Chapter 50

"Don't be so silly and wait for me like that next time," Qiao Ning said, vigorously rubbing the soft fur on the giant wolf's chest and belly.

Because she knew that she wouldn't be able to go back to find Ice Scales every time.

They probably won't see each other again after this natural disaster ends.

Reason told her that in a survival game, gatherings, separations, life, and death are all normal occurrences, and excessive worry would only cause unnecessary trouble. But humans are not plants or trees, nor are they machines; how can one simply dictate what will happen?

Ice Scale didn't understand why Qiao Ning said that, but it would always try to obey her, so it nodded its big head.

Qiao Ning smiled and gave it another good rub. It seemed that from the first time they met, this guy had been exceptionally well-behaved and obedient in front of her, as if he knew she wouldn't hurt him. He boldly approached her, and even if he was wary, he quickly let down his guard...

Isn't this their first meeting?

Qiao Ning sometimes had this question in her mind.

In fact, she had encountered treasure-guarding monsters who were not on guard against her more than once, but those were all very ordinary and common animals, such as dogs, pigs, and peacocks.

That said, she sometimes felt that these ordinary treasure-guarding monsters, in certain situations and aspects, weren't much different from Ice Scales. There was a sense that they weren't similar in form, but shared a similar spirit.

Qiao Ning didn't think much about these things. The temperature outside the car had dropped to almost minus forty degrees Celsius. Although she wasn't afraid of the cold after awakening her superpower, being in such a low temperature for a long time would cause her body to become stiff, cold, and numb.

After all, she was just a mortal being, made of flesh and blood.

Qiao Ning returned to the car, and Bing Lin ran alongside it, occasionally driving away a guardian monster.

There are even more supply crates tonight, and she now has the title of Treasure Hunter. With the title's effect and her invincible lucky star talent, all the treasure crates she encounters along the way are platinum crates.

While checking and counting the supplies in the rare and platinum treasure chests, she chatted idly with Icescale, not caring whether it understood her or not.

On such a cold, dark night, she had to do something to distract herself, otherwise she would just want to sleep.

Qiao Ning first looked at the golden treasure chests. Inside the three chests were 10 skill books: one skill book for each of the five elements, one book for "Basic Cultivation", one book for "Basic Body Refinement", one book for "Basic Swordsmanship", one book for "100% Accuracy" and one book for "Thousand-Mile Tracking".

Five Talent Experience Books (Universal type, each book can increase talent experience by 2000 points)

Eight special skill cards (Stealth, Explosion, Nightmare, Labyrinth, Berserk, Flight, Teleport, Transformation).

Several purple equipment items and one red weapon (Nightmare Gun), which cannot be upgraded.

One piece of red equipment (Night-Shining Armor), non-upgradeable.

If the items in the gold treasure chest are this rare, the resources in the diamond treasure chest can only be even better:

20 Talent Experience Books

Skill Scrolls *5 (Each scroll can only store one skill, and there is no limit to the number of times a skill can be stored. You can freely release the pre-stored skill when needed, until all the stored skill uses are used up.)

To change the type of skill stored, you need to clear all the stored skill uses before you can store the new skill type.

Skill scrolls will not be destroyed or disappear, but there is a 7-day cooldown period after every 100 skill uses. You must wait for the cooldown to expire before you can reload the scrolls with skills.

One gold skill book, "Thousands of Puppets," which allows you to refine all things into puppets for your own use.

The Pet Slot Expansion Crystal adds an extra pet slot without requiring any experience points or other resources.

Talent Cloner *1 (Allows you to choose another player's talent to clone. Only one talent can be cloned at a time, and the other player's talent level cannot be higher than your own; otherwise, cloning will fail. Regardless of whether cloning succeeds or fails, the cloner will be destroyed and disappear after use.)

When a talent is cloned using a cloner, the new talent will randomly increase or decrease in level from its original level, and the talent effect will change depending on the talent level.

Aside from weapons and some skill books, almost everything else was exactly what Qiao Ning was currently lacking.

She scans the card molds to create skill cards; any extras can be exchanged for other resources later. But the remaining items, each rare and valuable, are to be learned and used immediately if they are usable; she resolutely refuses to let them linger overnight, to avoid any unforeseen complications. She firmly believes that some resources only truly belong to you once you've used them.

