Chapter 1349: Can This Be Negotiated?

When Zheng Chen delivered the food box to the north gate of Territory Three, Xia Qing, whose mind was full of the pit, only gave a dry word of thanks before carrying the food box back into the territory.

Zheng Chen didn't even get a chance to speak, so he could only return to Territory Seven and think of another way.

After eating a pot of chicken stewed with mushrooms, a bowl of cold-mixed Green Lantern vegetables, and two steamed buns, Xia Qing rested for half an hour, then continued working full of energy, pushing through until evening, making up the progress delayed that morning before finishing the cover-up, and going home to rest.

On the afternoon of the fourth day, Xia Qing called over Lao Si and the Broken-Waist Wolf. The three wolves, one human, and one sheep used the micro-tiller and crowbar to haul the two stones weighing over eight tons up the earthen slope inside the five-plus-meter-deep pit and onto the surface, then moved them into Lao Si's ruined territory to hide them.

After that, Xia Qing didn't even take a sip of water, and while her territory had plenty of wolves around, she shoveled away the sloped earthen walls inside the pit in one go, bringing the soil up.

At this point, the pit for the basement was finally dug out.

Xia Qing lay on the ground and rested for half an hour, then once again took advantage of the construction window Seeing Xin Yu had won her by cutting rebar, using stones weighing over two hundred jin to tamp and level the basement's foundation, then carried building materials out of the rack-building warehouse and began assembling the basement's frame and outer walls.

These building materials had been hauled back from Mountain Fifty.

The soil purification mission in the Mountain Fifty danger zone was already seventy percent complete. The Zhang He squad, which had been stationed there for a full year, began withdrawing in batches, and the people staying behind would move into Xiong Dong to live. So the laboratory and living quarters built on Mountain Fifty had to be dismantled and the materials hauled back.

This job was, of course, Xia Qing's responsibility.

On the way back transporting supplies, Xia Qing first unloaded the materials needed for the basement at Area Five of Mountain Forty-Nine, then delivered the rest back to Territory Seven. By evening, she carried the materials hidden at Area Five through the north gate of Territory One in the northern sector, back to her own territory, and hid them in the rack-building warehouse.

When Zhang Han entered Territory Three to investigate her secrets, she locked her targets on the laboratory and the small building where Xia Qing lived. In fact, neither place had anything she feared people would rummage through, and even when Zhang Han discovered the underground food storage room, Xia Qing wasn't afraid.

Because Xia Qing is now a dual-element advanced Evolved sniper, and her combat skills are no worse than those of the military or the main force of combat squads. If Zhang Han had been bold enough to actually open the door to the underground food storage room, Xia Qing would have taken off one of her legs on the spot.

Spare her life, not because she doesn't deserve to die, but for the sake of the bigger picture.

Xia Qing's secrets were all hidden inside the crude rack building.

Not only the basement materials, but even her thirty-three precious Gao Ying element spinach plants were hidden in a temporary cultivation room she'd set up inside the rack building.

If she hadn't been cautious enough, when Zhang Han used going to the bathroom as an excuse to enter her small building, the spinach secret would have been exposed.

Thinking of this point, Xia Qing's strength rose along with her fury, and her construction speed increased once again.

"Buzz—"

While Xia Qing was busy, Yang Jin called her on the phone.

Yang Jin deliberately lowered his voice and briefly explained the situation. "Xia Qing, the commander of Red Eleven Base just contacted me, saying that Han Yanqian, the daughter of their vice-commander, was led astray and did something wrong. They hope we can give them a chance to make amends. What's the situation? Is this something we can discuss?"

Xia Qing understood at once that Yang Jin had outsiders nearby, and replied coldly, "She damaged the drip irrigation system in my laboratory to take water samples, and she also stole our carefully cultivated Green Lantern spinach with a Yi element content as high as 6.8. I only spared her life out of respect for Third Brother."

Spinach with a Yi element content of 6.8 wasn't considered precious in Territory Three, but it was 0.1 percentage points higher than the premium variety cultivated by the planting center in the safe zone.

