CHAPTER 65: CHAPTER 65: GEOTHERMAL HEAT

The winged snake is quite rare. Although it doesn’t fly high, it’s much more troublesome than an average snake.

Now that winter is approaching, snakes preparing for hibernation can be as fierce as they are in spring.

Flower Scorpion is already exceedingly cautious, but snakes are inherently hard to guard against, let alone winged snakes.

In this situation, even encountering them in daylight isn’t easy to handle—it’s nighttime now.

The rider was bitten by a poisonous snake, amputated one of his arms, and retreated from the adventurer ranks.

She was able to wait for Black Heaven in the dangerous zone, which indeed posed significant risks.

But after Qu Jianlei pulled her aside, he raised his hand and swung a blade, a winged snake over three meters long fell to the ground.

Flower Scorpion stared at the man beside her in astonishment, "That’s it... you killed it?"

"What else would you need?" Qu Jianlei looked at her strangely, "Shout a slogan or something?"

Flower Scorpion was taken aback and sincerely remarked, "Truly impressive skills. Is there a crystal?"

"C-level, what do you think?" Qu Jianlei answered casually, "The membrane can sell for some money, if you want, take it."

This type of winged snake has only the membrane that holds some value; the rest is worthless, the meat can’t be eaten.

Flower Scorpion really did cut off the two wings of the winged snake.

It doesn’t relate to personal financial condition, all adventurers in the Wasteland are the same, never wasting any useful resources.

After storing the wings and walking for a while, she asked, "Do you always find it this easy to defeat C-level mutant beasts?"

She doesn’t lack experience in fighting mutant beasts, not just C-level, she’s fought B-level ones many times, but it’s always team combat.

It’s rare to fight a C-level mutant beast alone, usually, it’s a sudden encounter.

And C-level winged snakes are just as difficult to handle as B-level mutant beasts, yet it was cut down with a single blade.

Qu Jianlei didn’t respond at all, acting as if he didn’t hear—what is there to boast about?

They walked until daylight and still hadn’t reached the place, Flower Scorpion was panting, her eyes full of resentment.

She suggested, "We must rest for a bit, maybe I’m holding us back..."

"But you will know later, I’m not the kind who only holds others back."

"Let’s go," Qu Jianlei remained unmoved, "Ahead is the territory of the Purple Blood Arrowed Fox, they’re usually asleep at dawn."

Purple Blood Arrowed Fox is also a mutant beast, not ranked; the fox king might be C-level.

This creature has spikes and its fur is useless; not only is there no hunting value, but they usually travel in packs, it’s better to just avoid them.

It was around the afternoon when they reached Qu Jianlei’s hideout.

They were now over a hundred kilometers deep into the "Extremely Dangerous Zone."

"No wonder no one can find you," Flower Scorpion sighed and then commented, "You even have a water heater? I’ll take a bath first."

Qu Jianlei nodded slightly, he too liked partners who valued cleanliness.

Though the makeshift place was simple, he had spent quite a long time there, so he had built it up somewhat, the living conditions weren’t bad.

They both took turns showering, then Qu Jianlei took out a pot to heat up the stew he had previously prepared.

Though there’s a lot of jerky, before winter fully sets in, you should eat the fresh meat you can hunt.

"You really have decent conditions here," Flower Scorpion praised, then thoughtfully stared at his face.

Qu Jianlei felt puzzled being stared at, "What are you looking at?"

Both had removed their masks, Flower Scorpion’s skin was mildly dark, with traces of weathering on her face but still could be considered pretty.

Hearing this, her face flushed slightly; she naturally wouldn’t say, didn’t expect you to be quite handsome.

She lowered her head to eat, "I feel like you resemble the Sha Qu they talk about..."

She said it casually, not expecting to be right.

Qu Jianlei didn’t mind.

This year he hadn’t lacked food, had grown taller and fatter—or rather, stronger, no longer the skinny figure he once was.

While eating meat in big bites, he casually answered, "From now on, don’t use the name Black Heaven, call me Panda."

"Panda..." Flower Scorpion pondered for a bit, confirming she hadn’t heard of such a creature; is it both bear and cat?

But she didn’t ask, just slightly nodded, "Then I’ll be... Yellow Scorpion?"

Adventurers casually changing nicknames is quite normal.

Qu Jianlei felt calling her "Black Scorpion" might suit better, but there was no need to say that.

After eating and drinking, Qu Jianlei went into the mecha to sleep—transport mecha has the advantage of letting you sleep in the storage compartment.

Flower Scorpion indicated she could watch the night, for the later part of the night... could Black Heaven switch?

Qu Jianlei responded unconcernedly: you could sleep too, I have set up quite a few warning devices outside.

Upon hearing this, Flower Scorpion didn’t stand on ceremony, she cleared a storage compartment and crawled in to sleep.

Both were quite exhausted, sleeping straight through to almost noon the next day.

They packed their things and it was nearly evening, waiting for dark, they set off towards deeper into the mountains.

