Volume 4, Chapter 4 – Gathering Intelligence

“An abandoned town to the east. Obviously not a great assignment.”

In the car, Anna could not help complaining.

“No help for it. The other squads all agreed on it,” Feilian said in a low voice. Because they were not strong enough, they had no say. In the end, that was still the core issue.

Of the four directions, the east faced directly toward Twinmoon City. Its danger level was definitely higher than the others. There was no way Morningstar would leave it undefended.

Since they were going to gather intelligence, they also had to hide their identities as much as possible and avoid exposure.

“The other squad has already set out. We should go too.”

Feilian sighed and glanced at the windblown sand outside the window.

No matter what, they still had to do their best with the mission they had been assigned.

The team traveling the same route as them was the one from the Security Department, not Zheng Han’s squad. They had only arrived right before the operational meeting was about to begin.

The two sides were completely unfamiliar with each other.

They drove toward the abandoned town.

This time, Feilian did not drive fast, doing his best to reduce the dust kicked up by the off-road vehicle as it moved.

Meanwhile, Anran closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep.

In reality, she was reviewing the newly received [Faction Sub-Missions].

This series of missions was all listed under the details page of the earlier faction mission [Confrontation!].

[Intelligence Gathering]: Gather information on Morningstar’s Far East Branch. Reward: 3,000 Free EXP.

[Infiltration]: Successfully infiltrate Morningstar’s Far East Branch stronghold. Reward: 10,000 Free EXP, Targeted Random Chest [Green].

[Theft]: Successfully steal Morningstar’s Far East Branch materials regarding the Canyon Continent Branch. Reward: 20,000 Free EXP, Targeted Random Chest [Blue].

[Hunt]:

1. Kill 10 Morningstar soldiers. Reward: 5,000 Free EXP.
2. Kill 50 Morningstar soldiers. Reward: 25,000 Free EXP, Enhanced Recovery Set [Blue].

III. Kill 100 Morningstar soldiers. Reward: 50,000 Free EXP, Elite Coefficient Bonus.

[Duel]:

1. Kill Zhong Liang. Variable reward: 1,000–10,000 EXP.
2. Kill Lunqin. Variable reward: 2,000–20,000 Free EXP, Jetpack [Blue].

III. Kill Heloise. Variable reward: 15,000–150,000 Free EXP, a chance to obtain a Gene Enhancement Drug [Purple] of similar effect, etc.

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The rewards were so rich that Anran was practically drooling.

But the difficulty of some of the missions also made her shrink back.

For example, killing a hundred people. In the middle of total chaos, she was supposed to get a hundred kills? She would be lucky if she did not get shot dead by stray bullets first.

Or killing Heloise. The top reward was 150,000 EXP, and there was even a chance of getting a purple-quality Gene Enhancement Drug. Most ridiculous of all, the line even ended with an “etc.”

Emmm…

But if Sandi already counted as an elite monster, then no matter how you looked at it, Heloise had to be at least a mini-boss.

She could not beat that.

Anran: “I’ll just look at it. I’m not touching it.”

The player interface really was amazing. While the other NPCs were worrying about whether Morningstar’s stronghold was here, how strong the enemy was, and whether there was any intelligence on the Canyon Continent here, Anran had already pieced together most of it from the missions.

But she could not conveniently say any of it aloud. There was no way to explain where the information had come from.

…

“We walk from here.”

Feilian parked the vehicle in a relatively concealed spot.

Judging by the map, the abandoned town was still three to four kilometers away from here, but that distance meant nothing to them.

Driving any farther would make them far too obvious.

Anran wore her backpack, had a microphone clipped to her collar, and a radio clipped at her waist.

For this mission, everyone carried a radio and could make contact at any time.

“We can’t move together. That’d make the target too big,” Feilian said.

“Exactly.” Chu Yuan nodded in strong agreement.

“In that case, Feilian, you go with Anna,” Anran suggested.

“Uh…”

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Daogu immediately said, “I agree. One melee fighter and one ranged fighter, that combination makes perfect sense. I’ll go with Chu Yuan.”

“Then what about Anran?”

That was right. Because Li Zhuying was not here, the squad only had five people.

“I’ll move alone. For now, we’re only gathering intelligence anyway. As long as the groups don’t get too far apart, it’ll be fine. If we really run into danger, with my speed I can escape easily enough,” Anran said after thinking it over.

Their main purpose was still gathering intelligence, not going head-on against Morningstar. Otherwise, with so few people, it was hard to say how much of a threat they could pose anyway.

Once the team split up, Anran walked out across the wasteland. Before long, her body was covered in fine dust.

Together with her travel-worn appearance and that equally battered old backpack, she really did look like a refugee trying to survive in the wilderness.

But the only thing that still looked strange, in truth, was her appearance.

For an ordinary person who looked like her, it was hard to imagine she could move smoothly through the wasteland.

Rustle.

The grass beside her suddenly shook, and Anran immediately alertly put a hand to her waist.

Then she saw a four-legged animal walk out.

It looked fairly large, a little like a dog, with sharp teeth bared and drool constantly dripping from its mouth.

It was just very skinny.

Life in the wasteland really is hard.

Anran sighed inwardly.

Then, with a swift flick of her right hand, the savage beast lunging at her instantly sent out a spray of blood and crashed heavily to the ground, already dead.

The game prompt informed her that she had gained 50 Free EXP.

“Emmm…”

Resting one hand against her chin, Anran thought for a moment, then smeared some of the blood over herself.

Useful or not, disguising herself first came before anything else.

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Then she continued forward.

Three or four kilometers was not far, but it was incredibly monotonous.

Feilian: “Didn’t see anyone on the way, but there are tire tracks.”

Daogu: “There’s wind and sand here from time to time, and the tracks still haven’t been covered. Looks like they were left not long ago.”

“Ding An, did your side find anything?” Feilian asked.

Ding An was the captain of the other squad from the Security Department.

A man in his thirties.

He looked sharp and capable.

“Nothing for the moment.”

Even through the radio, they could hear the sound of shoes crunching over gravel.

And the mournful whistling of the wind.

The other side had no intention of sharing any intelligence.

Anran ended the radio call and focused on what lay ahead.

That was a whole carload of missions.

From personal missions to team missions, to those that had to be personally completed and those that only required participation to earn rewards.

It was too rich.

Anran kept walking.

Then suddenly she heard a soft woo-woo sound behind her.

She immediately darted down beside a slope, then turned her head to look.

A vehicle had come into view.

A car?

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Could this be the one Feilian had mentioned over the radio?

Judging by the direction it was heading, it was going toward the abandoned town.

Were they Morningstar people or not?

Anran fell into hesitation.

She was considering whether to just kill everyone in the vehicle outright.

Just then, the slow-moving vehicle suddenly stopped.

The place where they had stopped…

Anran was startled. That seemed to be the exact spot where she had just killed that vicious animal.

She had only roughly covered up the corpse. Had they noticed it?

Anran quietly crept closer.

With her height, if she deliberately made use of cover, the other side really would have a hard time spotting her.

So being tall had its advantages, but being short was not actually so bad either.

As long as you had stat points, body size was not that much of a limitation.

Three people got out of the car.

Two men and one woman.

One of them crouched down. “So it is blood.”

“For all we know, it’s just some wild beasts that got into another fight,” one of the others said impatiently.

“We’d better take a look anyway. We’re about to withdraw. We can’t let anything go wrong at the critical moment,” the woman said.

“Check it out. We absolutely can’t allow any mistakes.”

After saying that, he started digging into the dirt.