Chapter 43
The search for survivors and recovery of supplies at the Jiangnan base lasted for more than half a month.
On the evening of November 6th, Lu Ya officially announced the end of the search. More than a thousand special forces rested on the spot and set off for An City the next morning.
Gu Fan was exhausted and went back to the tent to rest.
Her tent was set up between Lu Ya and the Xinghe team's tents, all of whom were people she could trust. Gu Fan set the alarm clock and slept until midnight to recover her consciousness, and used the second half of the night to practice.
As the sky was about to brighten, Gu Fan suddenly felt something.
She stopped practicing and released her spiritual sense, and saw Lu Ya standing outside his tent door, looking at her with complicated eyes.
Speaking of which, although the two have been inseparable for more than half a month, it was all for the purpose of rescue and they did not talk about any private matters.
Gu Fan still remembered the storage box of ice cream scoops Lu Ya gave her after the celebration, the beast-avoiding pills and life-extending pills she gave him during the beast tide alert, the defensive talisman that Lu Ya rejected, and she also remembered that she said that if they could meet again after the beast tide was over, she would tell Lu Ya about her origins.
Now that the rescue is over, has Lu Ya finally remembered this?
After using the dust removal technique, Gu Fan walked out lightly.
Lu Ya said nothing, just followed her with his eyes.
Gu Fan smiled and pointed to the woods not far away: "Want to go for a walk?"
Lu Ya nodded, and the two of them walked into the woods side by side. The patrolling special forces ignored them and continued to perform their duties.
The forest was dead silent. The explosion scared away all living creatures that witnessed the scene.
"Anything you want to ask?"
Gu Fan stopped in a relatively empty area of woods and turned to Lu Ya.
Lu Ya looked at her and asked, "Does your strength still have room for improvement?"
Gu Fan was stunned for a moment, then met Lu Ya's serious face and nodded, "Yes, it's very big, but each rise takes a long time. If I encounter an opportunity, I may rise several levels at once. If not, I may only be at my current level until I die."
Lu Ya: "Are you confident that you can reach the level of Xinghe and the others?"
Gu Fan: "It should be possible."
Meng Lianying said that her current attack is equivalent to that of some ordinary B-level psychics. Gu Fan guessed that if she could successfully build a foundation, even if it was the first level of the foundation building period, her strength would be thousands of times higher than the ninth level of the Qi Refining Period. She would be comparable to the top-level B-level psychics, or even comparable to A-level psychics.
"Why do you ask this?" she asked Lu Ya.
Lu Ya glanced in the direction of An City and said, "Before the beast tide arrived, I distributed the flesh-regenerating and blood-tonifying pills you gave me to the strongest men in the four armies, including several marshals. Now they value you. If you go to An City, they will jointly ask you to refine pills for the army. You can refuse, but you must teach the military personnel the alchemy techniques."
Gu Fan smiled: "Must?"
Lu Ya: "If I protect you, the entire Lu family army will be morally condemned by the five million people in the base."
Gu Fan raised his eyebrows: "So, you want to hand me over to them?"
Lu Ya: "I will let you go. Before your strength reaches A-level, it is best not to go to any base."
Gu Fan was silent.
She still remembered all the conciliatory tactics Lu Ya used to get her to serve the army. She didn't expect that when everyone else wanted her to contribute, Lu Ya was willing to let her go.
"If I leave, how will you explain it to me when I get back?"
"I will arrange for the Galaxy Team to go with you. On the way back to An City, you can choose a time to leave quietly. Mercenaries are not bound by any rules."
Only then did Gu Fan believe that Lu Ya really wanted to let her go.
The reasons behind this have actually been clear for a long time.
Gu Fan sighed, sat down on a patch of grass, took out the secret manual of her practice from her storage bracelet, and threw it to Lu Ya.
Lu Ya took it and found that the cover was written in traditional Chinese characters, similar to the traditional Chinese characters on Earth, but different.
Gu Fan pulled a small blade of grass, twirled it around in his palm, and whispered, "Actually, I'm not from Earth at all. The place I live is like those fairy tales you film, with ordinary people and sects of cultivation. Cultivators rely on spiritual roots to cultivate, but you psychics have crystal cores but no spiritual roots. You can't learn our techniques, and neither can you learn my alchemy."
After going through so many things, Gu Fan also hopes that humans can defeat monsters. If military personnel can learn alchemy, she is willing to teach them so that the military will not find ways to get her to work for them.
Lu Ya had no doubt at all when she said this fantastic story.
He sat down next to Gu Fan and returned the martial arts secret book that she couldn't understand to her.
Gu Fan accepted it and continued, "Spiritual root aptitude determines a cultivator's cultivation speed and future prospects. The higher the aptitude, the faster the cultivation, and vice versa. As for me, I believe you can guess that I have the worst aptitude among the five elements. I can use gold, wood, water, fire, and earth, but I have too many to master them."
"Qi training, foundation building, golden elixir, Nascent Soul, Spiritual Transformation... there are several more realms above that. A cultivator at the golden elixir stage should be about the same strength as you. For those with exceptional talent, it's not uncommon to form a golden elixir by the age of twenty. With my aptitude, I'm afraid only one in ten thousand people would break through to the foundation building stage. So I gave up on further cultivation after reaching the sixth level and focused on refining elixirs to support myself. Who knows..."
Gu Fan told Lu Ya about his journey through time.
Lu Ya: "Has your cultivation level improved since coming here?"
Gu Fan smiled and said, "Yes, you forced me to do this. Your subordinates criticized me for being selfish, and I got so angry that my state of mind improved and my cultivation level rose to the ninth level. I'll go out and gain some experience, and if I'm lucky, I'll be able to establish my foundation."
