"Every year, they assign one craft for you to take down yourselves. But you can't beat it, so you have to hire people to fight it, fight alongside them, and in the end you're only left with two or three blocks."
In her iron armor, no expression could be seen, but from the slight tilt of her helmet or the way she lowered her head in concentration, one could tell she was thinking.
It gave off a sense of cartoonish contrast. Here was a suit of full dead iron armor that looked utterly cool, yet inside was merely a teenage girl.
Rusty Sister muttered by the table.
To tell the truth, Qian Daofeng and Ao Yong were both rather curious why this young girl in full armor never showed her face even at home, nor did she sit down at the table to eat.
Still, they didn't ask. Peculiar people and strange happenings were everywhere in the City of Iniquity, and curbing one's curiosity was among the most crucial rules for survival here.
At last, the armored figure raised her head.
"Then why don't they just hand out source energy blocks to you directly?! I mean that 'Kill God' outfit or whatever—why do they bother going through the extra trouble of assigning you a craft to fight?"
"Because everyone needs to fight, and the City of Iniquity needs people to die," Qian Daofeng said. "Resources are actually very limited, while the population keeps growing. This place constantly needs people to die. Survival of the fittest—you survive only through combat strength. Grow stronger or die. We're no exception, and those of us in public service positions already receive a lot of preferential treatment."
Qian Daofeng rattled off these words with fluid practice, like a comic crosstalk performer running through a tongue twister. Clearly, this was not the first time he had explained it to someone; he had probably done so more than a dozen times.
From his tone, Han Qingyu and the others could clearly tell that he fully endorsed this philosophy and its rules.
As exiles, their yearning for martial power was even stronger than that of many soldiers in Azure, because it was their only chance to alter their destiny.
A brief silence fell over the dining table.
Han Qingyu and his companions ate, while Qian Daofeng and Ao Yong merely sipped water.
The two hosts had already eaten their free meal at the municipal public service center before coming back.
Now they had paid out of their own pockets to buy food to feed these fellow countrymen.
"Right, have you guys ever slashed a Great Spike?!"
As if the thought had just struck him, Qian Daofeng set down his water cup, fixing his gaze squarely on Rusty Sister as he asked.
She was clad in full armor, and in the minds of ordinary people in the City of Iniquity, a full suit of dead iron armor signified that a person was either filthy rich or exceptionally strong.
Had her armor not looked so extraordinarily pristine—so new that it lacked even a speck of a dent or scratch—Qian Daofeng would have assumed from the start that she possessed formidable combat prowess.
*Still, her armor is so brand-new she might never have even stepped onto a battlefield. Maybe it isn't pure dead iron at all. Wearing it all day long—is she just playing dress-up? She'd be better off pawning it...* Qian Daofeng mused.
Even so, it was full armor after all. If she was willing, taking on a Great Spike would at least give her the chance to step up and tank a couple of hits...
"We have," came the answer from the other side. Han Qingyu looked up and spoke.
"Oh," Qian Daofeng acknowledged, slowly shifting his gaze.
His eyes swept across the group, flicking past Wen Jifei and Zhu Jiaming, pausing for a second on He Tangtang and two seconds on the iron armor. Almost shyly, he didn't dare look directly at Zhe Qiuhong, before finally settling resolutely on Wu Xu. "You really have combat experience, right?"
Wu Xu looked at him and nodded.
"Can you fight? Do you know the Three Formations?"
The Three Formations were a compulsory subject for squad combat in Azure. Not knowing whether they were the same here, Wu Xu didn't bother asking and simply nodded again.
Only then did Qian Daofeng realize he hadn't heard this man speak a single word from start to finish. *He seems to be mute. Ah, I shouldn't have pressed him with questions.*
"Thank you," Wu Xu said in a numb tone, understanding the intention behind the inquiry.
Qian Daofeng jumped in surprise.
"That's great then!" Ao Yong beside him didn't notice the awkwardness. He spoke up in high spirits, breaking into a bright smile.
"Yeah," Qian Daofeng nodded and said. "Here's the plan. Later, I'll go check with Boss Dao first... For the past two years, we've had Boss Dao lead his men to help take down our share. If he agrees, when we fight in a few days, we'll count you in as well."
"That's right. That way, the seven of you together should be able to get two or three blocks," Ao Yong chimed in. "Once you have surplus source energy blocks, you can go out and find a few jobs, and you'll gradually be able to gain a foothold on your own."
The notion of 'surplus source energy blocks' was roughly akin to combat reserves or personal savings.
The baseline for survival in the City of Iniquity was that your apparatus had to contain a source energy block, whether full or down to its last dregs.
