Chapter 816

After the Blue Star evolution, humans were no longer the species standing at the top of the food chain.

When Xia Qing and Hu Zifeng's team entered Mountain Forty-Nine to dig shoots last spring, they were besieged by evolved bamboo rats.

After the Green Dragon Battle Team occupied Mountain Forty-Nine, they caught the evolved bamboo rats in the bamboo forest of Mountain Forty-Nine, screened them one by one, and selected edible bamboo rats for captive breeding.

Because of their actions, the bamboo rats in this bamboo forest were also scared away. So when Xia Qing led her team to dig bamboo shoots here this spring, they only discovered a small amount of activity traces left by bamboo rats. Plus, they had many people, so even though they dug away many edible bamboo shoots, the bamboo rats didn't dare to launch an attack.

Now was the period when animals in the evolved forest were most active after the second Qi rain; the bamboo rats here must have run over from elsewhere.

After the fragrant and sweet scent of the green-light bamboo shoots spread, it quickly attracted them over.

As the bamboo rats gathered in greater numbers, their courage would also grow. As long as one or two evolved rats took the lead in crowding forward, the other bamboo rats would follow.

Looking at the two large evolved bamboo rats leading the way, nearly a meter long, twenty-odd meters away, Xia Qing cautioned her companion, "Lao Er, you aren't wearing a protective suit, you retreat, I..."

In Xia Qing's eyes, Lao Er, who had recovered his health, was still a fragile wolf; but in Lao Er's eyes, Xia Qing was a companion with slow reaction and running speed who needed his protection.

So before Xia Qing could finish speaking, the wolf-dog Lao Er rushed up, and Xia Qing immediately followed with her knife. Bullets had gone up in price; for battles that could be solved with a knife and steel balls, she absolutely must not use a gun.

Lao Er rushed toward the strongest one among the leading bamboo rats, and Xia Qing rushed toward the second one.

After the steel ball she flicked with her left hand was nimbly avoided by the bamboo rat, Xia Qing confirmed that this was a speed evolver. However, she still didn't draw her gun and rushed up to fight this evolved bamboo rat.

Between an evolved wolf with the aura of a hunter and a human with the fresh fragrance of green-light bamboo shoots on her body, the bamboo rats naturally chose the latter. So the remaining hundreds of large bamboo rats, fifty or sixty centimeters long, also rushed toward Xia Qing, biting any part of this human they could reach.

Fighting these things in the dense bamboo forest wasn't as simple as beating up giant crocodiles. While Xia Qing was hacking and kicking to deal with the bamboo rats pouncing from every direction and angle, she also had to fend off the tricky sneak attacks of the speed-evolved bamboo rat.

Although these bamboo rats couldn't tear her protective suit or bite through her new backpack, Xia Qing, carrying a large bag, couldn't achieve victory quickly either.

This was why one must form a team when going out to collect supplies. Carrying a large bag of supplies would affect a human's flexibility in the evolved forest and reduce their combat power.

"Awoo—"

Seeing her companion being besieged, the wolf-dog Lao Er roared angrily, quickly bit the attack target to death, and rushed over to save her. Lao Er's target was that leading speed-evolved bamboo rat!

Seeing its natural enemy rush over, the speed-evolved bamboo rat turned and fled, and the pressure on Xia Qing's side suddenly lessened.

By the time Lao Er chased it down and bit this bamboo rat to death, Xia Qing's battle had also ended.

Lao Er killed the two leading bamboo rats, Xia Qing killed eight of the followers, and the rest all fled.

These ten pieces of prey, of course, had to be brought back.

While praising Lao Er, Xia Qing quickly cleaned up the battlefield. After testing and discovering that there was actually a yellow-light bamboo rat, Xia Qing was overjoyed. "Although it only weighs twenty-odd catties, processing it into freeze-dried food is enough for Lao Er to eat for two days. Does Lao Er like eating freeze-dried food?"

Lao Er licked the blood clean from around its mouth, lolling its tongue and smiling happily.

"Lao Er is still the best, not a picky eater." Little White Fur is a picky eater; not a good wolf.

Xia Qing happily packaged the yellow-light bamboo rat separately, then stuffed all ten rats into a black thickened bag, and carried them back along with the bamboo shoots.

