Chapter 129: Sorry, Go Ahead and Finish

The piece of bread in Huo Chenggui’s mouth fell to the ground with a “plop.”

“Qiao— Qiao Captain…”

In that instant, a thousand thoughts flashed through Huo Chenggui’s mind.

But Captain Qiao didn’t care about any of that.

It was his first time doing something like this—his face was pale, and his hands shook uncontrollably as he took off the bundle from his back.

“Huo—Huo Bro, hi, I have some food here. Yue Bai said I should sell it to you guys. It’s really cheap. A bag of QQ candies for 10 points, a box of Oreos for 20 points, and, and…”

Huo Chenggui squatted on the ground, at a loss for words, his bare white butt still sticking out.

“Great, Captain Qiao, thank Yue Bai for thinking so highly of us. We’d love to do business with you.”

“After all, this food is super cheap.”

“But!” Huo Chenggui gritted his teeth, “Can you let me wipe my ass and put my pants back on first?!”

Only then did Captain Qiao realize what Huo Chenggui was actually doing.

He hurriedly gathered up his bundle again, bowing and nodding to Huo Chenggui.

“Sorry, sorry, go ahead and finish, please, continue.”

“Sorry to interrupt, sorry.”

He’d just come over and ran into this awkward situation.

Captain Qiao felt thoroughly embarrassed.

He slung the big bundle onto his back and hurried a little farther away.

The security line wasn’t far from the front.

Mercenaries would often come down to rest.

Recently, the mutant beast situation had eased up a bit, so Yi Zhe and the others could finally breathe easier.

The mercenaries coming down from the front lines all eyed Captain Qiao strangely as they passed.

Captain Qiao forced an awkward smile.

When he saw Huo Chenggui rushing over, pulling up his pants, he finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Once Captain Qiao laid out his bundle again, spreading it on the ground, the mercenaries resting nearby swarmed over.

When they found out Captain Qiao was selling food—and that each item cost less than 100 points—they exploded.

“Why is it so cheap?”

“Captain Qiao, where did you get this food?”

Captain Qiao stiffened his neck and said nothing.

He wasn’t about to tell anyone that Yue Bai had taken all this from Xiao Lingye’s team.

Huo Chenggui jumped in just in time.

“Who cares where he got it? If you don’t take advantage of a good deal, you’re an idiot!”

In the mercenary corps, each person could only get 20,000 points a month from the city’s management.

If they couldn’t find a bit of food on the front lines, they’d never be able to afford the sky-high prices in the city.

“I’ll buy a bottle of green tea!”

“Thirty points.”

Captain Qiao immediately rattled off an account number.

Everyone fell silent.

They all recognized that account—it belonged to a fallen mercenary brother.

But they also knew that the communicator with that account had already been given to Shi Yue Bai by the captain.

Huo Chenggui was clearly siding with Shi Yue Bai.

He cleared his throat softly.

“This green tea is cheap. If we bought water in the city, it’d cost many times more.”

In other words, the wealth the mercenary corps earned was all carefully calculated by the management.

They wouldn’t spend points on food in the city, but they would use points and food to buy medical supplies.

The mercenaries had to fight mutant beasts and scavenge at the same time—their lives were hard and exhausting.

Any surplus food they saved up would have to be traded for water in the city.

So there was a saying in the wasteland:

Unless you’re desperate, never become a mercenary.

Nine out of ten don’t come back.

Led by Huo Chenggui, the mercenaries all looked at that familiar account—each buying a few things, eager to participate.

The first thing to sell out was the green tea.

All 24 bottles were sealed, and the liquid inside was still good, not spoiled.

Honestly, in the wasteland, even if the tea had gone bad, people would still drink it.

Next, the QQ candies and Oreos were also quickly bought out.

Not long after, nearly ten thousand points had been transferred into Shi Yue Bai’s communicator.

Before this, that account had been empty.

She sat in front of her four vegetable plots, thinking about what she could buy with this small fortune.

Based on the original owner’s memories of the wasteland, Shi Yue Bai realized that in this economy, aside from water and food, there were actually quite a few things you could buy.

Because in the wasteland, only things you could eat were worth anything—everything else was trash.

Shi Yue Bai waited for Captain Qiao to come back, planning to tell him to go to the city tomorrow and buy some vegetable seeds.

Even though nothing could really grow in the wasteland, there were always people who refused to give up and kept trying.

So vegetable seeds were cheap, but you never saw any actual vegetables on the market.

Everyone knew nothing would grow.

And if someone did manage to grow crops, before any survivor could bring them to market, the harvest would be locked down.

Anyone who could grow crops would soon disappear.

No one knew where they went, but it was never to serve the ordinary scavengers of the wasteland.

“Yue Bai, Captain Yi and Huo Bro are here!”

Captain Qiao stood on the other side of the ditch, shouting to Shi Yue Bai.

After several days, Yi Zhe returned and was shocked by what he saw.

He rubbed his eyes—was this really the Shi family’s place?

It had to be. Look, his army tent was still by the ditch.

“Huo Chenggui, do you notice anything different here?”

Yi Zhe turned to ask Huo Chenggui.

Huo Chenggui lied through his teeth.

“Really? Looks the same to me.”

“Come on, boss, we finally have some time to rest. Don’t overthink it.”

He never realized he was such a natural peacemaker.

Shi Yue Bai said nothing, but Xu Xuejiao and Da Jiao in the ditch knew this meant she allowed Yi Zhe and Huo Chenggui to return.

The two of them pulled out the ladder from the ditch and set it up.

They’d finally achieved fully automated bridge access.

Yi Zhe, completely confused, followed Huo Chenggui across the ditch.

He glanced down, “What’s all that stuff down there?”

The ditch was filled with rolling white smoke—nothing could be seen.

Huo Chenggui said, “It’s just the smoke machine. This way, no one will come and bully Yue Bai.”

“Yue Bai is very weak,” he emphasized.

Truthfully, Huo Chenggui was nervous. Last time, he’d been dragged away from this ditch by Shi Yue Bai’s people and hadn’t really looked at the surroundings.

Now, trying to cover for Yue Bai, he sounded pretty unconvincing.

Luckily, Yi Zhe just nodded and said nothing.

The two crossed the ladder and came to stand before Shi Yue Bai.

Yi Zhe wasn’t sure if it was his imagination, but Shi Yue Bai’s face seemed a little thinner.

Not too obvious, though.

Shi Yue Bai glanced at Yi Zhe and pointed at the army tents.

“Haven’t touched your stuff. Go rest.”

The tents were set up behind a waist-high wall.

Ah Hong had even used bricks to fence them in, making a little courtyard.

(T/N: Today I had a huge argument with the designer from the renovation company. They just used stock templates from the image library—what an easy way to earn a design fee!)"