Kingdom of Corrosion
Chapter 232 - 149 - Compound Bow_2

Chapter 232: 149 Chapter Compound Bow_2

"That’s a bit short," Shana said as she kicked away the stump Lin Wu was sitting on.

"Here’s some intel," Blood Meng spoke up. "Our Fortress agents indeed receive a batch of supplies every week, but even those need to be exchanged with points, and almost all tasks now require the use of bullets."

Shana said, "Right now, there are only three active Fortress agents, including you guys."

Blood Meng hesitated, "We don’t have a high demand for serum." Fortress agents aren’t afraid of death.

Shana said, "It’s not about the death penalty, but the resurrection takes 24 hours."

Blood Meng said, "40, can’t go any higher. Even without special events exclusive to Fortress agents, we can still trade through courier services."

Shana asked, "The courier service charges a 30% fee, who’s covering that?"

Blood Meng replied, "Each pays 15%."

Shana said, "Courier fees are a double income; you’ll lose 30% of bullets when you send them to us, and we’ll lose the same when we send serum to you."

After a long pause, Blood Meng proposed, "40 bullets per serum vial. You give me 5 vials of serum first, and I’ll give you 100 5.56 bullets in return, with the remaining 100 bullets to be paid within the next month, and I will cover all the courier fees."

"Alright, sister." Lin Wu looked at Blood Meng, worried that upsetting her might break the deal. As for the serum, there were no issues, and if worse came to worst, he could contact Maya to spend a day at the cement factory cutting down the Blood Plague.

Shana proposed a new term, "Give us 150 bullets upfront, I know you and Nightmare can provide them. The remaining 50 bullets can be paid within a month. Blood Meng, we trust you, goods first and payment later; shouldn’t you also make some concessions?"

"I’ll go discuss with Nightmare," Blood Meng stood up and said, "Bullets aren’t so cheap for us either. Everyone is worried about being blown up; many brought along most of their bullets for this event. Not like Nightmare, who has the home-field advantage with a safe house to store her ammo."

Only then did Lin Wu and Shana realize that the Fortress agents weren’t worried about their assault rifles being lapped up, guessing that they likely had spare rifles in their safes too. Yet, their ammo wasn’t abundant. But their "not a lot" was already quite wealthy by ordinary players’ standards. This suggested that their main source of bullets was probably disassembling guns. For instance, acquiring a Raider with a magazine of 150 rounds effectively meant getting 150 7.62 bullets.

Why did Blood Meng start by proposing a gun exchange? Now that she knew the supermarket base had a stockpile of serum, she dropped the idea of indirectly buying bullets, realizing that they wanted bullets just as much as her group did.

Minutes later, Blood Meng returned and first confirmed the bullets-for-serum trade. Then she took out a blueprint, "What do you think this is worth in bullets or serum?"

A Modern (2044) Recurve Bow, no range limit, no scope, silent. The bow’s tension can be adjusted, and the stronger the user, the more powerful the bow becomes. Since the bow can also shoot in an arc, its range can’t be measured by data.

The feather arrows required for the bow are very cheap to produce. 5 scrap iron, 1 wooden plank, and a piece of plastic can make 5 feather arrows, and there’s an 80% chance to recover them after use.

Strong or weak? It’s hard to say. Because the recurve bow is different from most weapons in the game, besides requiring strength, everything else depends on player skill. If used to the level of expertise of someone like Blue Wave, this weapon’s comprehensive power could exceed that of a machine gun. But in the hands of Lin Wu, it wouldn’t be as practical as a small dagger.

The materials needed to make it weren’t an awful lot, nor too little—Shadow Base should be able to gather them.

"Hold on," Shana said as she grabbed a radio. "Calling Maya."

Soon, Stone’s voice came through, "Stone here, what’s up?"

Shana said, "Someone has brought a purple blueprint of the Modern Recurve Bow for a trade."

Stone replied, "Wait a sec, I’ll go get Maya."

Maya immediately gathered everyone upon hearing this; she didn’t have archery experience herself, and a player without such experience would be better off with a water pipe than a bow.

Snow Egg raised his hand; he was an amateur archery athlete who had participated in district competitions during middle and high school, securing a spot in the top ten. His profile included "Archery Athlete."

