False Happiness, Real Adults!

Talent?

As he rode the bus home, Cheng Ye rubbed his aching ribs, abdomen, arms, and thighs.

All right, there really wasn't a single spot that didn't hurt.

"How is this talent? This is all my sweat and hard work!"

A smile tugged at Cheng Ye's lips.

It was painful, but he enjoyed it.

Compared to making no progress day after day, if a little pain could make him this much stronger, what was a little more pain?

Still, he secretly resolved to find a skill that would let him recover quickly as soon as possible.

Otherwise, even if his combat power increased, he'd only be a five-second hero. After one fight, he'd need half a day to recover.

"Besides, getting dragged into the direct conflict between the East and West Factions this early is really bad for me."

Thinking of this made Cheng Ye grit his teeth in frustration.

Garcia was a complete idiot. He had no brains and let someone else use him as a weapon, yet he still had to drag Cheng Ye into the spotlight with him.

And now look where that had gotten him. Liu Bi had beaten him into emergency care. Who at the Checkpoint would stand up for him? Who would dare?

Liu Bi had the entire East Faction behind him, including Station Chief Ding Yishan!

Deputy Station Chief Halin? Would he dare send someone to beat Liu Bi into the infirmary, too?

Or would he send someone to beat Cheng Ye until he was like Garcia?

Impossible. That would only give Ding Yishan more ammunition to make trouble and seize back even more control.

After all, the West Faction might be powerful now, but it wasn't powerful enough to ride roughshod over the East Faction.

As long as Ding Yishan remained Station Chief, the West Faction could only gradually eat away at the East Faction's influence and build up support for Halin. They absolutely wouldn't bring things into the open and start a direct conflict.

Only when their positions switched—Halin becoming Station Chief and Ding Yishan becoming Deputy Station Chief—would the situation change significantly.

"Forget it. Why am I thinking about all this?"

"Brother B was right. No amount of conspiracies and tricks matters as much as hard power. If I'd been strong enough to string Garcia up and beat him, none of this would've happened today."

For now, the most important thing to Cheng Ye was the Field Mission in half a month. As long as he survived, he'd have plenty of time to figure out how to turn the Factional Struggle to his advantage.

Cheng Ye took a couple of deep breaths, pushed thoughts of the factional squabbles from his mind, and looked out the window.

As expected, the rain was starting to come down harder. Puddles had already formed along the roadside.

Xingfu City's Buffer Zone was larger than those of other Sanctuary Cities, but so many survivors had recently arrived to join it that it had already exceeded its maximum capacity.

Looking beneath the eaves of the roadside buildings for shelter from the wind and rain, he saw Canvas Tents everywhere. Inside, people were packed shoulder to shoulder, their faces numb and their eyes dull. There wasn't a trace of hope for the future, much less any sign of the so-called "happiness."

"Happiness. It's fake."

Cheng Ye suddenly remembered Edmund, who had kept murmuring those words even as he collapsed the day before.

Perhaps happiness existed in this Sanctuary City, but it certainly didn't belong to these Bottom Layer residents.

Only by fighting their way inside the High Wall and entering the Inner City could they feel even a little of the peace and stability of a chaotic age.

Vrrm.

Before long, the bus began to slow, then stopped five stops short of the Electronics Factory Staff Residential Area.

The Middle-aged Driver turned to the passengers and called out:

"Sorry, the flood defenses in the Main Urban Area have blocked the bus route. Everyone will need to get off here and walk the rest of the way."

The doors opened, and Cheng Ye got off with the others.

Less than a hundred meters ahead of the bus stop, sandbags blocked the road, leaving only a narrow opening for people to pass through.

Four armed guards stood on either side of the gap, along with two Buffer Zone staff members.

"Sir, the flood defenses mean we have to strictly control the number of people entering. After eight p.m., anyone entering the Main Urban Area must show proof that they live there."

That strict?

Cheng Ye was surprised, but quickly understood why.

The Main Urban Area was formed by the intersection of three Central Pedestrian Streets from the Old Era. Residential buildings, housing complexes, malls, and shops were all crammed together, and the drainage system was already badly outdated. If refugees were allowed to pour in all at once, then in the event of severe flooding, they wouldn't be able to clear out the water.

By controlling the crowds in advance, they could restore order quickly even if the area flooded.

When it was Cheng Ye's turn, he didn't take out his room key and wait for them to verify it. Instead, he pulled the Checkpoint identification badge straight from his pocket.

