Chapter 43: Talking About Peace Again?

An advocate of peaceful coexistence…

When Chen Fengshi heard this, he wanted to spit!

Go fool a ghost!

The last Fungal Demon Main Body who said this created Liu Shuzhi and Sister Yao to deal with him, and this one just speaks such laughable nonsense? Or was it purely to stall for time?

Their stance on survival decided that there might be a period of peaceful coexistence, but when the balance of power was completely broken, the foundation of peace would no longer exist. Even if this Fungal Demon Main Body was sincere, other Fungal Demon Main Bodies would not all think the same way, especially when the power was severely unbalanced.

And peace right now would just be allowing the Fungal Demons to grow stronger, so how was that any different from self-destruction?

However, Chen Fengshi pretended to be very interested.

“Before today, I didn’t feel any sincerity from you. We have been watching this place for a long time. Did you think that ladder could get you out of danger?” Chen Fengshi sneered with a feigned seriousness to trick her: “You should be glad you didn’t try to escape just now, otherwise, you would have died sooner than now! We rushed here today not only relying on the power you saw, but also because—our long-range sniper weapons designed against you have been successful.”

Little An listened in silence. She really admired Chen Fengshi’s trick. Whether it was true or false, it meant the Fungal Demon Main Body did not have enough evidence to make a definite conclusion. It might be nonsense, or it might be true, so what could she use to confirm it?

“Oh?” In the voice of the woman with short wine-red hair, there was no abnormal emotional fluctuation. She controlled herself very well. Such a performance made it impossible to know her attitude towards this.

“So, now I am giving you a chance to express your thoughts. After you finish stating your proposition, whether you die or receive some other treatment is up to me!” Chen Fengshi sat up straight, and his tone deliberately sounded arrogant and overbearing, to strengthen the possibility of the existence of a non-existent restraining long-range weapon.

There was a kind of confrontation called bluffing. As long as the enemy did not dare to deny it on the spot, they would choose to hold back, and if they held back, the bluff would have achieved its goal.

“The foundation of peace should be mutual respect. In fact, although your power restrains us, the highest social form on Earth, human society, determines that we can easily grasp the general trend. Once we grasp the trend, we will be invincible.” The woman’s tone was very confident, but this was also the truth.

In contrast, the biggest crisis for the possessors of the Power of Life was their inability to grasp this trend. Just like the situation Little An had explained to him, they had no way to prove the existence of the Fungal Demons to the world, nor did they have the ability to easily grasp all the links in the social structure like the Fungal Demons.

The surrounding walls suddenly popped up alloy plates one after another, and behind them were movable gun muzzles. Red light dots covered Chen Fengshi’s whole body.

Little An was secretly startled. She was afraid of this, and it really was like this.

However, Little An’s expression did not show any fear at all. Instead, she calmly continued to stand where she was, seeming not to care at all about some red light dots that moved to her feet, her legs, and finally randomly shifted around her face and chest.

The corners of the woman’s mouth with short wine-red hair raised in a cold smile, and her eyes revealed killing intent. “Just like now, I could easily kill you, but I am willing to talk to you for the idea of peaceful coexistence.”

“I said, the dominance is not in your hands. Do you think these little tricks of yours are so new? These guns want to kill me? Without 3,721 bullets, it is far from enough to seriously drain my power. Even if you have that many bullets and they all hit, my power to eliminate you would be much faster than that; the ten weapons on standby outside to kill you would be even faster!” Chen Fengshi pretended to be calm and talked nonsense. Since he decided to bluff, he would bluff to the end.

No matter what plans this Fungal Demon Main Body had, one thing was basically certain: she was fearful of the power he and Little An had displayed. Yes, Little An made it impossible for her to control so many Parasites, and Chen Fengshi’s unbelievable power index shocked her just as much.

They needed an opportunity, an opportunity to capture this woman in one fell swoop, and for this, they had to find a way to shorten the distance between them.

“Three thousand seven hundred and twenty-one?” The woman smiled and said in disbelief: “The four who went down just now, even if they didn’t hit the head or the weak spots of the body, it wouldn’t take a tenth of the bullets to kill them.”

This, Chen Fengshi really wanted to believe. Given the muscle thickness of those four muscle men, he really felt bullets couldn’t go in very deep. Not hitting the vital points meant it would only injure the muscles, so of course they wouldn’t be so easy to shoot dead.

“Guys like them? Hmph, I could beat up a dozen of them in less than a minute.” Chen Fengshi said, pointing at the two Protoplasts floating in Little An’s palms. “Do you think the muscle men these two made back then were fewer than yours? The world is all food for you, but to us, you are food too!”

After Chen Fengshi finished speaking, he slowly stood up. He felt that if he didn’t think of some way, just relying on words wouldn’t be intimidating enough.

He stood up straight. Under the suspicious gaze of the Fungal Demon Main Body, he suddenly gathered all his strength, raised his leg, and stomped hard on the ground!

In an instant, the entire room shook violently. Then, the connections of those guns on the walls snapped one after another, and a large circle of them clattered down. Some that didn’t fall were only barely connected, hanging there, completely unable to adjust their angles and aim at targets under control anymore.

