PSW - Chapter 87
Chapter 87
The modified vehicle drove steadily onto the road. Zheng Yi gazed at the desolate town outside the window, wondering when the third great rain would arrive.
Five months had passed since the apocalypse began. They had endured one period of extreme cold, and the period of extreme heat had only just ended, though its lingering warmth had yet to fully dissipate.
As they drove away from the outskirts of Zhongshan and fully entered Chuanyang, it happened to be the beginning of a new month.
Yu Yinan still provided a full ten Saint Points, followed by the beginning-of-the-month prayers from the Zhongshan base. There were likely believers from Humanity's Light Shelter mixed in as well.
On the first day, Zheng Yi received a total of 5,899 Saint Points, thirty of which came from Yu Yinan. Right at the start of the month, an overjoyed and devout Yu Yinan had looked at Zheng Yi and decisively generated a full ten Saint Points three times in a row.
This time, however, her cumulative Saint Points surpassed twenty thousand, but no cumulative reward appeared.
[The tiers for cumulative rewards don't stack in fixed increments of five thousand,] Zero One explained. [Although I don't know the pattern either... the next reward is at the thirty-thousand tier. Your current cumulative Saint Points are 22,526.]
Zheng Yi clearly didn't care about this. Even the thirty-thousand tier was just a matter of another two days.
Yu Yinan, on the other hand, was counting the month that had passed. She wanted to ask Zheng Yi if the previous month could be counted, but after some thought, she decided against it. Perhaps one day, even before the ten months were up, Zheng Yi would mark her voluntarily?
Now that the period of extreme heat was over, Yu Yinan found herself looking forward to the arrival of the extreme cold. Once the temperature dropped, she could warm Zheng Yi's hands every day, right? At night, she could cuddle with Zheng Yi too. If it was too cold, Zheng Yi wouldn't refuse her embrace, nor would she complain that her unstable ability made her body temperature rise and become too hot. This round of extreme weather in the early days of the apocalypse hadn't lasted very long. She wondered if this frequency was set in stone for the future, or if it would change.
As evening approached, they once again found an abandoned building, gave the interior a simple cleaning, and settled in for the night.
Just as Yu Yinan was about to move the furniture aside and push some tables together to make a bed, Zheng Yi took out a small blue capsule. In the next instant, a 1.8-meter blue double bed materialized in the cleared space.
"This..." Yu Yinan was stunned for a moment. She never would have thought Zheng Yi could conjure such things out of thin air. Was... was the Saint's ability really this powerful? Gaining faith points... had it allowed Zheng Yi to unlock many new things? For a fleeting moment, a sense of unease and dread washed over Yu Yinan. This kind of power... Zheng Yi's ability, could it really be related to a deity?
[Are you only buying a bed?] Zero One clearly hadn't forgotten about the shower room. [A portable shower room is also great for traveling~]
[And there's this portable kitchenette! It's fully equipped with an oven, microwave, wok, pressure cooker, frying pan, rice cooker, dishwasher, and a whole range of other appliances and cookware! And when you use them, you still don't have to worry about consuming electricity, natural gas, or anything like that!]
'?'
【Capsule · Portable Shower Room】: Shower room with unlimited use. Price: 10,888 Saint Points
【Capsule · Portable Kitchenette】: Kitchenette with unlimited use. Price: 11,888 Saint Points
For the current Zheng Yi, there were very few things she found hard to understand. But the price of this portable room was something she truly couldn't comprehend. How did it dare to sell for such a price? Just because it was "unlimited"?
[Host, this is how it is with these portable rooms and spaces—the earlier you buy, the more cost-effective it is! You can't just look at its high price now. You have to think of it this way: if you buy it now, you can use it until you die, and you'll never have to worry about bathing again! Even if you die of thirst during a heatwave, you'll be clean right up until the end, and you can even take a cool shower!] Zero One was enthusiastically promoting the store's products. [Look, if you can use it for ten years, that's an average of just over a thousand Saint Points per year. If you shower twice a day, each shower only costs 1.5 Saint Points! If you can use it for twenty years, a hundred years—my god, isn't that basically a freebie?]
[The kitchen is the same. It's fully equipped with all kinds of cookware, allowing you to eat all sorts of delicious food anytime, anywhere. You can even bake little cakes in the apocalypse, or simmer soup in the pressure cooker. Paired with the various ingredients from the store, you can enjoy all the delicacies from before the apocalypse.]
Zheng Yi had little desire to entertain Zero One. A whole roasted chicken only cost 3 Saint Points. A box of fried chicken, containing six golden, crispy pieces that were crunchy on the outside, tender on the inside, and slathered in sauce, also cost only 3 Saint Points. No matter how crazy she was, she would never spend 11,888 Saint Points on some portable kitchenette.
That was enough to buy 3,962 roasted chickens. Eating one a day, she could eat for ten years.
'If you really have nothing better to do, go update yourself.' The portable bed came with its own mattress; 400 Saint Points hadn't been wasted. Zheng Yi spread a sheet over it. The current temperature clearly didn't call for a blanket. After tidying up, she took out pots and pans to start making dinner. She filled a pot with water, and Yu Yinan quickly lit the solid alcohol fuel under the stove.
The water in the pot began to bubble and boil. Zheng Yi spent one Saint Point to buy a bag of frozen assorted mushroom dumplings. She and Yu Yinan each ate half, and their dinner for two cost only that single Saint Point.
