Chapter 155: From Heaven Fell a Sister Lin[1]
Translator: Pluto Editor: Vermillion
Dark clouds loomed over an endless horizon. There were only patches of a sort of ugly knee-height bushes a few kilometers around them, which rustled noisily in the wind. Most of the man-made infrastructures had already been destroyed by nature with a vengeance. The occasional rusty skeleton of what had once been a traffic light would evoke a vague feeling along the lines of "Oh, so there was a road here decades ago".
Lin Sanjiu and her companions surveyed their bare surroundings many times but were simply unable to find a place where the person that ambushed them could have hidden.
[Could he be lying flat in the bushes?] Lin Sanjiu thought to herself though it was a little hard to imagine that possibility.
Lin Sanjiu whispered to Xueqin, "Don't you have that—"
Though Lin Sanjiu spoke vaguely, Xueqin immediately understood what she meant.
She took out a packet of dry noodles and a small Swiss knife without any hesitation. Using the knife, she quickly cut the noodle in half and stuffed it back. Then, she swung her hand and multiple whip-like shadows flew out from her wrist with a whoosh and hit the bushes with smackings sounds. The noodles swept across the bushes violently and many plants were destroyed instantly. Leaves fluttered as all kinds of disgusting creatures crawled out from the bushes. But, there was no sign of any humans.
"No matter how many times I see you using your weird ability, I just can’t get used to it." Bai Xiaoke mumbled and called out an escort.
A muscular male escort appeared, wearing only a pair of beach shorts. He walked cautiously toward the iron railing.
"How’s your man-crazy ability any better?" Xueqin couldn’t help retorting while she continued to search through the bushes.
They seemed to have developed a fluent pattern of communication which involved both of them just bickering.
Xueqin swept through most of the bushes but there was no one in sight. Seeing her companions trying their best to help her, Hui Chuyan seemed even more worried. The women could see her opening and closing her mouth, as if speaking, but they couldn’t hear a single word from her.
"It seems like it even blocks off sound," Lin Sanjiu commented quietly. Her expression remained unchanged but she raised her voice so that it could be heard from a distance, "Who are you? What do you want from us? Why don’t you speak?"
Xueqin and Bai Xiaoke threw her a glance without thinking. They knew all along that Lin Sanjiu was someone that could stay calm during a crisis. However, this was the first time both women saw her with such a composed expression—no, composed wasn’t the right word to use here.
When Lin Sanjiu asked those questions, her voice sounded unexpectedly flat, as if she didn’t really find the situation that serious.
[If I have to describe… it feels like Lin Sanjiu is acting like a gamer—] Xueqin frowned and thought to herself.
"Don’t waste your time, you guys can’t find me!" A hoarse voice that sounded like a male duck quacking suddenly rang out and interrupted Xueqin’s train of thought. "You’ve trespassed on my boss’ terrority! Do you think you can just leave like that?"
[It is good that someone replied and that person doesn’t sound too hard to deal with—] Lin Sanjiu thought to herself. The women were relieved to hear an answer, at least for the time being.
Lin Sanjiu quickly regained her usual countenance and slightly smiled, "Tell me what you want, we’ll see." As she spoke, she walked two steps forward, seemingly unintentionally, and examined the iron railing trapping Hui Chuyan.
The Quacker[2] stopped—he seemed to be using some sort of method which made it impossible to find him from his voice; when he spoke, it was as if his voice was coming from all directions. He spoke again, "Easy. Leave all your food and go."
Even though Xueqin was carrying a hiking backpack with a lot of food, most of their food had been converted to cards and were with Lin Sanjiu. Even if they left behind the food in the backpack, it wasn’t a great loss for them.
Seeing Lin Sanjiu nodding to her, Xueqin threw her backpack angrily onto the ground before she shouted, holding back her anger, "Happy? Let our friend go now!"
The Quacker kept quiet as if considering something, leaving only the sound of the wind blowing. After some time, he questioned slowly, "You have four people, and you only have one bag? I told you to leave all your food here, and you guys agreed so easily? I think you people have some way to hide and store your things."
Indeed, people who could survive an apocalypse were not that simple-minded. Lin Sanjiu knew that she was a little careless this time, but she didn’t show it on her face. Instead, she replied naturally, "Any amount of food can’t compare with the safety of our companion. Let me offer you an advice. You better quit while you’re ahead. You can always find more food… But if you don’t let our friend go, don’t blame us for using force."
The Quacker didn’t speak, he was clearly contemplating what to do next. After all, he was against several opponents. No matter how great the allure of food was, he couldn’t help thinking about the risks.
Lin Sanjiu walked around the iron railing and even tried to touch Hui Chuyan from behind. However, even though there seemed to be nothing behind the girl, Lin Sanjiu couldn’t reach her no matter how far she stretched her arms, she couldn’t even touch a corner of her clothes.
