A New Day (Seeking Collection)

The next morning, Gu Su slowly opened his eyes in the tent.

The simple wooden bed was indeed hard, making his back sore.

But last night, he had replaced all the dry grass on the bed with the downy feathers he'd taken from the Harpy's nest. The soft feathers wrapped around him, dispelling the night's chill. He'd slept quite comfortably, even his fatigue had largely vanished.

Recalling last night, after finishing the tasks of nourishing the Twisted Tree, setting up the cultivation rack, and marking the empty graves, he had fallen asleep almost immediately, without a second thought.

In the middle of the night, he'd vaguely heard rustling sounds outside the tent, like the footsteps of patrolling skeletons or the movement of branches. However, there were no jarring noises, and it didn't disturb his rest at all.

It was clear his subordinates, the skeletons, were truly reliable, guarding the territory tightly and preventing any anomalies from getting close.

Gu Su stretched, loosening his stiff muscles. His bones let out a few soft cracks.

Then, he lifted the tent flap and slowly walked out.

As soon as he stepped out, he ran into the returning team.

The skeleton squad sent to the marketplace to gather materials was pushing a pickup truck loaded with supplies, entering through the graveyard gate.

Five skeletons, with their stiff, synchronized gait, pushed the pickup truck steadily forward. There was no hesitation. The supplies in the truck bed were piled high, almost overflowing, even the front of the truck was packed full.

Gu Su walked up and took a glance. Besides the metal, wood, and stone he had specifically asked them to collect, there were many things he hadn't anticipated. They were jumbled together but arranged somewhat neatly.

Just in the front of the truck, he saw several relatively intact plastic chairs. The seats were covered in a thin layer of dust but were undamaged and still usable.

Next to them was squeezed a plastic mannequin, the kind used in clothing stores to display clothes. Its head was tilted askew, one arm broken off beside it, and it was covered in dirt. It looked inexplicably eerie, yet it had been placed carefully in a prominent position, protected from bumps.

A bag of weeds, leaves, and flowers hung from the mannequin's hand, with the grass and roots clearly sorted.

Gu Su blinked, then understood. These were herbs.

He hadn't instructed the skeletons to bring back any of these items, yet they were all packed and brought back, not a single scrap left behind.

Gu Su raised an eyebrow, muttering to himself.

It seemed there had been some changes within the skeleton squad. Otherwise, with their usual rigid nature, they would never have brought back anything extraneous.

He looked around the territory, and the more he looked, the more differences he noticed.

In just one night, the graveyard had expanded again, now a solid acre in size. It was significantly larger than the initial basketball-court-sized graveyard.

The Withered Woods also showed new activity. Two more withered trees had appeared among the sparse ones. Their bare branches pointed straight at the ground, their bark dry and cracked, exuding a faint aura of death. Clearly, even during the night, the Corrupting Mycelium hadn't been idle, continuously expanding the territory and increasing the withered trees.

At the same time, beneath the withered trees, several logs had appeared. These were the logs generated daily by the Withered Woods, but no one had processed them yet.

Meanwhile, under the Twisted Tree not far from the tent, there were also changes.

Many branches of various sizes and lengths were stuck into the ground beneath the tree, arranged artfully. Each branch was hung with skinned rats, snakes, or lizards. The bodies still held a slight residual warmth, clearly having been processed recently.

With Gu Su's eyesight, he could clearly see faint black mist slowly rising from the bodies of these creatures, like wisps of smoke, being gradually absorbed by the branches of the Twisted Tree, replenishing the vitality lost during its previous repair.

The branches of the Twisted Tree also looked more lustrous than yesterday. Its dark leaves rustled slightly, and he could even feel a faint, weak breeze causing the seeds of the Giant Lily to drift about.

Looking at the branches of the Twisted Tree, several fist-sized crows, their bodies reduced to mere bone, cocked their bare heads and stared intently at him. A faint red light glowed deep within their black eye sockets, but they remained motionless, behaving very obediently.

Gu Su blinked, then understood. These were the new troops he had marked in the empty graves in the Withered Woods yesterday.

Scout White Crows. He hadn't expected them to hatch overnight.

His gaze shifted to the area near the wall. Several rough wooden poles formed a simple frame, on which several animal hides were stretched and hung to dry. The hides were scraped clean, free of impurities, and carefully flattened. They swayed gently in the breeze.

The method of drying the hides was neat and skillful, definitely not something he had taught the skeletons.

Skeletons always followed orders rigidly; they wouldn't perform such meticulous tasks.

These repeated anomalies made Gu Su ponder, his mind filled with questions.

What exactly had happened last night? How had the territory changed so much while he slept?

The skeleton squad, the Twisted Tree, the White Crows, and the drying hides—everything felt off.

Gu Su suppressed his doubts and walked up to the skeleton squad that had just returned. He pointed to the plastic chairs and the mannequin on the pickup truck and asked with a hint of curiosity in his voice, "Why did you think of bringing these things back? I didn't instruct you to."

As he spoke, Gu Su reached out, wanting to read the skeletons' information.

The skeleton at the very front immediately stopped and made a strange sound, responding to Gu Su's question first: "Bone Ash said these things might be useful, so he told us to pack them all up and bring them back."

"Bone Ash?" Gu Su was stunned, a look of surprise on his face. He had never heard the name before, and his confusion deepened.

What surprised Gu Su even more was, had the skeletons gained intelligence?

When did they start talking? Were they no longer mindless skeletons?

The skeleton maintained its expressionless appearance and slowly added, "Bone Ash is the squad leader of our skeleton team."

At these words, Gu Su finally understood.

He had forgotten that once the graveyard population was full, one undead would automatically be promoted to squad leader to command the team and assist in executing orders.

It seemed this "Bone Ash" was the newly promoted squad leader.

With this realization, Gu Su's confusion eased slightly, and he pressed further, "Then where is he now?"

"Reporting, sir, Bone Ash is currently exploring the third level of the marketplace and asked us to bring the supplies back first," the skeleton replied truthfully, its tone unwavering. It was clear it only knew these details and couldn't say more.

Gu Su nodded, already formulating a plan. He instructed the skeleton, "Alright, I understand.

When you go back later, tell Bone Ash to come back."

"Yes, sir," the skeleton nodded stiffly.