When Tina spoke of the title hunter, her eyes were filled with admiration and longing.
Legend has it that title hunters are powerful enough to be given extremely high preferential treatment and equal status by the company. They can even serve as high-ranking officials in the company, such as ministers or senior managers.
Title Hunter... Li Xia silently memorized this information.
He had only been in this world for a short while and hadn't even fought anyone yet, so he had no idea about the nature of this world or the strength of its powerful inhabitants.
But if what Tina said is true, the title hunter's strength must be considerable.
After walking for a while along the muddy and excrement-strewn road, they would occasionally be met with malicious glances from behind shacks and in dark corners.
But perhaps Li Xia's aura was too strong. Because he appeared too calm and casual, the owners of those gazes considered it for a while and ultimately decided not to take action.
"After a few more turns, that's where Grandpa lives!"
Tina's tone was filled with undisguised joy, but her words surprised Li Xia and the three little ones:
"grandfather?"
"Yes, Grandpa lives there. He used to be a Level 3 Hunter!"
Later, after saving up some money, I rented a house on Liuhui Street.
I enrolled my dad in tutoring classes, which is how he got into the company. I also had a gene injection once, which my grandfather bought.
Have you received a gene injection once?
No wonder it has such an abnormally high food absorption and conversion rate; it seems this must be the effect of gene injection enhancement.
"Then why don't you live with your grandfather on Flowing Ash Street?"
Aowu asked in confusion, "If we bring him over too, won't someone take care of you?"
A level three hunter should be pretty strong, right?
Tina's face fell again, and she shook her head:
"No... Grandpa lost a leg in the wilderness before, so he stopped taking risks."
Later, in order to save money for my gene serum, he went to the suburbs to collect rusty fragments, but his arm was corroded by the decay liquid.
Moreover... Grandpa has been contaminated, and Flowing Ash Street won't let contaminated people in.
The company won't hire people who have been contaminated...
I miss my grandfather so much, but he won't let me go back to see him. He said we must live well in Liuhui Street...
By the end, Tina's voice was choked with emotion.
Li Xia was silent for a while, and he finally understood why Tina and her mother insisted on living on Liuhui Street, even though they had to do everything they could.
Because as long as you live there, you are at least still living in a normal society, instead of rotting in the mud in the back alley.
"We're almost there. That's the shack where Grandpa lives. He repairs shoes for other hunters and says life here is alright!"
Tina wiped her eyes haphazardly with the back of her hand, and her voice became cheerful again.
Unable to contain her joy any longer, she hopped and skipped through the mud like a nimble little rabbit, running forward on the slightly drier patches.
Li Ce watched as she stopped at the doorway of a shed, peering through the low doorway:
"Grandpa! Grandpa! I—"
Her voice suddenly stopped, and she stood there, stunned.
Li Xia stepped forward and saw a piece of something resembling plastic sheeting spread out inside the dark shed.
All sorts of garbage were piled up around it, emitting a foul stench.
In the center of the shed lay another person covered in pustules. His eyes, smeared with secretions and bloodshot, stared at Tina with greed and desire, while a strange, unintelligible laugh escaped his throat.
But when he saw Li Xia's rosy complexion and smooth skin, his greed and desire turned into hesitation, and finally into a lazy, indifferent gaze.
In the minds of these refugees, those with such physiques are either company employees or hunters of considerable skill; only they can afford to eat their fill and have a healthy body.
Neither of them was someone a lowly vagrant like him could afford to offend.
"Where are the people who originally lived there?" Li Xia asked calmly.
The man glanced at him, scratched the pustule, and yellow pus mixed with blood flowed down, dripping onto the plastic sheet beneath him.
"You mean that old cripple?"
It died and rotted in the ditch in front.
The person from Qingrang Biotechnology was two days late in distributing the synthetic nutrient paste.
The free medical consultation from Superdimensional Medicine never came, and the old man starved to death; his body was even carried away by the scavengers.
He yawned: "This shack is mine now."
Li Xia and the three little ones looked towards the doorway, where Tina suddenly seemed to have lost all her vitality, standing like a statue.
He was wooden, blank, and expressionless, his face turning deathly pale.
Suddenly, large tears slid down her empty eyes. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out.
It's like someone who has been abandoned by the whole world.
------------------
1. Monthly pass 2. Recommendation vote
Chapter 5 Wrath
On the way back, Tina was quiet and still, like a soulless puppet.
Even when Li Xia took her back to the little house and left her a meal, all she received was an empty thank you.
Li Xia shook his head, standing on the street corner of Liuhui Street, looking at the dim sun about to sink below the horizon. This is truly a messed-up world.
He threw off his tattered clothes and put on the luxurious clothes issued to him as a minister, then walked toward the alloy gate.
During this brief visit, he gathered a lot of information, and even had a rough guess about why the evaluation was lagging behind.
Tonight is destined to be a sleepless night.
.........
The office door slid open silently to the side. This technologically advanced and luxurious office presented a stark contrast to the back alleys and dusty streets we had seen before.
Li Xia finally understood why the room where he had an affair with his secretary Anna was furnished with solid wood furniture.
In this resource-scarce world, this type of solid wood furniture is quite expensive.
He first retrieved Silby's information, and the relevant entries immediately appeared on the smart computer:
Sylby, squad leader of the fourth patrol team on Flowing Ash Street.
He was responsible for the safety and order of a small section of Flowing Ash Street. His subordinate, Finn, died a year ago in an incident involving an alien invasion.
