“Survive, eh? That’s right. Any normal person would want to survive!”
“However, there were always some people who would dream of creating their own dictatorship, or of immortality, wanting to use the game to go above and beyond life itself.”
“Are they wrong for doing so, though?”
Without Su Mo to lead them, the noises in the meeting room below them slowly got louder and louder.
With Chen Shen mediating the meeting, they were intensely debating among themselves as to how to obtain the most benefits from the information about the disaster, which would subsequently improve Hope Village’s living conditions.
Under the cold wind of the night, Zhong Qingshu suddenly understood Su Mo’s wisdom and what he considered to be important.
“The times have changed, but they never fathomed, and nor will they ever, the kind of secrets this wasteland holds.”
“Everything that they want and everything that they’re doing right now is just mimicking whatever happened, or would have happened, on Earth.”
“And what I want to do is to completely shatter this dream of theirs and stir up chaos across this wasteland. Those with power will rise, and those without will fall. No one should dream of using something like Earth’s rules to suppress me!”
“As for what happens in the meantime, we’ll figure it out as we go!”
Su Mo noticed Zhong Qingshu’s silence as she stared at him, as if she had just discovered the other side of him, so he laughed and stood up.
With Blazeland as an example, if the people still wanted to follow the old ways and band together, then they would lose control over their own fates. Su Mo would definitely not trust people like these.
Because of that, given the current conditions, all Su Mo wanted was…
To maintain the status quo!
There was a limit to the number of people being transported to the new world. If a disaster’s death toll exceeded a certain threshold, a new batch of people would be let into the wasteland.
As for the mass migration to the New World this time around, even in the best-case scenario, there would be at least 20% to 30% of casualty rate in the process.
In that case, the game would let the rest of the humans on Earth into the New World.
Papa and Mama Su were 54 years old, so there was a large chance that they would be among the next batch of people to be sent in after arriving at the New World.
At that point in time, Su Mo would have nothing left to worry about once he was reunited with the rest of his family.
Besides, he had the legendary Hope One, the dangerous “God of Cooking” status—which was a ticking time bomb—as well as the mysterious system with him!
If he tried to act like a normal person instead, avoiding everything that was happening around him, it was more than likely that things would backfire and he would be…
Deserted by everyone around him!
Thus, announcing the news to Hope Village was Su Mo’s first step in getting everyone to hop onto his bandwagon.
“Alright, I know what you’re going to say, but even if I want all the foreign races dead, I wouldn’t choose to do it like this!”
Su Mo paused when he saw Zhong Qingshu hesitating to speak. He then pulled her up and hopped off the roof with her.
There was a spy among the humans.
Since the foreign races have a game panel of their own, if the humans found out about the disaster, the foreign races would find out as well in time.
However, in the absence of a concrete solution to deal with the marine foreign races, it was counterproductive to sacrifice possibly billions of humans in exchange for the destruction of the terrestrial foreign races.
This particular topic was also being discussed inside the meeting room.
From the initially dispirited discussion to a livelier one now, in regards to what boon this disaster might bring to Hope Village, even a fool would realize…
How important Su Mo’s message was!
“Alright then, if everyone has everything figured out, get back to work then. Just tell me if you need any tools. Hope One’s second test will be carried out tomorrow night.”
“I will announce the news within three days. Before that, the buffer period that we’re giving Hope Village is the most precious resource we can give them.”
Going up against this disaster was both easy and hard at the same time.
The time left for the other humans to prepare themselves was not long—three days—which would be enough to guarantee everyone’s survival as well as ensure that Hope Village would be the first to the market.
Besides, based on the village’s current level of development, they no longer had to rely on Su Mo for specific instructions on what needed to be done.
After more than ten minutes of brainstorming, the leadership team finally figured out the preliminary plan to manufacture the tools and equipment needed to resist the disaster.
The tensile strength of every material differed; some are higher and some are lower.
All Hope Village had to do was to find a material with the highest tensile strength, think of a way to quickly mass-produce it and put it on the market first, raking in the maximum amount of profit from the first wave of buyers.
What happens after that would not matter, even if it meant that other competitors entered the same market. Even if they lost out on the competition in the later phases, the profits they earned would last them a very long time.
“Very well, Big Brother Su, we’ll get to work.”
“We’ll do a beautiful job this time around!”
Su Mo watched as the men left the room with Chen Shen leading them. He bid Zhong Qingshu goodbye and began walking toward Iron Rock Mountain while the sky was still bright.
He had many problems at hand to deal with, but none that were overly critical.
Whether it was building a second fire-control radar, or finding out and repairing the error readings recorded by the OS, or digging a ditch, all of these were easy for him.
However, the question of how to survive the torrential rain was the most important one.
