Chapter 1416: The Gathering

"All these years of disasters, our base has been suppressed by Hui-1 and trampled by Hui-2 Base, and now even his mother Hui-5 dares to come stomp on us! Fuck! If the main base keeps playing peacemaker this time, we'll take the complaint straight to the Huaguo headquarters!"

After Tang Huai voiced his personal opinion, Wen Nengjie immediately followed up with a howl, "Right! We'll get ten thousand people to sign a blood letter online — I'll fight for every breath even if it costs me my life!"

After the Calamity Snow period, the allies of the Northern District-1 Territory Alliance gathered for a barbecue in Territory Two. After everyone chatted about the losses their respective territories had suffered in this disaster, the conversation naturally turned to two petitions that Hui-3 Base had submitted to the main base, which had been posted online.

The first was a petition regarding the dereliction of duty by Hui-1 and Hui-5 Bases in beast-tide prevention and control, which had threatened Hui-3 Base's security and caused losses, along with a demand for compensation.

According to the base jurisdiction principles and authority during disaster years, any beast tide that erupts within an evolution forest under a base's jurisdiction should be cleaned up and controlled by that base.

In this just-passed Calamity Snow, the air-defense departments of Hui-1 and Hui-5 Bases failed to act, allowing the uncontrolled animals in their northern evolution forests to gather and reach the scale of a large beast tide, which then charged into Hui-3 Base's evolution forest — this constitutes gross dereliction of duty. Therefore, Hui-3 Base maintains that the costs incurred by deploying its military and combat squads to eliminate these two beast tides should be borne by the two bases mentioned above.

The second was Hui-3 Base's request to the main base for a strict investigation into the serious intrusion incident in which personnel from Hui City bases carried large quantities of medical equipment and prohibited narcotics into Hui-3's western evolution forest during the Calamity Snow period.

Hui-3 Base's classification of this intrusion as "serious" is not an exaggeration at all. Because according to the on-site investigation, it was confirmed that this 10-person squad entered the tiger clan's core territory in Hui-3's western evolution forest carrying large quantities of medical equipment and prohibited drugs, attempting to capture alive the apex predators of Hui-3's evolution forest during the Calamity Snow. The actions of these intruders very likely enraged the western tiger clan and triggered conflict between the tigers and Hui-3 Base's humans.

This "accidental" leak of an official document, posted online by someone, was quickly deleted in its original form but had already been massively reposted, blowing up the internet.

The survivors of Hui-3 Base poured out all the suffering and torment they had endured in this disaster, topping one search keyword after another.

The people of Hui-1 Base, through the corpse photos in the second petition, identified that six of the ten-person squad that had intruded into Hui-3 actually came from the Blaze combat squad, and they too posted their views online, heating up the trending searches.

The people of Hui-5 Base were also in an uproar, because among this intrusion squad was actually a researcher from their base's research institute — and this researcher had been bitten to death by a tiger. Hui-5's citizens believed that Blaze had kidnapped their researcher; some demanded that Blaze compensate them for their losses, while others demanded that Hui-3 kill the tiger and compensate them for their losses.

As the internet boiled over, the lords of Hui-3's Northern District-1 gathered together — and of course they cursed and fumed as well.

Tang Huai shot Wen Nengjie a contemptuous look. "Why don't you go slice your wrist right now and write a blood letter — go stake your life on the complaint!"

Wen Nengjie immediately grinned sheepishly and handed Tang Huai a freshly grilled skewer of potato slices. "How could I? I was just venting my mouth. I only just managed to build up my blood energy — I need to save it to boost my evolution ability and go on missions with everyone. Brother Huai, this skewer's done."

Tang Huai snorted, picked up a plate of grilled skewers, and loudly called out as he trotted over to the table where Xia Qing, Xin Yu, and Zhu Li were sitting. "Ladies, make way — skewers are here—"

Hearing the term "ladies," Xia Qing and the others were momentarily taken aback, then laughed. Tan Qi, who had grown up in the safe zone, had also heard this term before and giggled along. Xiao Shiyi, who had grown up in the evolution forest, was always attentive to everyone's emotional changes — seeing Tan Qi laugh, she laughed along too.

When she called her mother tonight, she would carefully ask where the word "ladies" came from.

