118: Chapter 118 Allies with Hidden Motives

Su Qingxue's strategy of playing along with the enemy's ruse had proven quite effective.

The scout from Black Shark had scurried back to report, carrying the fabricated intelligence.

Throughout most of the night, Black Shark's people had kept creating disturbances to annoy them.

They had driven several straggling monsters toward their position, clearly intending to keep wearing Su Qingxue down.

But as soon as the monsters showed their heads, they were enveloped in ice mist and wiped out by a few high-explosive crossbow bolts.

It wasn't until the sky began to turn white with dawn that things finally quieted down outside.

After a night of tossing and turning, the girls all had noticeable dark circles under their eyes and were exhausted.

However, the look in their eyes was different from before.

The panic and trembling they had shown right after getting off the Train were basically gone.

In their place was a calmness born from seeing death and fighting for their lives, tinged with a bit of ruthlessness.

The morning sun shone in through the broken window frames of the bus station.

It brought a bit of warmth to their bodies, no longer as bone-chillingly cold as it had been in the middle of the night.

The girl responsible for keeping watch hurried over.

"Captain Fang, someone is coming from outside!"

She deliberately kept her voice very low.

Mu Waner swiped her finger across the screen, instantly syncing the drone footage to the tablet in the center.

Three people appeared on the screen.

They were slowly approaching from the other end of the street.

They weren't wearing the uniform black clothing of Black Shark.

They were dressed in old windbreakers and outdoor windproof pants, covered in quite a bit of dust.

The leader was a man wearing gold-rimmed glasses, looking quite scholarly.

A man and a woman followed behind him.

The woman looked around nervously every few steps, while the man carried a bulging dark-colored mountaineering backpack.

Teacher Qin Bing leaned in toward the tablet to take a look.

"It's Gray Pigeon."

Her voice was devoid of much emotion.

The three people stopped about a hundred meters away from the bus station.

The man with glasses raised both hands to his chest and waved them, signaling that he had no weapons.

"Friends from Train No. 774, we are the Gray Pigeon exploration team."

The man shouted.

"We mean no harm, we just came to trade some intelligence with you!"

Fang Che stood still, glancing at Teacher Qin Bing.

Teacher Qin Bing nodded and walked straight behind the pile of scrap metal blocking the door.

She looked out through a gap.

"Intelligence?"

Teacher Qin Bing's voice was filled with cold scrutiny.

"We have no interest in whatever you have."

The man with glasses smiled, his hands still raised.

"Hey, don't be in such a hurry to shoo us away. It never hurts to have more friends."

As he spoke, the man squinted and scanned the dilapidated bus station, clearly trying to suss out what was inside.

"You all should have seen clearly last night what kind of things Black Shark are."

"If you cooperate with people like that, you have to sleep with one eye open."

He took another small step forward.

"Um... we actually heard some pretty interesting news."

"They say your Captain Fang Che here... has some special abilities."

"I heard he can make people stronger at will. Is that true?"

After all that buildup, they finally got to the point.

Teacher Qin Bing leaned her shoulder against the old door frame, her arms crossed over her chest.

"You actually believe the nonsense rumors outside?"

She sneered.

"Our group from Train No. 774 never looks for trouble, but we've never been afraid of anyone either."

"If you came here to poke around about such rubbish, you can get lost now."

"If you see that we have fewer people and want to try your luck, just come over and try."

These words gave them absolutely no face.

She didn't reveal a single word about whether it was true or false.

Instead, it left the three people outside stuck.

The skin on the man with glasses' face twitched, a dry laugh stuck in his throat.

He probably hadn't expected the woman inside to be so merciless.

Su Qingxue walked over from the back at this moment.

The low temperature from the ice mist earlier hadn't fully dissipated; one could feel a chill just by getting close to her.

She deliberately held her breath, making her complexion look deathly pale, feigning the weakness of someone whose mental power was nearly exhausted.

"Since you are here to talk business, then bring out something substantial."

Su Qingxue's voice was devoid of fluctuation.

"We can sign a temporary non-aggression pact."

"But the items for exchange are limited to the specific locations of monster hordes in the city and where the supply crates are."

"Don't bother asking about anything else."

The man with glasses' gaze swept over Su Qingxue, and his eyelids twitched noticeably.

He could feel the chill brought by that white mist even from that far away.

This must be the ice-type ability mentioned in the intelligence reports.

He stood there without speaking, his mind rapidly calculating the pros and cons.

Black Shark had many people and deep foundations; they were not to be trifled with.

Train No. 774 had fewer people, but they looked terrifyingly tough, not to mention Fang Che, who was standing in the back without having revealed any of his moves.

