“Sister Su Su!!!”
The crowd had already dispersed when a massive venomous insect flew in from the distant sky.
Pang Cancan was seated on top of it, gripping two of its antennae tightly as she rushed over in a panic. “Someone just attacked me!”
She had been squatting in front of a stall, picking out expired snacks when she was suddenly surrounded by several Tier 5 ability users.
They came aggressively and, without a word, tried to capture her.
Fortunately, those people didn’t know that Pang Cancan’s venomous insect could fly. Seizing a gap in their formation, she took off and flew several kilometers away. The people below ran wildly but couldn’t catch up, and since their abilities couldn’t locate her, they were unable to attack either.
Only after shaking them off did she ride her baby back to the trading market, just in time to see the crowd dispersing.
The venomous insect slowly descended, and Pang Cancan jumped down mid-air, anxiously asking, “Did someone attack you too?”
“Mm.” Su Su nodded, recounting everything that had just happened. “It was Boss Jiang from the Battle Pet Guild who saved me.”
Jiang Hong interjected at the right moment, “Just call me Jiang Hong.”
Pang Cancan wasn’t stupid. She immediately sucked in a breath of cold air. “Sister Su Su, they’re targeting us!”
But the problem was, they had just arrived at the Northern Base and hadn’t offended anyone!
The only thing they had done today was go to the Battle Pet Guild for medical treatment… Pang Cancan’s gaze slowly shifted toward Jiang Hong, who was sitting on the back of a cheetah.
Clearly, she and Su Su had thought of the same thing.
Jiang Hong had already anticipated their caution and vigilance.
He got straight to the point. “That dwarf’s reception this morning was lacking. Why don’t I take you both on a proper tour of the guild? If you have any doubts, I can answer them for you.”
Pang Cancan instinctively looked at Su Su.
The situation at the Northern Base was far too complex. Even Sun Zhichun, who had been here multiple times, only knew surface-level information.
Jiang Hong before them, along with the Battle Pet Guild behind him, was the only force that had shown them goodwill so far.
Su Su decided to go along with it. “Alright.”
“Then please, this way.”
Just as they were about to leave, the stall owner who had gone home to fetch a dictionary finally ran back, panting heavily.
“Beauty, the thing you wanted is here!”
A thick Xinhua Dictionary was stuffed into Su Su’s hands. The stall owner braced his hands on his knees, taking a few deep breaths before his gaze suddenly fixed on his stall.
Su Su followed his line of sight and only then noticed—the stall, originally filled with books, was now in complete disarray. Many books had been blown open by the wind, yellow sand mixed into the cracks of their spines, further ruining their already aged appearance!
“Where did all this wind and sand come from? Wasn’t the dust storm over a while ago?”
He hadn’t encountered any sandstorms on his way back home!
The stall owner slowly turned his gaze toward Su Su.
Su Su had no way to explain herself.
She silently took out a cloth bag filled with Grade 1, 2, and 3 crystal stones and tossed it to the stall owner. “I didn’t take good care of the stall. This is compensation for you.”
The stall owner opened it for a glance and immediately beamed with joy. “Oh my, beauty, you’re really generous. Now I almost feel bad about it.”
Despite his words, his hands were honest, quickly stuffing the crystal stones into his chest.
“Beauty, how about this? Why don’t you take all these books with you and consider them as your purchase?”
He pointed at the scattered books on the ground. Among them, a few comic books had coincidentally flipped open to some rather inappropriate pages. Everyone’s gaze swept across them, taking in the content clearly.
The stall owner showed no embarrassment, but Jiang Hong, on the other hand, looked away awkwardly.
Su Su: “…No, thanks.”
Xiao Hei’s intelligence was growing, and so was its ability to mimic behavior. Without any guidance, it had already sneaked into the hot springs to act recklessly toward her. A few months ago, it had even watched a certain moonlit scene in the woods from beginning to end—who knew what strange things it had learned.
If she brought these books back…
Her firm rejection made the stall owner sigh regretfully. “Alright, then.”
Seeing that Su Su’s matter with the stall owner had come to an end, Jiang Hong spoke at the right moment. “Shall we go?”
“Alright.”
Pang Cancan lingered at the back, sneakily receiving a few comic books that looked quite intense from the stall owner’s hands before following the group as if nothing had happened.
Returning to the Battle Pet Guild for the second time in one day—only this time, they were accompanied by someone with real authority in the guild. The simple manpower-pulled tricycle had been upgraded to an open-top electric vehicle.
Jiang Hong rode his cheetah at a leisurely pace beside the vehicle, introducing the guild’s various buildings and facilities to the guests.
“That’s the racetrack. Some battle pets need exercise, so it has the largest area.”
“That’s the artificial mountain range. Some battle pets prefer to live in groups and don’t like staying with humans all the time, so they reside over there.”
“That’s the aquarium…” Jiang Hong paused for two seconds before continuing, “Our guild has another Tier 6 battle pet that stays in the aquarium. It was also the first to achieve human transformation.”
Speak of the devil.
Two figures happened to walk out of the aquarium.
One was tall, the other slender.
With the superior vision of an ability user, Su Su could easily make out their features—it looked like a completely ordinary couple, holding hands. The only striking detail was the man’s long blue hair, which gleamed brightly under the sunlight.
After watching for a moment, the woman standing at the aquarium entrance suddenly turned her head and met Su Su’s gaze across the distance.
However, she quickly looked away and shifted her focus to Jiang Hong, who was riding the cheetah.
Jiang Hong gave the woman a brief, indifferent nod.
The woman withdrew her gaze, pulling the blue-haired man along as they disappeared from view.
