Chapter 134: Square-shaped Building

Translator: Exodus Tales Editor: Exodus Tales

Xia Fei sat on a mountain peak and had his breakfast as he admired the morning sun gradually lighting up the huge, ancient ruins below him.

Most of the buildings within City 02 had already been reduced to rubbles, and even those edifices that had managed to retain their shapes were all riddled with holes under the intense firepower from the robot army. They were barely still standing and seemed as if all it would take was a light touch to bring them all crumbling down.

The only structure at the city center that could be considered intact was a square building. It was large and angular, with dozens or so already destroyed large cannons on its roof. The cannons looked like dead tree branches, bent and twisted as they dangled from above.

There was a layer of shiny silver metal on their surface. Despite experiencing the elements all year round over all these years, the metal remained gleaming under the sunlight. That should be where the core organization of City 02 resided. Its resistance against attack was simply beyond belief; it was nothing short of a miracle that it could remain standing and not succumb to the relentless onslaughts of the elements.

Xia Fei had a simple breakfast, composed of two cans of beef and peach, two liters of milk, twenty pieces of dense bread, and one each of White Dew and Snake Eye Berry. Xia Fei had a shockingly big appetite, and everything that he had just eaten only made him half full.

No one could eat their fill when in battle. He needed to keep himself on the edge of hunger, so he would be able to find his strongest explosive combat strength within. It was akin to someone heading off for a job after filling their stomach with food. Not only would he feel lethargic, but his stomach would also be unable to take the exertion.

A real experienced warrior would never let themselves be at ease. They needed to use hunger and pain to stimulate the biological instincts that had already deteriorated in humans, so that they could rely on their beast-like abilities to hunt, battle, and survive.

Getting up to his feet and exercising his limbs, Xia Fei began his trek down the mountain.

He maintained a speed of around 500m/s, a measured pace most suitable for him to observe his surroundings. It was now daytime, and most of the insectoids had burrowed into their caves to rest, making it the best time for him to go exploring. As for insectoid extermination, that was best reserved for the night.

Xia Fei had managed to harvest over eight hundred diamond-shaped crystals from fighting the insectoids last night, which roughly translated to an equal amount of points from the training camp. A simple conversion of these points would net him approximately eighty million star coins, and to the cash-strapped Xia Fei, this was a timely injection of funds. He had made the decision deep down that he would start to keep his ruins exploration to the day and insectoid massacre to the night in order to earn money.

It was not every day that he would get a chance to explore the ruins of the ancient civilization, so he must attempt to cover the expenses of his next batch of medicinal ingredients through this exploration, and it would be ideal if he could earn some for Quantum Holdings as well, so that when the right time came, he could afford a comprehensive industrial upgrade of the company, improving its competitiveness.

In the blink of an eye, Xia Fei had already arrived on the outskirts of the city. The alloy plate paving the roads within had long been made uneven, and the buildings on either side devastated to the point they were no more than rubble. A slight breeze lifted the dust off the ground and kept them suspended in the air, which painted a particularly desolate image.

Xia Fei concentrated, then began regulating his Breath Control technique. He needed to be careful at all times if he were to proceed in such an environment because even a pack of soldiers would have an easy time hiding in these densely packed buildings of varying states of dilapidation.

Xia Fei could keenly sense that there were plenty of unfriendly eyes staring at him from these rows of buildings on both sides of the road. Needless to say, they must belong to insectoids that were currently searching for chances to tear him into shreds. They had long been tired of feeding off their kind or what sparse vegetation that grew on this planet. Xia Fei’s appearance was akin to a piece of fragrant steak placed on top of bland white rice in a bowl; countless insectoids were already salivating at the prospect of getting their mandibles on this meat.

With a crooked smile, Xia Fei’s figure blurred as he instantly disappeared at the center of the road. The insectoids could only helplessly watch as that steak escaped from them. Because his speed was too fast, it easily surpassed the limit of scrutiny that the insectoids possessed.

The insectoids were not the only ones capable of lurking in the dark to ambush their prey; Xia Fei himself was an expert when it came to making concealed kills. After all, his specialized skills were all attuned to the assassination, so when it came to disappearing into the dark, Xia Fei was a lot smarter than these insectoids. There was no reason for an assassin to walk along the open road to wait for others to ambush. Instead, it ought to be the assassin who would hide to launch a sneak attack on others.

His figure flashed like a bolt of electricity, and Xia Fei kept making progress under the cover of the ruins.

His movement was very strange, flitting from one point to another before pausing to observe his surroundings.

What he was doing did not seem like running but more like jumping.

Xia Fei had seriously considered each and every point, and doing this would not only give him a suitable angle to take in his surroundings but would also take into consideration the light and the movement of the air, including the possible paths of return.

Xia Fei’s actions were not as a result of his fear toward the insectoids but a habit formed when it came to his mobility. Whether the enemies he was facing were powerful or weak, he felt it necessary to treat them all seriously. A proper assassin would never underestimate their target—a creed that any assassin would not compromise on.

Though Xia Fei was no assassin, he had been learning the assassin’s ways from the very beginning and was even under the unorthodox assassin Phantom’s direct guidance, so he had more or less been heavily influenced by their practice and views.

Xia Fei was half crouching behind a low wall, diagonally across from him was a green insectoid. This insectoid looked like a huge earthworm, plump and soft all over; its head was growing more than a dozen eyes of different sizes.