Initially, Flower Scorpion said she could walk, but after less than half an hour, she decisively opted to lie in the storage compartment.

In the mountains, walking is too slow, mecha is definitely more convenient.

Qu Jianlei controlled the mecha to advance at a uniform speed, which could cover about thirty kilometers per hour.

It’s not that it couldn’t go faster, but this speed was more power-efficient and made less noise.

By dawn, they had traveled about two hundred kilometers.

This was only the distance traversed, and the straight-line distance was probably less than fifty kilometers, as most of the time was spent finding a path.

When it was just getting light, Qu Jianlei began searching for a place to shelter.

It wasn’t hard to find such a place in the mountains, and once found, he started excavation with the mechanical arm.

Although Flower Scorpion was a seasoned adventurer, it was her first time seeing mecha construction.

She couldn’t help but remark, "With a mecha, surviving in the mountains is much easier."

Qu Jianlei muttered, "It’s good, but it consumes too many energy blocks."

The mecha quickly dug out a large hole for hiding. He maneuvered the mecha inside, and Flower Scorpion camouflaged the entrance.

They remained vigilant against the flying mechas that could appear at any moment.

The days passed one after another; after a month, the mecha had traveled almost a thousand kilometers in a straight line.

Along the way, they encountered beasts and mutant beasts, including an A-level mutant beast, a gigantic horned eagle.

However, Qu Jianlei did not fight it; he simply remained still until it left, a process that took him two days.

He temporarily disregarded the factor of mutant crystals, mainly because the horned eagle’s meat was inedible, and fighting it would be troublesome.

He believed there was no need to waste precious energy blocks here.

How much farther they had to go to exit the mountain, he couldn’t be certain, so he needed to conserve resources now.

In fact, half a month into the mountains, he had stopped digging holes altogether.

Digging holes consumed too many energy blocks, and flying mechas couldn’t reach this far into the mountains.

So, they traveled during the day and chose relatively safe spots to rest at night.

At this point, Qu Jianlei was genuinely a little grateful to Hunter Wind.

If he hadn’t gathered information about the mechas, this Endless Mountain Range would be difficult to traverse.

Moreover, ordinary combat mechas might not have been suitable, but this transport mecha was the most useful.

At the start of the month, they encountered a severe cold snap.

The Endless Mountain Range was already difficult to navigate in winter, and it became even harder after the cold snap, with fierce winds and slippery rocks.

Thanks to the mecha; if it were just a person, they could only choose a cave to hide in.

After traveling for a day, Qu Jianlei chose a sheltered spot and released Flower Scorpion.

He believed they could not continue this way; the energy blocks were depleting too fast, and it was necessary to find a place to hide.

Flower Scorpion’s face looked a bit grim, as it implied... they might not make it out of the Endless Mountain Range.

But Black Heaven’s suggestion made sense, so she proposed choosing a place with a water source to rest.

They had enough filters and filter papers, but continuous self-circulation... felt really unpleasant.

Many mountain springs in the Endless Mountain Range were unpolluted and drinkable.

Qu Jianlei also agreed with her suggestion; drinkable springs meant there might be animals coming to drink.

So their task the next day was not traveling but finding a reliable water source.

After two more days, they finally selected a water source—a place where fish and shrimp were frozen in ice, neither of which were mutated.

Nearby, they even found a cave inhabited by a group of black-backed golden apes.

The battle erupted instantly.

The black-backed golden apes had tough bodies and immense strength, and being social creatures, they were among the hardest to deal with in the C-level mutant beasts.

Fortunately, Qu Jianlei was sufficiently alert, with the mecha’s left hand carrying a vehicle-mounted Gauss machine gun, and the right hand wielding a long blade.

The overclocked oscillation blade only barely managed to cut through the golden apes’ skin.

This was thanks to the mecha; with an ordinary person’s strength, even wielding a long blade might not break through the opponent’s defense.

To truly kill the golden ape, they had to rely on the vehicle-mounted machine gun.

The effect of the electromagnetic cannon would certainly be better, but Qu Jianlei did not want to collapse the cave, and the electromagnetic cannon shells were also running low.

A total of seventeen big and small black-backed golden apes; Qu Jianlei took a full three hours to finish the battle.

If he hadn’t been equipped with the mecha, even if four or five of him were tied together, they would have been killed by the apes.

The long blade was completely destroyed, but that was not a concern, though over three hundred machine gun bullets were used, which was about a fifth of their stock.

The good thing was that the golden ape’s meat was edible and not too bad-tasting.

He then explored the cave further, discovering that it was winding and about seven to eight hundred meters long.

More amazingly, the deepest part of the cave was very warm, even hot.

Even Flower Scorpion was stunned, "What’s going on here?"

Qu Jianlei wasn’t very sure either, but he could roughly guess, "It should be... geothermal?"

However, these two words truly touched upon Flower Scorpion’s blind spot in knowledge, "What is geothermal?"