Lacking an Opportunity

"Master, should we tell Grandpa about this?" Li Ke asked.

The off-road vehicle drove south towards the rising sun.

They left City No. 18 all alone, then encountered the Freemasons, had a brief period of excitement, and then set off again alone.

It's like a journey through life; everyone experiences hustle and bustle, and then returns to solitude.

The road ahead is always your own; all good things must come to an end.

Qing Chen thought for a moment and said, "Don't tell him. The old man doesn't have much time left, so let's not let him know about his friend's death."

"Hmm," Li Ke replied after thinking for a moment.

In fact, Qing Chen had no right to make decisions for the old man, but he was indeed worried that the old man would not live to see the Forbidden Zone No. 002 after learning the bad news.

In the evening, the old man finally regained full consciousness.

By this time, Hu Xiaoniu was exhausted, so Qing Chen took over driving. Although he was a novice driver, he drove with exceptional skill...

The off-road vehicle moved steadily across the wilderness.

In the distance, the sunset glowed, and all around were plains and wilderness. The whole world seemed to be coated with a layer of orange-red oil paint, magnificent yet desolate.

Li Ke helped the old man up from the back row and fed him a little warm water from a thermos.

Qing Chen suddenly couldn't help but ask, "Grandpa, how did you and your friend meet?"

He looked up at the rearview mirror and found the old man was stunned.

The old man asked, "You've seen him, haven't you?"

Qing Chen was silent for a moment, then said, "Mm."

"You saw him, but you didn't want to tell me, so he's dead," the old man said, offering his guess.

Silence fell over the car.

The old man thought for a moment and said, "You didn't tell me because you were worried that I wouldn't be able to make it to Forbidden Zone No. 002 if I heard the bad news about my old friend, right?"

"Yes," Qing Chen nodded.

"Don't worry, I'm not that fragile," the old man said. "Besides, I've seen far too many partings in my life."

"You seem to know he's going to die," Qing Chen said.

"Let me tell you how we met," the old man said with a smile. "Back then, I wasn't as old as I am now, and I especially liked to go out through the secret passage of the Autumn Leaf Villa. One time, I went to my usual bar, which was holding a beer-drinking contest."

"That night, most of the people in the bar were drunk, and in the end, only the two of us were left," the old man recalled, looking at the sunset. "Later, we got drunk too, and I don't remember what happened next. According to Li Yunjing, the two of us went to the Red Star Boxing Gym and said we wanted to fight in a ranking match together. We smashed a lot of their things. I didn't have any money in my pocket at the time, and it was Li Yunjing who helped me pay the boxing gym some money so that we wouldn't get beaten up."

"From then on, whenever I secretly went out drinking, I would often invite him along, and then we would do some really outrageous things. Looking back now, that was probably one of the few happy times in my life."

"When did you find out he was a member of the God Era?" Qing Chen asked.

"Actually, I found out the following year. Li Yunjing followed him for three months and discovered some clues," the old man said. "However, I didn't expose him, and he never reported my itinerary to Shendai. It seems that as long as everyone pretends to be a little convincing, we can continue to be friends."

The old man continued, "In the third year, his mother fell seriously ill, but the Kamishiro Family refused to let him return to the north. He was very depressed during that time, and I knew why he was depressed, so I took the initiative to give him an important piece of information. This gave him a position and the right to make demands on the family."

"He went back to the north to accompany his mother through her final days, and when he returned to City No. 18, he confessed everything to me," the old man said with a smile. "He felt particularly guilty at the time, so I took the opportunity to make him drink eight cups of wine as punishment. This time, I won the drinking contest."

"It was from that time on that he kept telling me to take advantage of him once, so that he could feel a little better."

"But I know that he has already decided in his heart that as long as I use him once, he can choose to die without any remorse, so that he won't have to suffer the torment of family loyalty and friendship. Lu Doujun is different from those people in the Kamishiro Family. Sometimes I think, it's so rare for that filthy family to produce someone like Lu Doujun."

"So you know that after using him this time, he will definitely die," Qing Chen said softly, "Then why use him in the first place?"

