Life Dungeon Game

While working in the lab, Jess never lacked money. Although he donated most of it, he still kept a net worth of several million.

Hai Xi's bracelet vibrated, and then she looked up at He Ao in surprise, "Are all professors this rich? Oh no, I should have increased the price on the bill."

"That's too late."

He smiled; he knew Hai Xi was joking.

Judging from Hai Xi's surprised expression, she was probably prepared for He Ao not to pay her back after she paid the medical bills upfront.

"Is it already morning?"

He Ao sat up from the hospital bed, got out of bed, and slowly walked towards the door in his slippers.

"Your body's recovery ability is too strong after just one night! What kind of abnormal talent sequence do you have?"

Hai Xi looked at his actions in surprise, then stood up nervously, "Hey, don't open the door."

"Ok?"

He Ao, who was already standing at the door and touching the doorknob, was stunned and turned to look at Hai Xi.

As he turned around, he seemed to have triggered some mechanism, and the frosted glass around him instantly became transparent.

A city filled with filthy garbage came into Heo's view. "Where is this?"

"This is where I grew up."

Hai Xi stood up, her gleaming prosthetic eye looking out the window.

Chapter 552 The City's Cleaners (Mega Chapter, Requesting Monthly Tickets)

"Is this the Zarote neighborhood?"

He Ao turned around, walked back to the bedside, picked up the nutrient solution, and took a sip.

"Yes."

Hai Xi smiled, seemingly trying to dispel her earlier awkwardness. She calmly sat back down in her chair and nodded gently.

The Zarote neighborhood, a place almost every Vitlander knows, but the vast majority of Vitlanders never go there.

Located on the edge of the West End, this place is famous because it exists online in the form of some kind of 'ghost story'.

Zarote is a word that originated from the wilderness, and its exact meaning seems to be unclear, but in Witland, the Zarote neighborhood is also known as 'Garbage City'.

The people who live in this place also have another name: 'scavengers'.

The waste produced by the more than ten million people in Witland will be collected here. After processing, some of it will be transported out of the city for landfill, and some will be recycled and returned to the factories for production.

The Zarote neighborhood, like the city’s sewers, is part of the city’s ‘decomposition plant’.

But the scavengers living in the Zarote neighborhood are in a much worse state. They keep the city clean and tidy, but they themselves live in a dirty and smelly environment for generations.

"This is my first time here."

He looked out the window at the scene outside, where a dense array of small steel buildings stood against the sky.

Most of these small buildings have only a skeleton, with at least one side of what should be a wall completely exposed, leaving the interior completely exposed.

Adhering to the building's structural framework are some simple mechanical devices.

Small pulley systems continuously transport the sorted and compressed garbage from the ground to different floors. Then, people in tattered clothes stand on the floors and use small, seemingly rudimentary robotic arms to pile the garbage deep inside the floors.

This appears to be part of some kind of waste sorting and storage operation. Throughout the area, everyone works methodically and efficiently, much like a giant factory.

"how do you feel?"

Hai Xi, gazing at the view outside the window, suddenly asked softly.

She didn't give He Ao a detailed introduction to the place, but since He Ao could name the Zarote neighborhood, he probably knew something about it.

In Witland, very few people are unaware of the Zarote neighborhood.

Although most people understand it as a strange and bizarre tale.

"Feel,"

He Ao gazed calmly out the window, his eyes falling on the crude robotic arms that clearly posed safety hazards, and the thin, worn clothes of the operators. "They are working very hard, but they are not receiving reasonable compensation."

The situation in the Zarote neighborhood of Whitland, where an entire neighborhood is dedicated to handling garbage, is rare across the entire Federation.

In most cities, including Dawn City and Kaya City, there are specialized cleaning companies that handle garbage disposal and charge residents a cleaning fee.

Thinking about it this way, He Ao suddenly realized that Witland also had a cleaning company that charged for garbage collection, and

And the price is not cheap.

"That's a very fresh perspective; you're the first person I've ever heard say something like that to me."

Hearing He Ao's words, Hai Xi was stunned for a moment. She slowly stood up and walked to He Ao's side. "Is this how highly educated professors like you think about problems?"

“To be precise, it’s my way of thinking,” Heo shrugged. “Even professors think differently, right?”

He turned to look at Hayes, "I heard that the scavengers in the Zarot neighborhood don't have social security numbers?"

Jess's knowledge of the Zarote neighborhood was limited to fun educational videos online, but these videos did mention some key information, such as that the scavengers in the Zarote neighborhood did not have urban resident status or social security numbers.

"Yes,"

Hashi nodded gently. "The people in this neighborhood didn't live in the city a long time ago; they came from the wilderness."

"Whitland encroached on the territory of the scavengers' ancestors during a city expansion, and the core area of ​​that territory is the neighborhood we are standing on."

"The city government at the time allocated this neighborhood to homeless people who had lost their homes, but did not grant these homeless people the status of city residents."

The information that Hai Xi mentioned is information that is basically not available online.