Maya said regretfully, "You don’t have a strength attribute." Without strength, even with the technique, you cannot unleash the full power of a bow and arrow. Three days for crossbow training, three years for bow training.

Snow Egg said, "I can teach Little Knife." Although everyone had an assault rifle, bows and arrows played an irreplaceable role for their quietness and lack of need for ammunition.

Maya agreed, "Little Knife can learn."

Shana asked, "Does she want to learn?"

Maya looked at Little Knife, who nodded vehemently. Maya: "Hmm."

Shana asked, "The trader is right here, what do you think is a fair price to ask?"

Maya pondered for a moment, "Can we get them to come to the church on the mountaintop? See what else they’ve got for trade?"

Shana asked Blood Meng, and upon hearing that the church on the mountaintop had more supplies, he didn’t refuse and shook hands to bid farewell. Shana detailed the situation over the radio, informing Maya of Blood Meng’s needs.

Maya said, "We’ll all head to the cement factory first thing tomorrow morning to see what the fully-evolved Blood Plague looks like."

Regrettably, because of the Death in Waste City, Little Knife’s Undying skill had been punitively erased. In comparison, others lost enhancements to skills gained at levels 3, 5, or 10. What Maya lost was the explosive power of the strength attribute, a common skill that could temporarily enhance strength.

Maya had never seen Little Knife deeply saddened by the loss of her skill, for a single-celled organism couldn’t trigger tears unless placed in a specific context. No sooner had the cement factory been mentioned than Little Knife’s saddened expression emerged. The fully-evolved Blood Plague seemed to be specifically designed for Little Knife, who had mastered the Undying skill. If Little Knife hadn’t lost her ability, she could have been simply left in the cement factory, and after a few days, serum could be collected from there.

Maya stopped her train of thought, realizing her thinking pattern was beginning to resemble Lin Wu’s. Lin Wu’s approach was based on objective facts and impractical conjectures.

Nevertheless, Little Knife losing the Undying skill was not a coincidence as it was related to her 10-star strength comprehension; it just so happened to be understood while fighting the Blood Plague.

Lin Wu’s voice came through the radio: "You guys head to the cement factory, I need to make a trip to Left County in the morning."

Maya asked, "Do you have something to do in Left County?"

Lin Wu replied, "Find something to eat. It’s too hard to endure a long night without food for 12 hours."

Shana nodded emphatically by his side, while Maya sighed inwardly at the rapid pace of degeneration.

After the discussion concluded and the call ended, Maya asked Horse Soul to prepare some food and drinks to entertain the guests and also arranged for a celebration banquet. After all, in the course of one day, the Shadow’s influence had surged like a stock index.

Faced with such gains, the base members expressed their hopes for Dawn to frequently organize special agent-exclusive events.

...

Lin Wu had already seen the true form of the fully-evolved Blood Plague through a drone. Its size and appearance hadn’t changed, but the difference was the Blood Mist began expanding outward, and the Blood Zombies within it grew exceptionally active. Normal zombies soaked in the Blood Mist for a period would also turn into Blood Zombies.

Yesterday the Blood Mist had shrouded only the entire factory building and a small part of the plant area; today, 80% of the plant area was engulfed. The Blood Zombies were not leisurely wandering but running aimlessly. After running for dozens of meters, a zombie would look around with its head swiveling, then run another few dozen meters to a new spot and continue looking around.

This was very bad news for Lin Wu. The more frequently a zombie moved its head, the harder it was for him to infiltrate and assassinate. Fortunately, the number of Blood Ferocious Ma was fairly limited, and he believed Bai Ban and Shana could handle them.

Lin Wu arrived alone at the county landmark and saw two Blood Mists, one at the bus depot repair shop, which Lin Wu had not discovered last time, and the other at a residential community diagonally across from it. Lin Wu speculated that in less than five days, these two Blood Mists would converge, and when the Blood Zombies evolved into Violent Blood Zombies, they would block off Road 1.

Lin Wu climbed a signal tower for a better view and found that Road 2 was relatively clear, with no Blood Mist visible by the roadside. He relayed this information to Maya through Shana before sliding down the tower and heading towards Road 2. Underneath a large banyan tree by the road, there were a few scattered breakfast shops and a couple of barbecue restaurants open at night.

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