Lu Ya: "What are the benefits of building a foundation?"
Gu Fan: "There are many benefits. First of all, my strength will increase greatly. I'm not sure how it compares to you psychics yet, but it's at least comparable to top-tier B-class psychics. Secondly, I can practice fasting, which means I won't feel hungry even if I don't eat. I can also fly with a sword and refine more advanced elixirs. Oh, and if I can really build a foundation, my lifespan can reach 500 years!"
Lu Ya: "...How long is the lifespan of a Qi Refining Stage cultivator?"
Gu Fan: "Two hundred years old."
After she finished speaking, she suddenly noticed that Lu Ya's gaze towards her had become more complicated.
Thinking of the conversation between the two, Gu Fan jokingly said, "Do you want to guess my age again?"
Lu Ya was silent.
Gu Fan patted his shoulder soothingly: "Don't worry, even if I took the anti-aging pill, if I'm really nearing the end of my life, I will still look old. Now I look so young, which means I'm still in the prime of my life, just like you."
Lu Ya lowered his eyes.
It's still different. She still has a long time to live, but he will slowly age after his prime. Currently, the longest-lived S-level mutant in the three major bases, Mr. Yuan from the Northern Base, is ninety-six years old. Although he is still powerful, he looks gray-haired and wrinkled.
Lu Ya changed the subject: "Your mental strength..."
Gu Fan: "I don't have any mental power, I can only release my spiritual consciousness, which is equivalent to your panoramic detector. The detection range is related to the level of cultivation. I can only detect a radius of 100 meters now. Hmm, the galaxy is about to appear."
Lu Ya turned around, and soon he saw Xinghe walking out of the tent.
Lu Ya thought that since her spiritual sense could detect things so far away, even if she encountered danger outside the base, she would have time to deal with it.
He took out the beast-avoiding pill and handed it to Gu Fan: "After leaving the base, you will need this more than I do. I gave the green one to my aunt."
Fortunately, my aunt was able to save her life thanks to that pill.
Gu Fan didn't bother to be polite with him.
The sky gradually brightened, and more and more people with special abilities woke up.
Lu Ya stood up.
Gu Fan also prepared to stand up. Lu Ya reached out and pulled her, but when Gu Fan stood up, he still did not let go of her hand.
Gu Fan looked up.
The gentle morning sunlight shone through the branches and leaves, illuminating Lu Ya's eyebrows. It was so bright there that Gu Fan couldn't see his eyes clearly.
It seemed like a long time had passed, yet it also seemed like just a moment, before Lu Ya let her go.
"Don't tell me when you leave."
He whispered, taking the lead and heading towards the tent.
Dressed in black armor, his back looks tall and straight but lonely.
Gu Fan hesitated to speak.
He has the base and all of humanity in his heart, but she wants to protect herself more.
After all, their paths are different.
——
Back in the tent, Gu Fan called Xinghe and the other three together and explained the reasons why Lu Ya persuaded her to leave the base. He did not mention her background for the time being, nor did he mention that Lu Ya wanted the Xinghe team to leave with her.
But as soon as she finished speaking, Xinghe immediately said, "We'll go with you."
Qingteng, Meng Lianying and Fenghuo all nodded.
Xinghe seemed worried that Gu Fan would try to persuade him under the pressure, so he explained, "Actually, we chose to leave not just to protect you. The military suffered heavy losses this time, and they have to rebuild the Jiangnan base. They don't have the energy to clear out monsters anytime soon. At most, they can issue some mercenary missions. We stay at the base, and instead of facing the solicitation of various forces, it's better for us to go out and complete our own missions, whether it's killing monsters or gathering supplies, which are all contributions to the base."
Fenghuo touched his nose and said, "Xinghe is right. Marshal Lu and Marshal Li both died in this beast tide. The Lu family army is fine, with Young Master Lu holding on. The Li family will probably be suppressed by the Sheng family and will never be able to rise again. The elite of the Sheng family have all gone into hiding with the old thief Sheng. Now, among the five major families, their family has the most A and B-level experts."
Xinghe: "Rebuilding the base means reordering the power base. We don't want to get involved in this mess."
Gu Fan suddenly thought of the look Sheng Xi gave her before joining the rescue team when the No. 1 explosion-proof center was just opened. It was a look of provocation and determination.
She is Lu Ya's girlfriend, so Sheng Xi certainly cannot "get" her, a talent who can make pills, by force. So where does his confidence come from?
Did he expect that other forces in the base would unite to force Lu Ya to hand her over?
It is true that human hearts are unpredictable. Even when the earth has fallen to this point, there are still people who are thinking about fighting for power and seeking personal gain.
——
The five of them agreed to leave together, and the specific time was also decided.
On the evening of the third day after setting off for An City, Fenghuo had an argument with the logistics personnel because the boxed lunches distributed by the army were not to his liking, and even used his supernatural powers. If Lu Ya had not arrived in time, the two sides might have really fought.
Fenghuo was wrong for being picky, and Lu Ya scolded him coldly.
Fenghuo was indignant and went into the tent because he was afraid of Lu Ya's strength.
Lu Ya's cold gaze swept over Xinghe, Qingteng, Meng Lianying and Gu Fan in turn, with a hint of shock.
Outsiders were watching the fun, but Gu Fan knew that this was their farewell.
At midnight, Gu Fan and the other four put on their armor and quietly reunited.
Before leaving, Gu Fan released his spiritual sense and probed into Lu Ya's tent.
He was lying on the camp bed, and even though he was asleep, his handsome face was still so cold.
Gu Fan described his facial features one by one, then withdrew his spiritual sense and followed Xinghe and the other three into the deep forest.
In the pitch-black tent, Lu Ya opened his eyes at some point.
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