Chapter 363.1: You're Too Kind!

“How are you feeling now?”

“Thank you... I feel much better.”

After waking from a coma, Shen Rui raised his head to see a woman in a white coat standing in the hospital room, her long white hair catching his eye.

He then looked at his left hand, noticing that the rolled-up sleeve revealed flesh-colored wrinkles. It looked decayed...

Seeing this, his pupils constricted slightly, and he involuntarily held his breath.

Outside the hospital room window, several players who hadn’t logged off were whispering to each other in excitement.

“Is this the guy from the Enterprise?”

“He looks like he’s sick...”

“I guess it’s like Bucky. He probably got bitten by those Mutant Slime Molds on the way here.”

“Oh damn, his arm looks like a Qilin’s arm...”

“It looks pretty cool.”

“Damn, where can I get one of those?”

“What are you planning?”

“Get a set, of course! Haha, it would be great if it could unleash tentacles like in

Prototype

, stretching of meters long!”

“What the fuck? You really have weird tastes...”

Fortunately, the injured inside the room could neither hear nor understand what the fools outside were discussing. Otherwise, his blood pressure that finally stabilized would probably spike again.

Looking at the tablet in her hands, Hyrja’s eyes sparkled with excitement and curiosity as she mumbled to herself. “Erosion level 11%, a Mutant Slime Mold has replaced your left arm, luckily, it didn’t spread further and the infection will only affect your arm. Your symptoms are relatively mild, I’ve injected you with an inhibitor to prevent the Slime Mold from spreading further... I also stopped it from taking over your brain.”

“Can I be cured?” Doubtful of the medical conditions here, but hopeful at the mention of the inhibitor, the man on the hospital bed grasped at his final lifeline.

No one wanted an alien parasite growing on them, especially something that was alive and disgusting.

However, Hyrja’s next words plunged him into despair. “You can never be cured.”

“Each Hive adopts a different evolutionary strategy, and we are completely unaware of the conditions in the Forever East Municipality.”

“You now have 2 options, replace it with a bionic prosthesis, or... You can wait until you return to your place to see if any doctors there can help you.”

Hyrja actually hoped he would choose the former, as it would mean she could obtain an interesting sample.

The New Alliance recently acquired a batch of bionic prostheses from Boulder Town with pretty passable quality.

But the man on the hospital bed didn’t hesitate to choose the latter. “... I’m alright, thank you.”

With an awkward smile, Shen Rui resettled his head back onto the pillow. Even if it meant getting a bionic prosthesis, he wouldn’t do it outside of Ideal City.

The next moment, the hospital door opened and their Squad Leader rushed in with Chu Guang.

“What’s the situation here?”

Before Hyrja could answer, Yun Song immediately approached the recently awakened Shen Rui, asking earnestly and urgently. “Do you feel better? Any discomfort or allergic reactions?”

Shen Rui stared at his left hand for a while, then glanced at his unchanged right hand, seemingly comparing them.

“I feel much better than yesterday, though it feels like some parts of my body aren’t mine.”

“What else?” Yun Song pressed on.

“Nothing else really, just the left hand feels a bit odd, but it’s nothing serious. I even feel confident enough to return to the battlefield!”

As soon as he heard that, Chu Guang hurriedly spoke from the side, “That won’t do, your wounds have just healed, you need to rest!”

How could he spit out something he had just eaten? Much less something he just spent so much money on... After all, medicine and special drugs like that cost a lot!

Are they free? Of course not!

As per the agreement discussed with Yun Song, when the corporate caravan passes by next month, they would have to settle the costs for curing the injured soldiers.

Compared to these poor, mission-burdened soldiers, the returning caravans loaded with goods were obviously much better targets.

Hyrja shot Chu Guang a strange glare, not understanding why he would want to keep those useless burdens in the camp. However, when she saw the glint in his eyes, she nodded in agreement. “I will advise you to do the same. We need inhibitors to stabilize your condition, and producing those will require Slime Mold spores.”

“We previously only had a single patient, so we don’t have much in stock. Without enough medicine, it’s hard to prevent the Slime Mold from further invading your body if you try to rely on your immunity alone.” Hyrja concluded.

Yun Song revealed a somber expression. “Isn’t there any special medicine that can cure them?”

“Not at the moment.” Hyrja shook her head. “In fact, I only started studying this stuff this year... There was none of this in the shelter where I was born. Anyway, I suggest they stay here for observation for a while, maybe there will be some progress.”

That was the best method for the time being.

Actually, being parasitized by Mutant Slime Mold wasn’t entirely bad. Optimistically, at least their recovery ability and metabolic rate would increase. Their sensation of pain would also diminish.