Only the four guns in the four corners were firmly installed, or perhaps they were less affected by the shock. Although there were some broken parts, they looked like they could still be used.

Chen Fengshi did not stomp again. One strike was to establish his dominance. If he was too eager to shake off all the guns, it would make him look fearful and guilty. He slowly sat down, pretended to be impatient, and slapped the coffee table with one palm, directly leaving a neat palm print on it. “I’ll give you three minutes to state your proposition.”

Little An listened in silence as Chen Fengshi boasted to the skies. Besides sighing in her heart time and time again that ‘a person could actually be so shameless’, she could only say that relying on the two Fungal Demon Protoplasts she held up, it was indeed very convincing.

How could the woman with short wine-red hair know how these two Fungal Demon Main Bodies were killed? She would easily believe they were two of the same kind with a similar situation to hers. By this logic, it was easy to believe Chen Fengshi’s sky-high boasting.

Coupled with that domineering conclusion that treated the Fungal Demons as food, and finally using the power of a stomp that shocked even her to shake down so many threatening weapons, the deterrent power of this boasting was enough.

“Peaceful communication was originally my position.” The woman with short wine-red hair maintained her composure and smiled. She did not continue the previous topic. After all, she was scared by Chen Fengshi.

She took a notebook from the table beside her and opened it. On the screen, a series of very short video clips began to play.

At first, it was bits and pieces of the daily lives of various unfamiliar people. Little An glanced at it from time to time, but paid more attention to the spiral staircase coming up. Her phone also maintained communication with Canyue, but over there, Canyue was frustrated because there was no equipment near Hongye, and could only describe the scene of people surging like a tide towards Hongye on the streets and roads visible from the outside.

Suddenly, the people in those short videos attracted Little An!

Face after face being tied up and sent into cars heading to psychiatric hospitals; photo after photo of wanted posters; person after person being hunted down in various situations, even with corpses lying around them, yet shouting words like ‘It wasn’t me, it was something strange, something strange’.

“Is this your peace?” Little An suddenly erupted. Under the motorcycle helmet, her teeth were clenched tightly, wishing she could rush over and beat up the woman parasitized by the Fungal Demon Main Body!

She knew all these people; they were all from the Xuancheng Mutual Aid Association. Those who possessed strong combat power were often framed as extremely vicious criminals and were eventually shot dead; some who possessed auxiliary Power of Life, some babbled nonsense due to fear and panic, and were thus sent to psychiatric hospitals…

Among them were some she had met when her Power of Life had just awakened, partners she had a very good relationship with!

The woman put down her wine glass. There was no smile on her face, and her expression looked very serious and earnest. It seemed that this Fungal Demon Main Body was very clear about the meaning of human emotional expressions.

“Our way of survival is just to obtain a little bit of energy from the bodies of many creatures. We are never willing to hurt the creatures that provide us with energy, nor do we interfere with their thoughts and behaviors. We are just like the many fungi in the human body, relying on humans as our main channel to obtain energy. We only borrow the bodies of Parasites when we face a survival crisis. And this survival crisis originates from you! So—our peaceful coexistence is the best way to avoid unnecessary harm.”

It sounded… very reasonable…

Little An really wanted to slap her in the face, but she held back. She was not that reckless, especially not right now. Chen Fengshi could brag and say he didn’t care about the four guns in the room aimed at them, but bragging couldn’t give him nine lives.

Chen Fengshi didn’t care about this speech at all. It was just nonsense. The stance on survival determined that this kind of thinking was just an illusion.

However, he pretended to consider it, because the current predicament needed to be resolved. They came to live, not to die together with this Fungal Demon Main Body, so the problem was: how to get out of the current dilemma?

He needed time to expel the Fungal Demon Main Body, and during that time, the four remaining guns in the room would probably be enough to shoot them dead several times over.

He had an idea to take a risk, but it was too risky, so unless it was absolutely necessary, he would not consider it.

“It sounds a bit interesting, but what will you use as sincerity?” Chen Fengshi pretended to be interested and threw out a difficult question, while actually racking his brains for a plan.

“Human society has various propositions, various emotions, thoughts, and doctrines. Among my kind, there are also cognitive differences. For us peaceful coexistence advocates, the fiercely warlike members of our kind are harmful factors, and they are also your biggest threat. Helping you eliminate them, how is this sincerity?” The woman with wine-red hair said her sincerity with great confidence.

Thus, both Chen Fengshi and Little An were secretly stunned.

At this moment, even Chen Fengshi couldn’t help but wonder, had they really met such a bizarre Fungal Demon Main Body?

Or perhaps, was their understanding of the Fungal Demon world too limited?

Or perhaps, was this a very cunning conspirator?

Chen Fengshi didn’t want to believe it, so he remained silent. Little An also remained silent. She was very shocked, and she was even more unwilling than Chen Fengshi to accept such a situation!

However, the woman with short wine-red hair immediately followed up with an even more shocking sincerity.