Chapter 263: Zhou Rui’s Thoughts

Looking at the dazzling array of cold weapons in the shop, Yang Bo also felt a headache. He finally picked up a crossbow, 50 arrows, then also grabbed a short spear. He still brought a shield.

“How about messing with the upstream reservoir?” Yang Bo, after preparing his equipment, took out a map and found that, about ten kilometers upstream from this county town, there was a reservoir.

However, there wasn’t detailed information on the reservoir. Yang Bo checked and found that the game didn’t prohibit setting things on fire.

But Yang Bo felt that if he really set a fire, the game officials might just make it a real game.

In other words, the game officials could turn the remote control into a real game at any time. Maybe it wouldn’t matter much to other players, but for him, the difference would be huge.

“I have to accidentally cause a big event. It won’t work if I do it on purpose. The game officials will definitely intervene.”

“If a fire could cause widespread destruction, there wouldn’t be a need to send so many bionic humans.” Yang Bo was clear on that.

“For now, I’ll avoid the veterinary factory and go to the mountains to see if the zombie cattle or sheep give Charge Skills.” Yang Bo checked again and found there wasn’t a good method to tackle the veterinary factory, so it was better to farm other skills first.

The Charging Skill would increase physique. Trihorn Bulls in the Mecha Game gave the Charging Skill, so maybe the cows in this remote control world would too.

After thinking carefully, Yang Bo headed to a nearby town, descending from the mountain at the respawn point, then followed the road through the valley.

“Someone thought of this before me.” Along the road, Yang Bo saw the remnants of a zombie and muttered to himself.

While Yang Bo was playing, Zhou Rui was in her room, sitting cross-legged, her breath becoming increasingly rhythmic, filling the room.

Finally, the sound of her breathing resembled a sharp whistle, ending with a rumble from within her body as Zhou Rui opened her eyes.

With a wave of her hand, a finger-sized hole appeared in a nearby stone, sending up a puff of dust. Behind the stone was a warship armor plate, which now had a shallow mark on its surface.

Zhou Rui stood up, wiped the sweat off her body, then walked into the bathroom, tossing her training clothes into the washing machine before sinking into the bathtub.

The water in the tub turned brown as Zhou Rui leaned back, feeling a stinging sensation wash over her body.

“I wonder what Yang Bo’s superpower is. Hopefully, it’s not just simple physical strength.” Zhou Rui, gritting her teeth against the stinging, pondered as she soaked.

“Anyway, March Planet’s management has been strict recently, and the guild hasn’t issued any tasks. I’ll observe for a few days.”

“Too bad that fat guy refuses to cooperate. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have to waste time scheming here.”

“What is Yang Bo doing in his room?”

Time flew by as Zhou Rui’s thoughts raced. Twenty minutes later, the water in the bathtub had become clear.

Zhou Rui stood up, poured a bag of powder into the water, drained the tub, then refilled it with hot water before soaking again.

“Yang Bo used to like Li Aidu. He even went to her concert, where they encountered an extremist attack. But Li Aidu’s background is a bit complicated.”

“I need to find a way to get that fat guy away so I can figure out what Yang Bo’s superpower is.” Zhou Rui was feeling a bit troubled. There was no way to approach Yang Bo because the fatty was always around.

But the more things were like this, the more Zhou Rui believed there was some big secret about Yang Bo, making her even more determined to figure it out.

After finishing her bath, Zhou Rui stood in front of the mirror, drying off and admiring her perfect body.

“I wonder who will benefit from this body?” Zhou Rui sighed deeply as she dried her hair.

As a member of the family, she had no freedom in marriage, only interests to consider.

So, most large family marriages were just for show. Publicly they appeared as husband and wife, raising children, but privately they each had their own lovers.

This was an unspoken agreement among big families, forming political or business alliances through marriages, and family members were raised to prioritize family interests over personal feelings.

From childhood, the children of such families were taught that the family came first, and love was optional, if not dispensable.