“It seems that Mayor Whitland at the time did not want these wilderness wanderers to stay in the city,” Heo gazed out the window, “so he wanted to force them to leave in this way.”

Heo had once been a wilderness wanderer and knew very well what it would be like to be in a fortress city without a social security number and a formal federal identity: unable to find a formal job, unable to open a bank account, and unable to rent a house normally.

Unable to support themselves or survive in the city, these homeless people are naturally driven back to the wilderness.

He Xi glanced at He Ao in surprise. She hadn't expected He Ao to figure out the key to the problem so quickly. Many people born in the city and naturally possessing legal federal status cannot understand what losing federal status means.

They provided living areas for the homeless people who remained in the Zarote neighborhood at the time, but did not grant them legal status, which was essentially a disguised form of expulsion from these homeless people.

Mayor Whitland at the time wanted both fame and the desire to keep these homeless people in the city, which would increase his administrative risks.

They want both substance and appearance.

"The mayor's plan was half successful,"

Hai Xi walked to a white cabinet, opened it, and a set of men's clothing hanging inside was revealed.

“Some of the homeless people couldn’t stand the restricted life in the city and returned to the wilderness because they couldn’t find a way to make a living. The rest of them survived by processing urban garbage and gradually formed the current ‘scavengers’.”

Hai Xi took the clothes out of the closet and handed them to He Ao. "Your old clothes were all torn to shreds. I bought you a new set of clothes based on the general style of that outfit. Consider this a free gift from our transaction, so you don't need to pay for it."

"sorry to bother you."

He Ao took the outfit and glanced at it briefly. It was almost identical to what Jess had worn before.

That outfit is exactly the same.

Jess's clothes are mostly brand-name items, but they are not entirely rare custom-made clothing. If you look for the style by the brand, it is still easy to find them.

However, identifying the brand of the clothes from He Ao's pile of tattered garments, finding the corresponding styles, and then purchasing them was quite a laborious task.

“No trouble at all,” Hai Xi shrugged. “I had my men do it; it was just a matter of a word.”

"Looks like I was moved for nothing."

He Ao smiled.

He held the clothes up to his eyes and confirmed that the size was indeed his. Hai Xi had previously made suits for him and knew his size.

“Oh, right,” Hai Xi took out a silver mechanical mask from the wardrobe, “This is a small air purification mask. You were just injured, and the air outside might not be very good. You can put on the mask before you come out.”

After saying that, she turned around and opened the door. "Your dagger is in the bedside table. I'll wait for you outside."

She knew very well that He Ao wanted to leave the room, and it was only because she called out to him that He Ao hadn't opened the door and left immediately.

He Ao glanced at the clothes in his hand, shook his head and smiled.

Because of his promotion, his injuries have almost healed, so he now wants to see Thorne.

As one of the key figures who orchestrated Jayce's tragic fate, Thorne must have known many crucial clues about Jayce and the Mystic.

Last night, after figuring out that the group of mercenaries lurking in the mall were likely the same mercenaries protecting Thorne and ambushing 'Jace', Heo confirmed Thorne's location.

For those mercenaries, killing Heo was a higher priority than capturing Hayes.

They could not possibly abandon Thorne to do the mission, because if Thorne was captured by Heo while they were besieging Hayes, it would be as if all their efforts had been in vain.

Therefore, they would definitely keep Thorne by their side, next to the main force, in preparation for any possible attack by Heo.

So Thorne was in the shopping mall in Haixi at the time, surrounded by a group of mercenaries who were preparing to capture Haixi.

After understanding all this, He Ao also figured out the information gap between himself and these mercenaries at that time.

These mercenaries knew that there was a C-level expert beside Haixi, but they didn't know that it was Heo. However, Heo already knew that they were the ones protecting Thorne.

Based on this, Heo could create an 'unexpected encounter' so that the mercenaries who were originally waiting for Hayes would meet a more important target, 'Jes'.

After Heo appeared, Thorne lost his value, and because the encounter was sudden, the mercenaries did not have time to set up backup plans to protect Thorne.

The strength He Ao displayed when he wiped out the first elite mercenary squad the night before last was enough to make this group of mercenaries wary.

Therefore, they will most likely mobilize all their forces, leaving only a few soldiers to protect Thorne, or even leaving none behind and going straight to hunt down Heo.

As Ho had predicted, the entire mercenary force came after him, leaving Thorne completely unprotected.

Of course, Thorne wasn't stupid; once he realized he was unprotected, he would definitely act decisively.

Having lost his escape route, He Ao, who was entangled with mercenaries, had no time to launch a counterattack.

So Heo took the opportunity to ask Hai Xi to help him capture Thorne and come to pick him up at the last moment.

Hai Xi herself possesses C-rank strength and knows Thorne well, so capturing Thorne, who has no one to protect him, would be no problem for her.

Furthermore, if the mysterious figure sends additional C-level support at the last moment, Heo is confident that he can escape unscathed with Hai Xi's help.

Although last night was thrilling, everything was actually under He Ao's control.