The part of the body that was infected would also possess traits comparable to Mutant Humans.

Or... They could see it as possessing a self-repairing ‘biological prosthesis’. However, using a living thing as a prosthesis was psychologically unacceptable for most people.

Yun Song paused his step, turned to Chu Guang with a slightly embarrassed expression, and said, “We’ve troubled you to take care of these injured soldiers...”

“No trouble at all, it’s a piece of cake.” Chu Guang smiled, paused for a moment, then continued, “By the way, I didn’t ask during dinner, what happened to the Pioneer?”

Upon hearing this question, Yun Song fell silent, seemingly hesitant to disclose the situation.

Seeing his reaction, Chu Guang guessed that it was probably not a secret that couldn’t be mentioned, so he continued, “The crew of the Pioneer is our important partner, our residents want to know if they are safe. This is very important to us.”

Looking at the serious expression on the administrator’s face, Yun Song was silent for a while, then sighed softly, “To be frank, our Pioneer did encounter some trouble when venturing deep into the desert. They released Migratory Birds, sent the last message to the Enterprise, and then we lost all contact.”

“Upon receiving news of their troubles, we immediately dispatched reinforcements to the west and searched for their signal along the way. Unfortunately, there was no discovery, they vanished as if they had disappeared... We think that there are 2 possibilities. The first is that their communication equipment encountered catastrophic failure, the other is that there might be strong signal interference in the local area.”

“Now, it seems that only by continuing to move west into the desert can we hope to find new clues.”

From the Sunset Province to the easternmost coast of the continent spans thousands of kilometers, crossing multiple mega-city clusters and ancient battlefields.

Without the support of satellites and communication networks, the information sent from the Pioneer would find it hard to reach Ideal City.

As space was part of the ancient battlefield, it was covered with irregularly moving space debris and automated weapons, making the launch and stable operation of satellites nearly impossible.

It was also why most surviving forces, even if they possessed satellite launch technology, rarely used it.

As for the Migratory Bird system they mentioned, it was a one-time communication tool designed by the Enterprise for traders and long-distance teams.

The reason it was popular among them was because it was a lightweight item with a simple launch method. It was equivalent to a cheap long-endurance drone, capable of traveling the planet in low orbit, avoiding ground radar searches while carrying stored information back within the communication range of Ideal City.

Chu Guang had heard about the system from Luo Hua before, and even considered introducing a set.

However, since Migratory Birds were set to only fly towards Ideal City and there was no precedent for exporting this system to other survivor forces, he gave up after looking into it a little.

“Can you tell us what trouble you are facing?” Chu Guang felt that the person in front of him might know something.

And indeed, Yun Song’s next words confirmed his guess. “It’s the Army!”

A hint of gloom appeared in Yun Song’s eyes. “Those guys with prominent noses are like crows waiting for rotting flesh, pecking at whatever they see. Our guess is, the survivors or traders of the Sunset Province saw our land fortress and leaked the news to the Army.”

He couldn’t help but curse as he continued, “200 years, it’s always been like this, only when we decide to go find Shelter 0, do they become interested in Shelter 0.”

“What exactly is in that shelter?” Chu Guang couldn’t help but ask.

Although he didn’t expect the mere soldier in front of him to answer a question that even the highest commander of the Pioneer, Lu Yang, couldn’t answer, he was curious to hear others’ opinions.

Yun Song shook his head. “I don’t know, maybe it’s a superweapon, maybe it’s an unfinished piece of technology, I don’t know who said it, that there’s a treasure that can revive civilization there... But if you ask me, they might be lying from the very start.”

“It’s not like these things haven’t happened before. A treasure held sacred by a bunch of wastelanders turned out to be just a water purifier. Life in Ideal City is already good enough, why bother searching for that shelter? Even in the wealthiest times, everyone was just eating 3 meals a day...”

Although the belief in reinforcing allies hasn’t wavered, he clearly doesn’t believe the rumors about Shelter 0.

The story has been told for 200 years.

If there really was hope that there was a shelter that could solve all their problems, the world wouldn’t have turned out that way from the very start.

Realizing he had digressed, Yun Song no longer discussed his view on the rumor, steering the topic back on track. “I digress, no matter what the legend is, I have to wipe the asses of the brothers on the Pioneer. If they can continue, we’ll help them out. If they’ve suffered heavy losses, we’ll bring them home.”

“Since those mongrels on the West Coast have started to mess around again, it’s time to settle new and old accounts together!” Yun Song’s eyes showed a clear hint of hatred as he spoke.

Chu Guang couldn’t help but think to himself.

It seemed as though the Enterprise and the Army didn’t just not see eye to eye. There had to be some historical grievances involved.