The Invasion Day – Chapter 80

Table of Contents | Character Guide

Chapter 80

T/N: So these few chapters at Shuijing Lake are what I’d call an equivalent of the ‘beach episode’ that we often see in anime LOL. And what might be the purpose of a ‘beach episode’ in this sort of apocalypse story? That shouldn’t be too difficult to guess, huh? (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

Wen Zhaoming had an injury on his arm, so obviously he couldn’t be like them. He just leaned on the side of the car and gazed at the lake whose size was so large that its shore couldn’t be seen.

“Wen ge, is your arm okay?” Miao Jia carefully put back his laptop and jumped down.

Wen Zhaoming lifted his arm slightly and said: “I’m okay, it should be just a fracture. I’ll be fine after recuperating for a while.”

Earlier, Tang Xuhai gave him an arm sling bandage. Now that their physique was much better than before, the bone should grow back to normal in less than two months.

Although Tang Xuhai’s treatment wasn’t as good as a professional doctor, he encountered this kind of situation often on the battlefield. More or less, it was still handleable.

“Don’t you need to get a splint or something?” Miao Jia grinned and looked at his arm covered behind layers of gauze like a mummy.

“It’s okay, I just have to let it stay still.” Wen Zhaoming said: “Don’t worry about me, you go and play.”

Because the high-level aliens had summoned all the aliens wandering along the provincial road, plus they had Miao Jia’s satellite images, their journey was extremely smooth and they only sporadically encountered a few lone aliens.

This should also be thanks to the timing at which they left Ping Nan, which was promptly after the day the sky veil opened. Since those high-level aliens were busy gathering the ordinary aliens, this allowed them to travel on the road without harm.

One thing that should be known was that Tang Xuhai’s decision to make a temporary stop turned out to be right. With the lake’s gigantic size, the resort built around it could actually accommodate more than 10,000 people.

After meticulously setting up their own things, everyone almost couldn’t wait to run to the lake to unwind the tension that had haunted them for more than two months.

“We take a rest because we want to go further.” The corner of Tang Xuhai’s mouth curled up as he hugged his arms and stood beside Fu Shiwu, who was enjoying the soft breeze in the air with gratification.

“You are right.” Fu Shiwu looked back at him, a hint of helplessness revealed in his eyes.

No matter how slow he was, he did realise that Tang Xuhai’s decision was made for him. Just like that time when he ran to Fu Shiwu with a bunch of items as though offering treasures, Tang Xuhai didn’t have any intent to hide at all.

Seeing Fu Shiwu finally enlightened, Tang Xuhai’s heart turned tranquil with content, and the two stood by the mesmerising lake, quietly enjoying the beautiful scenery.

At this moment, Liu Peiqi was holding a handful of grass seeds in his hand, frowning and pondering some ideas.

When he caught the rabbit yesterday, he found that the grass was quite tough, which made him wonder if he might build something with this kind of grass seed.

Previously, he only had the seeds of the corn king on hand. The corn looked all so powerful, but its damage power was lousy, merely good enough to scare people off.

But these grass seeds were different. At least in terms of trapping the enemies, it could be considered rather useful.

Liu Peiqi made an experiment to make the seeds grow. With ample patience, he first threw the seeds on the ground, then they germinated instantaneously, their roots plunged into the ground and the plants quickly matured.

“It seems that this grass will save me more energy than corn.” Liu Peiqi muttered to himself as he squatted down and stared at the grass.

“Liu ge, what are you doing?” Passing by him, Miao Jia walked over with interest.

Miao Jia was the youngest in the entire team, and even the newcomer Zhen Zi was older than him. Miao Jia always had a glib tongue, so he comfortably called everyone ‘gege’ and ‘jiejie’ — except for Hollande. At first, it was because he came from a foreign country, where such an honourific system didn’t exist, and later, Hollande didn’t trust Miao Jia’s technical skills, giving Miao Jia a good reason to harbour a ‘grudge’.

“I’m experimenting with this type of grass seed.” Liu Peiqi raised his head.

“You planted this?” Miao Jia also squatted down: “They look no different from other grasses.”

“Try stretching your feet over there.” Liu Peiqi grinned evilly.

“?” Confused, Miao Jia stood up and stepped on them.

A moment later, the grasses under his feet exerted a ferocious force and grew aggressively around his feet, tightly binding them up.

Miao Jia’s eyes opened wide in surprise as he yelled “Ah”, then he pulled his feet back with all his might.

“Hahahahaha!!!” Liu Peiqi clutched his stomach and laughed blissfully.

Since Miao Jia used too much force, his body swayed unsteadily left and right before he ended up slumping to the ground on his butt.

He looked at the grass wrapping around his feet in disbelief: “Liu ge, is this your manipulation?”

Liu Peiqi’s lips curled into a broad smile even though his whole body was aching, and he said victoriously: “How was that? Your Liu ge isn’t bad, right?”

“It’s awesome! This amusing trap comes totally undetected.” Miao Jia gave him a thumbs up.

“Hehe, I’m trying to work towards this direction!”

Like two children who had gotten new toys, Liu Peiqi and Miao Jia started experimenting further with excitement.

There were grasses all over the place. When Liu Peiqi threw his own seeds down and made them grow, one absolutely couldn’t tell which one was planted by Liu Peiqi and which one was natural. However, Liu Peiqi, the manipulator behind these seeds, could tell them apart by feeling the energy of those that he forced to germinate.

