Chapter 1126: with translation of chapter title

Holy shit, Lin Dui, is this for me?

Looking at the card Lin An pushed in front of him, Zhang Tie curiously touched it with his hand, and a few seconds later he was completely stunned, like a wooden chicken, only coming to his senses after a while.

"Promoted straight to Fourth Stage? How could such a thing exist?"

Although Lin An had mentioned something similar before, seeing it in person felt completely different.

It looked like a beginner's tutorial, a series of tasks handed over step by step, and even he couldn't help feeling a pang of bitterness.

Amid that bitterness, his heart was filled with shock.

"Lin Dui, you don't want it?"

"You've always wanted to reach Fourth Stage, haven't you?"

The item was too precious; in the midst of speaking, Zhang Tie anxiously pushed the card back toward Lin An. No matter how careless he usually was, he knew exactly how high the card's true value was.

A solid Fourth Stage slot—if word got out, anyone would go crazy. In this Apocalypse, nothing matters more than strength.

"No need, I still have one."

"But you can consider for yourself whether to use the card."

Lin An shook his head slightly, not bothering to explain too much to Zhang Tie. In fact, he wanted to give the card to Zhang Tie, largely because he thought this simple-minded bear might not be able to grasp the rules on his own. Although theoretically, after enough beatings, his strength might approach Fourth Stage...

But considering that there are definitely stronger rules, Lin An still decided to let Zhang Tie learn the ready-made ones.

Otherwise, if Zhang Tie tried to figure it out himself, he'd likely come up with some strange rules...

For example, big change yellow peach, heating a hot pot with bare hands..

Seeing Lin An confirm he would give it to him, Xiong Hanzi was stunned for a moment, then stopped being pretentious.

"Lin Dui, rest assured! I will definitely not let you down!"

Lin An chuckled after hearing that, and just as he was about to say something, a private chat that hadn't sounded in a long time suddenly flashed.

The sender was none other than Chu An.

"I'm out."

"Get ready to launch the satellite plan..."

After accelerating his return, Lin An hardly had time for anything else and headed straight for the core fortress.

After drawing a bit of attention, he soon saw Chu An, who had been missing for a long time.

He still wore a white robe, though his face showed unhidden exhaustion. Habitually sipping a bag of glucose, Chu An lightly nodded, indicating he had returned.

"You're out now—did you manage to get the amoeba worm's original fluid?"

Unusually eager, Lin An wasn't excited about launching the satellite; he was excited that Chu An had suddenly returned, perhaps because he had secured the original fluid.

But the next second, Chu An hesitated, shook his head, and spoke softly:

"Sorry... I still don't have it."

"Because it's impossible to bring real-world humans into the amoeba worm, or rather, bringing extra people in would be too costly, I can only conduct human experiments inside the amoeba worm world."

"But you know, the people there are essentially worms, very different from real humans. I can only have Kelaisen replicate human cells as much as possible to simulate infection. Progress... isn't fast."

He lightly lifted his glasses frame; Chu An saw Lin An's expression suddenly freeze, and realized it might be disappointing.

But there's no choice; before fully solving the amoeba worm problem, he couldn't and wouldn't dare release the original fluid into the real world. Once a mistake caused it to spread, leading to uncontrollable events, it would be more terrifying than any natural disaster.

After offering comfort, Chu An spoke again:

"However, after a while longer, we should be able to run small-scale trials."

"I'm looking for a way to promptly halt the amoeba worm's shared strength; even if it spreads, we'll at least have some room for rescue."

Lin An listened in silence for a moment, then finally squeezed out a smile and lightly nodded.

Although he didn't hear the good news he'd hoped for, at least there was now a clue.

Setting that thought aside, Lin An simply asked, puzzled:

"So you came out early this time just to launch the satellite?"

"How do you plan to do it?"

He found it strange that Chu An would come out for this matter, simply because he sensed Chu An's subtext. Not being able to bring extra people in also meant that entering himself would require some payment. Lin An didn't believe that repeatedly opening the dungeon would come without cost.

Rather than delay the amoeba worm original fluid matter, Chu An also intended to come out early, which Lin An found somewhat hard to understand.

Satellite launch can happen anytime, right?

Although there is a satellite for scouting zombie tides and mutants, which counts as a divine artifact, its priority shouldn't be that high. After all, for him, increasing strength is the main goal.

Seeming to guess what Lin An was thinking, Chu An slightly shook his head and spoke directly:

"Under normal circumstances, there's indeed no need to rush so much. Launching next month would be fine."

"But the theater confrontation is about to start, so we must prepare in advance. The food crisis will definitely erupt early. We need the satellite to guide survivors away from the zombie tide!"

"Huh?"

Lin An blinked slightly, not really grasping the connection between the two. In Chu An's and his original calculations, the food crisis would likely begin in about three months; what relation did that have to the opening of the theater confrontation, and why would it be advanced so much?

The next second, Chu An gave a brief explanation:

"It's simple: although during the theater confrontation, mutants and zombie tides are under system control and won't attack the safe zones, making it a rare peaceful period."

"But likewise, during the theater confrontation, a large number of high-rank Awakened Ones will definitely enter."

"Lin An, think about it: as each faction, including the main forces of the major safe zones, all enter the confrontation, what strength do the survivors left outside have to acquire resources? Without high-rank leaders, their harvest will be pitifully small."

"Add it up, and the food crisis will inevitably erupt early! Don't forget, this confrontation gives no hint that time flows differently!"

"This means nobody knows how long the situation without high-rank forces will last!"

"If the time spent inside exceeds a certain limit, each faction might even erupt in riots! In a vicious cycle, the situation will only get worse."

Lin An's eyes narrowed upon hearing that, and he instantly understood Chu An's meaning.

It's just like dominoes: the lack of top-tier combat power will trigger a chain reaction!

From the safe zone in the Qinghai theater, one can see how miserable a safe zone can be without top-tier combat power.

Not only is it difficult to venture into the territory of high-rank mutants to gather supplies, but the missions that high-rank Awakened Ones can accept in the Safe Zone also offer rewards far greater than those of low-rank ones. A single third-rank individual's haul from the next dungeon run could easily feed several thousand people.

Seeing Lin An grasp the thorniness of the problem, Chu An shoved the empty nutrient pouch back into the pocket and spoke seriously:

"As for how how to launch the rocket..."

"Considering the severe interference of electronic equipment, precise control is hard to achieve. I plan to assemble a simplified three-stage launch device from the satellite base."

"The first half ascends by manpower to high altitude, the middle half relies on spirit-powered aircraft to reach the edge of the atmosphere, and the second half uses boosters to enter near-Earth orbit."