Therefore, that single block was generally not counted. If you didn't even have that, you were nothing more than an absolute waste of space or a corpse-in-waiting here.
What truly counted as wealth and represented future prospects were surplus source energy blocks.
At this moment, the nineteen-year-old youth kept dropping hints around the dining table that made his heart bleed: *You ought to think about standing on your own feet; you can't just freeload off us forever. Food is very expensive...*
Unfortunately, the group around the table offered zero reaction to his hints.
Han Qingyu merely uttered a simple: "All right."
He didn't even bother to ask for more details about participating in the battle, which left Qian Daofeng feeling somewhat unsettled.
*Could they be that kind of people too?* Qian Daofeng suddenly wondered.
In the past, people had arrived in the City of Iniquity from secluded mountain valleys. They belonged to the source energy world, yet understood nothing about it, lacking even real combat experience.
*They kind of look the part—except they haven't called the person in the armor 'my lady' or 'family head' or anything like that.*
***
Afternoon, just before two o'clock.
Qian Daofeng and Ao Yong prepared to head out for work once more. Their work was intensely demanding; each day, they had only three hours of rest at night, two hours at noon, and two hours around dinner.
The City of Iniquity never allowed anyone to truly live with ease.
Han Qingyu, Wen Jifei, Wu Xu, He Tangtang, and Zhu Jiaming hitched a ride in their truck, leaving Rusty Sister and Zhe Qiuhong behind to watch over their belongings.
Since trench coats and hoods might draw unwanted attention, the five men wore plain shirts in black, white, and blue. It was unpretentious attire, and fortunately there were only three colors; otherwise, they really would have looked like the Calabash Brothers.
They carried blades strapped to their backs—one for each man.
Their other weapons could not be brought out into the open for the time being, so blades were their only choice. Blades were fine; even standard-issue combat sabers from Azure's various frontal armies flooded the markets in the City of Iniquity.
"Just stroll around this street. Come back here and wait for us around five-fifty," Qian Daofeng said, pulling the vehicle over at a cross street and pointing.
"Remember not to leave this area. This is the Third District... Not that it's particularly safe, but there happen to be slightly more Huaxian people here."
They had been reiterating this throughout the ride. Han Qingyu nodded.
The heavy garbage truck started up and rumbled away from the intersection.
Inside the cab, Ao Yong looked back through the window at the five figures walking forward with blades on their backs. "They won't get into trouble, will they, Brother Daofeng?" he asked worriedly.
Unfamiliar faces appearing in the City of Iniquity usually signaled danger. They would first be viewed as prey until someone moved in to test the waters—either completing the slaughter or having their perception violently upended with blood.
Of course, there had been one exception years ago: that old Huaxian man who had stepped off an airplane alone didn't count. The day he deplaned, all twenty-three streets of the City of Iniquity had cleared out automatically.
Only the corpses sprawled across the ground and the fallen leaves swept by a cold wind had welcomed the arrival of the Commander of the Huaxia Sole Witness Legion in the City of Iniquity.
And then, the person ranked number one in Kill God had walked out alone from the far end of the long street. Right on the pavement of this very street in the Third District, he had taken a head-on slash from the Huaxian Legion Commander—and remained standing.
"...Let's hope nothing happens. But they have to step out sooner or later," Qian Daofeng said, turning his gaze back ahead.
Meanwhile, on the other side.
"Wu Xu, look at you wandering off. Wander off and bad guys will snatch you away, you know? Stick close," Wen Jifei chided as he walked, glancing down at the pitted, long-neglected concrete beneath their feet.
Looking forward, a long fracture stretched down the surface of the broad avenue.
At the end of the fracture lay two knee-deep pits.
"They didn't even fill these in?!" He Tangtang remarked.
"They don't fill them, because that crack was cleaved by the Huaxian Legion Commander, and those pits were stamped out by Shu You when he blocked the blade." A middle-aged man with mixed East-West features stepped up from behind them to their flank, offering an easy smile. "New arrivals? Huaxian? I'm Huaxian too."
"Hey, take a careful look around yourselves," he lowered his voice. "Well? Notice a lot of people sizing you up on the sly? It's very dangerous here! Tell you what, seeing as we're countrymen, let me show you around..."
Han Qingyu and the others glanced at him, turned, and walked away.
When out in the world, the most terrifying thing of all was bumping into a fellow countryman who immediately treated you with overflowing warmth.
They walked forward through the streets of the City of Iniquity beneath prying eyes from all directions, stepping across the blade mark left behind by Chen Buer.
Chapter 427