their numbers, they bared their teeth at Chu Guang aggressively. If Chu Guang had run away with his back to them, they would have swarmed him.
Unfortunately for them, the intruder wasn’t afraid at all. Those timid mutant rats snarled at him, but that was all they did. Chu Guang was already used to this.
Without saying anything, Chu Guang thrust the pipe forward, piercing the nearest mutant rat and immediately killing it. When they saw that they were no match for their foe, the rats fled, rushing to the entrance and disappearing into the shadows.
"It doesn't seem to be a rat nest. There should only be about ten or twenty of them..." If there were a few more, they would’ve been difficult to deal with. Swarms of mutant rats could be tricky even if they were up against heavily armed mercenaries. Chu Guang only had a rifle, he would stand no chance if he were to face a real swarm.
Heaving a sigh of relief, he swung his pipe and got rid of the corpse along with the blood that stained it.
After arriving at the tenth floor, Chu Guang used the steel pipe as a crowbar. He pried open the rusty door panel before stepping onto the rooftop.
The wind on the roof was strong. He walked to the rusty water tank and looked towards the resident community in the east. What he saw confirmed what he had thought.
In the open space in the middle of the concrete building stood a wooden camp with rags and construction waste blocking his view. The survivor strongholds on the wasteland were roughly divided into two types of structures: One was to live in a house that hadn’t collapsed after the war, and the other was to set up a camp in the ruins or an open space depending on the condition of their surroundings. Marauders living in urban areas usually lived in buildings, they rarely built such primitive dwellings and forts.
Only mutant humans two meters tall and weighing more than a hundred fifty kilograms could build a wooden shack when there was already a ready-made building that could be used instead.
The wooden stakes at the entrance of the camp were sharpened like the fangs of wild beasts. A few broken corpses were clumsily draped over them, the ground covered with dried blood.
Mutant humans eat everything, not just fungi or the fruits of plants. They even ate the meat of mutant flies, rats, and cockroaches. However, their favorite food was humans.
Looking at both sides of the street, Chu Guang saw a mutant sentry carrying a metal longbow on the roofs at the end of 76th Street that used to be shops. Their green skin resembled Orcs from a fantasy movie, and they were, in fact, as strong, savage, ruthless, and bloodthirsty as them.
The creatures he was looking at were two meters tall, and their muscles were wrapped in armor made from scrap metal. Chu Guang could even see words on the billboard they used as a breastplate. “Half price on your second piece…” was what it read.
The two turned-out steel bars inlaid on the shoulder pads of the armor were taken from a bicycle’s handlebars. Those had amazing effects when dealing with attacks from melee weapons, and they could jam a chainsaw or block an axe. It looked quite cyberpunk.
If Chu Guang and Night Ten continued to head forward, they would most likely be ambushed by the sentry before they arrived at the intersection.
A lingering wave of fear washed over him. Chu Guang's Adam's apple bobbed up and down as he swallowed a mouthful of saliva. He shifted his gaze and continued to look at the mutant camp in the residential community to the east.
There were too many obstructions, he couldn't see how many people were inside. He could only give a rough estimate based on his experience. Judging from the size of the camp, there should be about twenty or thirty mutant humans.
"A small mutant colony..." Chu Guang's expression became solemn. They wouldn’t be easy to deal with!
Simultaneously, a light blue system pop-up window appeared in his field of vision.
[Mission: Destroy the mutant colony on 76th Street.]
[Type: Side quest]
[Reward: 200 reward points]
Wait… Can tasks be triggered outside the shelter?!
Chu Guang was taken aback and tried to call out to the system, but there was no response. The pop-up window had disappeared, as if it had never been there in the first place. He originally thought the system could only be summoned when he was near the shelter, but it seemed as though he was wrong. Missions could be triggered anywhere outside the shelter!
However… Two hundred reward points was a bit ridiculous.
Without any hesitation, Chu Guang put away his weapon. He went downstairs, returned to Night Ten, and quickly left the area.
Night Ten was dumbfounded.
That reward was two hundred points! The side quest for summoning a hundred players was only worth one hundred reward points, but he would be awarded two hundred for getting rid of the colony! There was most likely a massive trap hidden within! Chu Guang wasn’t stupid; he wouldn't be fooled so easily.
"Administrator, what did you see?" Night Ten couldn't help but ask, panting. He looked at Chu Guang, who had finally stopped running away.
Chu Guang who finally stopped running, replied casually, "It's a mutant human colony."
"Then are we... Are we going to just leave?"
"Are you suggesting we fight them and get eaten?" Chu Guang glanced at him and continued, "Please use your brain, we only have one gun."
There was also no need to mention that among the two of them, he was the only one who could fight.
Night Ten closed his mouth and said nothing. He hadn't reacted earlier. He’d thought that the mutant humans were NPCs in the game.
After hearing how the Administrator said that those mutant humans would be hostile, who would eat them…
After committing the information to memory, Night Ten planned to tell the other players after they returned.
"It's not a good idea to provoke the beasts now. We need to be more prepared and defeat them in one fell swoop so we can get it done once and for all." Chu Guang cursed as he walked away. "Such bad luck. The camp is on 76th Street, directly opposite the park’s east gate. We have to be careful!"
...
Their original hunting route needed to be changed!
Chu Guang brought Night Ten around 76th Street before they walked about one mile north along the viaduct. Eventually, they found an abandoned construction site.
The site was massive. It had most likely been a real estate project that had just started construction. One of the buildings had seventeen or eighteen floors, and the other large pits were foundations that had been dug. Most of the equipment used in the construction had been scrapped, and the tower crane had smashed into the unfinished building, forming a nice ramp.
The building still seemed to be in good shape even though the crane had been knocked over by the shock wave of a nuclear explosion. There was only a single gap created from the impact, and the main structure hadn’t been damaged.
The steel piled on the construction site had corroded, and the cement in bags that lay around had already been hydrated and worn down, making them no longer usable.
However, Chu Guang was surprised to find a lot of unused blueish gray stones! He recognized them at a glance.
He was looking at limestone and if he remembered correctly, it was mostly made of calcium carbonate which could be used as a raw material for cement.
"This is good stuff!" Chu Guang was overjoyed. He took out the map and made a mark on it. He would have no problem building two buildings if he could smelt those limestone into cement.
As long as Old White unlocked the technology to turn calcium carbonate into cement, they wouldn’t have to worry about cement materials for a long time to come!
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