The Great Merchant in the Cataclysm

Chapter 122: Got Into A Trouble

The trip had been exceptionally smooth. Due to the fact that the majority part of the city had been cleared up to make it safe. However, it was only limited near the city as the human defense group could only enclose on that small part of the area. Thinking about it, it was such a sad matter.

At the human base, a third-ranked evolver or even a fourth-ranked evolver would be stationed to guard their bases. Nonetheless, they were unable to compete against the evolution rate of the walking dead and the mutated animals. In fact, the reason why humans residing in the city could survive was the power from the era merchants. Without their help and the protection they provided, when these mutated animals slowly gained their intelligence, there would be a king amongst them long ago. Leading their herd to swept out every human base until there were none of them left.

Zhang Mu was adept in making short-term transaction along the way. In this manner, it would be much easier to control the scales of the trade. Hence, he had already cleared out and fixed the pathway he would take within three years. Unless something had happened to the path, Zhang Mu would not change it for no particular reason.

The destination that Zhang Mu had in mind was still Shan Xi city. Recently, he could not figure out the market price so he might as well used a familiar path that he had just traveled to and fro for the past month.

In front of his eye, Zhang Mu saw the mountain that indicated he had reached the final obstacles for Shan Xi city. That were some escapees remained on the peak that had cleared beforehand. That was done by a fourth-ranked evolver to ensure the safety for the city. But when there were about two or three kittens left, the evolver did not bother about them and left them over there.

Although there were mutated animals that were not worthy to one’s eye, for Zhang Mu’s case, it was a massive hurdle to him. He had yet to reach the third rank and was barely at the peak of the second rank only. Hence, even in the human race, he was just a small figure at the bottom. Naturally, he had to be very cautious and kept his body low for him to move ahead.

In a world where terror was steadily growing, even if it was merely a pathway, Zhang Mu had to spend many efforts for the sake of selecting the easiest route for him to take on. One could imagine the cruelty level in the wild.

Half a year ago, Xi An city tried to expand its safe margin and a fourth-ranked fire-type evolver decided to step forward and used his awaken ability to help out. Tremendous fire energy was released, setting the mountain on a raging flame. However, no one had anticipated that a group of fourth-ranked mutated animal would come out, scaring the fire-type evolver back to the city.

Although the group of mutated animals was not afraid of the fire set by the fourth-ranked evolver, none of them were able to extinguish the burning flames.

After that, the mutated animals were terrified to take a step into the city again. Because of the raging flame, there was no way for them to continue and inhabit this piece of land. With a large number of low ranked mutated animals were dead, most of the second-ranked mutated animals and above were taken away by their respective king. Leaving a big piece of burning land and a few scattered second-ranked mutated animal left as they had no one to lead them.

At the same, the people residing at Shan Xi city did not dare to have the thoughts of expanding the city’s safety margin again. With the powerful evolvers retreating, what more could the others rank below them going to do about it?

Despite that, there were still a group of desperate people eyeing the burned corpse of the mutated animals and their beast cores on the mountain. Even though several second-ranked mutated animals were roaming around, they rather risk their lives and enter the mountain.

Zhang Mu was also part of the group. With only a little meat for so many wolves, the amount of the corpses were getting lesser and lesser while the location for them was getting deeper and deeper into the mountain. Under the situation where danger was increasing, the craze from the group also went down as they were forced to retreat from the mountain. Seeing that the number of people to search for the corpse was decreasing, this gave a different thought to Zhang Mu. This path could allow him to reach Shan Xi city at the top speed, instead of taking a longer route.

The forest had not recovered from its last cleaned up. With a charred look, everywhere was filled with the collapsed burned woods. It was a mess to look at, as the signs of vegetation were hard to find with the few exceptions of yellowed weeds.

Shuffle! A series of noise rang from the branches on top of Zhang Mu’s head while flashes could be seen around him.

Was it them again? Those four were not the last of them?

Last month, something had stopped him at this spot. Creatures that he never saw before suddenly appeared when he had to walk this path from Luoyang city to Shan Xi city.

This familiar jumping rhythm, it must be them for sure!

Zhang Mu lifted his head abruptly, and he saw the figures above looking down at him on those brown branches. Silvery white fur with abnormal smoothness, paired with a petite appearance that looks harmless.

Indeed, it was them! Second-ranked silver mink!

Previously when Zhang Mu walked down this path, usually a second-ranked creature would automatically sense the bloody smell that leaked from Zhang Mu’s body. Hence, they would stay away from him. Even if there was a fierce animal with no signs of intelligence yet, he could handle them easily.

However, this group of silver mink had only entered this mountain last month and was unfamiliar to the scent leaking from Zhang Mu. Granting that the smell had an ominous scent, but they were not the least fear of him.

These little things were extremely agile, yet their attacks were weak. At that time, Zhang Mu was not surrounded by many of them, merely four silver minks. When Zhang Mu entered their territory proudly, they would launch a lightning-like attack. In the end, they were all struck dead by Zhang Mu in exchange for his injuries.

But now, Zhang Mu took a closer look at his surrounding on the spot. Immediately, it caused him to take in a breath of cold air. Currently, the previous pitch black forest seems to be glowing with dozens of shining gems now. However, Zhang Mu knew that there would not be any gemstones in this broken forest.

In fact, these glistening gems were from the silver mink’s night-vision eye! And there was at least twenty of them!

He tried to take a step forward. As the silver mink had a weak attack, if Zhang Mu could carefully avoid the mistake he made last time, he might be able to slip through under their nose completely. As long as he could walk out of this path, he would be able to reach the safety boundary set up by Shan Xi city.

Although he could not see the silver mink’s movement in the forest, it was clear that there was a problem based on those on the tree branch above him. Whenever Zhang Mu moves, their head would follow every movement that Zhang Mu made.

It should be when he went through their defenses last month, which cost them to have such an attitude.

Did they remember his scent?

Indeed, these creatures must have recognized his scent. They must have been waiting for Zhang Mu to enter deep within the forest before making their moves. What an intelligent creature! Those four that died previously had already caused Zhang Mu to use up all of his might to save himself. At first, he thought that those four were the last of them. Never in his mind would he expect that that was only part of a small unit. Now, this was great as the large forces had come together.

With more than twenty second-ranked silver mink, that was a big deal for someone like Zhang Mu who barely reach the peak of the second rank!

He slowly thought of the countermeasure. However, no matter how did he shift slightly, the silver mink would also move together with him.

Looks like moving forward was hopeless now and he could only withdraw back. Count himself unlucky!