When passing by the green-light bamboo, Xia Qing heard the sound of gnawing on bamboo roots under the thick fallen leaves.

Looking at the bulge and listening to the movement, that should be a small bamboo rat that wasn't very big. It had very good taste; it was gnawing on the root of a yellow-light bamboo plant.

Xia Qing and the wolf-dog Lao Er only took one look and continued forward. A small bamboo rat didn't have much meat at all, and besides, one shouldn't hunt prey to extinction, otherwise there would be nothing left to catch in the future.

Bringing Lao Er to the side of the aggressive Qi-evolved bamboo discovered in the spring, Xia Qing discovered that after she cut away the hardness-evolved bamboo there and dug away part of the bamboo roots in the spring, the remaining bamboo roots had grown 11 bamboo plants during the second Qi rain.

The height of each was around 25 meters, the color of the leaves was basically the same as when she cut them last time, and also the same as the bamboo grown from the bamboo roots in the Mountain Fifty patch.

The performance of these two locations and the Qi-evolved bamboo within Territories Three and Five during the second Qi rain could explain that this kind of aggressive Qi-evolved bamboo possessed a certain stability; as long as it wasn't repeatedly and excessively cut during the Qi rain, it shouldn't undergo secondary Qi evolution.

This was bamboo that could be promoted for planting.

98% of the aggressive Qi-evolved bamboo and bamboo roots here had to be dug away before the third Qi rain, with only a few bamboo roots left to preserve the native species; otherwise, this kind of bamboo would soon spread to cover the entire bamboo forest, encroaching on the growth space of edible bamboo.

Upon reaching the vicinity of the third peak of Mountain Fifty, Xia Qing let Lao Er cross Mountain Forty-Nine to return to the territory, while she carried the supplies to the parking lot to rendezvous with Xin Yu.

When acting in a team with Xin Yu, Xia Qing harvested two green-light bamboo shoots, and Xin Yu harvested one; there was no need to redistribute them.

The bamboo shoots Xia Qing dug after saving the red fox cub and the bamboo rats she hunted were harvested when she and Xin Yu were acting separately, so they all belonged to Xia Qing and didn't need to be distributed either. But she still gave Xin Yu a red-light bamboo rat, letting her take it to feed the broken-winged harrier and the ground-walking eagle within Territory Eight.

Then, Xia Qing sent the red-light bamboo rat to Territory One to exchange for points, sent two fresh bamboo shoots to the idol, and left the yellow-light bamboo rat, asking Ji Li to process it into freeze-dried food. Xia Qing brought all the remaining thirteen green-light bamboo shoots back to her own territory.

Yang Laoda, who had merit in guarding the territory, obtained one green-light bamboo shoot, and Lao Er, who came over to visit, obtained egg-pumpkin-boiled green-light small crocodile. Xia Qing's lunch was egg-cucumber fried rice and grilled yellow-light small crocodile meat skewers.

After eating, she gave Lao Er a bath, and after killing insects and sterilizing, one wolf and one sheep lay in the hanging chair, while Xia Qing lay on the sofa, taking an afternoon nap together.

With Lao Er there, Xia Qing and Yang Laoda slept exceptionally peacefully and soundly.

But when Xia Qing went to catch Little Feimao to feed it medicine in the afternoon, it consumed more time and more supplies than the time in the morning.

Because the aura of the top predator on her body made the red squirrel family feel afraid. The angry Xia Qing increased the debt Little Feimao owed to points.

After Lao Er finished feeding on the fish, it didn't intend to stay overnight and indicated to Xia Qing that it was leaving.

The yellow-light bamboo rat freeze-dried food wouldn't be ready so quickly, so Xia Qing loaded all five catties of freeze-dried food from the storage room onto Lao Er's back, cautioning it to bring Queen Mother and Broken Waist over for a visit as soon as possible.

The second Qi rain had already ended, and Xia Qing had started soaking in the medicinal solution to recover from bodily damage again.

This time, no matter what situation arose, she wouldn't use medicine; she must soak for half a year to thoroughly recover the skeletal, muscular, and skin damage she had accumulated over these years, and raise her physical fitness and combat power by a notch.

Today, when hunting evolved bamboo rats, her performance was too poor. Fortunately, the companion cooperating with her in hunting today was Lao Er; if it had been another wolf, she would definitely have been looked down upon.