Chapter 19: Begining Of Being Lethargic
  In this city, water also costs money.
  Ah Ye’s face was not currently not looking looking. She held the silver coins in her arms, hesitated for a while and suddenly stepped forward to touch Lin Xi’s pocket.
  “Brother Bai, I’m not robbing your money. All of this money will save your own life.”
  She found Lin Xi’s seventy silver coins, counted them one by one and finally counted all.
  Thirty silver coins. It is just enough to buy a bucket of water.
  Lin Xi didn’t answer, he was speechless.
  Ah Ye took the rest of the money and opened a room for Lin Xi. She asked the dwarf to prepare a large bucket and helped the other party to carry into the clean barrel of water.
  Lin Xi leaned against the edge of the barrel. After a while, his body slowly fell over, his mouth and nose were submerged in the water.
  Ah Ye was startled and wanted to fish him out of the water.
  But before she even do it, she found that Lin Xi was not struggling or drowning. He just closed his eyes tightly. His white hair floated in the water and rows of small bubbles floated on the edge of his skin.
  Ah Ye was stunned.
  There are holes in the room. The sunlight outside shines, leaving circles of light spots in the water surface of the bucket shining like golden scales.
  Under the spot of light, the person that was curled up in the barrel also refracted by the water waves, making them pure and transparent.
  Ah Ye lay on the edge of the bucket and poked Lin Xi on the cheek.
  Lin Xi didn’t respond, he fell into a deep sleep in the bucket.
  Ah Ye pondered for a while, she thought that the house’s space was wide and will be a waste not to used it, so she decided to let herself live with Lin Xi as well.
  At night, she felt the ground start to rumble again. The prehistoric “giant claws” once again appeared and fought with the alien species for several rounds in the basin. Finally, it happily ate its fresh meat and chewed it all night.
  The mutants without a residence were not-so-lucky. This night, they ushered while the aliens were fighting, silently crying and wailing.
  Just one wall away, Ah Ye heard the screams of the people outside. She felt a sense of safety in her heart that she had never felt before.
  The next day, she helped Lin Xia and replace the water. In order to wake Lin Xi up earlier, Ah Ye took out Lin Xi’s last ten silver coins, bought ten days’ worth of nutrient solution and poured them all into the bucket.
  As if in response to her hard work, Lin Xi reopened his eyes and woke up from his slumber in the early morning of the third day.
  “Brother Bai, you’re finally up!” A Ye immediately came to him.
  “You slept for two days! I spent all the oil refining money in order to save you!”
  She lied.
  Stating the dosage of the nutrient solution reagent to 30 bottles and added that her money had also been used for him.
  The woman’s words floated in his ears and Lin Xi couldn’t help but be stunned for a moment. He first checked the seeds he just bought and after confirming that they were the same, he slowly sat down beside the bed.
  His heart began to wander.
  He is a human Xenogeneic with a genital cavity that normal human men do not have.
  There is no example of this kind of reproduction in the world. The people in the laboratory estimate that the probability of his reproduction success is less than 10%.
  However, less than two months into the breeding program, the result have begun to become apparent.
  He felt that if this continued, he might not survive the moment when the child was born.
  But again this was his only hope.
  He has nothing.
  There was only this unknown life left by his side.
  Lin Xi dazedly listened to Ah Ye’s nagging beside the bed. It wasn’t until a long time before he got up again and put on his windsock.
  He went back to pulling the cart full of iron buckets.
  Ah Ye knew what Lin Xi was going to do and instantly cheered up.
  She also hurried to keep up and worked hard to help Lin Xi push the cart behind.
  The life of two people started to become easier.
  Lin Xi’s oil extraction and refining speed is very fast, he can often harvest a full truckload of raw materials in half a day. Meanwhile, Ah Ye helps Lin Xi carry the materials by his side.
  One day of work is one month’s living expenses. Two days of work, Ah Ye can have two months worth of food and clothing without worry. On the third day, she can even have a small vacation.
  Lin Xi began to fall asleep. After every two days of activity, he would go into a deep physiologically sleep and would take two days to wake up each time.
  During this period of time when brother Bai was sleeping, Ah Ye stopped working outside. She took the initiative to take care of Lin Xi who was dormant, bought a lot of nutrient solution and let Lin Xi soak in the abundant water, showing that she was very caring.
  In this way, Lin Xi’s face seemed to be a little rosier and his lips become not so pale.
  This regular cycle is repeated twice.
  The third time they went to Chengjiao to extract and refine oil, the two encountered a little accident.
  This was the seventh day that Lin Xi came to the city. The ‘giant claws” killed a desert lizard in the basin and Lin Xi occupied a piece of land as usual.
  But he was soon invited by the rest of the mutants.
  “Little brother, you’re e technique is very good. Are you interested in joining our team?” The person who invited him was an eight-foot-tall mutant with a burly stature.
  At first, Lin Xi ignored it.
  “Little brother, it is very dangerous to mine these things alone. Rodents are often infested in this generation. We have team here, which is safer than one person.”
  Lin Xi didn’t stop and picked a small half-barrel of fat blocks.
  The invited people couldn’t help but hang their faces.
  He had the “team” crowd around him.
  “Little brother, think about it. We are Qiao Daying’s people. If you follow us, it will definitely benefit you.”
  Qiao Daying.
  Lin Xi felt a little familiar, so he stopped and looked at the other party.