"This evolution tiger won't undergo Calamity Evolution, will it?"

In Territory One, after watching the helicopter footage recorded as it flew over Mountain 36 showing the intrusion squad being killed, Tan Junjie was the first to ask about the evolution tiger that had done the killing.

Luo Pei shook his head. "When our base's people went to collect the bodies, they didn't run into the evolution tiger — we don't know its status for now."

Yue Haiying took a sip of tea. "Old Tan, are you hoping it undergoes Calamity Evolution, or hoping it doesn't?"

In front of his old comrades-in-arms, Tan Junjie was very relaxed and spoke much more casually. "Whatever you're thinking, that's what I'm thinking."

Not having seen the actual combat footage, and with the aerial overhead video only able to show bodies on the snow, Tan Junjie did not believe that this well-equipped Blaze combat squad had been wiped out by a single evolution tiger.

What the real situation was, Tan Junjie could more or less guess.

The commander of Hui-3 Base personally issued Tan Junjie an order, classifying Territory Three as a classified unit on the same level as Territory Seven, strictly prohibiting the patrol squad from monitoring, inquiring about, or interfering with Xia Qing's actions.

Therefore, when Tan Junjie led his squad on daily patrols along the northern isolation belt, he only pretended not to see the honey badger that banged against walls and bit tires, pretended not to see the red foxes and weasels that occasionally darted into Territory Three, pretended not to hear the occasional wolf howls coming from within Territory Three, and absolutely did not allow his team members to use their sense of smell to investigate the situation in Territory Three.

Not investigating didn't mean he didn't know.

Last month, when Blaze used poison to wipe out the southern wolf pack, causing the southern wolf pack to launch a beast-tide attack on Blaze Volcano, the western tiger clan of Hui-3 also went along — this showed that the western tiger clan of Hui-3 had formed an alliance with the southern wolf pack. Combined with the fact that when the western wolf pack launched a beast tide this spring, the northern wolf pack stepped forward to protect the Northern District-1 territories, Tan Junjie had already confirmed that every evolution wolf in Hui-3's evolution forest was connected to Xia Qing.

So indirectly, the western tiger clan was also connected to Xia Qing.

This 10-person squad that intruded into the tiger clan's core territory was very likely wiped out by Xia Qing leading the tiger clan and the wolf pack. During the first night of the Calamity Snow period, Xia Qing had left the territory for eight hours — she couldn't have been shoveling dirt the whole time.

Now that everyone was on different sides, so Luo Pei didn't speak and Tan Junjie didn't ask — he only cared about the evolution tiger's situation.

Yue Haiying looked surprised. "Old Tan, you're something else — your brain's a lot sharper than before. Old Luo, quick, get your instrument out and scan Old Tan — let's see which brain region evolved."

Tan Junjie glared at him and asked Luo Pei directly, "Will that group of evolution tigers threaten our territory's security?"

His old comrade-in-arms was responsible for the danger inspection of this territory — since he had asked, Luo Pei didn't play games with him and gave a definitive answer: "No."

"That's good then." Tan Junjie set down his tea cup, picked up a dried sweet potato, leaned back in his recliner, and asked, "How much longer are you going to be sickly and listless? Have you gathered all the medicinal ingredients?"

Luo Pei also leaned back in his recliner, slowly stretching his limbs. The feeling of his body getting a little better day by day was just too comfortable. He said with a smile, "The medicinal ingredients are all gathered — in half a month the three of us brothers can drink together."

Yue Haiying continued to tease his old comrade-in-arms. "The two of us can, but Old Tan can't — he's not retired yet, he has to maintain combat readiness twenty-four hours a day."

Tan Junjie answered lazily, "I'm different from you two bachelors — I need to earn points to raise my daughter."

That shot was brutal enough to take out both Yue Haiying and Luo Pei on the spot. Yue Haiying turned to look at the silent Luo Pei, a bit puzzled. "Old Luo, aren't you going to bring your disciple out for a walk?"

That disciple of his who, when danger came, would only carry Zhang San on his back?!

Luo Pei snorted. "A disciple who fired eight shots and only killed three advanced speed-evolution users — what's there to show off?"

Tan Junjie……

Yue Haiying……