Pang Cancan couldn’t help but ask, “People can still dye their hair in the apocalypse? Or does your guild offer that service? If so, how about I dye mine red?”
“That’s not dyed.”
Jiang Hong had evidently heard this misunderstanding countless times before.
He replied indifferently, “He’s the first Tier 6 battle pet to take human form. He was also the first case in the base where a human and a battle pet became a couple.”
Su Su instinctively looked down at the Xiao Hei creature in her arms.
The black serpent didn’t look at her. Instead, it fixed its gaze on the disappearing backs of the couple, particularly on their hands, which were clasped together.
Jiang Hong only mentioned them briefly before shifting the topic.
Su Su clearly sensed that his relationship with the other party was quite neutral—not particularly good, but not outright hostile either.
“Miss Su.”
Jiang Hong suddenly turned the conversation toward her.
“You must be wondering why the Ability User Guild came after you so quickly. You might even suspect that I had a hand in it, right?”
Having her doubts exposed so directly, Su Su saw no reason to conceal them further. She admitted frankly, “Yes.”
“We only arrived at the base today. Other than the medical room, we didn’t expose our strength anywhere else.”
“This morning, when we were in the car, Shorty told us that Sister Yun is under your command and that she would report everything to you.”
“What’s more, when the Ability User Guild targeted us, you showed up at just the right moment, as if you had been waiting for this exact situation.”
At these words, Jiang Hong’s cold, hard expression finally relaxed into a slight smile. His rugged features softened a little.
“You’re right.” He admitted openly, “I was indeed waiting for you to run into this inevitable conflict.”
Su Su questioned, “What do you mean by inevitable?”
“Although you’re staying in the quadrangle courtyard under our guild’s control, the moment you settled in, all three major guilds began investigating your movements and strength behind the scenes to determine whether you were worth recruiting into their forces.”
Su Su had already considered this possibility. However, as far as outsiders were concerned, their group had only displayed Tier 5 strength. She didn’t think a Tier 5 ability level was enough to make the Ability User Guild specifically target her.
Jiang Hong saw her doubt and elaborated further. “You’re already at Tier 5, and you came to our guild with a battle pet seeking medical treatment at this specific time. That means one of two things—you’re either seriously injured or your battle pet is about to undergo transformation.”
Even if their guess was wrong, eliminating a battle pet that had a high likelihood of reaching Tier 6 was still a guaranteed win with no losses.
Su Su was silent for a moment before hitting the key point. “Your guild’s intelligence leaks very quickly.”
Jiang Hong didn’t deny it. “If you stay here a little longer, you’ll realize that even within our guild, there are three factions.”
“There are various ways for each guild to acquire information, even if it’s not top-secret.”
For example, the moment Su Su and her group—who were complete strangers—set foot in the guild’s premises, someone would have immediately reported their presence to the other guilds. A little analysis from those with a sharp mind, and they would have figured out most of the situation.
“Is the relationship between the Battle Pet Guild and the Ability User Guild really that bad?”
“They are like fire and water.” Jiang Hong continued, “So from the moment you brought a battle pet into the Northern Base, you were destined to be caught in the conflict—unless you had concealed both your and your battle pet’s strength from the very beginning.”
That was impossible.
The main reason Su Su had rushed to the Northern Base was to seek medical treatment for Xiao Hei and determine the cause of its abnormal condition.
“Of course, avoiding exposure wouldn’t have been easy either.” Jiang Hong added another layer to the problem. “The male companion who entered the base with you owns a Tier 5 eagle and even purchased an Energy Disruption Device. He’s already on the Research Guild’s exclusive watch list. The moment you all entered, the Research Guild started paying extra attention to you.”
“The woman standing beside Huang Yongjun just now—she’s the new ‘sworn sister’ he recently recognized within the Research Guild. So in this matter…”
Jiang Hong only said half of his sentence, but Su Su had already grasped the underlying message.
The earlier conflict likely had the Research Guild’s instigation and encouragement behind it as well.
Pang Cancan was already feeling dizzy from all the information. “What did we do to deserve…” being caught in the vortex of a power struggle?
“Do you think you lack capital?” Jiang Hong countered. “Two Tier 5 ability users, one Tier 6 battle pet, and another battle pet with yet-unknown potential—is that not enough for them to take you seriously?”
Pang Cancan proudly tilted her nose upward. “That’s true.”
“Then what about you?” Su Su finally asked the most critical question. “Why did you help us out? What’s your goal?”
There was no such thing as kindness without reason in this world. She had a rough guess about Jiang Hong’s intentions.
But she needed him to confirm it.
Jiang Hong’s expression turned serious as he stated plainly, “I need you to join the Battle Pet Guild, to join my faction, and work with me to achieve my vision.”
“As compensation, I can give you a Grade 6 crystal stone.”
Jiang Hong pulled out a pale green crystal stone.
To be honest, as two “country bumpkins” from the Southern Base, Su Su had never seen a Grade 6 crystal stone before.
Now that she was seeing one with her own eyes, she could hardly believe it.
She hadn’t expected Jiang Hong to offer such a generous reward. There weren’t many Grade 6 crystal stones in circulation throughout the entire Northern Base. On their journey here, they hadn’t even encountered a single Tier 6 zombie.
The only Tier 6 creature they had come across—the seagull—had been swallowed whole, feathers and all, by Xiao Hei.
Su Su’s thoughts were being pulled in different directions.
If she had this Grade 6 crystal stone, would she have needed to fear the Ability User Guild members at the trading market earlier?
Jiang Hong, who had taken out the crystal stone, was waiting for her response.
From his demeanor, he didn’t seem impatient.
It was unclear how much time passed before Su Su finally spoke. “And your vision—what is it?”