It was a round badge, with the image of Xingfu City's Giant Wall stamped on the front and a large "Check" character on the back. An embedded sensor chip verified that it was genuine.

"Oh, a sir from the Checkpoint!"

The staff member took it and held it against the Defense Communicator's scanner. The moment the notification appeared, he became extremely respectful.

"The rain may get heavier over the next few days. If you need anything at all, you can use your Defense Communicator to call the Public Works Department. We'll provide emergency assistance around the clock."

"Thank you. I appreciate your hard work."

Cheng Ye nodded, took back his badge, and walked on.

His black raincoat covered most of his face, but the fair skin visible on his forehead still drew envious looks from the refugees huddled in the roadside tents.

There were ranks within the Inner City, and the Buffer Zone was no different.

Though it was only a little over ten kilometers long, it was divided into the outer suburbs, inner suburbs, urban districts, and Main Urban Area.

Cheng Ye was so young and lived in the Main Urban Area. He could definitely be called a winner in life.

He passed through the gap and continued down the road.

The buildings in the Main Urban Area were run-down, and the pipes were old, yet there wasn't much standing water along the roadside.

Sandbags were piled in front of every shop along the street, some almost waist-high. Shredded vines had been stuffed into the gaps to plug them.

Every four or five hundred meters, a foreman from the Public Works Department could be seen squatting by a drainage ditch with a few temporary workers. Some repeatedly chipped away at clumps of hardened mud with shovels, while others reached straight into the drains to pull out rubbish lodged in the openings.

An iron Loudspeaker hung around each foreman's neck, rasping out the same message: clear the pipes, face hardship together, and welcome a happy, beautiful life.

The contrast between all this gave Cheng Ye the sudden feeling that this world had gone mad.

Just a sliver of the Inner City technology he'd seen in his predecessor's memories could utterly transform the Buffer Zone.

Yet the High Level had chosen to restrict the spread of technology, leaving the Buffer Zone to limp along amid the decay. The Ordinary Residents living here were kept in a state where they never had enough to eat, yet didn't starve; never had enough to wear, yet didn't freeze to death.

"Without such a stark contrast, nobody would be desperate enough to fight their way into the Inner City."

Cheng Ye saw the same numbness in the foreman's eyes.

Clearly, for people who were just going through the motions, the more they understood the truth, the more hopeless the future seemed.

He hurried through several outer districts. As he neared the center of the Main Urban Area, he saw more foremen and work crews.

Suddenly, Cheng Ye stopped.

Beneath the building at the end of the street corner, which bore a sign reading "Tianyuan Mall," he spotted a somewhat familiar figure among the temporary workers. The man was hauling sandbags with all his might, blocking every point where water might seep into the mall.

A little farther away, a woman huddled with her child beneath a makeshift tent, shielding the child from the rain.

"Now that's a real man."

The large sandbags used to block the water weighed at least seventy kilograms each.

The ordinary workers were so frail that it took two of them to lift a single bag together.

But Chu Yunfeng carried one on each shoulder, looking relaxed, as if he still had strength to spare.

"Too bad they're in the Buffer Zone. One person can't support a whole family just by doing hard labor."

Cheng Ye stood in the shadows at the street corner, watching the crew work for more than ten minutes.

He waited until Chu Yunfeng went to the gathering point behind the mall to fetch more sandbags before approaching the foreman.

"That big guy, the strong one. Where did he come from?"

The middle-aged foreman turned at the question, saw a young man, and frowned, ready to snap at him.

But the next second, a badge spun between Cheng Ye's fingers, and the foreman's expression changed drastically.

"Reporting to sir, he's a refugee who arrived this afternoon. I saw how strong he was, and he'd been asking everyone where he could find work for a meal, so I brought him on."

"He's doing the work of four people. How many workers' wages is he getting?"

"Uh..." The foreman hesitated, trying to guess what the relationship was between Chu Yunfeng and Cheng Ye.

One was a refugee who'd just arrived in the city; the other was a sir from the Checkpoint.

If they had any connection, Chu Yunfeng wouldn't have ended up here doing hard labor.

Having worked that out, the foreman answered honestly. "Reporting to sir, you know the rules for laborers in the city. No matter how many people's work you do, you only get paid for one."

"He's strong, so he has a better chance of being selected for work than the others. It's only fair."

"Pay him for four."

Cheng Ye waved a hand, his tone leaving no room for argument. "If there's a problem, have someone from the Public Works Department come to me."

"Understood, sir."