  Ah Ye also stopped.
  She found that these people were not only inviting Lin Xi, but also staring at their scooter. There are barrels full of grease on the trolley and the eyes of these people are both envious and greedy.
  Their achievements in the past few days must have attracted the attention of this group of people.
  Ah Ye’s face suddenly looked ugly.
  However, no one paid attention to her.
  “Okay, I’ll consider it.” She only heard Lin Xi’s reply.
  “Then I’ll give you a day to think about it.”
  Lin Xi nodded and ignored him.
  The mutants glanced at his size and frame before returning with ambiguous grins.
  Soon only Lin Xi and Ah Ye were left on the field.
  “You can’t go to Qiao Daying’s place!” Ah Ye said quickly.
  Lin Xi frowned.
  “Qiao Daying is the mutant bully in the city. They specially recruit other mutants to work for them in the past. These bottom-mining mutants who have pulled over can only allocate less than 10% of the fat. You’ve will be bullied to the point of being near to death!” Ah Ye said.
  Lin Xi made no statement.
  A Ye was a little anxious: “You must not believe their words. Although they are a team, they are dangerous. They will not help you and also will escape faster than you. Specially Brother Lu, he is…”
  She said “Brother Lu” suddenly paused for a while.
  Then she saw Lin Xi’s cold eyes.
  Ah Ye felt guilty, she found that the names of the two city brothers did not seem to be very good.
  But Lin Xi still didn’t say anything, he just lowered his head to pull the scooter.
  Ah Ye felt that he could still be rescued.
  “Brother Bai, don’t get me wrong. Brother Lu is the mutant who brought me here. In fact, he is already long gone.” She quickly pulled the car and forced a smile.
  Lin Xi didn’t speak.
  A Ye hurriedly said again: “I was tricked by him to come here. My home was originally in a village 70 kilometers away from the base of the other side. Brother Lu used to have a relationship with me. Later, he picked me up in the village and said he wanted to take me outside. But later I found out that he is a deserter from the other side, he is afraid of fighting with aliens.”
  She said and took out a bone sign from her neck: “Look at how badly I was hurt by him. I am his fiancée but he tricked me into making me a slave in this city. He wanted to sell me for money in order to be able to live in an earthen house…”
  “Brother Bai, if you were my master, you would definitely not do this, right?”
  She said, looking at Lin Xi with a hopeful smile.
  However, Lin Xi was not convinced by her routine.
  “I won’t go to Qiao Dayi.” Lin Xi said.
  “!!!” Ah Ye’s eyes lit up.
  “I can’t be your master either.”
  “I won’t do anything for you and I won’t give you any future.”
  “Thank you for your care these days but you’d better make plans early.”
  Ah Ye: “…”
  She wanted to keep smiling but found that Lin Xi was not joking.
  Gratitude is serious but rejection is also serious.
  Brother Bai didn’t plan to stay with her for a long time.
  This made her panic all of a sudden.
  She pushed the car slowly, all kinds of thoughts flooding her mind. Until they passed the city gate, she did not see the skeptical expression of the guard in front of the city gate after seeing the two of them.
  Lin Xi didn’t see it either.
  Only the guard at the left gate was on duty today. He was smoking a cigarette and noticed Lin Xi’s slender figure.
  Then, he followed this body and saw a faint strand of white hair under the windbag.
  His pupils tightened slightly and subconsciously looked at the tag on Lin Xi’s chest almost instantly.
  A mutant tag, not as the same as he remembered.
  He stuck out his tongue, licked his lips and let out a smoke ring.
  An hour after Lin Xi left, three more mutants came to the city.
  The three mutants were led by a cold and solemn young man. He was wearing a sand-proof windbreaker.
  There was one person standing beside him. The one on the left was a slightly shorter young mutant and the other was slightly taller, which is also observing the city.
  “There are no other villages nearby, only this city has a lot of people. Xiaobai should have walked into this city.” The young mutant squatted outside and said, “I observed outside for two days and found that there is a giant lion claws under this city.”
  Lion claws are the apex predators of the Xenogeneic species. They are aggressive and usually hunt alone after breaking the size limit.
  Whenever they encounter a different species that can be beaten, these huge claws will rush forward to fight their prey without hesitation.
  “It should be like an angler using the humans on its back to attract other alien species to come and then fish for the food it wants. The humans here are all his bait. If ordinary people go in, it will be very dangerous.” The tall man next to him judged.
  Alien species will not take into account about the safety of the bait. Just like the earthworms on the hook, no angler will care about their life and death.
  The people of the city are temporarily safe with the protection of the top predator. However at the same time, they need to sacrifice their lives for this predator.
  He paused for a while and hesitated again: “Commander, we have already located Gu Yang. Do we really need to go in and find that mutant?”
  Eight days ago, they had suffered a lot at the hands of Xiao Bai.
  Cang Jie looked at the commander with some incomprehension.
  The commander is still looking at the city.
  The wind and sand rose making the corners of his clothes fluttered. Mu Yechen carried his gun behind his back and set off for the city gate.
  “Find him first and confirm his identity.” He replied.
  “Commander, do you think he is…”
  Mu Yechen paused.
  He thought of the human body suspended in the culture vessel in the laboratory and the blood-stained corpse in the sandstorm.
  “It should be him.”
~~~~~~~~~
(n: “Giant Claws” = Lion Claws)
Edited: 7/20/22
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