It felt as if Hui Chuyan was trapped in a sort of isolated space. The iron railing was merely a part of the person’s ability and not something ‘real’ because Lin Sanjiu couldn’t convert it into a card and couldn’t use her [Mosaic Censorship] to blast it apart either. When she was at her wits’ end, the Quacker suddenly spoke with clenched teeth, "I’m not being greedy! But that little bit of food is not sufficient for us. Just hand me… hand me one month worth of food. I’ll let her go!"
[That isn’t going to happen.] Lin Sanjiu thought.
"Think of a way to distract him, I will try to look for him." Lin Sanjiu whispered while she edged towards the two women.
Bai Xiaoke immediately had an idea once she heard what Lin Sanjiu said. She made a realistic-looking worried expression, "Hey bro… our food is with that girl. If you don’t let her go, we will have nothing to eat, and neither will you."
Xueqin quickly added, "That’s right! That’s why we need her back no matter what! Right?"
Xueqin’s explanation seemed more plausible to the Quacker than Lin Sanjiu’s ‘friendship’ talk. He was momentarily stumped, he could neither believe them nor ignore what they said.
"How would I know if you're telling me the truth?" the Quacker asked cautiously with a sort of girlish precaution.
When Xueqin and Bai Xiaoke heard him, they continued trying to convince him for some time. Meanwhile, Lin Sanjiu was making a gesture with her hand silently.
"Try to talk to him a little longer." Lin Sanjiu urged very softly
Words appeared on the white card she hid in hand: "This ability has not reached the next level. This is the maximum level of details that will be provided." She was holding her diary card.
Sometimes when her diary card recorded something, it would add some small details. For example, the super cute girl looks very happy; Chen Jinfeng schemes at his desk; every time Gong Daoyi speaks, the girls blush. The number of details was limited by Lin Sanjiu level, thus these minute details were not provided all the time.
However, Lin Sanjiu deduced something interesting about her ability: her diary card only reported facts, thus it's not affected by forms of deception.
This time, the words wrote: "A coarse male voice rang out from above."
[So, that’s why we couldn’t find him...]
"So, I have to fly now?" Lin Sanjiu cursed quietly, "First a dog, now a bird? F*ck."
The other two women heard her mumbling and got closer to her. To the Quacker, it was like the three women were discussing something. He didn’t think there was anything about that, so he just waited while he thought about the situation.
[I should have asked more people to come along—] Just when that thought flashed in his mind, the women below suddenly spoke. He immediately perked his ears to listen, but he had to reply awkwardly, "What do you say? I didn’t hear you clearly. Can you speak a little louder?"
"We said…" Bai Xiaoke dragged every single word. While she spoke, Lin Sanjiu quickly climbed up the escort’s shoulder. The escort half-squat and Xueqin climbed up from his knees. Luckily, both women were quite slim and the escort was strong enough, so he managed to support the two women.
"Your…. request…"Bai Xiaoke was speaking in an infuriatingly slow manner.
"Are you ready?" Lin Sanjiu asked. Xueqin nodded hastily and carefully stood on the escort’s shoulder. Once she was on the escort’s shoulder, Lin Sanjiu held her ankles.
Lin Sanjiu didn’t know if it was a misperception, but she felt that she had grown stronger recently. This was immediately proven the next second.
Lin Sanjiu threw Xueqin into the sky flinging her by her legs. Xueqin flew upwards like a missile. She opened her arms and multiple whip-like shadows swept past, covering a large portion of the sky.
[Is that high enough?] Lin Sanjiu looked upward but she did not really feel that worried. She didn’t really feel that unsure about it.
Xueqin shouldn’t be able to reach the clouds but she actually managed to hit a piece of cloud. As she fell from the sky, the cloud also fell with a terrified "ahhhhhhhhhh" scream. The cloud fell to the ground with a plop.
Without Lin Sanjiu’s instruction, the escort shot toward the large piece of cloud and pressed it down on the ground. The three women walked over to take a closer look. The piece of cloud gradually lost its shape and changed into a translucent raincoat.
A teenager was wrapped in the translucent raincoat. He was at most 18 or 19 and was struggling against the escort’s grasp like a fish out of water. When he saw the three women gathering around him, he finally gave a resigned sigh, "Okay. Alright. I will let her go… don’t hurt me."
Lin Sanjiu had other plans. "Didn’t you say you had a boss? Who?" She frowned and questioned the teenager. Her calm demeanor had disappeared without a trace.
The teenage boy huffed two breaths before he answered reluctantly, "The few square kilometer around here all belong to my boss, Yo Daddy! Let me warn you! He thinks highly of me so you guys better let me go ASAP!"