Chapter 63: The Memo
Screech—screech—screech—
In the process of waiting, another sound of a plastic bag rubbing against the ground was heard.
Zhu Hui, who was still panting slightly, instantly reined in all fluctuations. The shadows also enveloped the two of them at the same time, merging with the shadow cast by the side wall of the residential building.
Looking toward the street corner, it was indeed a cataclysmic being with its face obscured by an umbrella.
The part that was probably its feet was parallel to the ground. It was unknown whether it was actually touching it, whether it was walking or floating, but Xu Xunyue could be sure that its movement speed was faster than the first one he had seen.
The cataclysmic being stopped in front of the residential building on the right side of the crossroads, closed its umbrella, and went inside, disappearing from sight.
Zhu Hui’s gaze lingered in the direction it had disappeared for a long time.
[Have you seen a cataclysmic being like this on your way here?]
Xu Xunyue asked through the mental link.
Zhu Hui shook his head.
[What about other cataclysmic creatures?]
He still shook his head.
Didn’t encounter a single cataclysmic creature?
Xu Xunyue thought for a moment and asked:
[How far was the place you came in from, and what was it like?]
Zhu Hui first made a ten with his hand, then wrote the word “park” in Xu Xunyue’s palm.
Ten kilometers, an open but empty park with no cataclysmic creatures.
Ghost Town was a town, and a park was a more internal facility. The other’s teleportation location should be closer to the center than his own.
As he was pondering, he was suddenly nudged on the shoulder by Zhu Hui.
Xu Xunyue followed his gaze.
It was a long wooden bench.
Its current appearance was very strange.
Drip, drip, drip…
The rain was getting heavier, and the force of it falling was also increasing, as if it were about to smash through the umbrella in the next moment.
With the washing of the rain, the long wooden bench became blurry from the cracks. The originally clearly visible rotten marks turned into a sticky, unknown substance, dripping onto the ground bit by bit.
If nothing unexpected happened, this strange state would spread to all parts of the long bench until it completely disappeared.
“Melting.”
This was the most appropriate word in Xu Xunyue’s mind.
He exchanged a look with Zhu Hui and got a meaning similar to his own thought process.
[You also felt that the rain has gotten heavier. This is caused by the rain.]
[We might have to go into a residential building for a while.]
It wasn’t just that wooden long bench. There were many similar examples around. Although the current victims were all small, dilapidated infrastructure, Xu Xunyue didn’t want to risk his life to test the durability of his equipment.
The spiritual power from Yu Yuan, who was a few kilometers away, indicated that she had already met up with Yi Chengli. Cheng Tao was a little ahead of these two, and it was estimated that he would arrive in another two minutes.
He and Zhu Hui could pick a place first.
There were four directions at the crossroads. Both the left and right sides had cataclysmic beings entering under his nose. All that was left were the houses in front and behind.
In front was a tall office building, and behind was a low-rise residential building. Xu Xunyue did not sense any fluctuations from living things in either of them.
The residential building had a simpler structure and limited space. And it was where the residents of the cataclysm zone had lived before they died. Perhaps they could find something.
Giving the coordinates to Yu Yuan, Xu Xunyue and Zhu Hui entered the residential building first.
The public area on each floor of this residential building was not large. There were three households on each floor, distributed left, middle, and right. The door of the middle household was directly opposite the stairwell.
The door on the left of the first floor was closed, while the doors in the middle and on the right were open. This meant that as soon as the two of them entered the main door, they had come face to face with the middle household.
There were no cataclysmic creatures inside.
The entire residential building did not look large from the outside. When divided into three households per floor, the area of a single household was even smaller. Compared to the concept of a “home,” it was more like a rental house or a temporary residence.
The middle household was probably a rectangular single room of about a dozen square meters. The walls were so clean they were almost barren. The door faced a table with miscellaneous items on it. Behind the table was a single bed placed against the wall. The toilet was simply partitioned off in this single room.
In addition, this room also had a balcony. The narrow side of the single bed was against the wall, and the wide side was against it.
The balcony was a semi-open design. The glass door was not closed, but the curtains were drawn rather tightly—which caused the wind from outside to blow in, making the curtains move, but the room was not much warmer than outside.
Zhu Hui went over to check the balcony, and Xu Xunyue began to look at the things on the table. The life of the person who lived in this room was probably relatively simple. The furniture was only the most basic, and there were not many things on the table.
There were tissues that looked like they would rot at a touch, an oil-based pen that was 100% unusable, a memo stuck to the side of the table, and a stack of newspapers at the corner of the table.
All of the above were covered in dust. A person with a cleanliness obsession might faint at the sight of it.
As someone who had returned alive from a cataclysm zone many times, Xu Xunyue of course would not care about this. He first looked down at the content on the memo—
[To-do:
-
Read the newspaper and understand what’s happening around.
-
Exercise, maybe I’ll get a chance to go to the adult’s house in the future.
-
Think about whether to find the police chief (crossed out) maybe I’m being nosy, I’ll see.]
Who is the adult? And who is the police chief?
Is this “police chief” some kind of code name, or is it the position of a police chief as I understand it?
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat…
The footsteps of a companion?
Screech—screech—screech—
No.
Xu Xunyue looked toward the door.
The streets and the square were empty. The raindrops splashed on the ground, creating quite a large splash. There was nothing else.
An afterimage appeared from behind, then quickly slid out of his retina and disappeared at the end of the road opposite the main door.
“Brother, wait for me for seven seconds.”
It was Zhu Hui.
He had already shot out, and his voice had just fallen. In the end, only a small whimper was left by Xu Xunyue’s feet.
