Chapter 48: Provocation

Seeing that what was inside the bucket was probably the laborers’ food, Chen Chong frowned.

This was the treatment the laborers received for working like slaves, toiling over ten hours a day for the Blood General.

In peaceful times, such stuff even pigs wouldn’t eat, yet now it was the food that over seventy percent of the laborers in the Territory depended on to survive.

The world was like this, and being cynical about it was pointless.

Chen Chong’s face remained expressionless as he walked another two or three hundred meters, arriving at a semi-open shed.

Inside the shed were over a dozen stone platforms that served as dining tables. At that moment, dozens of Territory underlings were already gathered around the stone platforms, eating hungrily with bowls or jars in hand, while many more underlings were hurrying over from all directions.

As Chen Chong passed through the crowd, he quickly observed that the underlings’ food was a greasy thick porridge and a palm-sized flatbread.

Though not particularly rich, it was undoubtedly much better than the laborers’ food he had seen earlier.

Chen Chong watched for a while and glanced around. He then saw the supervisor captain Yin Hu, the warehouse manager Gu Jun, and two other figures who he had not seen before but who also appeared to be Territory managers, walking in this direction with a group of underlings following behind them.

Chen Chong narrowed his eyes. After a moment of thought, he stepped forward to meet them, starting with a hollow greeting, “Captain Gu, Captain Hu, what a coincidence?”

“It’s you.”

Gu Jun and Yin Hu were both cold in expression and only gave a slight nod.

Chen Chong didn’t mind. He turned to look at the two tall, burly men beside them who faintly radiated a fierce and menacing aura, and asked, “These two are…?”

He had previously vaguely guessed that these two men were probably Territory squad-captain-level figures like Gu Jun and Yin Hu, and likely also Awakeners. Now that he was closer, he immediately confirmed his earlier suspicion.

“Kid, I know the General brought you here.”

Beside Yin Hu, a man with high cheekbones and triangular eyes stared at Chen Chong and laughed loudly, “But I don’t know you, so don’t try to get chummy with me!”

The crowd of underlings behind them immediately burst into mocking laughter.

The other Awakener, who had a gloomy temperament and remained unnamed, also coldly swept a glance over Chen Chong without answering. Then the four Awakeners walked straight past Chen Chong into the shed, while only their underlings made faces at the empty air one by one, as if mocking him.

Having met with a cold rebuff, Chen Chong showed no trace of anger or humiliation. He stared at the backs of these four people, silently calculating in his mind: “Tie Shan, Gu Jun, Yin Hu, and these two… As I currently know it, the Crimson Territory has at least five Awakeners… I wonder if they are all controlled by the Blood General’s Bloodline Gu?”

Chen Chong naturally had not come over just to get chummy. He shifted his gaze to the large number of underlings eating in the shed: “And these people cannot be ignored either.”

The Blood General was not only an immensely powerful Transcendent beyond ordinary comprehension. From what Chen Chong had seen in the Territory, there were at least nearly a hundred underlings equipped with homemade guns who had a certain degree of combat capability.

Although the effective range of these homemade guns was only about twenty to thirty meters, the power of the iron sand pellets at that distance was not much lower than standard firearms.

Even though Chen Chong now possessed the strength of a thousand jin, if he faced a coordinated siege and volley from these nearly one hundred guns, he would still be splattered with blood on the spot, without exception.

Furthermore, Chen Chong also knew that the chemical plant heavily guarded by the Blood General had the ability to produce homemade bombs!

Although Chen Chong had never personally witnessed the power of these homemade bombs, he knew perfectly well that flesh and blood could not withstand them.

Without these high-power explosives, relying solely on homemade firearms, the Blood General’s group clearly could not have rampaged across the danger-filled Wilderness.

“The Blood General probably doesn’t eat here, and Tie Shan is nowhere to be seen either.”

His thoughts drifting, Chen Chong noticed that Yin Hu and the others collected their food from a different place than the other underlings. He also walked into the shed, and imitating them, headed to the meal cart where Yin Hu’s group had collected their food: “I am Chen Chong. The General instructed that I have a squad-captain-level quota.”

The two underlings distributing food in front of the meal cart were about to curse when they saw this unfamiliar face, Chen Chong, but the word “General” immediately made them swallow the shouting that had risen to their throats.

They clearly also knew of the Blood General’s instructions, so they grudgingly took out food and handed it to Chen Chong.

Chen Chong took it. It was a meal considered sumptuous compared to what the other underlings ate: a large cup of vegetable porridge, a sizzling meat patty dripping with oil, and two steaming hot baked flatbreads. This was clearly the privilege of the squad captain level.

He casually glanced at the place where Yin Hu and the others were sitting. Chen Chong did not go over to them but instead randomly found a corner with fewer people and dug in hungrily.

…

Beside a stone platform dining table, Yin Hu, Gu Jun, and the other two Awakeners sat facing each other.

“That kid… didn’t even let out a fart just now. He doesn’t seem like much.”

The triangular-eyed man who had mocked Chen Chong earlier glanced at Chen Chong not far away and scornfully said, “This kid has zero merit, yet he’s freeloading off the General’s food. It’s really infuriating!”

“That just shows this kid knows how to endure, recognizing that you are not to be trifled with.”

Yin Hu smiled in a sarcastic, ambiguous way, provoking them lightly and seamlessly: “Li Bao, you and Zhang Long lead the Hunting Squad, braving death in the Wilderness. You work hard and suffer; naturally, you can’t stand such a useless parasite. But if the General treats him well, it must be because he has value. Why are you getting so worked up?”

These two were the captains of the Blood General’s Hunting Squad.

And their hunting targets were those non-poisonous Alien Species beasts in the Wilderness whose flesh and blood could be eaten. Most of the meat in the Territory was hunted down by these people who risked their lives.

And this job was extremely dangerous, requiring them to hunt equally ferocious Alien Species beasts in the inherently lethal Wilderness, so the mortality rate was extremely high. Without some extraordinary skills, one simply could not survive. Thus, Li Bao and Zhang Long, the two Hunting Squad captains, carried a lingering, bloody, murderous aura about them.

Zhang Long said coldly, “Everything we have now was won step-by-step, with our blood and sweat, following the General. Yin Hu, have you forgotten that?”

Before Yin Hu could speak, the triangular-eyed Li Bao curled his lip into an impatient smile: “I’d like to see if this kid can really endure so well!”

Then he raised his hand and beckoned over a few underlings eating not far away, whispering something into their ears, seemingly giving orders.

To the side, a barely perceptible look of anticipating a good show rose in Yin Hu’s eyes. But at that moment, Gu Jun, who had not spoken all along, raised his head with an indifferent expression: “Li Bao, don’t go looking for trouble.”

Li Bao dismissed his two underlings with a wave and chuckled: “Captain Gu, I’m not looking for trouble. I’m just helping the General conduct a small test. Even a vicious dog knows to guard its food. I just want to see if this kid has any bloodlust or guts, and whether he’s worthy of working for the General!”