Chapter 28: Chi Zhouhu

Long after Chen Yining and the others had left the hallway, the door next to theirs opened with a small click.

The landlord stepped out, carrying a bucket of water and a mop.

He sprinkled some bleach and water on the floor before mopping the dirt off the floor.

After that, he returned to his house and locked his door.

***

Meanwhile, Chen Yining and the others were on their way back. Even though the five corpses had been wrapped with thick plastic fabrics, there was no helping that some odor was left lingering inside the car.

He therefore opened the car window to let some cool breeze in, which came whistling in as it blew away the unbearable smell inside.

On the other hand, Chen Jing was a little drowsy, and was leaning on the window of the passenger’s seat groggily.

One of his gnomes were sitting side-by-side with Green Skin at the backseat—a picture of friendship of harmony.

However, the gnome felt utterly uncomfortable, and kept shifting its little rump away from Green Skin.

It certain did not expect Green Skin to slither an arm over its shoulder and pull it close.

Caught off guard, the gnome slammed into Green Skin’s chest.

It could not help shooting Green Skin a look of grief. “Can’t you be gentler?”

Its words fell on deaf ears, however, since Green Skin listened to no one aside from Chen Yining.

Still, it soon became interested in the interior of the car, and would touch various objects or stare, leaving the gnome alone.

Just outside, moonlight shone upon the highway like water.

Rarely were the lights on in any of the tall buildings on both sides of the road.

Right now, almost household was reluctant to use their candles or torchlights.

They were learning—one candle unused was one candle saved, and most citizens were reserving their remaining resources.

Soon, they returned the car to the underground carpark, alighting and locking it.

They were just one floor below the first floor, but the underground carpark appeared eerily silent.

“Could there be ghosts?” Chen Jing chuckled in an attempt to clear the air.

Chen Yining remained impassive as he looked around—he had maintained that expression ever since he killed those thugs, whereas Chen Jing had been acting carefree through it all, as if he was unaffected.

In the end, they all returned to their place on the fourth floor uneventfully. They were perhaps imagining things.

Chen Yining returned the car key to the landlord then and thanked him again.

The landlord, on the other hand, appeared to have something to say but ultimately stopped himself.

The brothers then returned to their rented house and lay on the couch.

“I don’t think it’s safe if we keep the food in this house, Brother.”

“Where do you think we should keep it, then?”

Chen Jing frowned in thought, and eventually suggested hesitantly, “… Next door?”

After all, he had thought for a long while, but realized that no place was really safe wherever they keep the food.

There were too many magical beasts prowling near the suburbs if they tried to store their food there, and heaven knows if those creatures had some special ability that helped them track down food.

Likewise, their recent bloody experience was a precedent against keeping their food in their own rented house—against the skilled, a sturdy door was basically nothing.

Moreover, the landlord had the keys to this house as well, and it was ultimately not theirs…

It would also be difficult to rent a new place for the time being, since they had so much food that it would take up to eight rounds to move everything.

Despite all those conditions, however, moving their food to the next house was a good choice.

“We’ll shift half of our food over there—never put all your eggs in one basket,” Chen Yining said.

They hence went to work. It took quite a while for them to shift half their food to the storeroom of the next house, covering them with some random objects.

After they stepped out, Chen Yining was suddenly looking down at the cleaned floor of the hallway. There were tiny puddles of water that had yet to dry off and there was a faint smell of bleach in the air.

“What’s wrong, Brother?”

“Nothing.” Chen Yining shook his head.

After they closed their door, Chen Yining passed the gun to his brother.

Chen Jing kept fiddling with the pitch-black firearm, as if reluctant to part with it.

It was heavier than imagined, and Chen Jing only took one full magazine.

“Since it’s only used for intimidating other humans, it just needs to fire,” he said as he kept it on his hip, lowering his gaze to study how it looked.

He pulled down his T-shirt to conceal it, but the protruding outline over his clothes left him chuckling stupidly. He even went on repeatedly pretend that he was drawing his gun, mouthing ‘bang-bang’ without end.

“Isn’t this so cool, Brother?”

Chen Yining narrowed his eyes as he studied his younger brother and could not help flashing a mocking smile. “Just like an idiot.”

Chen Jing groaned and fell back limply on the couch. “You’re definitely jealous.

Chen Yining smiled but said nothing. He merely held up his handgun for a while, imagining that he was aiming at a target before eventually lowering it.

Regardless, neither of them slept well that night, and were jolted awake by something loud as dawn crept over the skies of the next day.

Someone was honking their car very loudly.

“Community committee members and logistics management of the residential complex, please gather at Gate A. I repeat, community committee members…”

Chen Yining looked out of the balcony to find a car parked within the residential complex. Soldiers, armed with real guns, were standing guard over both sides of the vehicle, while a white-shirted man stood in the middle, holding up a megaphone wired to loudspeakers affixed on the roof of the vehicle…

Chen Yining breathed a sigh of relief. Those people probably were not here for them.

After breakfast, both him and his brother left the house fully armed, and locked it as they usually did.

Once they were gone, Chi Xiaomo—who had been hiding behind the door like paparazzi—promptly sprang to her feet and dashed into the living room, “Daddy, Chen Yining has gone downstairs.”

“I asked Shortie, and it seems that those two summoned beasts are powerful magical beasts of the forests. They must be going to the forest to catch those babies and we should go too,” she added excitedly.

Shortie was the name she gave the halfling.

“You’re only seeing the whole picture here. If summoned beasts were that easy to capture, those five men wouldn’t have died yesterday,” Chi Zhouhu countered.

Still, he looked at his daughter then and mulled over the idea, before saying, “Come.”

He led her to the fourteenth floor and opened the door to one of the houses handily, while Chi Xiaomo was left in a daze. She only knew that her father was a landlord, and never found out that this was another one of his houses as well.

Be that as it may, this particular house was special—similar to a vault, one could pass through with a double security verification involving fingerprints and the right keys.

Chi Zhouhu allowed his daughter in before heading to the washroom and opened the mounted mirror cabinet inside, behind of which was a password-protected safe box.

Sliding an army knife and a handgun on his hip and concealing them, Chi Zhouhu then closed the safe box and looked into the mirror. Finding a man with rather thick stubble, he touched it and picked up his army knife, shaving it off and leaving only a thin layer.

Outside, Chi Xiaomo was standing on her toes and looking curiously through the door.

She promptly shrank when she saw his father stepped out, feigning indifference as if she had not been curious at all.

Chi Zhouhu patted her head and said, “Let’s go.”

“Where are we going?”

“To the suburbs.”