No one expected something like that to happen at the end of the mission. Everyone’s hearts were heavy, and their morale was very low.

Except for the three players who looked confused and the Baker Street guide who didn’t know what to do.

Chu Guang said that he wanted to be alone for a while and calmly think about how to notify the family of the victim of this cruel fact.

He was not very good at speaking comforting words.

If his acting was too exaggerated, it would be embarrassing later if it was exposed, so it was better not to speak.

Sometimes silence was the best form of communication.

Lu Yang put his hand on Chu Guang’s shoulder and expressed his understanding.

"I understand how you feel, but it will be dark in two hours, and the situation in the city will become very complicated. After I go back, I will let Li De contact you about compensating the family of the victim."

It was at least twenty kilometers from here to the Pioneer, and they had to try to get back before dark. Although the night was not a mortal danger to them, it was better safe than sorry for them to return sooner.

"You guys can go back first, I’ll take care of the body before leaving."

"But… is it really okay for you to stay here?" Lu Yang said with a slightly hesitant expression, and couldn’t help but glance at the hands of the other three shelter residents that were holding their equipment.

Iron barrelled rifles, the most common weapon in the wasteland.

But in his opinion, it was not so much of a difference compared to a water pipe.

"Don’t worry, we’re familiar with this area, and we’ve been surviving like this for a while now."

Hearing what Chu Guang said, Lu Yang no longer insisted, and after giving him a firm look, he returned with his own people.

After they were far away, Chu Guang released a mission through the VM asking the other three players to recover the bullet casings all over the ground, and then he took the corpse of Makka Pakka on the road.

To be honest, it was not that Chu Guang was greedy for those bullet casings.

The main reason was that it was too difficult to act all the way to the base. He used to work in sales, not in funerals, so he really had no experience in that regard.

That was why he got Lu Yang and the rest to leave first.

On the way back to the outpost, when passing Baker Street, Chu Guang remembered the payment, so he took out 5 silver coins and threw them in Zhao Sheep’s hands.

Looking at the silver coins in his hand, Zhao Sheep was overjoyed and nodded quickly in thanks. "Thank you, sir!"

At first, everyone in Baker Street rejected this metal currency, but since they found out that this thing could buy a lot of good things that they couldn’t buy before, they gradually began to accept it.

After all, what’s the difference between using chips and silver coins?

In winter, there would be no Boulder Town caravans coming here. All they needed was food, fuel, and warm clothing, and perhaps a new set of bedding to make life a little easier.

"This is what you deserve, and I will come back to you if I need anything next time."

After sending Zhao Sheep away, Chu Guang returned to the outpost and sent the corpse into the active matter extractor.

Three days later, the player would be back again anyway.

As for what if someone remembered his face? Chu Guang felt this was not a problem at all. If some people really suspected it, he could just say that they were twin brothers.

Or perhaps, he could post an announcement on the official website…

For example, due to a bug in the expansion that temporarily cannot be resolved, players who died in the expansion cannot be resurrected. And later, maybe the official could compensate the affected accounts with a limited assault rifle or event reward points?

That was quite reasonable.

After all, how could there be a game without any bugs?

Not to mention the testing stage, the game itself could only be regarded as the DLC of bugs.

As long as the compensation and rewards were reasonable, the players would still be appeased. At most, they would be like Yaya of the past when they failed to sleep for three days straight.

Chu Guang was actually a little impressed by himself as he held a lot of cards close at hand.

However, the problem now was that he didn’t want his players to die on purpose as soon as they saw the rewards. It would be too fake to die like that, and those Pioneer members were not fools after all.

But at the same time, he hoped that his players could help him earn a little more compensation. After all, they could only earn up to 13CR for three days of work. So it would not be not be too much to ask for a four-figure compensation, right?

Tsk.

It would be nice if there was a way to die reasonably.

Thinking that it was almost time for Li De to call him, he walked towards the barracks.

Coincidentally, just as Chu Guang was walking in that direction, Luo Hua happened to come out of the barracks. Seeing Chu Guang, his eyes lit up, and he took the initiative to greet him.

"Hey, you’re finally back."

"Your division chief is looking for me?"

Luo Hua looked at Chu Guang in surprise, then nodded. "That’s right, he told me to call him if you are back... How do you know?"

Chu Guang was about to smile, but remembered that he couldn’t do it, at least he shouldn’t, so he held back and sighed softly.

"That’s a sad story... We can talk about this when we drink in the future."

Luo Hua looked confused, not understanding why Chu Guang could only talk about it over drinks in the future, nor did he understand why the expression of the always gentle and elegant Chu Guang was so heavy.

