ebonymovies Chapter 496 City of Fire
Chapter 496 City of Fire
Fu Xiaojian knew that what he said was inappropriate.
After all, everything the team owns now is inextricably linked to Xu Si.
The survival base is now built entirely thanks to Xu Si.
But no matter what, he should do something and say something.
Whether it was to comfort or to rouse Xu Si, he had to say something.
"Old Xu." Fu Xiaojian lowered his voice and sat down next to Xu Si.
"Yi Yi and Jiao Jiao both chose to do that, not to see you sitting here forever."
Xu Si seemed to have taken it to heart, his shoulders trembled slightly.
He didn't really know why he was sitting there in silence; he just felt more tired than ever before.
I was so tired that I didn't want to move a single part of my body.
"Do you think this is the state they want to see you in?" Fu Xiaojian continued.
"I know I have no right to say these things to you!" Fu Xiaojian stood up, patted off non-existent dust from his clothes to hide his unease.
"But doing nothing will change nothing."
He turned around, took two steps, and then stopped.
"By the way, this city doesn't have a name yet. How about calling it 'City of Unbridled Will'?" Fu Xiaojian made a joke, not too big, not too small, to Xu Si and Yi Yi.
However, the survival base has been set up, but the city does not yet have a name.
Fu Xiaojian's figure disappeared at the end of the stone house.
That's all he could say; anything more he said would ultimately depend on Xu Si himself.
Xu Si remained seated on the edge of the Breath of Earth, but he finally raised his head and looked up at the World Tree, which was now taller than the city wall.
The emerald green canopy gleamed with a warm luster under the blood-red sun, and the fluorescent green light flowing between the leaves resembled the eyes of someone smiling.
"Yi-yi," he called out in his heart.
no respond.
But he could feel that bond was still there.
Feeling the connection that was etched into the very core of his being, he slowly stood up.
A gentle breeze swept across the treetops, like an invisible hand gently supporting him.
"Why do I always make decisions for others? Am I not strong enough?" he said in a low voice.
If he were strong enough, would all of this have happened?
If he wins God's choice, can he still turn things around?
Xu Si's obsession with strength was reignited.
He may have scoffed at the divine position before, but now, for the first time, he has the thought of making it his own.
And it is a must.
-
The thirty-first day.
The blood-red sun rises.
Xu Si stood at the highest point of the city wall, surrounded by Chen Pei, Fu Xiaojian, Shao Bing, Ta Shan, Su Su, Chen Xi, Xiao Luo, and all the other core members of the caravan.
Their gazes fell on the verdant World Tree in the center of the city, on the convoy members who were busy planning farmland, surveying water sources, and building roads, and on the empty plains left by the strange tides that had receded on the distant horizon and would not return for some time.
"Isn't calling it 'City of Fire' a bit too high-profile?" Fu Xiaojian asked.
"What's so high-profile about it? It's the apocalypse, how many people are left? Who would think it's high-profile? What else would you call it if not 'Spark'?" Tashan thought the Spark team was pretty good.
"I also think City of Fire is a good name! Seeing this name is like seeing the path we came from!" Shao Bing said.
"Who will write it?" Fu Xiaojian asked, and everyone looked at Xu Si.
The city gate was very large, and the plaque above it was also very large; all that was missing was a name.
"My handwriting isn't good," Xu Si was self-aware.
He dropped out of high school. He was good at carving on stones, but he was still a little ashamed that he could not be sure how many people would see his writing on the city gate.
"If you don't write it, then we have even less right to do so!" The quality of the handwriting is secondary; this is also Fu Xiaojian's way of giving Xu Si a chance to express his true feelings.
Xu Si remained silent for a moment before giving in.
"From today onwards, this city will be called the City of the Flame."
Xu Si turned around, and the Sword of Royal Power flew out, clearly engraving these words on the white jade-like city wall.
To everyone's surprise, those few words seemed unremarkable at first glance, but they contained the supreme sword intent that Jian Gui had deliberately preserved.
Everyone who enters the city, unless they have reached a high rank, must bow down before this sword intent.
No one cheered, no one applauded.
But everyone stopped what they were doing, looked up with firm eyes at the familiar figure above the city wall, and then at the emerald green World Tree in the center of the city.
In the silence, a force is growing wildly.
-
Day 32.
Zhou Wan squatted at the edge of the shallow pond of life-giving soil at the base of the World Tree, carefully cultivating the first experimental field.
