PSW - Chapter 140
Chapter 140
With the cooperation established, Humanity's Light began to promote Zheng Yi. Considering that some ability users might be unconvinced or suspect foul play, they consulted Zheng Yi and readily opened a channel: any ability user who was dissatisfied with the promotion or felt they could replace her could apply to challenge her at any time. As for the challenges, Yun Lingjian and her team, while busy creating their instruments, also gathered some recording and broadcasting equipment. After some minor repairs, it could be used to project the fight scenes onto a large screen for more people to watch.
Just when they thought many ability users would eagerly participate and issue challenges, and that many would be dissatisfied with a young girl like Zheng Yi being the shelter's guardian, the result was far beyond their expectations.
Among the ordinary people, a trend of supporting, even believing in, Zheng Yi actually emerged. This trend was led by the women Zhu Lanyuan had previously rescued. Furthermore, because Zheng Yi and Yu Yinan provided free flames and hot water to the ordinary people every day during the extreme cold, most of them had an excellent impression of the two. Guardian? The affairs of the shelter's upper management and ability users were too distant for ordinary people like them. They didn't care who was guarding the shelter, only who was guarding and protecting them.
Among the ability users, Zhu Lanyuan was the first to show support after hearing the news, even declaring that she was willing to accept challenges on Zheng Yi's behalf. According to her, "If you can't even beat me, what right do you have to challenge her?"
Initially, just Zhu Lanyuan alone wouldn't have seemed that incredible to the other ability users. Even with her entire squad's support, it was only a few people. But then, Lian Langxi also stepped forward with her entire squad.
After them came Zhao Haiyue. As the person in charge of managing the ability users, she didn't shy away from showing her stance. After Zhu Lanyuan and Lian Langxi had spoken out, she couldn't sit still any longer and raised the banner of support for Zheng Yi. The tide of support built up bit by bit. After seeing the shelter's promotion, Xu Lanjun would also say with a smile, "Zheng Yi? She's a good child. She will definitely shoulder such a great responsibility well."
The children at the school, the ability user in charge of the water station who had witnessed Zheng Yi effortlessly provide water daily…
When an unconvinced ability user finally did issue a challenge, Zheng Yi effortlessly condensed a high-pressure water blade directly behind her opponent in an instant. The opponent didn't even realize they could have been killed at any moment!
In a challenge that lasted less than three minutes, broadcast in detail and from all angles on the large screen, Zheng Yi demonstrated at least a dozen ways to easily and directly kill her opponent, but she never struck. After three minutes, she used her overwhelming mental power to control the blood flow inside her opponent's body through their skin and flesh, causing them to become short of breath and dizzy. The opponent, desperate and terrified, shouted their surrender.
The next few who still didn't know what was good for them and wanted to try naturally met the same fate. Zheng Yi wouldn't kill them. Even if she wounded them to the brink of death, she could immediately save them with her healing ability. After "sparring" with six "courageous" challengers in this manner, there were no more objections to her being the shelter's guardian.
"…That was hardly a spar." The shelter's upper management rewatched the battle recordings, unable to hold back a low, trembling sigh. This thought had lingered in their minds when they witnessed the fight firsthand, but only now, gathered together and with Zheng Yi absent, did they dare to whisper it aloud. "She was just playing, wasn't she."
Teasing, toying? Like people catching crickets and putting them in a jar to poke at, or like a well-fed beast catching weak prey to amuse itself and pass the time.
Effortless, superior, almost crushingly dominant… it was just a game to her.
How terrifying.
The number one person in the apocalypse?
Gradually, Zheng Yi began to receive Saint Points from various people. The earnings came in one by one. The amounts were relatively average, usually around 5 points. There were also many who only gave one or two points, likely because they acknowledged her as a Saint due to the propaganda but didn't fully approve.
In return, every time Zheng Yi boiled free hot water, she would add two bottles of tasteless nutrient solution, which could be considered a way to increase the ordinary people's chances of surviving the extreme cold.
With such widespread and massive publicity, almost everyone in the shelter now knew of Zheng Yi. As Zheng Yi became famous, the fire ability user who was always by her side, Yu Yinan, naturally entered the public eye as well. Zheng Yi and Yu Yinan didn't deliberately hide their intimacy. With Zheng Yi's strength as a deterrent, even if someone had other ideas, they wouldn't dare act presumptuously in front of them. However, there was still one person in the entire shelter who went mad.
Yu Yinan had almost completely cut ties with her past and had forgotten about that person. It wasn't until she was with Zheng Yi again, heating up the camp and boiling water with her fire ability, that the person rushed over, crazed and shrieking shrilly. Only then did Yu Yinan suddenly remember: Oh, that person is still in the shelter.
When they left that time, Zheng Yi had paid three months' rent for her in Yu Yaozu's name, so she wouldn't have to worry about accommodation for three months. It seemed she had also worked hard to earn a lot of contribution points; otherwise, she wouldn't have been able to survive the high temperatures and heavy rains to live safely until now.
"Bitch! Bitch! It's all your fault, all your fault! Give me back my son, give me back my Yaozu… Sob… sob… My Yaozu, my…"
Yu Yaozu. It felt like she hadn't heard that name in a very, very long time. Hearing it so suddenly, Yu Yinan was a bit dazed. She blinked slowly, as if processing the woman's words, then glanced at Zheng Yi before turning back to the crazed woman. "Yu Yaozu, didn't he run away on his own? Because you two offended Lian Langxi, he was afraid of dying, so he abandoned you and fled."
