Chapter 205
Fortunately, Qiao Sheng and his group of four made the right decision this time. They started their return journey at noon. With Su and Ah Dai, they were able to find the way. Even so, they walked for an entire afternoon before returning to the boat on the shore.
The four people on the boat did nothing but rush into the bathroom to take a shower. They were all sticky from sweating for two days and one night. After washing and changing into dry clothes, the four people finally felt alive.
They gathered on Qiao Sheng’s boat for dinner. It was not too troublesome to make. It was basically all kinds of cold salads. After dinner, they also cut a few iced watermelons.
While eating watermelons, they discussed the players on the nearby boats. They actually walked on the island for a day and a half. Apart from the screams, they did not meet any players at all. It was very strange. Did these people disappear or get lost on the island?
Last night, because they had to take turns to keep watch, the four of them didn't get enough rest. Tonight, they returned to the boat and finally got a good rest. They went to bed early.
Unexpectedly, they were all woken up by screams in the middle of the night. When Qiao Sheng and Li Mu stood on the terrace, Xia Beibei also came out. Lin Haiyang probably didn't hear it and didn't come out yet.
The three of them discussed it and felt something was wrong. If these screams were made by the players, they had already reached the shore and the boat was nearby. How could they pass by without entering the house?
Then they went ashore with lanterns and began to set up net traps around the forest in front of them. Because they didn't know what was making the sound, the nets were tied in large and small sizes. They didn't dare to go in, so they could only tie them at the edge of the forest.
After setting the trap, the three of them went back to the boat to rest until the sun rose in the morning. Lin Haiyang got up and called them one by one, muttering in his mouth whether he had gone to steal at night. They were all too lazy and slept too much.
Xia Beibei sprayed him with spray while brushing her teeth. Last night, she and Sister Qiao were busy like three old oxen for half the night. Lin Haiyang, the pig, slept soundly. Now he dared to say that they slept too much. He deserved a beating.
When eating breakfast, you can still hear screams from time to time in the forest. After eating and drinking, the four people went ashore to check the traps they had tied last night. The
screams were still in their ears. When they saw the species in the traps, the four people were simply at a loss. There were only two trapped in more than ten traps.
"Is this the same emoticon?" Xia Beibei folded her hands in front of her chest and opened her mouth to imitate the emoticon she had seen at the time.
"Woodpecker?" Qiao Sheng simply didn't know what expression to use to express his current mood.
Lin Haiyang even laughed at Xia Beibei for imitating it very well. Only Li Mu, who didn't use emoticons, looked confused and didn't know what they were talking about. However, he confirmed Qiao Sheng's answer that this guy was a woodpecker.
No wonder they didn't hear screams these past few nights, and they came from far away to near, but didn't approach them, just circled around and walked away again.
Before, they had speculated whether the formation in the forest was too powerful so that those people couldn't get to them. Now it is certain that they thought too much. Those were not players or NPCs at all, but just a few woodpeckers that made them nervous for two nights.
Xia Beibei followed the two woodchucks and shouted at them for a long time, then hit them with a wooden stick a few times before letting them go.
"Do you think these two guys know the way? Should we let them lead the way?" Qiao Sheng asked uncertainly.
"What if they are smart enough to lead you to the ditch?" Li Mu said as he re-laid the trap net.
"It's bad, we should let them fight. I've seen woodchucks fighting each other in short videos, choking each other again and again." Xia Beibei looked at the rope left in her hand after letting the woodchucks go, and suddenly felt it was a pity that she missed a performance.
After packing up, they returned to the boat. Since it was not a copy island, they did not need to go to the island. According to Xia Beibei's description, there were more than 20 people on the island, and now their lives were in danger. Should they go to rescue them?
"Let's put aside whether to rescue them or not. The wood resources on this island are indeed rich enough, and there are many wild animals. How about we go up and collect some?" Qiao Sheng thought more simply. After all, these were people she had never seen before, and it was not realistic for her to risk her life to save them.
The other three also agreed with her idea. Although there was no shortage of wood planks, there were many other things besides wood planks when cutting down trees. They could really stay here for a while.
Going to the island for the purpose of collecting is different from usual. They specially repacked their backpacks, and each backpack was filled with a lot of lockers to save the need to run back and forth to deliver supplies. Other things must also be stored in sufficient quantities.
There was a lot of food in Qiao Sheng's ring space, so he cooked a lot of green bean soup. Li Mu made a lot of ice, and after it was chilled, he poured it into a clean glass bottle and put it all in the ring. When he was busy later, he would have this to support himself, at least he would not get heatstroke.
Xia Beibei's purse was also filled with various snacks and desserts. When packing in the cabin, Qiao Sheng was still worrying with Li Mu. If she had known that she had to cut so many trees, she would not have changed her butcher knife a few days ago. If she had changed to an axe, wouldn't this job be much easier?
"Without the butcher's knife, we would have to work hard to cut the meat in the refrigerator." Li Mu was pragmatic. He thought the butcher's knife was more important.
