Chapter 28 Desert Ruins - Part 2: Desert Driving is...

Driving in the desert is very dangerous. The vehicle's cooling system is prone to malfunction, and the soft sand can cause the tires to get stuck. So, Kai slowed down and carefully towed the bus forward.

"Can we go around the edge of the desert?" Tang Bufan asked Kai Ge. Although the journey would be longer, it seemed easier than crossing the desert.

"Xiao Tang, the Tarim River has disappeared. Now the edge of the Taklamakan Desert has become a shifting sand zone." Kai Ge projected the map that Evelyn had transmitted to him onto the windshield, marking a schematic diagram of the former river. A blue river line could be seen encircling the desert.

“The rivers are covered by yellow sand, groundwater spreads to the surrounding areas, and the sand loses stability in a saturated state, forming quicksand. The center of the Taklamakan Desert is actually safe because it is dry.” Kai explained to Tang Bufan in a gentle electronic male voice: “Evelyn’s calculated route takes safety into account.”

"Alright." Tang Bufan said awkwardly, deciding not to interfere with the route, otherwise the RV would definitely have been driven into quicksand.

“But Evelyn just said the map is from four years ago.” Lu Yi frowned slightly. “Maybe there are other hidden quicksand areas in the center of the desert… No, I have to go out and drive the bus to scout the way for the RV.”

If the RV were to accidentally drive into the quicksand, given its weight and size, even a high-ranking orc like Lu Yi would be unable to pull it out. Without the RV, Tang Bufan would undoubtedly die in such an extreme desert environment.

The bus is still drivable; Lu Yi didn't remove the driver's seat yesterday.

Kai had already turned on the temperature control system when the temperature inside the car reached 40°C. As soon as Lu Yi opened the car door, the heat wave outside rushed in, mixed with fine yellow sand. Tang Bufan immediately reached out and grabbed him.

"Don't go out! What if you get heatstroke!" Tang Bufan gripped Lu Yi's wrist tightly, glancing at the temperature display in the corner of the glass screen. It was 52°C outside.

"I'm an orc, I can handle it." Lu Yi reassured him that their body temperature is around 39°C, and can reach up to 45°C when they transform into beastmen, so they rarely get sick and are much more heat-resistant than humans.

"But……"

"Xiao Tang, let Lu Yi give it a try. The RV needs him to scout the way." Kai Ge said gently, "Lu Yi, please put on the light screen glasses and stay in touch at all times."

Tang Bufan frowned, and Lu Yi nodded at him again. Tang Bufan sighed helplessly and let go of his hand.

He opened the dark box in the driver's cab and handed the light screen glasses to Lu Yi.

"If you feel unwell, come back immediately," Tang Bufan solemnly instructed him.

"I know." Lu Yi smiled slightly, put on the light screen glasses, and got out of the car, stepping into the scorching desert.

Kai slowly brought the RV to a stop. Tang Bufan sat in the driver's seat and looked at the image of the car behind him on the glass. He saw Lu Yi walk to the front of the bus and unlock the chains. His hair was blown by the hot wind and covered his face.

"Lu Yi, I'll get you a rubber band." Tang Bufan put down the salad in his arms and quickly got up.

"Don't come out. Give it to me through the car window later," Lu Yi said through his light-screen glasses, his voice coming from the speaker in the driver's seat.

By the time Tang Bufan brought the old rubber band from the bathroom, Lu Yi had already driven the rusty bus to the RV. Tang Bufan immediately rolled down the window and tossed the rubber band to him.

Lu Yi reached out and grabbed the bus through the car window, speaking to Kai Ge: "The RV and the bus should be more than 300 meters apart, so that we can handle any situation that may arise."

“Okay, Lu Yi,” Kai replied gently.

Lu Yi then drove the bus ahead, and Tang Bufan closed the window again. The two vehicles then drove slowly across the desert, one after the other, about 300 meters apart.

Anderson had disappeared sometime earlier, and there was no sign of him around. Tang Bufan thought that he probably thought the two of them were driving too slowly and the desert was too hot, so he found a place to escape the heat first.

After sitting in the driver's seat for a while, Tang Bufan saw that the bus was driving smoothly ahead, so he went back into the passenger compartment to sort out the small pieces of trash.

"Lu Yi, the bus doesn't have a temperature control system. Pay attention to the engine." Kai reminded Lu Yi as it approached noon.

