"What's going on? I think I heard something."
Chu Fu, standing in the palm of the mecha, was filled with confusion.
She hadn't even shown her face!
How could someone call her name?
Shen Chi was controlling the mecha, and as a machine, it had some radar scanning functions.
He naturally saw those people.
They were fleeing in panic.
On the team voice chat, Shen Chi said,
"The mecha is too conspicuous; it was recognized by Wan Huanyu's studio. But apparently, my intimidation isn't enough—after seeing me, they yelled Plant Girl's name instead."
Xie Lin sneered. "Blackstone Village is Wan Huanyu's territory, so it makes sense they're here. Still, these cowards—they didn't even try to fight us and just ran off!"
Suture Saint thought it was normal. "They're all just workers trying to save their own characters. They can't beat us anyway. If they dared to come, Plant Girl would wipe them out with one move."
Jiao Jiao Bu Jiao chuckled.
"I've got an inside source in their studio. They just told me that Wan Huanyu doesn't dare fight us at all and has already adopted a policy of avoiding conflict!"
Chu Fu hadn't expected Wan Huanyu to be so spineless. Was it because she lacked protagonist luck?
He hadn't been stupid enough to attack her.
Back then, Wan Huanyu had gone out of his way to cause trouble for her brother.
But when it came to her, he was choosing to avoid battle.
Chu Fu had no idea.
What underhanded tactics Wan Huanyu might be using against her, making him hold back his studio from going all out.
"They're gone? Good. We're taking over this quest!"
The [Rescue Quest] offered generous experience points, plenty of game coins, and even reputation and hidden rewards.
To monopolize this quest, Wan Huanyu's studio had already cleared the area.
And since the location was far away, solo players didn't want to travel that far.
All the resources here had been claimed by Wan Huanyu's studio.
Now that they had fled, it all became Chu Fu's gain.
A massive beast tide of five million stretched as far as the eye could see, completely engulfing the village.
Above the village, flocks of crows and bats circled.
As Shen Chi approached, these birds, like sharks smelling blood, swooped down toward his mecha like a black cloud.
"Holy Light Judgment!"
Xie Lin found his chance to shine and unleashed a big move, blasting a hole through the area where the crows and bats gathered.
Shen Chi controlled the mecha, opening its palm to release Chu Fu and Suture Saint.
The evil Chu Fu was unleashed!
The ultimate weapon had arrived.
Chu Fu waved her staff, casting [Plague Spread]. A scarlet mist enveloped the monsters in the sky.
Within moments, the bird monsters screeched in agony and fell like rain.
As their bodies hit the ground, they swelled up like balloons and exploded, infecting all the monsters on the ground.
Not only that, as Chu Fu attacked, the poison bottle in her other hand began to absorb the released toxins in reverse, gathering them inside the bottle as if brewing some ultimate move.
Saving it up, she might feed it to some boss later.
In just ten minutes,
The gathered beast tide was completely cleared by the toxins, leaving equipment scattered all over the ground.
"It's just the few of us—how long will it take to pick all this up?"
Jiao Jiao Bu Jiao felt overwhelmed.
Shen Chi, however, revealed a slightly smug smile.
The top three contributors in the village defense and counterattack battles each received golden treasure chests, though the skill stones and talent stones diminished in number.
"My golden chest gave me something good."
He showed it off.
[Multifunctional Equipment Vacuum Collector (Golden Grade)
Special Item:
Feature 1: Automatically absorbs all drops within a 100-meter radius centered on itself.
Feature 2: Equipment is temporarily stored in the collector and can be dumped out all at once. Storage capacity: 100x100x100.]
A special item like this, similar to Chu Fu's [Spiritual Plant Pouch].
It had no stats,
But it was incredibly useful.
As soon as the vacuum collector activated, a gust of wind swept through, and the coins, materials, and equipment on the ground were all sucked in.
This made things so much easier—
No more picking up every single copper coin.
In total, they got 2 gold coins, a large number of white-tier equipment, over 100 black-iron pieces, 32 bronze pieces, and 4 silver pieces.
Chu Fu didn't need anything, so Shen Chi bought it all up. His mechanical crafting consumed a lot of equipment, and all his material sources came from the dismantling ability.
Chu Fu earned 3 gold coins.
Next came clearing the ruins of the village.
There were few corpses worth salvaging, and the hidden cellar where the children had been kept was clearly destroyed—no NPCs survived.
A flicker of disgust passed through Chu Fu's eyes. She suspected this was the work of evil-aligned players from Wan Huanyu's studio.
Fortunately, the bodies of the children hiding in the cellar hadn't been taken away.
Those evil-aligned players hadn't gone completely mad and eaten the children.
The bodies were intact.
Their time of death was no more than three days ago.
Suture Saint could still repair them.
After stitching up the wounds and channeling internal energy into them, the children hidden in the cellar gradually awoke.
"Ah! Mom! Wolves! A wolf wants to eat me!" one child cried out.
A "..." dialog box appeared above their head.
This was an interaction prompt.
"No wolf will eat you. We've driven the wolves away!"
Chu Fu comforted them.
The child sobbed, looked at the group, and then whispered, "Where's Mom?"
Chu Fu...
How was she supposed to answer that?
The village massacre had happened more than a day ago—58 hours by the count.
With a beast tide swarming the area—millions of beasts—how could Suture Saint, no matter how miraculous, piece together different people from incomplete remains into one whole?
So only these children survived; no one else made it.
The child seemed to understand something.
"Are you... Awakened Ones, sir?"
Chu Fu nodded.
"Then when I grow up, I want to be an Awakened One too!"
Chu Fu smiled and patted the child's head, feeling a pang of sadness in her heart.
NPCs could become Awakened Ones—after all, that was their life!
Because all NPCs were set programs created from souls that died during the game's invasion of reality.
Some souls had awakened, realizing they were in a game, and now served humanity.
They had their own duties, and as versions updated, they might join battles, or even die.
Chu Fu couldn't bear to imagine this child's fate.
"You can definitely do it!"
Chu Fu checked her backpack and pulled out a silver-tier staff.
The Malefic Staff was a silver chest reward when Chu Fu was level 4—by now it couldn't compare to the stats of a level 10 dungeon staff or field boss staff.
But its 20% poison damage amplification had kept her using it until now.
She had also kept a level 10 silver staff as a backup.
Now, she took out this staff and gave it to the little NPC.