"I understand. They are both important. This is forcing us to work hard and leave no way out for the players." Qiao Sheng sighed and shook her head. She couldn't help but complain about the system store's inhumanity. She couldn't just let her exchange the supplies for points, and then exchange the points for the codes of the goods on sale. She had to save points day by day, which was really annoying. Even though
she was complaining, she still had to do the work. Because the amount of wood to be cut was huge, Qiao Sheng also brought a lot of rare metals in her bag, so that when the durability of the machete was exhausted and it was gone, she could make a new one on the spot without delaying her work.
I ate more at lunch, thinking that I would have to do physical work in the afternoon. At noon, four people went to the island to start logging. This time, logging was simple. We didn't choose the type or style. We just went in one direction, one person cut two rows wide, and rushed forward.
Their work progress was really controlled by the weather. If they didn't rest after working for a while, they would have the precursor of heat stroke. They could only log for half an hour and rest for fifteen minutes.
Because there were no trees blocking their way back, they didn't have to worry about getting lost. They worked in the forest for a while longer. After all, it wasn't that hot after the sun went down the mountain. They could work for 45 minutes and rest for 15 minutes. However,
the obstructed vision was also a problem. They worked for about an hour before they were ready to return.
It was already dark when they returned to the boat. The four of them were exhausted. They had a simple meal, a nice bath, and packed up. Qiao Sheng threw himself on his bamboo bed and fell asleep as soon as he closed his eyes. There were screams in the middle of the night.
This time, Qiao Sheng and the other three heard it, but no one paid any attention. They didn't even close their eyes. They turned over and continued to sleep.
In the morning, except for some soreness in their arms, they felt good.
In the next two days, they cut wood crazily on this island and hunted animals when they saw them. They saw quite a few groundhogs, but they really didn't have the habit of eating mice, so they let them go.
Then they found that as the forest shrank, the number of woodchucks was really increasing. Xia Beibei also marked each of them. A rough count showed that there were about twenty woodchucks with ID codes.
No wonder this family could shout all night long. Maybe they took turns to commit crimes and kept torturing the four of them. So Xia Beibei would hit the woodchucks with a stick every time he made a mark. He didn't need to use much force, and he didn't want to kill them with one stick. He just wanted to vent his anger.
They had been on the island for five days. They didn't understand the situation in the first two and a half days, and they didn't see anyone. They really searched the island in the next two and a half days, but there was no sign of people on the island.
Looking at the forest that had been cut down by them, Qiao Sheng felt that even if there were players on the island, they would probably be gone now.
The heat stroke alone was enough to make these players drink a bottle of wine, not to mention that they could get lost in the forest and there were beasts. With so many dangers, it seemed that they didn't need to save anyone who could really survive for so many days.
After another two days, two-thirds of the island had been cleared by them. Except for the bewildered groundhogs on the tree stumps, Qiao Sheng and his team left almost nothing behind.
The recently cut wood, collected fruits, and hunted animals have filled up quite a few storage cabinets. Every time I go to the island, I have to make a new storage cabinet, otherwise I really can't put all these things away.
Because he was very busy, Li Mu was not in a hurry to decompose the animals. He asked Qiao Sheng to put them all in the ring space and do this job when he has time. It
was not until the ninth day that they cut down all the trees on the entire island and didn't see even a single player. Only then could they be sure that there was no one on the island.
The four of them were standing alone on the bare island, which looked quite funny. Just now, a player's boat approached the island. Seeing this situation, it didn't even drop the anchor, but turned the bow and continued to drift.
After collecting all the supplies, the four of them prepared to go back. When they passed by the huge rock standing in the center of the island, they felt it was a bit abrupt, so they stopped in front of it.
Qiao Sheng and Li Mu circled around the rock for a few times, and You Su also jumped around. Xia Beibei and Lin Haiyang were already exhausted, so they sat down on a small stone next to the rock, asked Qiao Sheng for a bottle of iced sour plum soup, and leaned against the rock to rest.
"Sister Qiao, you two should sit down and rest for a while too. I'm almost like Baldy Wang these days. It's really tiring to chop wood all day long." Xia Beibei took a piece of mung bean cake from her purse. She was hot and hungry, and she felt uncomfortable because she was expending too much energy. There was something to lean on behind her, and her center of gravity soon began to move backwards.
Li Mu squatted on the ground, not knowing what to look at. Qiao Sheng just walked over and heard two screams. Xia Beibei and Lin Haiyang, who were originally leaning on the boulder, had disappeared. He
quickly walked to the place where they had just sat. On the ground was still the sour plum soup that Xia Beibei had placed next to her because she was taking the mung bean cake. Lin Haiyang's bottle disappeared with him.
"There must be a hole somewhere, and they fell in. Look at this piece of soil, it's obviously different from other places." Li Mu said while rolling the soil he had just grabbed from the ground.
Qiao Sheng quickly pushed the small stone first, but found that he couldn't push it. He tried to push the boulder again, but still failed. He simply gave up and sat down on the small stone that Xia Beibei had just sat on, and imitated her movements and leaned on the boulder.