Looking down, he saw the snow wolf spiritual body that had been thrown out by its master to protect the Guide.
The shadows immediately appeared happily, two-thirds of them surrounding Xu Xunyue, and one-third landing on the snow wolf’s white fur and flowing, as if they were sitting on a fluffy slide.
[Little wolf, little wolf, you’ve been thrown out by him again!]
[Sit here obediently and don’t move. He told you to guard this human well.]
[Ah, although he won’t say anything here, it’s still more fun to play like this when he’s not around.]
[Are you feeling guilty?]
[Of course not.]
“…” Xu Xunyue was a little speechless.
The sound that had first sounded should have been Cheng Tao’s footsteps.
Logically speaking, at such a distance—he hadn’t even seen a figure—at such a distance, he shouldn’t have heard the sound of a Sentinel moving.
The process of Zhu Hui coming to find him was a typical example. He could detect Zhu Hui’s existence early on through his spiritual power, but his five senses only reacted when Zhu Hui climbed down from the wall. Although Cheng Tao’s physical fitness was far inferior to Zhu Hui’s, it shouldn’t have been so loud.
So he had encountered danger.
Cheng Tao might have run into those cataclysmic beings that would suddenly appear and rush into the buildings on his way here.
No matter how logical a cataclysmic being’s own logic was, if it was disturbed and discovered the existence of a different race, it would still launch a pursuit.
Yu Yuan had also sent a message at this time that Cheng Tao had encountered danger. She had reported the coordinates and said that she had already met up with Yi Chengli and was rushing over.
These were two young military officers with the least experience. It was estimated that by the time they arrived, Zhu Hui would have already left with the person. Xu Xunyue simply had her and Yi Chengli come directly from the nearest road, saying that there was a discovery in the residential building.
He withdrew his gaze from outside the door, then glanced at the spiritual body rolling on the ground and reminded it:
[This is not at home. Behave yourself.]
[There are four seconds left.]
Xu Xunyue continued to focus his attention on the table in front of him.
The hand wearing the ivory-white gloves gently pinched the stack of newspapers and flipped through them with the force that was least likely to damage them.
After carefully identifying them, he confirmed that the dates were consecutive.
Combined with the content on the memo on the side of the table, the owner of this single room should have a habit of subscribing to the local newspaper of the small town.
Unfortunately, fourteen years had passed. The tissues and oil-based pens were unusable, and the newspapers here had also become decayed. The dates were in bold and could be barely identified, but the small characters used in the official articles were completely illegible. Xu Xunyue had already restrained his strength to touch them, but a table full of crumbs still fell.
Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang…
The rain grew heavier, and began to hit everything on the ground like it was smashing things.
On a rainy day, it was impossible for a residential building to have electricity to turn on the lights. The balcony curtains were half-drawn, blocking what little light there was from the outside.
There were only two seconds left of the seven seconds Zhu Hui had mentioned.
Xu Xunyue unhurriedly sat in his wheelchair and slid to the balcony to close the glass door.
It’s getting dark so fast outside.
Whoosh— The glass door closed.
The room suddenly became much warmer.
Then, he heard Zhu Hui’s footsteps.
Zhu Hui was moving at high speed with a person, so he inevitably made a little noise, but it didn’t matter since he was already in the residential building.
Cheng Tao, who had been dragged all the way by him, looked a little pale, but his protective suit was intact, not wet by the rain or stained with the smell of blood.
“He’s fine. He looks pale because he was running,” Zhu Hui let go. “He was unlucky. He ran into several cataclysmic beings at a corner, and then he was chased by them all the way. Because he had to hold an umbrella, it was not easy to attack and defend, so he made some noise.”
“I went over and helped him solve it. Those cataclysmic beings won’t chase after him anymore.”
The enlarged raindrops hit the balcony glass door, making it vibrate. The warm room and the outside seemed to be two different worlds. With people gathered in the room, it became a home of unparalleled security.
If the door were closed, it would probably feel even more secure.
But the other two hadn’t arrived yet. They were almost there.
The snow wolf, which had been standing up straight, saw Zhu Hui and, as if its willpower had reached its end, immediately lay down on the ground and turned into a wolf pancake.
The shadows exclaimed.
[It’s changed!]
[It’s become flat!]
[Didn’t I say my skills haven’t declined? Hmph, no matter how strong a wolf is, it will fall down after being touched by me for seven seconds!]
[Actually, you don’t have to doubt yourself. The little wolf should be waiting for him to come back. When this Sentinel comes back, its protection mission will be over.]
[Oh—then the little wolf is a wolf with a lot of principles.]
[We are shadows who are very good at touching wolves.]
Xu Xunyue tried hard not to laugh.
Before him, Zhu Hui’s concise summary ended, and Cheng Tao immediately followed up.
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t fast enough to react, and I didn’t control my aura and emotions well. I almost got you into trouble.” He looked guilty, but also had undisguised admiration. “You—oh, actually, I kind of want to address you with ‘sir’…”
“No need.”
Cheng Tao wiped his sweat and smiled. “Okay. In short, you’re very powerful. You let me see what a Chief Sentinel is really like. Those few cataclysmic beings were no match for you at all.”
“They didn’t die. I just scattered them for a moment. The main purpose was to get you out of danger,” Zhu Hui said. “Between companions, it’s what I should do. There’s no need to apologize if there’s no mistake.”
Xu Xunyue also agreed with Zhu Hui’s statement.
“It’s just that this place is too unusual. It’s good that you came back safely.”
Before he could finish, he looked toward the main road outside the door.
At this time, the figures of the other two finally appeared on the street.
…They had finally met up.