"Okay," Lu Yi replied.

Tang Bufan, who was tidying up the small trash, looked up and noticed that his breathing had become a little heavy. So he quickly walked back to the driver's seat and saw that the outside temperature had reached an astonishing 61°C!

Hearing Lu Yi's increasingly noticeable breathing through the loudspeaker, Tang Bufan knew he couldn't let him continue driving, and immediately contacted Lu Yi.

"Lu Yi, come back! We'll drive again this evening!"

"I can hold on..."

"Listen to me!" Tang Bufan said sternly in his anxiety.

A person can survive for a few hours to a day or two in an environment of 50 degrees Celsius by sweating and being exposed to wind, but in an environment of 60 degrees Celsius, it's like being slowly boiled at low temperature, and sweating won't help; the person will slowly get cooked.

Lu Yi fell silent, while Tang Bufan stared intently at the bus that was still exploring the road ahead.

"Don't make me get out of the car to pull you out," Tang Bufan said in a deep voice.

Lu Yi sighed helplessly, "I'll be right back."

The bus in front finally stopped, and the RV slowly came to a stop as well. Tang Bufan breathed a heavy sigh of relief, watching Lu Yi jog back under the scorching sun, stepping on the hot sand.

Before he could get close, Tang Bufan opened the driver's side door to let him in.

The temperature difference between the inside and outside of the RV is significant. Kai Ge kept the temperature inside the RV at 28℃, and Lu Yiyi breathed a long sigh of relief as soon as she got back into the RV.

"Look, your skin is all red." Tang Bufan reached out to touch his arm with concern, and it was indeed hot. So he called to Lu Yi, "Go to the bathroom, I'll get a towel and wet it for you."

"No need." Lu Yi felt comfortable with his cool hands, so he said comfortably, "We don't know how many days it will take to cross the desert, so we have to use the water sparingly. Teacher, you can touch me more often."

Tang Bufan knew that his body temperature was low. Seeing that he liked being touched, he simply got up and walked behind him, placing his hands on his flushed cheeks and cupping his face.

"Is it comfortable?"

"That feels good." Lu Yi still wasn't satisfied, so he raised his hands and placed them on Tang Bufan's hands.

"It's comfortable." Tang Bufan felt his overheated body temperature and scolded him irritably, "You were so hot and you still didn't know to come back. This isn't how you rush. Although I wanted to get to the East District Underground City as soon as possible, you are more important."

Upon hearing this, Lu Yi's heart stirred slightly, and the corners of his mouth curled up. Tang Bufan, seeing that he was still smiling, was speechless.

"Idiot." He scolded again, then looked up at the golden expanse outside and discussed with Lu Yi, "We have enough gas now, so let's switch to driving at night? We really can't drive during the day."

Tang Bufan originally thought the desert daytime was hot enough, but when he got here he realized that the desert heat was incomparable to that of the barren land; they were practically moving forward in a furnace.

Lu Yi glanced at the data displayed on the glass; the RV's engine temperature was extremely high. He then touched Tang Bufan's icy hands and asked Kai Ge, "Kai Ge, can the RV's engine withstand this?"

"It's 11:37 now. The desert temperature is expected to peak at around 3 PM, around 65°C, putting a lot of pressure on the engine," Kai replied.

"Then let's change it to driving at night." Lu Yi understood that it would be a loss to damage the RV in order to move forward.

The two stayed in the driver's seat for more than ten minutes. Lu Yi's skin gradually turned red. Tang Bufan cupped his face and looked at him. Seeing that he was still in good spirits and showed no signs of heatstroke, he was completely relieved.

The RVs and buses just sat there on the scorching hot sand, enduring the daytime heat.

With Kai Ge monitoring the RV system, the two returned to the compartment to continue tidying up the small trash. Tang Bufan sat on the bed, and Lu Yi sat on the folding chair opposite him.

On the folding table sat a small red artificial rose. Lu Yi noticed a small handle next to the wooden base below, so he tried turning it. When he released the handle, the artificial rose slowly began to rotate inside the glass dome, accompanied by clear and melodious music.

"It's a music box." Tang Bufan had already noticed it. He was taking the cotton stuffing out of the doll to prepare for winter. Some of his cotton-padded coats were quite thin, so he could stuff them with the cotton stuffing.

"It sounds beautiful." Lu Yi appreciated the ethereal and melodious music.