The Lucky Star and Blind Box talents accumulate experience, but there's no fixed experience requirement for leveling up. The only gold talent with a visible experience bar is Card Crafting Expert.

She had already fed this talent two skill books before, and after opening this skill book, she fed it 10 more in one go, finally leveling it up.

Card Crafting Expert (Level 2): ​​Except for special cards, rare cards, and cards that cannot be copied, all other cards can be copied infinitely. There is no copying time or cooldown. Every 10 copies of a card require 1 point of talent experience.

Special and rare cards can be copied, but there is a 1-hour copying time and a 1-hour cooldown. Each copy increases talent experience by 5 points. No talent experience is consumed.

Qiao Ning was quite surprised by the upgraded talent effect. She had thought it would only reduce the time for copying and the cooldown, but she didn't expect it to allow her to copy ordinary skill cards without limit. In this way, she could copy countless skill cards as long as she had enough talent experience.

However, if she runs out of talent experience, she won't be able to create ordinary skill cards even if she has the talent.

Talent experience is hard to obtain; the drop rate for experience books is terrifyingly low. If you have enough talent experience, this level up will be perfect. But if you have no talent experience left… frankly, this talent level up is worse than not leveling up at all.

In short, there are both advantages and disadvantages.

After Qiao Ning finished checking the supplies in the rare treasure chest, she started opening the platinum treasure chest.

When they find a delicious meal, they casually toss one to the ice scales running outside the car.

Tonight, the Platinum Chest contains more warm supplies, and even the drop rate for medicine has doubled.

This didn't make Qiao Ning happy; instead, it gave her a strange feeling.

Given the nature of this game, this sudden generosity might mean there's a trap coming up later, right?

Otherwise, there's no way to explain its sudden kindness in distributing large quantities of supplies to players to improve their survival rate.

Qiao Ning couldn't help but assume the worst about every unusual thing in the survival game.

Under what circumstances would a game proactively provide players with resources to increase their survival rate?

Could it be that... something might happen later that causes a large number of players to die, so they have to let a few more players live now to prevent them all from dying later?

Qiao Ning felt something was wrong, so she reminded everyone in the server-wide chat channel to prepare themselves mentally and stockpile essential survival supplies as well as defensive items.

Gasoline, food, and water are basic survival supplies, while defensive supplies are mainly used to give players some resistance when danger comes.

But if it's a terrifying danger, like a volcanic eruption we've seen before, then any defense will be futile.

[It's best if everyone listens to Qiao Ning's advice. Compared to the original Heng, Qiao Ning rarely appears in the chat channel. Her sudden appearance must have a basis and reason. Whether you believe it or not, it's never a bad thing to be prepared. Better safe than sorry.]

[Having survived this far, I haven't made any other progress, except for one thing: "listening to advice." Before, people said I was stubborn and unyielding, impervious to reason. Now, I listen to advice more than anyone else, especially from influential people.]

[Me too, on the top floor. Ignoring advice, I died and logged off.]

Anyway, the last stubborn and headstrong player I encountered died without even a proper burial. I even held a memorial service for him on the seventh day after the last Cataclysm.

[I'm already doing as the expert suggested. Does the expert have any other information? This temperature is frightening. Although I don't lack warm clothing for now, I still feel uneasy for some reason.]

[Qiao Ning (1408): I just had a feeling that the next two days might not be easy. I'm just as unsure as you are right now.]

The game is increasingly incorporating elements of conflict between players, which can severely impact player unity and survival rates. Be careful not to get caught up in these traps; the survival of others increases your own chances of survival.

This was the first time Qiao Ning had said so much in the chat channel. To others, these might all seem like clichés and nonsense, but every word came from the bottom of her heart.

Every time Qiao Ning watched the chat channel, she would get off the car for a while, ride on the Ice Scale, and let it carry her. Next to her was an autonomous vehicle. The two of them, a person and a wolf, were speeding along the icy highway in the dark night.

She used to see videos of ethnic minority girls riding horses, and she thought the girls riding horses were heroic and dashing. Now she is riding a giant wolf, which is faster and cooler, and her long-lost teenage spirit has been rekindled.

