From Apocalypse Boss to Farmer: My Vegetables Make Me Stronger!-Chapter 84 - 78: Waste Paper

Gu Xi’s recent safety training hadn’t been for nothing. She had already used her spiritual power to survey the nearby terrain.

Now, all she had to do was wait for the startled snake to come out of its hole.

That night, as Gu Xi lay in bed, she suddenly heard a faint noise from deep underground...

Her heart stirred, and she silently extended her spiritual power downward.

Soon, she "saw" it: in a corner deep inside the cafeteria, that slender girl named Tian was carefully digging away a layer of black soil with her hands. Then, she got on her stomach and tapped lightly a few times.

A few minutes later, a dark mine shaft appeared before her.

A woman climbed out of the mine shaft.

When Gu Xi saw the fleshy black mole beneath the corner of the woman’s mouth, she was unusually calm.

’It really is her.’

The woman had shown kindness to her several times before, which Gu Xi had found strange.

After struggling to survive in the apocalypse for so many years, Gu Xi was certainly no naive, innocent girl.

In the past, Li Ming had repeatedly reminded her, ’In this world, who would be nice to you for no reason?’

’They’re always after something.’

Gu Xi lay on the hard bed with her eyes closed, feigning a deep sleep.

The little green sprout silently emerged from her fingertip, a small bud perched on its tip...

A small black flower bloomed silently in the black of night, releasing a faint fragrance.

A few minutes later, Gu Xi appeared silently in a corner of the cafeteria on the second basement level.

She was completely hidden in the darkness, as if she had merged with the surrounding black rock walls.

In a distant corner, the woman with the mole on her lip was pushing the slender girl, her voice low and urgent. "You need to leave, now! Something’s happened down there!"

But the slender girl didn’t budge.

"Where are the goods?" she asked, staring coldly at the woman with the mole.

"The goods were moved long ago. Even those ability users who were just sent in a few days ago are gone."

The woman with the mole seemed to think of something, and her face paled. She pushed the girl urgently. "Everyone from the lab is gone now. You need to leave. Don’t ever come back..."

But the girl just stared at her coldly, saying nothing.

After a moment, she suddenly shoved the woman away and jumped into the dark opening.

Caught off guard, the woman with the mole stumbled back. By the time she recovered, the slender girl’s figure was already gone from the entrance.

The woman stomped her foot, but ultimately followed her down.

Gu Xi didn’t move.

She waited in place for a few more minutes before silently following them down.

The mine shaft was pitch-black, so dark you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face.

The tunnel underfoot led to who-knows-where, like the gaping maw of a giant beast in the darkness...

A terrifying aura spread silently.

Once she had her bearings in the dark, Gu Xi walked forward, her expression unchanged.

About an hour later, she "saw" the woman with the mole up ahead suddenly grab the slender girl in a tight embrace, her legs trembling faintly.

The girl she was holding looked over unhappily and cursed under her breath, "What are you—" ’doing?! You scared me!’

But the woman with the mole clapped a hand over her mouth, shaking her head desperately.

Just then.

Out of the corner of her eye, Gu Xi saw a tiny sliver of purple light flash at the end of the tunnel.

At the same time, the woman with the mole felt a chill on the back of her neck. She instinctively tackled the slender girl, pushing her down underneath her.

The slender girl hadn’t even processed what was happening until something warm and sticky dripped onto her face.

Only then did the slender girl realize something was wrong and slowly looked up.

But right at that moment, the sound of chaotic footsteps came from ahead.

Several men in black, wearing miner’s headlamps, rushed out with weapons. "Who’s there?"

The slender girl knew this was bad and immediately lay motionless on the ground. At the same time, a wisp of poisonous gas drifted silently toward the men in black.

In the darkness, someone soon collapsed.

Seeing this, the girl felt a flicker of joy.

Gu Xi’s heart, however, sank to the pit of her stomach.

The instant the men in black fell one after another, thick plant roots suddenly burst from the surrounding rock walls. They were packed as densely as a mass of tangled vipers, enough to make one’s skin crawl.

’It’s a trap!’

Clearly, someone had planned this all out, just waiting for their prey to fall into the net!

Then, they would bury everything silently, deep underground.

No one would ever know. Once the tunnel collapsed, all evidence would be wiped clean...

Gu Xi wasn’t sure if all this was aimed at her. But... at this moment, the tenacious growth of the mutant plants was matched only by the insanity of their destructive power!

As countless mutant plant roots surged, the surrounding rock walls soon began to tremble, and large chunks of earth and stone started to fall.

The slender girl noticed the anomaly then, too. Her expression changed drastically. She shoved the woman off her and ran for the exit without a second glance.