That’s why the upper circles were a chaotic mess, with everyone doing their own thing in private, so long as they didn’t cause major public scandals.

Some couples would only share a bed a handful of times in their entire lives, primarily just to produce offspring, then continue with their separate lives.

In the meantime, the clothes in the washing machine had already been washed and dried.

Zhou Rui put on her training outfit and walked to the room connected to the internet. She picked up her wristwatch and saw an email from her father. It said people from the Thief Sect would arrive after the storm to recruit Yang Bo.

“Maybe Yang Bo is a good choice after all.” As she read the email, Zhou Rui became a bit lost in thought.

The Thief Sect was an ancient group. Its members were elusive, and no one dared to provoke them.

Once, someone killed one of their disciples, and that person’s entire faction was swiftly ruined by the Thief Sect.

No matter how advanced your lock was, most mechanisms still relied on mechanical lock components. Even magnetic locks could be cracked by disrupting the internal electronics.

The Thief Sect was very independent, never aligning with any major force. In addition to their thievery skills, they also had a unique martial art. It’s said that anyone who saw it didn’t live to tell the tale.

Although Zhou Rui had already anticipated that Yang Bo’s entry into the Thief Sect wouldn’t be a problem, the speed at which it happened was still surprising to her. After all, it had only been a short time.

There were rumors that all three empires had Thief Sect agents inside their intelligence departments to prevent their own information from being stolen.

It’s also said that various mecha companies and warship manufacturers would hire the Thief Sect at high prices to test the security of their ships and mechas.

Basically, it was like paying protection money to the Thief Sect so they wouldn’t target their designs.

Zhou Rui’s family wasn’t particularly large, which was why they were running an illegal guild on March Planet, rather than operating a more legitimate guild in one of the other empires.

If Zhou Rui’s family had been more powerful, they wouldn’t have come to March Planet at all, instead running a Bounty Hunter Guild in the larger empires.

“I wonder which member of the Thief Sect will come?” Zhou Rui tossed the thought aside. In the end, she had to follow her family’s orders.

Yang Bo, of course, was unaware of this good news. After walking along the road by the river for half an hour, he finally arrived at a town near the riverbank.

There were already two other players in town. They were using standard tactical movements to climb to the second floor of a building.

One stayed below while the other took a running start and climbed up to the second floor.

It looked like the second-floor platform had once had railings, but they were now completely rotted away.

The two players operated their characters skillfully, clearly showing they were experienced players.

The highway cut straight through the town. The two players were preparing to clear a row of buildings near the river.

“No wonder these zombie monsters are so tough.” Yang Bo had already learned from experience that as soon as bionic humans appeared in the zombies’ line of sight, they would activate immediately.

Silenced weapons didn’t help because you never knew when a zombie would be hiding around, and once spotted, they’d activate.

Last time, as soon as Yang Bo peeked, the zombies were triggered, and one howled loudly. That was when the military had to enable remote control. If silenced weapons worked, they wouldn’t need the bionics.

Yang Bo chose a row of buildings along the highway, with a cliff behind them.

He knocked on a wall first. Sure enough, he quickly detected suspicious spots. Last time, he’d missed a gap, and a zombie dog slipped through.

This time, Yang Bo knocked a couple more times until he found a zombie lurking in the building ahead.

Yang Bo maneuvered his character to approach the building from the rear. Inside, there was a zombie, sitting with its back to the window on a wooden stool at a table.

Just as its head moved, a crossbow bolt pierced through its skull.

Blade Mastery +2!

“As long as I’m faster, you won’t even have time to scream.” Yang Bo smirked as the zombie’s head was swiftly taken down by the bolt.

“I feel like these zombies’ heads are basically radars!”

“It seems like something else caused these people to become like this. Even though there’s no metal in their bodies, that doesn’t mean they weren’t modified.”

Yang Bo crept toward another window before suddenly flashing inside.

His crossbow bolt flew again, but this time there was still a zombie cat inside, its body so shriveled it was unrecognizable.