However, he originally just asked it in passing, so since Chu Guang didn’t want to tell him, he would not ask further. "Okay..."

Chu Guang nodded and walked towards the office.

After going through the barracks door, Ace, who was maintaining her weapon, looked up at him without saying a word, and then skillfully turned on the holographic communication system on the table and sent a contact request to the Pioneer.

This bodyguard rarely spoke. It could even be said that she never spoke.

Chu Guang liked her character very much. Whether it was her attitude of doing things, or her professionalism, it would be great if Xia Yan could learn a little from her.

Dark green light beams intertwined in the air, weaving a three-dimensional net.

After a short wait, Li De’s full body figure appeared in the hologram.

After looking at Chu Guang for two seconds, and seeing that Chu Guang had no intention of starting the conversation, the chief of the logistics department cleared his throat and said, "I have heard from the captain about what happened. I am very sorry for the death of that young man. Of course, regret alone is not enough to express our apology. If you have no opinions on the matter, let’s talk about compensation."

Sure enough.

Chu Guang knew it in his heart, but he didn’t show it on his face.

With a slight nod of his head, he said, "Okay."

Guessing that the old fox would not take the initiative to name the price he wanted, Li De stopped wasting time and continued to speak.

"You are not employees of Enterprise, so we cannot pay pensions to your people according to Enterprise’s standards and employee levels. After we carefully discussed it, the compensation plan... 1,000CR, which is equivalent to hourly wages paid for 1,000 hours of his time."

Chu Guang stared at the projection and growled, "I can’t accept it, is a human life only worth 1,000CR in your eyes?"

It’s merely one ton of starch! They are so cruel!

Makka Pakka is our good friend… As his friend… You have to pay us more!

Li De also stared at Chu Guang, but he was not fooled by Chu Guang.

"I know that a human life is far more than this price. Life cannot be measured by money, but we also have to consider realistic factors... Not to mention that his death was not caused by us, am I right?"

Huh?

Chu Guang was a little surprised. He didn’t expect that the dude would actually be smart.

It could be seen that before answering the phone, this chief of the logistics department had done his homework. At least, he had asked his captain about the entire process of the operation.

Indeed

.

Strictly speaking, Makka Pakka didn’t die because of their mistakes, but because of his bad luck. He could only blame himself for stepping on a mine when he was searching through the building.

Li De’s implication in his words was very obvious. One could even say that it was not an implication because the meaning was very clear. He was saying that the deceased did not die because of them. However, because he died in an action related to them after all, they were willing to pay for it out of morality, and Chu Guang shouldn’t be asking too much.

Of course Chu Guang was very clear about this in his heart. But it would be undervaluing his professionalism if he just gave up.

Nodding his head, Chu Guang decided to make concessions in order to gain advantages.

"Yes, it is undeniable that we all have responsibilities, and I have no intention to put all the blame on you. To be honest, it is very noble and respectable of you to give compensation for the families of the victim. However, please also understand that from my standpoint, I naturally have to find a way to help our people gain as much benefit as possible."

"I understand. So your answer is?"

Chu Guang sighed. "I accept the compensation you offered. In addition, I will give his widow a compensation of 2,000 silver coins in my own name, which should be enough for her to not worry about her expenses for a period of time."

Li De’s brows relaxed slightly.

Before making the call, he had been making mental preparations for a long time, but it seemed as though communicating with the other party was really smooth.

To be frank, he was surprised.

He was shocked that the old fox didn’t take the opportunity to shake them down, so much so that the plan he had made earlier was completely useless.

It was such a waste of his time.

"Looks like we’ve reached an agreement."

"Yes, we’ve reached a consensus on the compensation of the victim."

Li De had a smile on his face when he heard the first part, but when he heard the second half of the sentence, his blood pressure suddenly soared.

Staring at Chu Guang’s hologram, he searched for his blood pressure medicine in his pocket and angrily yelled, "What do you mean? Are you trying to tell me that every shelter resident is the wealth of the shelter as a collective, and in addition to his personal losses, we have to compensate you collectively as well?"

Huh?

You can even interpret it this way?

Chu Guang, who hadn’t thought about anything like that, was secretly impressed. He burned the excuse into his mind and planned to use it again when he ran into another opportunity in the future.

Taking a second to sort out his emotions, he stared at Li De in the hologram without feeling ashamed and said righteously, "What do you mean by that? Do you think all I think about is money?"

No shit?!

Li De resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Stop going in circles, just tell me what you want!”