The best approach was to stay far away and watch these two fight to the death.

"Fine, let's do it as you say."

The man with glasses immediately nodded in agreement.

He gestured to the man behind him carrying the large backpack.

That person took a piece of paper from his pocket, on which crooked lines were drawn.

The man shook the piece of paper from dozens of meters away.

"This is a location we found in the west of the city last night. It's a dilapidated supermarket, and there's definitely a stash of food and drink inside."

He pointed to a red cross in the top right corner of the paper.

"We'll trade this for the route you took to get here, and information about the movements ahead."

Mu Waner crouched a few steps away in the back, not moving.

On the tablet screen, the location of the supermarket they mentioned had already been highlighted in yellow, clearly contrasting with the footage captured by the drone earlier.

She looked up toward the outside of the gap.

"We already cleared that dilapidated supermarket yesterday."

"There were at least thirty Stitchers surrounding the perimeter."

"Furthermore, the rolling shutter door was welded shut from the outside; you'd need explosives to force your way in."

"You call this a simple supply point?"

The muscles on the man with glasses' face visibly stiffened.

He had tried to fool them with a mess that was impossible to handle, but the ruse was completely dismantled before the words had even finished leaving his mouth.

Fang Che stood against the wall, observing the reaction outside.

This group from Gray Pigeon was clearly betting on both sides.

They wanted to bait out Train No. 774's trump cards while avoiding Black Shark's attention, always thinking about picking up scraps and taking advantage.

He didn't let Mu Waner continue to retort.

He pressed the throat microphone.

"That dilapidated textile factory in the north of the city, we passed by and took a look last night."

He spoke slowly, sounding quite casual.

"There was a lot of noise inside, probably a lot of things nesting there, so we didn't get close."

"This one is free of charge for you."

The man with glasses was clearly stunned for a second.

He probably hadn't expected the male captain on this side to speak so decisively.

He craned his neck to peer into the gap of the bus station, but inside there were only dark shadows blocked by a pile of scrap metal.

"Thanks."

"Then... happy cooperation."

Without staying any longer, he waved to those behind him and led the three people back the way they came.

Watching the backs of those three people disappear around the corner.

Mu Waner stood up from the shadows, reaching out to tug on the hem of Fang Che's jacket.

"Hey."

"Fang Che, the woman following behind just now, her reaction was off."

"As soon as the man with glasses let the words 'Black Shark' slip, her eyes started trembling."

"That feeling wasn't like ordinary caution; it was pure, terrified panic."

She leaned in closer to say this, her voice extremely low.

Fang Che nodded while leaning against the pillar.

This detail had hit the nail on the head.

It was highly likely that Gray Pigeon and Black Shark had bad blood in the past.

"What kind of bullshit cooperation, they look unreliable at first glance!"

Jiang Ning clutched a rag in her hand, vigorously scrubbing black bloodstains off the blade.

"Just looking at how cowardly they were earlier, who knows when they might stab us in the back."

"If you ask me, we should find a chance and kill those three too."

Fang Che turned his head.

"No need to rush."

"These people don't have the guts to start trouble for now."

"They are dying for us and Black Shark to fight to the death so they can catch a breath."

"Keeping these few fish around will, more or less, create some trouble for Black Shark."

"The leader isn't stupid. The first thing he'll do when he gets back is check that textile factory to see if there was any water in what we said."

Fang Che calculated the information he had just given away.

The textile factory in the north of the city wasn't a lie he had just made up.

There was indeed a nest of monsters there.

But the number and size of the monsters would be enough to cost these people, who were only thinking of picking up cheap wins, a layer of skin.

If they dared to run up to Train No. 774 to try and get intelligence for nothing, they had to pay some blood as a toll.

Less than two minutes later.

A slight static sound suddenly came from Fang Che's throat microphone, and then Gu Nanzhi's hurried and deliberately lowered voice rang out:

"Brother Fang Che, they've moved!"

"Black Shark's main force has come out!"

There was a hint of nervous panting in her voice; she was clearly observing from cover.

"It's not a small harassment squad, it's a large force. I estimate at least thirty people, and they are advancing rapidly northward along the main road!"

"Based on this direction... they are heading straight for the Old Energy Station!"

Hearing this, the people from the several combat groups nearby all stood up straight.

Inside the Old Energy Station lay the Energy Core.

It was the key item that would determine who could survive this great confrontation.

Fang Che lowered his eyelids slightly.

After enduring all night, Black Shark finally couldn't sit still and wanted to rush the progress.

He tapped his fingers on the table and replied.

"Nanzhi."

"Your mission, continue."