The land around the World Tree felt completely different to him compared to other places.
"I think it will definitely work!" Zhao Fei said from the side. As a farmer, he was the most suitable deputy for Zhou Wan.
Meanwhile, Mr. Wu and Mr. Gou also personally helped to level the land.
"Sister Wanwan, do you want me to flip through it again?" Doubao said.
The Mudman Sequence is incredibly efficient for tilling the land. If Doubao is around, tilling thousands of acres a day is no problem at all, and his sequence even climbs higher while tilling the land.
Doubao also enjoyed it.
"No need, no need! This time it might really work!" Zhou Wan, with her hands stuck in the soil, was almost crying with joy.
She had tried countless times to breed crops in the past, but the lifeless soil could not produce grain seeds. As a last resort, she tried to cultivate plants by using herself as the soil. Now she saw hope.
The World Tree truly can turn 'dead soil' into 'living soil'.
In other words, they really intend to settle down here.
Wu Shuangbao and Gou Daquan, two veterans of the Xinghuo team, also had tears in their eyes, deeply moved as well.
They thought their fate would be sealed in some bizarre attack, but unexpectedly, after experiencing such terror, their luck turned around.
In just over a month, they actually managed to build humanity's first city of the future.
This is something they wouldn't even dare to dream of.
Until dusk.
It took several of them working together to plant all the different kinds of seeds the convoy possessed.
Of course, not all of them were planted, but about half.
Moreover, more than half of them are seeds whose species are difficult to identify.
Experiments are experiments, but it's still necessary to leave some room for maneuver.
"Little girl, are you really confident you can get them all to sprout?"
Although Gou Daquan lost an arm, his spirit and energy were still strong. The ascetic training had provided him with an unprecedented boost to his physique.
Despite his advanced age, few in the team can match his physique.
"Don't worry, Grandpa Gou, we definitely can. We'll be able to harvest our first crop in half a month at most!" This is where Zhou Wan's confidence comes from, even though she is in a vegetative state.
"Don't put so much pressure on yourself! The convoy's supplies aren't too tight right now!" Fu Xiaojian appeared from somewhere else at some point.
These past few days, he, the nominal "city lord," has been extremely busy.
If it weren't for Qian Duoduo and Shao Bing's support, he would have really collapsed.
He never imagined that a convoy of less than a hundred people would have so many problems.
He was tasked with making decisions about building schools, planning locations for workshops, and organizing the guard.
Other duties included night watch, security, trading, gatekeeping, tree cultivation, farming, and childcare. He even had to decide how many toilets to build and where to build them.
For the first time, he felt that it was a failure that Sequence 4—City Lord—didn't give him the ability to handle government affairs.
Day 33.
The first crop actually sprouted immediately.
It wasn't the kind of tentative, timid, and potentially doomed sprout that emerged from the black soil, but rather a reckless and almost savage life force that burst forth from the black soil.
It evokes a scene reminiscent of a gentle drizzle on a celestial street, where the grass appears green from afar but is barely visible up close.
The green area is not large, and the greenery is not lush.
But that patch of green brought tears to the eyes of everyone in the convoy.
Zhou Wan squatted by the experimental field, pinching the tender leaves of a wheat seedling with her fingers, and tears fell without warning.
She had waited too long.
To be precise, humanity has waited too long.
After the end times arrive, the soil dies, crops fail, and humanity, like a flock of duckweed uprooted from the earth, drifts, struggles, and dies among ruins and wastelands.
And now, the roots have truly been replanted.
This means something that is extremely important.
"It's sprouted, it's really sprouted." Zhao Fei stood behind her, his voice strained.
The man, who belonged to the farmer's lineage, had red eyes and his Adam's apple bobbed several times. In the end, he didn't say anything, but just rubbed his hands together vigorously and repeatedly.
The news spread like wildfire throughout the city.
In less than ten minutes, the experimental field was surrounded by people.
No one made a fuss, no one cheered.
They simply stood quietly, watching the tender green shoots that had just broken through the soil, as thin as needle tips, as if they were witnessing some long-lost miracle of the apocalypse.
"Is that wheat seedlings?" Xiao Shi, holding Xiao He's hand, squeezed through the crowd, tiptoeing to look inside, his little face full of curiosity.