Liu Peiqi said with a little regret: “Unfortunately, these grass seeds are only mutant species, not special ability species. They won’t have the consciousness for autonomous attack.”

“Don’t be sad yet! Liu ge, a rabbit is coming, hurry up and trap it!” Miao Jia poked Liu Peiqi with eagerness. 

Liu Peiqi and Miao Jia didn’t need to chase after the rabbit. As soon as they knew the position that it appeared, Liu Peiqi would force the grass in that spot to directly entangle the rabbit.

Most of these rabbits were caught completely off guard and neatly fell into their hands.

The two had such a thrilling time trying out their new discovery, and gradually, they caught more and more rabbits, which awed their other teammates and even made them come over to join in the fun.

“Hahaha~ here, Liu ge, hurry up!” Zhen Zi’s voice came from a distance.

Fu Shiwu and Tang Xuhai glanced at them curiously.

“What are they doing?”

“No idea, maybe they are catching rabbits.” Tang Xuhai said casually while hugging his arms.

“Let’s go there too.” Seeing the excitement, Fu Shiwu felt the urge to come over. 

But Tang Xuhai pulled him back: “Wait, we ate rabbit yesterday. If we get more rabbits today, our meal will be the same.”

“Yeah?” Fu Shiwu was perplexed.

“Do you want some fish?” Tang Xuhai raised his eyebrows.

“Are you planning to go fishing?” Fu Shiwu looked back at him in surprise.

“We don’t need a fishing rod. We’ll use a spear to catch them!”

As soon as he finished his words, Tang Xuhai jumped onto business. He rolled up his trousers, took off his long-sleeved jacket, and simply clad in a singlet, he stepped into the water.

Fu Shiwu immediately forgot the commotion over there and, with immense enthusiasm, he watched Tang Xuhai slowly stretch out a steel spearfishing pole from his palm. Step by step, he walked into the depths of the lake.

As a scenic spot, Shuijing Lake had been very well preserved in recent years. If it was any normal day, the staff wouldn’t allow anyone to go directly into the water like Tang Xuhai.

But now the only people in the entire resort were this survivor group who happened to pass by, and meanwhile, the other people definitely wouldn’t have the nerve to walk up to Tang Xuhai to make a fuss.

Tang Xuhai stood silently in the water whose depth had reached half his height, motionlessly holding the steel pole. A moment later, he thrust it down, and when he lifted it up, there was a big fish twitching and desperately struggling on the pole!

“Such a big one!” Even Tang Xuhai was amazed. The fish was about five or six jins11 Chinese jin = 0.5 kilogram., which could easily be considered a big fish inland.

Unable to hold himself back anymore, Fu Shiwu firmly took off his tactical boots and walked into the water with bare feet.

“You can wait for me at the shore.” Tang Xuhai walked back holding the steel pole.

“I want to try too.” Fu Shiwu said keenly.

“Oh?” Tang Xuhai looked at him with a mischievous smile and said wickedly: “Of course.” 

After getting back to the shore, he knocked the fish out, then grabbed some grass to wrap around its gills.

But looking at it, Tang Xuhai still felt somewhat not at ease. He raised his head and shouted to the distance: “One of you, go find a bucket.”

The elated Zhen Zi who was playing on the other side turned around to cast a glance at the huge fish, her eyes beaming brightly as she rushed over: “Hai ge, did you catch this?” 

“Uhm, go find a bucket to put it in. We’ll have grilled fish in the afternoon.” Tang Xuhai said.

“Wonderful!” Zhen Zi said happily. She hadn’t eaten fish since the apocalypse started.

Miao Jia also got a tad tired after catching rabbits for a long while. Catching sight of something new here, he came over at once.

“It’s just nice that you’re here. Grab this fish, don’t let it jump back into the water.” Tang Xuhai reminded him.

“I understand, no issue at all, leave it to me!” Miao Jia assured him, patting his chest.

Seeing Miao Jia’s confident look, Tang Xuhai couldn’t help but say again: “Don’t be careless, this fish has absorbed the heterogeneous molecules, it’s much stronger than a normal fish of the same size.” Then

Only then Miao Jia did cautiously reach out both hands to pull the grass rope.

Thereafter, taking another steel pole from Tang Xuhai, Fu Shiwu stood still beside him in the water.

“Look at me.” Tang Xuhai motioned to him, and with his incredibly sharp eyes, he shoved the spearfishing pole into the water the moment a fish swam by.

And exactly when he retracted the pole, a grass carp weighing about three jins was stuck on it.

“Have you seen it clearly?” Tang Xuhai asked.

“Uhm.” Fu Shiwu nodded sternly.

“Then you try it.” Tang Xuhai said with a snigger, then he turned around and walked toward the shore holding the steel pole.

Spearfishing wasn’t as simple as it looked. Because there was always a certain angle of refraction in the water, the position seen by the eyes might not be the correct one. As such, untrained people that failed to grasp the essentials at the beginning usually ended up empty-handed.

Tang Xuhai wanted Fu Shiwu to try and experience a bit of defeat first, then he would teach Fu Shiwu the right method.

He turned to put away the fish, leaving Fu Shiwu standing alone in the water.