"Zheng Yi..." Yu Yinan swallowed a dumpling. She hesitated, looking as if she wanted to say something but was holding back. Finally, watching Zheng Yi's expression, she asked tentatively in a soft voice, "The Saint... Saint, is she really a deity? Does a Saint God truly exist in this world?"
"There are no gods in this world, and no Saint God either," Zheng Yi said with a light laugh. "It's just a trick to fool the bases and earn faith points. How did you end up getting caught up in it yourself, Jiejie?"
"Then you..." Yu Yinan paused. She gazed into Zheng Yi's smiling black eyes, unable to tell if the smile was genuine or fake, or what Zheng Yi was thinking at that moment. "Are you a deity, then?"
"If I were that powerful, this apocalypse would have ended long ago~" Zheng Yi said, a hint of interest appearing in her eyes. She stared into Yu Yinan's eyes and asked, "But... what if I really were a deity?"
"You've fallen for a deity, you adore a deity, you even ask a deity for kisses and beg for her favor... Jiejie~ aren't you afraid?"
"..." Yu Yinan fell silent. That was true. If Zheng Yi were really a deity, what kind of deity would be so indulgent of a mortal's intimacy? She had... done those things time and time again. And yet, at certain moments, in certain instances, Yu Yinan always had the illusion that... Zheng Yi didn't belong to this world. "I am afraid," she answered, lowering her gaze. She used her chopsticks to break apart the last dumpling in her bowl, stirring the pieces around before finally lifting the bowl and shoveling them into her mouth.
"But I would still fall for you, still like you, still not want to give up, and still..."
"Still want to be closer to you." Perhaps this, too, was an offense and a blasphemy against a deity? Sacrilege...
Just thinking of that word stirred complex emotions in Yu Yinan's heart—it was both frightening and thrilling. But her feelings for Zheng Yi were already incredibly complex, so this was nothing new.
She looked at Zheng Yi, but Zheng Yi didn't respond to her words, merely using her ability to wash the finished bowls and chopsticks.
"I'll clean up." Yu Yinan stood and took the items from her, putting the pots and pans back in their respective places. The solid alcohol fuel had long since burned out and extinguished itself. Zheng Yi, in turn, took out a bucket and filled two for Yu Yinan, telling her to find a separate room to wash up in later.
Ever since leaving the Zhongshan base, Zheng Yi had stopped using her ability to clean Yu Yinan, only providing her with a sufficient amount of water.
[Even if you don't need a shower room, Yu Yinan clearly does! Don't you want her to be able to take a hot shower every day and smell nice all the time?]
Zheng Yi glanced toward the next room, where she could clearly hear the sound of Yu Yinan brushing her teeth.
In the truck's cargo bed, there was a large box of body wash and shampoo, and they had also stockpiled plenty of toothpaste and toothbrushes.
[...] Zero One was utterly defeated. It had thought its exquisite sales techniques could move Zheng Yi.
When Yu Yinan came out after her shower, changed into a fresh set of clothes, she had already hand-washed her dirty clothes and dried them with her ability. She emerged with a faint chill of water vapor clinging to her. Apparently, Yu Yinan hadn't heated the two buckets of water and had washed with cold water.
She sat on the bed and carefully lay down next to Zheng Yi. The 1.8-meter double bed was a bit large for Yu Yinan. If she wanted to sleep while holding Zheng Yi, a lot of space would be left empty on her side, making her seem very deliberate.
She turned on her side, and just as she raised her hand, Zheng Yi turned to face her, those black eyes staring straight at her.
"..." Yu Yinan's arm hung suspended in mid-air, not knowing whether to lower it or keep it raised. "I-I'm not hot..."
"Is that so?" Zheng Yi reached out and placed her hand on Yu Yinan's cheek. Her fingertip gently tapped one side of her cheek before moving behind her ear to pinch the cool earlobe.
It was just a simple gesture, but Yu Yinan felt the spot on her face that Zheng Yi had touched instantly grow hot. The earlobe now pinched between her fingers was heating up even faster.
"Jiejie, you're blushing again."
The earlobe beneath her fingertip grew scorching hot. Zheng Yi kneaded it gently, and the entire side of Yu Yinan's ear turned a deep red.
"What are you thinking?" Those clear black eyes watched her quietly, curiously inquiring about her current emotions.
But Yu Yinan was willing to be controlled by her.
"I... I was thinking, I wish I didn't get so hot and flustered so easily." Yu Yinan shuffled closer to Zheng Yi. Her suspended arm moved with extreme lightness and care to rest on Zheng Yi's waist. She didn't even dare to put any real weight on it at first, only gradually wrapping it around Zheng Yi's waist. Only when she saw no change in Zheng Yi's expression did she truly and properly embrace her.
"I was thinking... this bed is a little too big. I want to take advantage of the fact that it's not too hot right now to hold you for a while."
"I was thinking, the period of extreme heat is finally over, and the next one should be extreme cold... I feel... I feel very happy, very much looking forward to it..."
Yu Yinan moved closer bit by bit. Her voice trembled slightly, but she still spoke the words in her heart truthfully and honestly. "Right now, I'm thinking... you haven't kissed me in a long time."
"You still have so many thoughts." Zheng Yi chuckled softly. She didn't stop Yu Yinan from getting closer. Her fingertips moved down, pressing against Yu Yinan's thin white T-shirt, right over her heart. "What if I'm not willing?"
"You're too warm, and your emotions are too intense~ Jiejie, what if I don't like you this way?"
"What will you do?"
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