Cold sweat beaded on the back of the foreman's neck. He hurriedly nodded and agreed.

But even after watching Cheng Ye leave, he didn't dare ask to verify the badge or record his identity.

How could he possibly dare?

As the top institution in the Buffer Zone, the Checkpoint held a firm grip on the lifelines of personnel movement, supply allocation, public works assignments, and Field Missions. Let alone a low-ranking foreman like him—even the head of the Public Works Department had to bow his head before an inspector. Trying to verify Cheng Ye's identity would be practically asking for death.

As for how to explain paying for three extra workers, that was easy. He could simply report it.

After all, in the Buffer Zone, people could lie and embezzle without being killed. But if they tried to pin the blame on an inspector, the matter would be investigated to the end, and heads would roll before it was over.

"Qinghui, son, you must be starving, right?"

Chu Yunfeng opened his coat, revealing five pouches of Nutrient Paste and two pieces of Board Candy wrapped inside. For the first time since entering the city, a faint smile appeared on his usually stern face.

"That merchant we ran into earlier wasn't lying after all. As long as you're willing to work, you really can earn enough to eat in Xingfu City."

"Dad, weren't there only two pouches? H-how did the boss give you so many?"

An adult could still endure hunger, but the child had been so hungry his eyes were seeing stars. Excited, he picked up a piece of Board Candy and crunched away, savoring every bite.

The families of the other workers beneath the shelter couldn't help licking their cracked lips as they watched.

"I'm not sure, either. When the boss first hired me, he said he'd pay by the person. But just now he paid me for four people's work, saying I had plenty of strength and didn't slack off, which made him look good. He was satisfied."

Chu Yunfeng was puzzled.

Normally, he would already have been suspicious, wondering whether there was some scheme behind it.

But everything that had happened throughout the day had left his mind in a mess.

Xingfu City, famous throughout the Wasteland, was full of people whose behavior was completely contradictory. One inspector had insisted on charging an entry fee, nearly driving him to kill the man on the spot. Another had been like a philanthropist from the Old Era, treating them extremely well. Even now, he still couldn't quite believe it.

It had been the same when he'd entered the city and looked for work.

Some foremen had clearly despised him, preferring to hire a group of scrawny refugees who did their work sluggishly and wasted time.

Others, like the boss just now, had treated him extremely well. They'd put him to work after only a few words, then paid him for four workers in the end.

The starkly different treatment made it difficult for Chu Yunfeng's long-practiced Wasteland vigilance to serve him well.

"Yunfeng."

Yu Qinghui beckoned him closer and whispered, "I just saw a young man standing next to the boss. The boss seemed very respectful toward him. I wonder if that has anything to do with it."

She put extra emphasis on "him."

Their unspoken understanding let Chu Yunfeng realize at once which "him" she meant.

"Are you sure? He was wearing a mask this afternoon..."

"I'd say there's an eighty or ninety percent chance. I couldn't see his face, but his build, habits, and posture were all unmistakable. There couldn't be anyone else who matched so many personal traits. Still, there was something strange about it."

"What was strange?" Chu Yunfeng pressed.

"I... I felt like he walked just like you, the way he shifted his weight. I hadn't noticed him at first. He was just so similar that..."

Yu Qinghui stammered as she spoke. She couldn't very well say that he reminded her of the younger, thinner Chu Yunfeng she'd met more than ten years ago. That would have sounded absurd.

"He looked like me?"

Chu Yunfeng was stunned. "I didn't notice this afternoon when he was sitting down. He suddenly helped me out. Could there really be some connection between us?"

"I don't know if I imagined it. It was night, and it was raining..."

Yu Qinghui's explanation only made her sound more evasive.

They had traveled the Wasteland for years and never stopped training. Martial Artists had keen senses—how could they have mistaken what they saw?

Chu Yunfeng fell silent for a moment. He shook his head, then nodded, and finally picked up a pouch of still-warm Nutrient Paste and put it in Yu Qinghui's hand.

"Drink up. Whatever his motives, he's helped us twice. We owe him for that."

"Later, I'll find a way to repay him tenfold."

Then he paused before adding, "For now, the most important thing is finding somewhere to stay before the downpour hits and securing steady work so we can eat. Don't worry about anything else."

Four thousand characters delivered. Thanks to peidajia for the generous 10,000-currency donation—you've been reading my previous book for a long time, and I'm truly grateful for your support. I bow to you! P.S. Please add the book to your collection, keep reading, and vote! Your support really means a lot to me!