However, the giant wolf ran so fast that even with its fur protecting her from the cold wind, Qiao Ning's head still ached from the wind.

After riding for a while, you have to get off and rest in the car.

Binglin especially loved carrying Qiao Ning while running. When he was extremely happy, he couldn't help but stop and let out a long wolf howl.

In the vast, frigid world of the highway, its wolf howl possesses a particularly powerful, heart-stirring force.

As dawn approached, Qiao Ning felt reluctant to get off Binglin's back.

Today marks the sixth day of the natural disaster.

The end of the natural disaster is just around the corner.

At eight o'clock in the morning, Icescale left the highway and disappeared behind the barrier.

As time passed due to the natural disaster, this highway barrier gradually weakened, but it still stands, separating the highway from the icy world beyond.

Perhaps because she slept for a few hours yesterday afternoon, Qiao Ning didn't feel sleepy at all after not sleeping all night; on the contrary, she was full of energy.

She put the unused supplies on the shelves in batches, exchanging only materials, talent experience books, and plant fertilizer; she didn't exchange anything else.

Qiao Ning's planting pots have never been empty, but those few evolved plants are currently dormant because they haven't received enough fertilizer to advance or develop. The carnivorous plant, in particular, has long been dormant due to hunger.

Qiao Ning has a recipe for pet food that she can make herself. Fat Tiger's food has never run out, and it also gets to eat fresh bamboo shoots every day. Qiao Ning even planted bamboo for it in a special planting pot.

The giant locust feeds on blood, but since this natural disaster has killed relatively few animals, Qiao Ning feeds it with her previous blood food reserves. She also has to feed its offspring and grandchildren.

The poisonous locusts are powerful; when fully grown, they are equivalent to an army of poisonous locusts. However, they also consume a great deal of blood and food, and most people simply cannot afford to feed them.

Qiao Ning had no shortage of supplies, so she didn't rush to pick up any more supply boxes. Instead, she got out of the car, left the highway, and entered the ice field area.

After learning the skill book "Basic Cultivation" last night, she discovered that she no longer needed to swallow beast cores to absorb them. She could directly absorb the energy inside through cultivation to enhance her superpowers, and she never fainted again.

After confirming that the beast cores had no side effects, Qiao Ning had already publicly announced their uses. However, whether tens of thousands of players dared to risk venturing into the icy plains to hunt ferocious beasts was beyond her control.

As for the miraculous effects of the basic cultivation skill book, Qiao Ning didn't mention it. Not everyone has such a thing, and revealing it rashly would only bring her trouble.

Today, the temperature on the ice sheet is even lower than yesterday, and the oxygen is even thinner. Even in the peripheral areas, oxygen tanks are needed to breathe normally.

The ice sculpture in Qiao Ning's inner pocket felt slightly warm, and a moment later, she saw a huge shadow running towards her in the swirling snow.

When it got closer, Qiao Ning realized that Binglin had changed its outfit again today.

The vest looked strange yet familiar; it was entirely ice-blue, with the shape of a sheep on its head, a single horn on its forehead, a body resembling a musk deer, and a tail like a dragon…

The vest looks about five or six parts similar to the ice sculpture I gave to Qiao Ning yesterday.

When Qiao Ning saw it, her first thought was of a mythical beast called the Qilin.

Many online games feature mythical beasts like the Qilin, Dragon, and Phoenix, each with a different appearance but largely similar.

Qiao Ning was naturally familiar with it.

Ice Scale's disguise is definitely not a real Qilin, but it does resemble one. It's probably a strange beast naturally bred in this world.

Having changed into a new outfit, Binglin couldn't wait to show herself off to Qiao Ning, spinning around in front of her and making a few moves that she thought were very fierce.

He then squatted down, his big eyes gazing expectantly at Qiao Ning, as if waiting for her evaluation.

Qiao Ning was forced to watch a Qilin fashion show. After a moment of silence, she sincerely commented, "You look beautiful today! Absolutely perfect!"

Qiao Ning, who has zero eloquence, has already done her best.

Overjoyed and excited, Binglin opened her mouth and let out a cry.

Um?

Qiao Ning looked bewildered and confused.

Did she mishear?

She heard a...woof?