"Nonsense! Nonsense!" The woman instantly became agitated, as if a sore spot had been hit. Her face flushed red as she roared, "He would never abandon me! My son, my Yaozu… he was the most obedient, the best-behaved, the most promising… It's your fault, all of you! Every single one of you is a bitch! I never should have given birth to you! I should have strangled you back then, I should have…"
"How did I let you escape… and that meddling bitch back then…"
She screamed curses like she'd lost her mind, cursing Yu Yinan, cursing herself, cursing that homeroom teacher from back then, cursing her dead, useless, and pretentious husband. She had so much resentment to vent. After one round of cursing, she started pointing at Yu Yinan's nose, calling her a bitch for getting involved with another woman, shameless, calling her a lowly slut.
The scene instantly spiraled out of control. Zheng Yi watched from the side with a cold gaze, her arms crossed. Even when the woman's curses were directed at her, it didn't stir any emotion in her. Many of the surrounding ordinary people, however, couldn't stand to listen anymore. In their eyes, Yu Yinan and Zheng Yi were the best people imaginable; other ability users wouldn't spare the time to care about the lives of ordinary folk! If not for these two, they didn't know how they would have endured this extreme cold period.
But when they spoke up, not only did the woman in the middle show no fear or intention of stopping, she started cursing everyone. There were no substantive accusations, just a torrent of curses like "scum," "trash," "lowlife," "whore," "bitch," and so on, mixed with words about genitals and "parents," never stopping.
Yu Yinan hadn't wanted to bother with this person. Although this was her mother in name, she had never given her any warmth. With Zheng Yi's help, she had come to see through everything that happened later. When she said she was cutting ties, she meant it. Now, seeing this woman acting so crazed, she couldn't say she felt hatred; instead, she found her rather pitiful.
But this mother never stopped. When someone stepped forward to lead her away and calm her down, she shrieked madly, pulled a fruit knife from her clothes, and began swinging it wildly. "Don't touch me! You're not allowed to touch me! If you have the guts, kill me! Go on, kill me! You ungrateful wolf… Guardian of the shelter… Pfft, you think you can be a hero? Kill me! Let everyone see you kill your own birth mother with your own hands!"
"…What's there not to see?" Yu Yinan sighed. Since Zheng Yi didn't intervene, it meant she had to resolve this herself. Besides, this matter had started because of her, so she shouldn't trouble Zheng Yi with it anymore. As for her feelings… Yu Yinan looked at the woman, whose hair had already turned half-white in just six months, with a complicated expression, unable to describe what she was feeling at that moment.
Mother, Mom. Perhaps she could watch her father die without batting an eye, and she hadn't felt much grief when she heard the news of him turning into a zombie and dying, but she had indeed desperately craved even a tiny bit of maternal love from the role of "mother."
"You can curse me and hate me like this all you want. I have no relationship with you anymore. Even if I committed matricide, what does it matter? This is the apocalypse. How are you going to punish me?" Yu Yinan's voice was steady, betraying little emotion. She looked at the woman, her voice softening considerably. With a slight smile, she continued, "Yu Yaozu didn't abandon you and run away. He's already dead."
"You're right. Your precious son loved you so much, how could he possibly abandon you to run away and live on his own? He died a long time ago. I killed him myself. I coated my blade in flames and cut off his head with a single strike. When the high heat touched his skin, it made a sizzling sound. Oh, and there was a smell of roasted meat."
"He died a very painful death. I tortured him for a long time. He screamed miserably, constantly begging me to spare him. But I didn't. I found someone to heal his wounds with their ability, then I viciously stabbed my blade into his palms, thighs, and ribs, sliced off his flesh, and made cuts on his arms, almost skinning him… but then I healed him again. I only killed him when I got tired."
"I was also the one who paid your three months' rent. I faked the information about him leaving the shelter, which is why Lian Langxi couldn't find him when she went after him."
"He's been dead as a doornail for a long time~ His ashes were buried in the botanical garden. I doubt there's anything left of them now, right?"
Yu Yinan's tone was extremely gentle, and she strove to make her description detailed. She had been with Zheng Yi for a long time and had managed to grasp some of the essence of Zheng Yi's various facades.
But when Yu Yinan admitted to killing Yu Yaozu, agreeing with the woman that he hadn't abandoned her, the mother's face became even uglier and more desperate. She shrieked uncontrollably, "No, no, no! No-impossible, impossible, impossible!"
"Yaozu isn't dead, Yaozu isn't dead! My Yaozu can't be dead! You're lying! You're lying to me! Yaozu isn't dead… Yaozu isn't dead…"
She fell hard to the ground and scrambled back up wretchedly, her disheveled hair making her look even more crazed. Tears streamed from her eyes, starkly visible on her dust-covered face. Luckily, the temperature inside the shed was relatively high; if she were outside, her tears would have probably frozen into beads of ice.
"Impossible… you're ly… no… Yaozu…"
But she paid no mind to any of this. When she staggered to her feet again, her eyes were vacant, no longer looking at Yu Yinan. She even stopped cursing, her muttering devoid of its earlier force. It was as if all her spirit had been drained in an instant. Her body struggled weakly, powerlessly, as she rushed headlong out of the shed.
The woman was gone.
Yu Yinan watched her retreating back. The door, which she had stumbled into, was left open, and a cold wind rushed in. She pressed her lips together, walked forward, and closed the door properly. Then, in silence, she continued using her ability to raise the temperature inside the room.
No one in the room dared to make a sound.
When it was all over, Zheng Yi took Yu Yinan's hand and led her out of the shed. As they walked back to rest in the blizzard, Yu Yinan faced the wind and snow and suddenly said, "I'm afraid she won't live much longer."
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