“If we build a huge boathouse-like shelter, with Hope One’s size and volume…”
“Materials would not be a problem, but time would be insufficient…”
Eighty meters long, 21 meters high and 14 meters wide. Building a steel shelter over the ship would take up a lot of time and materials.
With their current manufacturing rate, the earliest they could finish building the shelter would be on the day of the disaster itself.
If they suddenly found out that there was something wrong with the shelter, then there would be little to no time left to modify the structure!
“We’ll just have to be unorthodox and come up with some other ideas!”
Staring at the foot of Iron Rock Mountain, Su Mo noticed a light in the Lioness Connie’s cave.
A novel idea suddenly popped up in his mind. Su Mo grinned as he quickly followed the path at the foot of the mountain and “crawled” inside.
Knock!
Knock knock!
“Come in…”
After turning herself in and getting used to life in Hope Village, Connie the Lioness had also slowly adapted to the customs of humans.
Before opening the door, no human would ever think that there would be a foreign race creature sitting inside the room.
After getting her permission, the wooden door swung open as Su Mo pushed against it. Connie had something on her mind, and was clearly surprised to see him here.
“Su Mo… what are you doing here?”
“Growl… growl…”
After acknowledging the terrifying power of Hope One, Connie the Lioness concocted a plot the moment she returned to the village.
She even forgot to eat her lunch because she was so deep in thought.
In the beginning, when she cooperated with the humans, while Connie thought that there was a difference in power between both sides, she felt that if she was presented with the opportunity, she could use her summoning abilities to even the odds.
However, when she realized that Su Mo’s power was way above hers, and the fact she would never catch up to him, she was stunned, anxious even.
The most crucial factor in a cooperative relationship was…
Giving each other benefits!
Su Mo gave her a conducive environment to live in as well as protection, all so that she could lead the lion people to glory.
But what could she give him in return?
Just the shelter core of a foreign race?
After figuring it out, she realized that if some other “vixen” appeared, they could easily take her place.
She felt a great sense of danger, and that emotion overrode her primitive instincts.
To the point that she almost leapt off the ground the moment she saw Su Mo.
“Don’t worry, you’ve not eaten yet, right? Why don’t I bring you out for some supper!”
Su Mo’s grin grew wider as he heard the growling sound coming from Connie’s stomach.
The human and the Lioness walked out of the cave toward the resources room and grabbed some meat, seasoning, and a barbecue grill.
Su Mo then brought Connie to a spot on the top of the mountain.
From their position, they could clearly see Hope One in its entirety. They could also see everything around Iron Rock Mountain, and the development that was going on in Hope Village.
“I haven’t cooked for over ten days, and the first meal’s actually going to be a barbecue with you!”
They piled on the charcoal, built a fire, seasoned the beef, and pierced the meat skewers into the ground above the grill. Su Mo then sat down, stretching his back.
The seasoning was nothing special.
However, with the addition of some psychic energy water as the main ingredient, it somehow was irresistibly attractive to all living things, except if one drank the psychic energy water on a daily basis like Su Mo did.
However, Connie the Lioness was not paying attention to that. Instead, she simply stared worriedly at Hope One; various thoughts running through her mind.
Pop!
Su Mo took out two bottles of beer, pulled off the cap, and put them on the stone block in front of the grill as he lay down beside Connie, looking at the moon.
“You’ve seen our ceremony today. I heard that the lion people did not give you a ceremony of your own, right?”
He took a big gulp of the beer, savoring the sweetness of the malt on his tongue. Su Mo smacked his lips as he started the conversation.
Connie did not answer immediately. Instead, she mimicked Su Mo’s actions, taking a huge gulp from her bottle.
Cough cough…
This was her first experience with alcohol, so she had not expected that flavor at all. She could not help but cough to relieve herself of the weird taste in her mouth.
“A send-off? No, we don’t do that!”
“Once we were chosen to go to another world, we were already considered dead…”
Alcohol opened up the hearts of men, and it affected the lion people in the exact same way.
As Connie drank, she began to talk more and more.
“Chosen? I thought you guys wanted to come here of your own free will?”
“Of course not. No one would want to come to this murderous, disaster-ridden world. Every single one of my people who were chosen were bawling their eyes out.”
“Utterly useless!”
Connie used that phrase well after familiarizing herself with the human language. If it were not for her “lion” characteristics, no one would be able to tell that she was a foreign race creature.
“Were you chosen, then?”
Su Mo paused, drank a sip of beer and asked Connie that question after he listened to her mock her fellow lion people.
“Of course not. I came here because I wanted to. I was one of the youngest among my fellow lion people, so there was no way that I would ever get chosen to come to this god-forsaken land.” Connie waved at him proudly.
“I know you’re curious as to what we foreign races are looking for when we come to this wasteland. You don’t even need to ask. I can tell you why right now.”
“The thing that we are looking for is…”
“An item that allows us to transcend into a god!”