The zombie’s head was pierced by his bolt, but the zombie fell forward, and the zombie cat let out a screech.

Yang Bo quickly fled because he could already hear the howling of other zombies nearby.

As Yang Bo fled town, he saw two players on a second-floor balcony across from him, quickly shooting arrows.

“I should’ve picked a bow,” Yang Bo thought, realizing his mistake. The crossbow didn’t fire as fast as the bow.

The two other players also quickly joined Yang Bo in running as the zombies targeted them too.

“Dude, could you stop screwing things up?”

“Yeah, we barely found a quiet spot, and now you’re here.”

The two players complained to Yang Bo. Hearing their words, he quickly responded, “Sorry, I’ll get out of here!”

Yang Bo had only intended to test things out before hunting cattle or sheep.

Yang Bo and the others ran for about a kilometer before the zombies stopped chasing them.

This confused Yang Bo. If this were just a normal game, it would make sense, but this was remote control. Why had the zombies stopped?

Yang Bo looked at the map and noticed there seemed to be a livestock farm up in the mountains.

The two players watched as Yang Bo disappeared into the forest, shaking their heads.

“That guy’s definitely a noob.”

“There are even more zombie animals in the forest.”

“Plus, the dense forest makes it tough to see or use the minimap.”

“This lousy game hasn’t paid off yet, and the players in the city act like total idiots.”

“What can you do? The city’s players are all fighting about something.”

Yang Bo could hear their chatter in the distance but said nothing.

He checked the map again. There was an abandoned road leading to the farm, which sat halfway up the mountain, about 800 meters away.

Yang Bo didn’t take the mountain path; it was too hard to move quietly there.

The abandoned road was cracked, with grass, bushes, and vines sprouting in the gaps.

Controlling his Bionic Puppet, Yang Bo picked up two rocks and knocked them together, sending out sound waves. Soon, feedback came back.

“Nothing?” Yang Bo was surprised.

After another kilometer, he tested again twice but still found no animal tracks—none at all.

“Something’s not right.” Yang Bo sensed something was off.

When Yang Bo arrived at the farm, he saw the problem. The farm had clearly been reinforced, with stone walls built around it, obviously done after the apocalypse.

“So there were survivors here?” Yang Bo observed the handholds carved into the wall, clearly used as a makeshift ladder.

The stone wall was six meters high. When Yang Bo climbed to the top, he gasped. Inside the walls was a horde of zombies.

The zombies, upon seeing Yang Bo, roared and rushed at him, but clearly, they had no climbing ability and were stuck beneath the wall.

“How tragic.” Seeing this, Yang Bo felt a wave of sadness. Who knew what kind of suffering the survivors here had gone through?

Building a six-meter-tall, meter-thick stone wall must have been an exhausting effort.

But in the end, it had all been in vain. Yang Bo could only imagine the hopelessness the last survivors here must have felt.

But that didn’t stop Yang Bo from drawing his crossbow and harvesting skills.

Blade Mastery +2!

Cooking +2!

“What rotten luck!” Yang Bo looked at his crossbow and then at the surrounding forest. He decided it was better to set the place on fire since he was running low on bolts anyway.

Just then, a shadow flickered in the distance, and Yang Bo instantly jumped down from the wall.

A second later, a black figure swooped right over where he had just been standing.

“What kind of bird is that?” Yang Bo watched as a creature with fleshy wings flew past his previous position.

The creature circled around and flew back at him.

“Coming back for more?” Yang Bo quickly pulled out his short spear, eyeing the monster diving toward him.

Calculating the distance and speed in his mind, he suddenly swung his arm.

Since it was close enough, the short spear collided directly with the creature.

Controlling the Bionic Puppet, Yang Bo rolled to the ground right after throwing the spear.

The creature slammed headfirst into the stone wall.

Tear Skill +4!

“Congratulations! You’ve found a bounty item.” Two notifications popped up, one directly in his mind and the other in the game.