Lords of the Heavens

Chapter 203 Cat Paw Ability User

I go!

Are you out of your mind? You seem unable to think straight.

While quickly observing them, Li Wei immediately said, "Friend, please don't misunderstand. The deal I'm talking about is that we can be friends. We'll provide you with dried rat meat, and you'll allow us to live in the hunting grounds. Do you understand?"

Li Wei gestured as hard as he could, afraid that they wouldn't understand.

Fortunately, this time, both the cat's paw and the bull's head understood.

The bull's head even laughed, making a strange, hoarse sound.

"Tom the cat says he wants to be our slave!"

You son of a bitch!

Li Wei held back, still smiling as she waited for the other party to make their next move.

But Tom the cat frowned and asked, "You're very strong, why do you want to be a slave?"

rough!
"Because we need a place to live. That building is great, we like it. That way we don't have to groom ourselves when it rains!" Li Wei tried to explain. It was a ridiculous reason, but Tom actually believed it.

"Meow! We hate rain too. We live in caves and we love to bask in the sun. However, if you want to live in our hunting grounds, you must provide two cat paws of mice every month. If the number is not right, then war awaits you."

As he spoke, Talking Tom stretched out his hands, and Li Wei counted them carefully: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten—so many!

"No problem, I promise. But, may I ask a few questions? I'd like to know if there are any other gods like the Rat God in this area, or even further afield? We'd like to seek divine protection and blessings..."

This time, the two cat-paw ability users and the one bull-head ability user all fell silent, and even seemed somewhat saddened.

Li Wei was puzzled, but was willing to wait and listen.

After a long while, Talking Tom finally spoke, “Meow! There used to be many gods. When I was little, there were so many, even many, many moons before. We could only hide in the caves, afraid to look, afraid to show our faces. But later, the gods gradually became fewer and fewer. They all seemed to have gone to very, very far places. Even our Meow Goddess left. Before she left, she told us that this was our hunting ground. She said that she had spoken to the Mouse God, telling us not to make a fuss each time, and to stay outside. Each moonset, we could only take away mice with two cat paws, otherwise the Mouse God would be angry.”

"And what about your parents?" Li Wei couldn't help but ask again.

"Meow, what's that? Can I eat it?"

This time, Li Wei was completely silenced. Without a doubt, the facts were clear: the world had been destroyed not just two or three years ago, but perhaps more than a decade ago.

The magical radiation granted the survivors various powerful abilities, but it also essentially destroyed their logical thinking abilities. Of course, this might be the case for weaker ability users, while powerful ability users might be perfectly normal in normal times.

Furthermore, the god that Tom the cat mentioned must be a powerful mutated creature or superhuman with four or even five stars or higher, but they have all left, probably to a place with more concentrated magical radiation.

This is almost identical to his previous guess.

But does this also mean that whenever magical radiation fluctuates, these powerful mutated creatures or superhumans will return to the place they left behind, like the tides?
"This is the monster siege plot! It's probably going to start in six months."

Li Wei had this realization in his heart, and then said, "You wait here, I can give you some rats now."

Today, Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue were killing various mutated rats. Although they didn't dare to go too far, each of them killed about 15, which is 15 contribution points. This is more worthwhile than doing other things.

Soon, Li Wei returned from the third floor and saw that Liang Yuzhi was still on night watch. After the usual routine of going through the motions and saying hello, he went to the fourth floor and took a string of dried rats. This was his rightful share; family property included food for family members. It didn't matter if he didn't eat it, but he was guaranteed a share.

Returning the way he came, Li Wei didn't see the three superhumans. He tried walking a little further away, but still didn't see them. After thinking for a moment, he threw the dried rat on the road and quickly drove away.

After walking more than a hundred meters, he looked back and saw Tom the cat running away with a shifty look on his face.

Fine, I'll feed you all now, so I won't hold back when I kill you later.

Li Wei sighed softly, turned around and went back.

Today his family contribution is 0, with a cumulative contribution of 200. Liang Yuzhi's cumulative contribution is 92, and Li Yue's cumulative contribution is 106. The score is very close!

But Li Wei really didn't care. Yes, this wasn't a game where the monsters you killed today would respawn tomorrow. You two clever people thought you were cautious enough, that you were cunning and quick-witted, thinking you could slowly erode them from all sides. But if you continued like this, the number of mutated rats would decrease.

In the darkness, the four-star rat king's gaze should remember your faces clearly.

"I'm not cursing you to die, I just hope you can understand that gambling is wrong, and taking shortcuts is also wrong."

That night, Li Wei roasted rat jerky again, and the water in his resource card was completely used up.