Yang Jin understood Xia Qing's meaning at once. His voice was still quiet, but it was brimming with killing intent. "The results of our year of hard work, just ruined by her like that? Even if we spare her life out of respect for Third Brother, you should have crippled one of her legs to teach her a lesson. Don't be angry, leave this matter to me. I'll call Third Brother as soon as I'm done. What supplies do you want Red Eleven to compensate you with?"

Talking to a smart person really saves effort. Xia Qing replied coldly and hard, still burning with anger, "What supplies could possibly be more precious than my spinach?!"

If you want to apologize, bring out your own precious supplies.

Hearing Xia Qing's words, the intermediary standing beside Yang Jin sighed silently.

Yang Jin agreed, and gently coaxed Xia Qing not to be too angry. "Alright, I'll handle this. You protect the territory well. I'll definitely rush back before the heavy snow."

"Mm." You don't need to rush back, I'm busy.

Xia Qing hung up the phone in a good mood, humming a little tune as she continued working.

Last year, when building the two underground food storage rooms in the territory, Da Ya was the main force, and Xia Qing assisted him. Now Xia Qing had already learned the assembly sequence and techniques for this high-performance, high-priced building material, and could work alone.

Even when it got dark, she didn't rest, but pressed waterproof cloth over the bamboo boards to block the light, and kept pushing forward with the work.

When dawn was approaching, Xia Qing finished assembling the basement frame and the outer walls' moisture-proof and animal-bite-proof high-hardness new-material boards, and filled in the gaps between the outer walls and the earthen pit as well as the soil layer above, restoring the ground to its original state, and continued drying the corn stalks.

Only then did the sense of urgency in her heart ease.

On the fifth day, when Zhang Han's internship qualification was revoked and she left Territory Seven, Xia Qing was working on the interior walls of the basement, doing the noise-reduction process.

Basement noise reduction requires a three-pronged approach of "sound insulation, sound absorption, and vibration reduction." What this complex process needs most isn't strength, but skill.

Gypsum board, soundproof doors, soundproof felt, soundproof cotton, soundproof floor mats, vibration-damping pads, sound-dampening ducts, sealant... how to install all these things to achieve the best noise-reduction effect, Xia Qing could do it with her eyes closed.

Because when she was working on the construction crew, she had led a team doing noise-reduction projects for five months.

This tedious and patience-requiring process, done in Xia Qing's intermittent construction schedule where she went out for a patrol every so often, took two days to complete.

Rushing as fast as she could, she finally finished the basement within seven days.

On the eighth day, when Xin Yu and her allies came over to help Xia Qing build the brick walls for the kitchen and bathroom, seeing that the surroundings looked no different from before, they sincerely admired Xia Qing's execution capability.

Once the walls were built and the doors and windows installed, the room could be considered built. Next, the interior and exterior walls still needed plastering, then pest-proofing, waterproofing, and two coats of putty. The floor and roof also needed a series of pest-proofing and waterproofing processes before they could be put into use.

These processes Xia Qing could handle on her own, but in order to let people know there was nothing fishy here, Xia Qing decided to call over Qi Fu, who was equally experienced in construction, to help out a few times.

After seeing her companions out of the territory, by rights Xia Qing could have brought Zhang Shi and her daughter into Territory Three, but she decided to wait until just before dawn.

Because tonight was the day for her seventeenth medicinal bath, and many wolves would gather in her territory, making it unsuitable for moving.

Still, Xia Qing sent Zhang Shi a message to give her a heads-up. Because after dark, the wolf pack would pass not far from the cave entrance on their way into her territory, and wouldn't leave until dawn.

Because she had received the message, after dark Zhang Shi, hiding in the cave, used her magnetic field perception to sense the large predators approaching and moving away one by one, and her mood remained fairly calm.

But one large predator broke from the pack, jumped down into the valley, and stopped outside the cave entrance. Although the four weasel guards Xia Qing had arranged for her didn't raise the alarm, Zhang Shi was still very nervous.

The wooden door was pushed open silently, and a tall, brown-gray evolved wolf poked its head in, stared at Zhang Shi for a few seconds, then bared its teeth in a grin.