Cave Refuge

"Wait a bit later before you leave. Your mother, through her circle of friends, arranged a meeting with a girl. Go and check her out."

Upon hearing Mr. Thompson say this, Dong Tianyu immediately fled. Afraid his mother would stop him, he gave her a quick greeting and hurriedly left.

As Dong Tianyu went downstairs to get his boat, he saw Ye Liuyun nearby. He found Ye's presence strange, but didn't give it much thought.

When he saw Dong Tianyu preparing to leave, Ye Liuyun quickly approached him. "Bro, don't rush off. I have something to discuss with you."

"What is it?"

"Bro, do us a favour. I know you have some eggs and chicken left. Whatever you have, I'll buy them all."

"You know, even though the fish under the water have eased the food crisis, my poultry farming was reduced during the previous food shortage. We only kept some chicken breeds to save food.

Although the food shortage has been resolved, you should know that it takes time for livestock to grow. They are not like assembly line products which could increase production overnight."

"Bro, I know everything you're saying, but I'm seriously in a pinch right now. No matter how much you have, I'll double my purchasing price."

Only after hearing Ye Liuyun's words did Dong Tianyu start to take this matter seriously: "We've been partners for so long, you know that I am not the type to take advantage of others.

Forget about doubling the price. I have chickens and eggs, but I don't want money, I want bullets. You're well aware of the guns I own. Don't try to rob me like the Mutual Aid Centre.

Give me a quote, if it's fair, we can trade. I've got about less than 200 pounds of Lu Ding eggs and over a thousand Lu Ding chickens."

"Bro, can we trade something else? I have an agreement with them; I sell guns, they sell bullets. We don't interfere in each other's business."

"Alright, we have been partners for a long time. I should still help you out. But I might be a bit busy recently and might not have time to deal with you. You should wait."

Initially, Ye Liuyun looked delighted when Dong Tianyu agreed to trade other items, but upon hearing Dong Tianyu avoid discussing the transaction time, he quickly understood Dong Tianyu's intention and hurriedly spoke up:

"Bro, stop joking around. I'm really in urgent need. I can pick it up myself if you don't have time to deliver."

Hearing Ye Liuyun say this, Dong Tianyu rolled his eyes, "Didn't you start joking with me first? Don't rush; I promised I'd keep the goods for you. Wait a bit."

"Stop messing around, bro. Aside from bullets, what else do you want? As long as I have them, I'll try to get them for you."

"Since you put it this way, I don't need bullets. Get me some grenades, flashbangs, smoke bombs, and concussion grenades. I've been craving these throwing weapons for a long time."

Hearing Dong Tianyu say this, Ye Liuyun immediately fell silent. These items were even more heavily regulated than bullets.

Seeing Ye Liuyun fall silent, Dong Tianyu didn't linger. He turned around and walked away.

Seeing Dong Tianyu had already gotten onto his foot-powered boat, Ye Liuyun called out to him in a loud voice, "Bro, don't go. I agree. Let's discuss the exchange ratio."

After some haggling, they agreed for the price of bullets to be reduced to one tenth of the market price, and Dong Tianyu was to be provided with 35% handgun bullets, 50% rifle bullets, and 15% sniper bullets.

Dong Tianyu really didn't care why Ye Liuyun wanted to buy these items at this time.

Actually, the usefulness of bullets had significantly decreased for him. Dong Tianyu was currently stuck at a bottleneck.

Although his Spiritual Energy cultivation had reached the Eleventh Layer, almost breakthrough to the Twelfth Layer, he had grown accustomed to his twice-a-day automated cultivation training. Thus his cultivation growth had become a grind, requiring time. However, this grind had a unique benefit in improving one's mental state, making it difficult to deviate during cultivation.

Besides his personal cultivation, the upgradation of his cave mansion was also stuck in a bottleneck.

Dong Tianyu had swept through several major material warehouses in the West District and the storage areas of Pengville Port, only then was he able to upgrade his cave mansion to a larger size. However, to upgrade to the next level, although he had plenty of common materials, he still needed a certain amount of special materials.

Although these special materials could be steadily harvested from the Ley Lines in his cave mansion, at their current annual production rate, it would take at least ten years or more to gather enough.

In addition, although Dong Tianyu could use survival points to lessen the upgrade requirements, given the maximum of five survival points he could earn per day, it would still take him several years to gather enough.

Originally, Dong Tianyu's plan was to reach the Foundation Establishment stage in his cultivation before the arrival of the Eternal Night while also hoping to upgrade his cave mansion.

As the Officials lifted the survivors' fishing restrictions, no longer restricting their fishing methods, more and more survivors began to notice the abnormal growth of the fish population underwater.

As the survivors increased their fishing efforts, rather than decreasing, the amount of fish in the water appeared to increase even more.

Although the survivors were not sure why the amount of fish in the water was increasing, those who had lived through a food crisis began to instinctively hoard resources.

Some observant survivors noticed that the previously persistent rainy weather was giving way to more and more sunlight. Many were thrilled by this weather, beginning to dry fish to make fish jerky.

Only a few people noticed that the water level, which had submerged Pengcheng, had fallen slightly.

As the sunny days increased, the dark clouds shrouding Pengcheng began to dissipate.

Slowly all of the survivors came to realize that the flood submerging Pengcheng was slowly receding. Everyone knew that the flood was about to subside and the earth would once again be uncovered.

Ever since he warned those people last time, Dong Tianyu thought they would retaliate. But, after a long wait, they did not come to retaliate or reconcile. It was as if that last conflict had never happened.

By the time the fish appeared in the water and the food crisis in Pengcheng was resolved, the people who were originally assigned to guard the plantation area had been withdrawn. The situation on Nameless Mountain had returned to its bottleneck state.

Noticing this, Dong Tianyu began to feel like he might be a supporting character. Ever since he received the System and started cultivating, although his journey hadn't been completely smooth, he could only describe it as having minor ups and downs.

He wondered if his dull life could only be broken when he encountered a true 'main character'.