As is customary, the company provided a substantial compensation payment, demonstrating its relative generosity towards its employees.
This money is enough for Tina's family to live comfortably on Flowing Ash Street for decades, and even includes an allocation for a gene enhancer injection.
However, it is clear that this compensation was not distributed to Tina's family.
He closed the page and silently sentenced Silby to death in his mind.
He gained a lot today, and Tina also told him a lot of things, such as that in addition to hunters, there is another type of organization in the back alley area: gangs.
The gang practically controlled the entire back alley area, and the company disdained to touch that rotten junkyard. The power vacuum left behind after their withdrawal was filled by the gang.
They resold off supplies that had leaked from the company, colluded with those who maintained basic livelihoods, and gained de facto control by controlling the distribution of these essential supplies.
Within the territory controlled by each gang, they are the absolute rulers.
The gangs deliberately reduced the number of older, less useful people in the back alleys by delaying and cutting back on supplies and medical care.
Furthermore, they creatively pioneered the practice of exchanging childbirth for money; as long as the baby was born, it could be sold to a gang in exchange for a certain amount of money.
The gangs then sold these children to corporations, creating a shocking supply chain.
As for why the evaluation of Jianbi Defense has been declining recently, it is precisely because of the gangs' interference.
Businesses need back alleys to generate a constant stream of fresh talent, filtering and recruiting talent through the flow of dust and ash.
But for some reason, they are unwilling to be fully incorporated into the company's management. With their technical capabilities, supporting tens of millions of people should be a very easy task.
People living in the back alleys, due to their proximity to the suburbs and the protective shield, will suffer from mental pollution disease, and if they die, there is a small chance that they will turn into heteromorphic monsters.
Each time an isomer is created, it causes casualties in the back alley area, but the corporations don't have to do anything; the gangs and hunters handle it themselves.
This is why companies send SuperDimension Medical to provide diagnosis and treatment.
If too many people die too quickly in the back alley, isomers will be constantly generated, and one day they will draw an SSR, causing incalculable losses.
For example, the decline in the performance evaluation of Jianbi Defense during this period is because the character played by Li Xia is derelict in his duties, or rather, completely inactive, only caring about dating Annie in the room.
The gangs, however, were constantly cutting off the elderly, weak, sick, and disabled under their control, leading to frequent heterogeneous incidents.
Even if these isomers do not need to be eliminated by the company, the outbreak of isomers can still be monitored by the "Original Blood Chief".
This is...so strange!
Li Xia frowned. No matter how much he thought about it, the optimal solution should be for the company to take over the back alley and ensure everyone's basic livelihood. This was the way to stabilize the situation.
But they seem to turn a blind eye to the risks involved.
So what exactly is the leader of the Yuanxu sect thinking?
Just as he frowned, pondering the connection, a sharp alarm suddenly blared in the room, its cold system voice echoing throughout:
"Level 2 Warning: High-risk isomer detected in the Liuhui Street area!"
"Level 2 Warning: High-risk isomer detected in the Liuhui Street area!"
Li Xia suddenly stood up and strode towards the door. At that moment, red lights were flashing in the corridor, and people were constantly rushing out of the rooms.
High-risk isomers haven't appeared for a long time, let alone in Flowing Ash Street.
"What's the panic?"
Li Xia's gaze swept over the flustered members of the Special Operations Department in front of him, and he became increasingly aware of the department's incompetence.
He glanced at two of them who remained calm and were fully dressed, and nodded directly:
"You two, straighten out the ranks and bring them over."
The two men, who were merely squad leaders, were taken aback for a moment, then a surge of wild joy welled up in their eyes, and they stood at attention, their bodies ramrod straight.
"Yes! Your lord!"
The others were stunned, and two of the men who looked like managers had a drastic change in expression and were about to say something.
But when Li Xia's cold, emotionless gaze swept over them, their bodies couldn't help but tremble, as if a chill had seeped into their skulls.
Their hearts felt as if they were being squeezed tightly, and the murderous intent pierced their brows like needles.
The two of them stood there speechlessly, not daring to utter a word.
Li Xia withdrew his gaze, took to the air, flew out of the huge window, and rushed towards the location of Liuhui Street.
......................
At this moment, flames soared into the sky from Liuhui Street, and thick smoke spread through the night sky.
A group of security guards, their faces filled with terror, gripped their weapons and shouted hoarsely, "Everyone get out of here! Where are the Special Operations Department personnel? Why haven't they arrived yet?"
Their voices were filled with despair.
The surrounding area was littered with shattered limbs and remains, and thick blood plasma seemed to have been shaken into a blood mist by some high-frequency vibration, which drifted in the air.
Li Xia descended from the sky in front of them, her gorgeous, extravagant uniform billowing in the wind as she slowly drifted down.
"Your Excellency, Minister?!"
The guards standing around the edge of the fire suddenly froze, their faces instantly filled with astonishment replacing the despair on their faces.
They thought they would all perish here, but no one expected that Minister Dark Flame, who rarely showed his face, would suddenly appear.
The squad leader's knuckles turned white as he gripped the energy gun. He quickly stepped forward, about to report the casualties and the characteristics of the isomers, when Li Xia stopped him with a hand:
"Seal off all intersections around the perimeter, evacuate residents within half a kilometer, and prohibit anyone from stepping into the cordon."
The team members looked at each other, then breathed a sigh of relief as if they had been granted a pardon, and agreed in unison.
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