Chu Guang said with a serious face, "I seriously reflected on the reasons for today’s accident. The reason why this happened isn’t because your men didn’t give us protection. Instead, we failed to protect one of our own.”

"If we could get him body armor and a helmet, he wouldn’t have been killed so easily. If we could get him a submachine gun or a shotgun, today’s tragedy wouldn’t even happen. If…"

Li De couldn’t help but interrupt. "If we could provide you with a few sets of exoframes, you wouldn’t even need us to get the fuel rods, and you would get it for us, right? Is that what you meant to say?"

Chu Guang actually wanted to nod and agree, but he knew that talk like that was useless and it would only annoy Li De more.

There were some things that couldn’t be negotiated, like those exoframes, or those modular production units that were easy to use.

But there were definitely other things he could try to get his hands on.

"Oh no, that would be too much, and we would be embarrassed to ask you to do so much for us. Besides, it’s better to teach a man to fish than to give him a fish." Chu Guang continued without feeling embarrassed, "Our requirements are not high. In order to prevent similar tragedies from happening again, I implore you to send an engineer to help us with our construction. For example, help us build a production line to produce steel, cement, helmets, protective gears, and weapons."

"That’s what you mean by low requirements?!" Li De stared at him, his eyes bulging out in anger. "What do you think we are, magicians?!"

Building a production line to produce rifles was much more difficult than producing a single rifle.

Depending on the type of process, product quality, degree of automation, and expected capacity, the cost and time required to build the line could vary wildly.

𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

It didn’t make much sense to build a single production line by itself. The parts on a production line were worn out all the time. If those replaceable standardized parts could not be produced, it was better to buy what they needed.

"That’s enough." Interrupting Chu Guang, who was about to say something, Li De frowned. After a pause, he continued, "You are lucky... We happen to have a Magnetic Confinement Plasma CNC Machine in our warehouse. It’s a high precision equipment and it’s easy to use and relatively easy to maintain. It was an antique we found from the last city. But because we have more advanced production tools, we don’t actually need that stuff. So it’s been kept in the warehouse for a long time.”

Chu Guang’s eyes lit up instantly. "How much?"

Li De smiled and said, "I can give it to you for free, do you want it?"

Chu Guang frowned. "... Is it broken?"

Li De glanced at him unexpectedly and said with a smile, "Yes. It’s broken in every sense and it will be very troublesome for us to fix it for you.”

Chu Guang finally understood what the guy wanted. He had no choice but to bite the bullet and ask, "How much?"

"100,000."

"..."

Motherfucker! 100,000?!

Even by making them work 10 hours a day, plus the cost of 600 meals per day, and nearly 1,000CR of value-added service, 200 players would have to work for 27 consecutive days to earn so much!

Who knows if they will even stay for 27 days?!

"... Your prices are really inflated…”

"Really? This is already a very good price. If you don’t believe me, you can ask the caravan from Enterprise to see if they can offer a cheaper price than us."

Seeing the defeated expression on Chu Guang’s face, Li De couldn’t help but smile smugly, but he quickly coughed and restrained his inappropriate expression, "Mhm, keep up with your good work. I will send you the instructions manual later. Of course, if you really can’t afford it, you don’t have to force yourself. The assault rifles and body armors we produce can also give you the ability to protect yourself. And I bet the quality will be a lot better than what you make yourself.

"By the way, the compensation will be sent over later... I almost forgot something as important as that!” After dropping his last sentence, Li De ended the communication happily.

From Li De’s last second expression, Chu Guang could sense the elation he was feeling… It was definitely very satisfying.

Chu Guang tried to feel it from Li De’s position. Actually, it was more than just satisfying. It’s really amazing!

"Do you still want to use the phone?" Ace, who was waiting beside Chu Guang, asked him when she saw that he didn’t move for some time.

"No."

Hearing that it was no longer necessary, Ace did not delay, reached out and turned off the holographic communication device.

Dark green beams disappeared from inside the barrack.

Glancing across Chu Guang’s face inadvertently, Ace was dazed for a moment, and there was a hint of surprise on her expressionless face.

She clearly noted how this person had a deflated expression a second ago, but she couldn’t see any signs of it now that the connection had ended!

Instead… There seemed to be a flash of excitement?

Huh?!

Ace felt that she must have read him wrong.

After all, they just lost a man, and the compensation didn’t seem to have met his expectations. She couldn’t imagine that he had any reason to be happy.

Heh… Old man Li of the logistics department is really stingy.

100,000CR… Those little players will have to work for a very long time.