Chapter 584: Python Meat

Xu Juan's face turned very ugly. "Chen Dongyang must have found out something. He's been running to the inner city frequently these past few days, and Yang Shan hasn't been acting right either."

Xia Qing continued to ask, "Do you know where the two vials of Yi-element nutrient liquid that the Dongyang Squad traded with Territory Seven are, Sister Juan?"

Xu Juan nodded. "They've been in Chen Dongyang's hands the whole time. What's up?"

"The evolvers who invaded this territory on the night of the beast tide had taken Territory Seven's Yi-element stimulant. The only squad in Hui-Three that has ever traded stimulants with Territory Seven is yours."

Xu Juan froze, her eyes slowly widening.

Xia Qing said nothing more, cradling her tea and taking it in small sips.

Once Xu Juan had collected herself and slowly leaned back against the chair, she suddenly brought up an old matter. "Xia Qing, do you know how I got this scar on my face?"

On Xu Juan's right cheek were two long scars slanting across it. Xu Juan loved beauty and always covered the scars with concealer. Concealer wasn't cheap during the Calamity years, and Xu Juan had spent no small number of points on it.

Xia Qing shook her head.

She had been on good terms with Xu Juan back in the Safe Zone because she had once saved Xu Juan's life. Later, Xia Qing often went on missions with her squad, but the two of them had never been close enough to open their hearts to each other.

Xu Juan raised a hand and gently stroked her right cheek. "My first boyfriend was my high-school classmate. We promised we'd get into the same university. In the end, we didn't manage that, but we did get into the same city. So during winter break, I brought him home to meet my parents."

Before the first winter break of the Calamity, Blue Star had already seen plenty of large-scale natural disasters, but people all firmly believed the disasters would pass and life would go on as before, so everyone just kept doing what they were doing.

Until the world-shattering catastrophe utterly destroyed Blue Star's modern civilization.

"We went through earthquakes, tsunamis, and the great temperature drop together. After my mom and dad died, the two of us leaned on each other to survive. But when the insect tide hit, he shoved me into a sewer that was crawling with cockroaches and rats, just to save his own skin. My face was cut by shattered mirror glass at that moment."

Xu Juan slowly stroked her own right shoulder. "Here, a big chunk of flesh was gnawed off by rats and cockroaches. Luckily there was half a bottle of 84 disinfectant left in the bathroom. I escaped thanks to that half bottle of disinfectant, and it left a huge scar here too."

84 disinfectant could drive off rats and cockroaches in their early stages of evolution. Xia Qing had seen many times what happened when you poured that kind of disinfectant on a wound — afterward, it left an ugly scar.

"After I got out, I pushed him into the moat. Warm-hearted?" Xu Juan laughed coldly. "That kind of thing got left behind in the sunshine of a society ruled by law long ago. After the Calamity, this old lady only warms up to people who are useful and capable. You never asked afterward, so I never told you."

Xu Juan looked up at Xia Qing. "Last time Zhang Yong and I entered your territory, Sufeng gave me five thousand points. I used those points to buy a big chunk of green-light meat, and I hid alone in my room and cooked and ate the whole thing by myself."

Xia Qing said calmly, "The reason I saved you that time was also because I couldn't have walked out of the Evolution Forest alone and made it back to the Safe Zone."

The two of them looked at each other and laughed at the same time.

Xu Juan settled comfortably in her chair, her manner relaxed. "Coming out here to farm really suits you. Not only have you grown taller and put on weight, your mindset is a lot better than before. Back then, plenty of people said the poisonous bug bite had left your facial muscles stiff and turned your brain stupid, so all you could do was sell your labor. Looking at you now, you're smarter than anyone."

Xia Qing smiled. "You could come out here to farm too."

"I couldn't. I don't have your willpower. I couldn't take that hardship, and I couldn't stand the loneliness either." Xu Juan stuffed the last bite of pumpkin cake into her mouth, took the teapot and filled Xia Qing's cup, then poured half a cup for herself. "If you hadn't told me all this, I might really have been set up by Chen Dongyang and Yang Shanshan working together this time."