Nothing happened that night. The ruined town was quiet, except for the southern part of the town, the furthest point from the Level 1 scavenging camp, where two dark shadows occasionally flashed by, with mutated rats squeaking in their sharp bone claws, and occasionally a few meows could be heard... The next day at dawn, Li Wei ran to the rooftop. He had collected more dew today, probably because the temperature was higher yesterday and more water evaporated.

He drank one-third of it and gave the rest to Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue.

"Second Aunt, is there any progress on the handcart you mentioned you wanted to assemble?"

Taking the opportunity, Li Wei asked, which was also a veiled warning: stop catching mice and get on the right track. Even setting up a blast furnace to smelt steel would be fine.

"Xiaowei, don't worry, your aunt is trying to figure something out."

Liang Yuzhi and Li Wei started playing Tai Chi. They're both old foxes. What nonsense are you spouting? If you're so capable, why don't you go and persuade your girl?

And did we do anything wrong?

Now that we've decided to use the ruined town as our camp, shouldn't we clear out all that ruins and build a wall? Only by clearing the ground can we prevent the mutated rat king from launching a sneak attack, and only then can we farm properly. You don't think that three-tenths of an acre on the rooftop is enough, do you?

No way!
We won't go to places without paved roads. The Rat King is trying to use the same trick again. Heh, does he think we can't handle him?

This is equivalent to 20 points of income per day, why should we give it up!

We'll deal with that Rat King sooner or later. So, when the time comes, it'll be righteous and reasonable for you to kill the mutated rats, but it'll be wrong and evil for us to kill them?
Go to hell!

"Well then, thank you for your hard work, Auntie." Li Wei didn't say anything more. He packed up and headed northeast. The muddy water in the well should be cleared up by now. He needed water!
As Li Wei walked along the road, he even activated his Level 2 Blood Raven to focus on observing the wilderness on both sides of the road, but he found nothing. It was very quiet here, and the three ability users were nowhere to be seen.

After summoning back the Blood Raven, Li Wei went straight to the well. However, he didn't rush to draw water. He first took out a shovel and cleared away the silt nearby. He then dug up some soil to block both sides to prevent rainwater from flowing back in. Later, he moved a lot of stones, huge asphalt blocks from the vicinity, and overturned stone slabs from both sides of the road to continue building a circular stone wall around the well.

After each section of stone wall was built to a certain height, the surrounding soil was completely backfilled.

They worked like this until noon, finally managing to pile up the wellhead until it was level with the ground. Hmm, that's about it.

At this point, Li Wei looked around, released blood crows to keep watch, and then nimbly climbed down the stone wall inside the well. After reaching the water, he took out a container and drank his fill.

The resource card itself cannot hold water and requires a container. Li Wei only brought 20 liters of water with him on this trip, so there were four extra bottles.

A few moments later, Li Wei went back and forth several times, pumping out twenty liters of well water that was still murky, but actually quite good.

He did not use a resource card to carry the water bottle because a one-star resource card has a limit of 100 uses, with each use being one unit.

Five liters of water is one unit, and five kilograms of wheat is also one unit.

The noble heraldic armor, on the other hand, requires two units.

It's just too much trouble, so it's best to avoid using it if possible.

Next, Li Wei cut down some larger tree branches from the surrounding area and covered the well. He wasn't worried about anyone poisoning it, but rather about wild animals accidentally falling in—that would be disgusting.

Almost the instant he covered the wellhead, a line of information appeared silently.

You've clumsily built a murky well and gained 100 building experience points. Would you like to donate it to your family?

[You chose to donate this murky well to your family. Although it's a well two kilometers from the camp, it has indeed solved their urgent water shortage problem. You received a 50% donation bonus, earning 20 + 50% × 20 = 30 contribution points, bringing your total contribution to 225 points.]

[With the increase in the family's fixed assets, the maximum total contribution points that can be obtained has been raised to 850.]

-

Great, this is awesome!

Li Wei smiled inwardly, then carried the tools and the four buckets of water back. At this moment, he missed the backpack he had in the newbie quest world so much, but unfortunately, he couldn't bring it out.

In the past four months, he hasn't had the opportunity to buy a one-star backpack because he had to prioritize farming for Destiny Points.

When he returned to the scavenging camp, it was already around 2 p.m. Liang Yuzhi and Li Yue were still tirelessly rummaging through ruins and killing rats on the outskirts of the town, but they had killed even fewer rats today.

Yesterday, each of them could kill fifteen, but today, the two of them have only killed 12 together.

Those mutated rats are at least semi-smart beings; they're not stupid.

Tsk tsk tsk!
(End of this chapter)