"I feel this might be a copy of the rose from Beauty and the Beast," Tang Bufan guessed. "The Beast Prince's rose was encased in glass."

"The Beast Prince? Me?" Lu Yi turned to look at Tang Bufan, who was sitting on the iron bunk bed with a pale, moon-like complexion. "Is the teacher a beauty?"

"Get lost." Tang Bufan laughed, teasingly unpacking the cotton, "You're a beauty, I'm the beast."

The two of them spent their time tidying up the small trash until evening. As blood-red clouds appeared on the horizon, the desert temperature began to drop. The RV had plenty of electricity but not much firewood left, so Lu Yi used an induction cooker to cook dinner for the two of them.

He served Tang Bufan some vegetables, while he himself only had meat. Tang Bufan thought about it and decided not to say that he was a picky eater. He remembered that he didn't like carrots when he was a child, and he wanted to cry when his mother forced him to eat them.

After dinner, the outside temperature had dropped to 39°C. Lu got off the bus to check if the headlights were working. Although he had excellent night vision, having lights was still helpful for driving at night in the desert.

With nothing else to do, Tang Bufan climbed onto the roof of the car to tend to the four plant cultivation boxes and buried the lettuce seeds.

Lettuce can self-pollinate. When a yellow flower emerges from the center of a lettuce plant, and it slowly withers, the flower will turn into a cluster of fuzzy seeds. Pick it and gently pat it to get a handful of tiny seeds.

In addition to lettuce, the four plant cultivation boxes also contained cherry tomatoes, garlic, water spinach, and chives. Water spinach can be propagated by cuttings, and chives are propagated by division. Neither of these two require seed saving. Garlic and tomatoes, on the other hand, are seeds themselves. The poisonous people were growing vegetables that could be repeatedly harvested and replanted.

Besides radishes, Tang Bufan had already finished them all. He was thinking of looking for other easy-to-grow vegetables, such as peppers and peas, on his way to the East District Underground City.

Tang Bufan was lying on the roof of the car, his front half inside the incubator, carefully planting lettuce seeds. Suddenly, he felt someone jump up beside him. He grabbed the seeds and came out. Lu Yi was standing next to him, looking down at him.

"Is the light working?" Tang Bufan asked him.

"It's bad," Lu Yi sighed.

"Then drive slower." Tang Bufan said, glancing at the horizon. The bright red sun was only half-hidden, the air was still, and the temperature had dropped a few degrees.

"We can set off now." Tang Bufan looked up at Lu Yi again and reminded him, "Driving at night is risky, don't rush, safety first."

"I know." Lu Yi looked at Tang Bufan, who was only wearing a thin shirt and shorts, and also reminded him, "The temperature is dropping very quickly, so don't stay on the roof of the car for too long, teacher."

"I'll plant a few more seeds and then go down," Tang Bufan nodded.

Lu Yi then drove back to the bus ahead to scout the way. The RV followed slowly, 300 meters away from the bus. The speed was so slow that Tang Bufan was quite relaxed on the roof of the vehicle, sitting on the plant cultivation box and swaying with the vehicle, looking at the endless orange-yellow sand dunes, a scene completely different from the desert.

The post-apocalyptic scenes sometimes left Tang Bufan unsure whether they were terrifying or beautiful.

For the next two days, they continued to work through the day and drive at night to slowly cross the desert, even switching to sleeping during the day.

Since there was no GPS, Kai could only estimate their location based on the distance they had traveled; they should be close to the center of the desert by now.

On the fourth night, after the two woke up and ate, Lu Yi continued to drive the bus to scout the route, while Tang Bufan sat in the driver's seat, lazily yawning. Because his biological clock was out of sync with his sleep schedule, he was feeling sleepy.

After an unknown amount of time, a hissing noise suddenly came from the RV's speaker, followed by Lu Yi's urgent shouts:

"Brother Kai! Back off! Quicksand! This area is quicksand!"

Tang Bufan snapped out of his daze and immediately opened his eyes to look ahead into the darkness. The searchlight on the roof of the RV was on, and he saw that the sand in front of him began to flow slowly like water, gradually forming the shape of a huge whirlpool!

The rusty bus was at the edge of the whirlpool, its tires stuck in the soft sand, slowly "flowing" towards the center as the whirlpool formed! Lu Yi was nowhere to be seen!

Tang Bufan's heart raced, and he quickly stood up, his face pale.

"Lu Yi!"