Chapter 260: Evolved Bear

To deal with hardness-evolved trees, they still needed strength-evolved people. Hu Zifeng agreed, "Don't push yourself. When you're tired, we'll take turns. Cut what we can reach, give up what we can't. Don't force it — if you fall, you're dead."

Jingkuan also said, "Right, leave some for the evolved crossbills too."

When the three began climbing, the evolved crossbills in the tree showed no reaction. By the time they reached five meters up and Xia Qing took out the improved stretching-pole sharp sickle she'd modified yesterday to cut pine cones, the crossbills objected, screeching angrily as they dove down to attack.

Xia Qing focused on cutting pine cones — one swipe of the sickle brought down several. Hu Zifeng and Jingkuan used their guns to shoot the charging evolved crossbills, keeping them from getting close.

After a burst of dense gunfire, the crossbills dropped straight down, their reddish-brown feathers drifting loose in the air and floating away on the wind. After this counterattack, the evolved crossbills circling the three had thinned by a third, and the survivors no longer dared approach, landing on distant branches to curse them out.

After the first wave of crisis passed, Jingkuan found the mood for small talk. "Boss, these birds have a nice call. How about we catch a few and take them back to raise?"

Hu Zifeng immediately objected, "No way. Their claws and beaks are too sharp — they'll hurt my cat."

Xia Qing instantly pictured the little kitten in white boots who could barely walk steadily that day they went to Territory Seven, and how it now walked over on its own, trembling. Her heart ached. "Captain Hu, bring your cat to Territory Three to play sometime, okay?"

Hu Zifeng declined, both embarrassed and decisive. "Your territory reeks of wolf. I'm afraid Little Fifth will get stressed. Come visit Territory One when you're free to see it."

Evolved cats still get stressed? Xia Qing lost control of her strength for a moment and snap — severed an arm-thick hardness-evolved pine branch with one swing of the sickle. Jingkuan watched and just shrank his neck.

"ROAR!!!"

Before Hu Zifeng could say more, a sudden roar of an evolved bear came from the adjacent peak. The sound was deafening; the forest's birds and beasts all trembled with it.

The evolved crossbills screeched and fled in panic. The hearts of the three in the tree skipped a beat. The visual evolver Hu Zifeng immediately gave orders: "The bear is on the neighboring peak. Xia Qing, keep collecting pine cones. Jingkuan, you're on protection. I'll observe the bear's movements."

"Copy that." Taking advantage of the absence of crossbills causing trouble, Xia Qing sped up her harvesting.

"ROAR—"

The bear on the next peak roared again. At that decibel level, that shockwave, even the evolved crossbills hiding in their nests were startled into flight, abandoning their nests to flee.

Jingkuan's liver trembled too. "Boss, what's happening over there?"

Hu Zifeng answered, "Another evolved brown bear has shown up. Looks like they're fighting over territory. While they're roaring at each other, let's speed up. Jingkuan stays on guard — I'll start cutting pine cones too."

In the evolved forest, fighting means injury leads to weakness or even death. So when evenly matched opponents meet, they first display their strength to intimidate the other side into backing off.

On the neighboring peak, the two bears roared at each other — one roar from you, one shout back from me. You smash a tree, I push down a boulder — letting the other see how fierce they were.

When two bears fight, humans profit. Xia Qing sped up her pine cone harvesting again. Two hours later, only the top three-plus meters still had surviving pine cones. A thick layer of pine cones and pine needles lay on the ground below.

The collection squad stopped harvesting pine cones. Level-nine visual evolver Xia Qing put away her sickle, worked her sore palms and arms to prepare to climb down, and peeked past the trunk to glance at the neighboring peak.

That one glance nearly made her fall from the tree over forty meters high.

The two giant evolved bears roaring at each other hadn't scared her, but the wolf head with a notch missing from its left ear, peeking from behind a boulder to watch the bears fight — that truly startled her.

Oh my god, my lord, what are you doing?

The head wolf seemed to sense something and turned its head to look toward the peak where Xia Qing was. High on the mountain, under the blazing sun, its pair of landlord-rich gold wolf eyes gleamed with terrifying light.

Xia Qing immediately ducked her head and climbed down to pick up pine cones. That was her real business. As for why the two bears were fighting, what role the head wolf played in their conflict — Xia Qing didn't want to know at all, and even less wanted to get dragged into it.

She couldn't even beat the head wolf, let alone two evolved bears over four meters tall, weighing tons, who could shatter stone and snap trees with a single slap.

Because of the two bears' appearance, the collection squad worked faster than expected. But they quit while they were ahead, didn't touch the other pine tree, and shouldered the pine cones to head back.

If they didn't run now, once the two bears came down the mountain, they might run into the bears face-to-face. If the bears decided to challenge them, the three-person squad without heavy weapons was no match for evolved bears.

They sprinted out of Mountain Fifty in one go. Back at Territory Three, the three took off their protective masks and sweat-absorbing head coverings and sat on the ground, panting hard.

Chen Cheng, who was guarding the territory, ran over. "You're finally back. You didn't run into any evolved bears, did you?"

"No, they were on a different peak." Jingkuan patted the big bag on his back and grinned brightly. "Thanks to the bears, we got this many pine cones without a hitch."

Chen Cheng immediately put on a fawning face. "Brother Jing, have Eryong make us some pine nut and corn, will you? I've been craving this for almost a year."

In other words, the last time they ate pine nut and corn was this time last year. Xia Qing, who had been craving it for ten years and who grew corn and had pine nuts, decided she absolutely had to learn this dish from Eryong.

Once she learned it, she could eat as much as she wanted!

From one forty-plus-meter pine tree, they harvested 740 catties of large green pine cones. After resting a while, the three began dividing the harvest from this mission.

Unlike last time when they went to Zone Three of Mountain Forty-Nine — which belonged to Xia Qing — to gather chestnuts, this time they went to unowned, purely wild evolved forest, so the harvest had to be divided according to mission contribution.

All three were core team members, just with different roles. So they'd agreed in advance: after setting aside Eryong's share, then subtracting the ammunition and tools consumed this time, the remaining pine cones would be split equally among the three — 208 catties each.

Normally, ten catties of pine cones yields one catty of pine nuts, meaning each member of the collection squad got about twenty catties of pine nuts.

High risk comes with high reward. Green-light pine nuts are rare goods, so the price is high — over 350 merit points. For this trip into the evolved forest, each person's harvest converted to merit points was at least seven thousand!

Jingkuan grinned so wide he couldn't close his mouth.

Hu Zifeng discussed with Xia Qing, "When should we go harvest the other pine tree?"

Chen Cheng gazed at Xia Qing eagerly, wanting to join the next collection mission too.

Xia Qing answered, "We've already disturbed the bird flock, so we should harvest as soon as possible. I need to rest up, and I also have to prepare for the migratory birds passing through. Captain Hu, form the team — I won't join this time."

High reward comes with high risk.

Xia Qing had a clear sense of her own limits. She had no experience tangling with large evolved beasts. Mountain Fifty now had two evolved bears, so the pine cones should be collected by Hu Zifeng's squad, who had rich combat experience and worked well together.