The insectoid’s most unique feature was its mouth; it had numerous circular rows of teeth, much like the ones seen on lamprey’s, so anything that accidentally ended up in its maw would get shredded in a matter of seconds.

Xia Fei learned from his inquiry that this type of insectoid was called sawtooth, considered to be rank 2. Possessing a certain level of intelligence, it was cunning and brutal.

Xia Fei had positioned himself very cleverly; including the protection from his Breath Control technique, that sawtooth was simply unable to sense his presence despite being so near.

Xia Fei waited for the opportune time and went dashing behind the creature in a flash as his Chasing Light deftly carved a circle around the sawtooth’s neck, cutting off its head at one go.

Green liquid gushed out of the wound like an open fire valve—an amount that was almost at least several dozens of liters.

This headless sawtooth carcass lay in a heap on the ground, madly thrashing about. As it lost all blood, its originally plump body gradually shriveled up.

Its head was still thrashing about on the ground; its maw full of tooth-whorls tore and bit at the empty air.

Xia Fei stomped its head and it finally ceased moving. Thrusting in his Chasing Light, he very casually dug out that diamond-shaped crystal from the insectoid.

Storing the crystal into his spatial ring, Xia Fei continued toward the heart of City 02. He did not intentionally go out of his way to kill insectoids; unless they were obstructing his path, Xia Fei would not take the initiative to kill these insectoids.

It was already daytime, and according to Xia Fei’s timetable, his focus now should be on exploration. If he were to stumble upon one or two valuable ancient relics during his search, his expected haul would far outstrip what he could earn by killing tens of thousands of insectoids, and money was something that Xia Fei sorely needed right now.

Along the way, Xia Fei discovered that the ruins rarely had anything that could be deemed as a hundred percent intact. Even if there was any, it would just be worthless trash, and there was hardly a trace of those top-grade items that he so desperately sought.

Xia Fei stopped and considered this. He realized that the chances of finding what he wanted were very low if he continued to search through the ruins blindly. If he wanted to be rewarded for his efforts, he had to choose a specific location and carefully comb through it.

He tried to construct a mental image of how the city looked back in its heyday, attempting to integrate himself into this city in a way that he had higher possibilities of locating the places where he might find valuables.

That huge and square-shaped building at the city center evidently came to mind as one such possible location. There were also those mansions on the west side of the city that the wealthy had lived and the local garrison. Finally, there was that upscale business hub, which could potentially be worth searching.

Xia Fei walked on the road leading to the city center, slowly making progress toward that huge building.

All of a sudden, Xia Fei became keenly aware of a distinct aura coming from that building ahead. This aura was thick and violent, like what one would sense from a ferocious tiger deep in slumber. Though it was asleep, fatally carnivorous sensations still strongly permeated the air around the area.

Phantom coincidentally appeared beside Xia Fei at this time, his eyes also trained on that silver-colored, square-shared building.

“You’ve felt it, too?” Xia Fei asked.

Phantom nodded. “Its aura is formidable, something an insectoid possessing extremely high combative strength can give off.”

historical

Xia Fei furrowed his brows. “Indeed, and the fact that the creature isn’t even trying to mask its aura means it’s very confident of itself.”

High-ranking insectoids usually gave off two auras: One was maniacal savagery and violence—a murderous aura that clearly indicated the insectoid’s ferocious and combative nature.

Two was none—cunning insectoids were very careful to let their auras be felt by others, and some would even try to make themselves appear harmless.

Apparently, the insectoid currently hiding in that building was the former, the ruthless type that possessed formidable strength.

Going by Bosingwa’s initial introduction, the insectoids living on this planet ought to be of the lowest ranks, so why would there be such a unique insectoid here?

Xia Fei did not give this further thought and followed along the decrepit walls of the surrounding edifices as he fast approached that square building, hoping to catch a glimpse of the insectoid with his two eyes.

Killing a high-ranking insectoid would reap him plenty of benefits, and the carcass could be sold to science institutions. This would be a very lucrative haul, which was why Xia Fei had decided to venture deeper in all by himself. He would kill it if he could, and if he could not, he would rely on his speed to beat a hasty retreat. There hardly posed any danger with his plan.

He spread his body backward and got into a stance, ready to take off.

Pumping strength to his two legs, Xia Fei applied top speeds as he dashed toward the wall in front of him, and just as he was almost upon the metal wall, with a mere 0.5-centimeter distance away from slamming on it, Xia Fei abruptly lifted his right leg and used the force to send his entire body skyward as if he were spiderman.

His leg stomped on the surface of the wall as he continued to use the force from his acceleration to scale the wall. The moment the force weakened, Xia Fei would begin to fall off that shiny wall.

There was a hole on the fifth floor of this building created by the blast of an explosive shell. Just as the impetus of his sprint was able to ebb, Xia Fei’s two arms managed to grab hold of the hole’s edge, then he pulled himself up and climbed into the building.

Because it was apparent that a ferocious insectoid resided in this building, Xia Fei did not choose to enter the place via conventional routes but utilized his speed ability’s advantage instead to get himself to the fifth floor at once.

It appeared that he had ended up inside an office of sorts. There was an old map hanging on a nearby wall, and several alloy desks were piled at a corner in a disorganized fashion. The explosive shell had, once upon a time, come from outside the building, creating a circular tunnel that bore through one wall after another along its trajectory.

Xia Fei surveyed this messy room, then took a deep breath, venturing further to the core of this huge building.