"Do you know why I've been fighting Yang Shanshan over the same man all these years? It's because Chen Dongyang has supplies and strength, he's generous to women, and he loves watching women fight over him. Following him, I've gotten plenty of real benefits. Guess what level my hearing evolution is now?"

Xu Juan's registered ability level in the Safe Zone was Level-Three hearing evolution. Since she was asking like that, it had to be more than Level Three.

Xia Qing guessed, "Level Five?"

"You really do think highly of me." Xu Juan shot Xia Qing a look, then said smugly, "But I'm almost there. I'm at Level Four and a half now."

From Level Three to Level Four and a half was indeed quite a leap. If Xia Qing hadn't left the Safe Zone, with the points she earned from working on construction crews and going on missions, the food she could have bought wouldn't have stored up enough energy in her body to level up in three years.

"If Chen Dongyang doesn't play any dirty tricks this time, I'll just keep following him and mixing with the Dongyang Squad. But if he dares to frame me, this time I'll make sure he falls headfirst into a pit of shit and never climbs out. Once my ability hits Level Five, I'll find a Level-Six man to marry and move into the inner city to live the kind of life a person should live."

Before the Calamity, the male population of Hua Nation had already been higher than the female. During the Calamity years, female mortality was far higher than male, so the gender ratio had become even more lopsided now, and among evolvers there were also more men than women. So once Xu Juan's ability reached Level Five, finding a Level-Six advanced male evolver to marry really wouldn't be hard.

At this point, Xu Juan suddenly got excited. "You haven't heard yet, have you? Last November, Red City sent a reinforced company to our base to boost our base's defenses."

Xia Qing nodded. "I heard."

Xia Qing had heard people from the inspection team and from Hu Zifeng's squad discussing this matter, and Yang Jin had even told her the truth: this reinforced company had been borrowed from Red-11 by the Hui-Three base commander to make sure the Hui-Three Gao Yi-element spinach could grow and go to seed smoothly.

"Then do you know that this reinforced company has over a dozen advanced evolvers in it?! Their company commander, Zheng Chen, is a dual-system evolver — Level-Seven speed and Level-Five vision — and he's pretty good-looking too." The more Xu Juan spoke, the more excited she got. "Even Tang Lu has stopped chasing Yang Jin and gone to cling to Zheng Chen instead."

Xia Qing also grew interested. "Even at Level-Seven speed, he's still a fair bit behind Yang Jin."

"Speed-wise he's a notch below Yang Jin, but he's dual-system. Besides, Tang Lu chased Yang Jin for five years, tried every trick in the book, and still couldn't land him. She's given up hope. Zheng Chen really is quite something. Oh, I have his photo!" Whenever Xu Juan got onto gossip, she got especially excited. She pulled out her phone, quickly found Zheng Chen's photo, and handed it to Xia Qing to see.

The man in the photo was wearing a Level-Three camouflage protective suit, with thick brows and big eyes, a stern expression, and an air of upright righteousness. Xia Qing handed the phone back to Xu Juan and gave an even-handed assessment: "He really is quite something."

Zheng Chen had no obvious scars on his face, was above average in looks, and had a very resolute gaze. His first impression really was quite good.

But he was only on loan here and would have to return to Red-11 sooner or later, so he probably wouldn't be looking for a marriage partner in Hui-Three.

"Right!" Xu Juan took an enthusiastic sip of tea. "Once I level up to Five, I'll go try my luck too. He's speed and vision evolution, I'm hearing evolution — our abilities complement each other perfectly."

Xia Qing took out six bags of frozen rock-hard snake meat paste and set them on the table. "This is green-light python meat from a high-level hardness evolver. Sixty jin in total. Two jin a day for twenty days, and you might just be able to level up to Five."

The smile still on her face, Xu Juan froze on the spot. After a long while, her trembling red lips asked, "Y-you-you said this is what?"