Just then, a vine shot out of the ground like a sharp spike and stabbed the girl’s shoulder... At the same time, the nearby section of the tunnel began to collapse on a massive scale.

The girl let out a blood-curdling scream, but she quickly fell silent, seemingly buried deep underground.

It wasn’t until a good half-hour later that the depths of the earth fell silent again.

In the silent darkness, a black cocoon of mud cracked open without a sound.

Simultaneously, the earth in front of the cocoon parted like a receding tide, silently revealing a deep passage in the darkness.

Gu Xi stepped out of the cocoon, her face devoid of expression, and walked toward the end of the passage.

She paused slightly as she passed the spot where the girl had fallen.

Soon, a huge stone cocoon slowly emerged from the earth and appeared before her.

The stone cocoon cracked open silently, revealing the slender girl’s pale, bloodless face.

Gu Xi frowned slightly, and the little green sprout extended silently.

A few minutes later, the girl woke from her unconscious state. She seemed scared out of her wits, but she instinctively clutched her injured shoulder.

She looked up at Gu Xi, dazed.

Gu Xi glanced down at the girl.

The next moment, another huge stone cocoon "floated" over silently from a short distance away, carried by the surging earth.

It stopped in front of the girl and cracked open without a sound.

A mangled woman lay inside, barely breathing. Blood and dirt caked her entire face, obscuring even the black mole by the corner of her mouth.

When the slender girl saw her, her lips twitched, but in the end, she looked away.

Gu Xi frowned slightly.

After a moment, the girl abruptly looked up at Gu Xi. "I know you can get me out of here!"

She paused, then gritted her teeth. "If you get me out, I’ll tell you a secret..."

"And what about her?" Gu Xi asked calmly, glancing at the woman with the mole.

The girl lowered her head, remaining silent.

Gu Xi understood.

She gave the girl one last look, then calmly turned to leave.

"Wait!" The girl grew anxious. She instinctively reached out to grab Gu Xi, but for some reason, her raised hand eventually fell.

She bit her lip, hesitating.

Gu Xi’s steps faltered, but she didn’t look back.

She just left a single sentence hanging in the darkness—

She said, "I’m not interested in your secret."

The girl’s expression changed abruptly. ’What if my last bargaining chip isn’t enough to keep her here...’

’No, she must be bluffing...’

For a moment, the slender girl was indecisive.

But in the darkness, the footsteps never stopped.

The girl bit her lip hard.

"You..."

Seeing Gu Xi walk further and further away with no intention of turning back for her, the girl finally felt a pang of fear. She struggled to her feet and shouted at Gu Xi’s retreating back:

"Don’t you want to know how I went from being a normal person to an ability user?!"

Sure enough, the next moment, Gu Xi stopped and looked back.

The girl was secretly delighted, but she didn’t notice that Gu Xi’s gaze, in the darkness, was fixed on the dying woman behind her.

It turned out the woman had woken up at some point. She was struggling to raise her hand, looking at her daughter with a fond yet weak gaze. "Tian’er..."

The faint, breathy sound made the girl’s body stiffen slightly.

After a moment, she seemed to realize something and turned around mechanically.

But the woman’s hand had already fallen limply...

In the distance, Gu Xi sighed, then turned around with a calm expression and strode forward.

Whatever grudges existed between the mother and daughter behind her had nothing to do with her.

But soon, the girl staggered to her feet, looked up, and shouted at Gu Xi, "Don’t go! It’s useless. Those Crystal Core Fragments were moved long ago!"

Gu Xi’s steps faltered. ’Crystal Core Fragments? So it’s true...’

In that moment of hesitation, the girl had already stumbled over to block Gu Xi’s path.

"My mom was undercover here for twenty years... I know a lot about this place. If you’re also here for the Crystal Core Fragments, then get me out..."

She was panting heavily, her eyes locked on Gu Xi.

Gu Xi looked at her calmly. "Move."

The girl gritted her teeth. "You don’t believe me?"

Gu Xi glanced at her, walked around her, and continued on.

The girl stumbled along behind her. "Everything I said is true..."

Just then, Gu Xi, who was walking ahead, suddenly stopped.

The girl instinctively looked up and saw the earth in front of them suddenly part, revealing a slightly crushed and misshapen laboratory.

Gu Xi forced the laboratory doors open. It was completely empty inside, with nothing but a messy pile of trash.

Suddenly, the little green sprout shot out and retrieved something from the garbage-strewn floor. Gu Xi reached out, grabbed it, and froze.

It was a piece of scrap paper.

—A piece of scrap paper stained with blood.

Gu Xi stared at the red numbers on the paper, cleverly obscured by the bloodstains. Her face was placid, but a storm was raging in her heart.

Because those numbers were the secret contact code she had casually written for that person when she came here to suppress bandits at the age of eighteen...