"This whole area is covered." Gou Daquan recognized it; even though the wheat seedlings were only the size of toothpicks, he would never mistake them.
"Will I be able to make steamed buns when I grow up?" Xiao He asked softly.
"Yes," Su Su said.
"When I grow up, I can make bread, noodles, steamed buns, and fried dough sticks!" he said, drooling.
"Approximately how many kinds of crops are there?" Fu Xiaojian asked at this moment.
"There are 73 species, and we can recognize about 21 of them. The rest can only be identified when they grow up. It's hard to say, but a large part of them are grass species!" Zhou Wan said.
She thought that about ten kinds would be enough, but to her surprise, all the seeds she planted sprouted under the nurturing of her sequence ability.
"Good grass seeds! That's exactly what we need. Don't pull out a single one of these that have grown. We lack everything right now, even grass. For us, these are all endangered species!" Fu Xiaojian clearly understood the importance of biodiversity.
More than seventy kinds of plants—it's a huge treasure trove!
He was almost tempted to plant all the remaining seeds, but this was his last resort.
Let's breed these seeds for three or four generations first!
The thirty-eighth day.
The crops in the experimental field have grown to the height of a finger joint.
The wheat seedlings are no longer tiny, needle-like sprouts, but small plants with straight backs and outstretched leaves, swaying gently in the morning breeze, like a group of children who have just learned to stand.
Every night, Zhou would squat on the ground before dawn and stay there for most of the day.
Her vegetative state sequence thrived in this environment; the growth status of the seedlings, the moisture content of the soil, and the development of the root system were all clearly presented in her perception, like an electrocardiogram.
Squatting next to her was Zou Hui, a researcher who was six months pregnant; she had taken even more detailed notes.
She and Zhou Wan are two extremes; Zhou Wan is focused on her work, while Zou Hui is focused on her research and recording.
The two little ones in her belly were also very well-behaved, not being so unreasonable as to prevent him from doing anything.
Xu Si was also surprised. He didn't expect that the [Hermaphrodite Sequence] that Zou Hui took would actually work in her body, turning one embryo into two.
One yin and one yang, a pair of twins, a dragon and a phoenix.
Although we don't yet know what characteristics these two little ones have, the auspicious combination of dragon and phoenix is clearly a good omen.
"They're growing very well," she said softly, her fingers gently tracing the leaves of a wheat seedling as if stroking a baby's cheek.
"Indeed, it's bound to be a bumper harvest. Look, the first batch of cucumbers is already ready to be picked!" Zhao Fei pointed at a fully grown cucumber, drooling.
However, every plant here is numbered by Zhou Wan, and if even one is missing, someone will suffer.
Therefore, he dared not pick them.
Other vegetables have also grown to maturity.
The rest of the team would often wander over here, partly to pay homage to the World Tree, and partly to drool over the "vegetable basket".
"Don't pick them! I'll ask the city lord first. In a little while, go and have Master Wei come over and pollinate these flowers again!" Master Wei's insects also played a good role this time.
Especially the wind beetle, it's simply the best 'bee'.
Although they don't produce honey, the little hurricanes they create can spread pollen over a wider area.
"I know, I know! Even if I'm greedy, I still know what's important!" Zhao Fei, a survivor of the Guangming Motorcade, was still very clear about his position.
"Oh, and that cucumber is Mr. Wei's reward!"
As the Minister of Agriculture, Zhou Wan felt that she still had to pay for Wei Fuzi's hard work over the past few days.
……
Meanwhile, Fu Xiaojian, who was nominally busy in the city lord's mansion, felt like he wanted to die because he was just too busy.
The main problem is that there are too few people and too much work.
"Let's not announce it yet! Although the news of the city's establishment is encouraging, we don't have the capacity to provide relief if a large number of survivors gather towards us!" Fu Xiaojian said to Shao Bing.
At least we need to wait until the World Tree revitalizes the soil in the basin more before they can have enough soil to support more humans.
Otherwise, if the ecosystem were to suffer a sudden and severe blow, it's hard to say whether the World Tree could withstand it.
"There's one more thing. Yesterday's report mentioned convoy number 004, named Sky City! They said they want us to reveal the coordinates of Apollo and want to meet with us!" Shao Bing said.
These days, Fu Xiaojian has been busy with political affairs and hasn't had time to listen to the reports from other convoys.
However, the emergence of Team 004 is good news, even though Team 001 is practically defunct.