The old man smiled and said, "You might be looking for a philosophical answer, or one that would restore my reputation, but my answer is simple: I am the head of the Li family."

Qing Chen remained silent.

Because he was the head of the Li family, he was willing to be "imprisoned" in the Banshan Manor for the rest of his life.

Because he is the head of the Li clan, he wants to take the best opportunity to eliminate the person who has the best chance of becoming a demigod in recent years.

There is never a perfect solution in this world, neither for Kamishiro Riku nor for Li Xiurui.

"Qing Chen," the old man said with a smile, "I envy you knights because you are never bound by worldly conventions. So, never follow my example."

As Qing Chen looked up, he suddenly saw two lines of tears streaming down the old man's face in the rearview mirror, yet he was still smiling.

"Grandpa, is this world really that complicated?" Qing Chen asked inexplicably.

"No, if you live simply, the world will be simple," the old man replied. "Young man, I don't have the power to make the world change its rules for me, but I hope you do."

Return countdown: 31:00:00.

5 PM.

Inside the SUV, Qing Chen saw once again the magnificent giant tree, standing like a pillar supporting the sky in the center of the Forbidden Zone 002.

No matter how many times he has seen it, Qing Chen is always deeply moved when he sees it again.

Just then, Hu Xiaoniu suddenly exclaimed, "Brother Chen, it looks like a colorful tail is trailing down from the canopy of that big tree!"

Qing Chen looked over and, sure enough, a tail fin over ten meters long trailed outside the tree canopy, while the other's body was hidden inside the canopy.

The old man, wrapped in his sleeping bag, stared blankly. "So what he said was all true."

This "he" was Li Shutong's teacher and the old man's close friend.

Decades ago, when that friend described the wonders of the outside world to the old man, the old man always felt that the friend was lying to him, because even the Federation Group Army had never taken any relevant photos, nor had they found such magical creatures.

All of this was like a dream that the old man had cherished for decades, which he had finally come to see today.

The old man was so engrossed in watching it that he became somewhat mesmerized.

The next moment, a shadow drifted in from the sky, completely enveloping the moving SUV.

Hu Xiaoniu peeked out and was stunned. A huge Azure Falcon was circling overhead, its wingspan giving the illusion of blotting out the sky.

A cry.

Qing Chen was stunned for a moment.

Because he actually understood what the other person meant. "You're back so soon? Where's that old bastard Li Shutong?"

Qing Chen thought for a moment and shouted to the sky, "My master has gone to the north, and this time I have brought a new knight."

Azure Falcon cried out again, "Are we going to have two more annoying brats? Don't bring out so many knights. Too many knights will just cause trouble."

Qing Chen: "..."

It seems that after becoming a knight, he met the containment conditions of Forbidden Zone No. 002, and he could even understand the meaning conveyed by the creatures in that Forbidden Zone.

Azure Falcon ignored the off-road vehicle and flew back to Forbidden Zone No. 002.

The old man asked with curiosity, "Is this Azure Falcon?"

"Yes," Qing Chen nodded, "I have a pretty good relationship with the knight."

The old man asked again, "It seems to be talking to you, can you understand it?"

Qing Chen nodded. "Yes."

"What did it say?"

"It says welcome the knight home."

The old man remarked with envy, "This falcon is quite hospitable."

The SUV drove toward the big tree, but Qing Chen slowed down after a short while.

"What's wrong?" the old man asked.

"There's a convoy parked outside Forbidden Zone No. 002," Qing Chen said. "There are Freemason vehicles and Federation Group Army vehicles."

In total, there are probably over a hundred cars, making the area outside Forbidden Zone No. 002 look like an expanded parking lot.

The Freemasons' vehicles were dilapidated, clearly having been through a fierce battle; they must have been driven into Forbidden Zone No. 002 by the Federation Group Army.

Qing Chen said to Hu Xiaoniu, "Look out over the wilderness for any spent bullet casings."

"Yes," Hu Xiaoniu replied, "And the shell casings are quite densely packed, so it looks like a battle has taken place."

At the Federation Group Army's parking area, dozens of people were on guard near the vehicles, and the enemy immediately raised their weapons when they noticed the vehicles approaching.

"I saw their unit number. It should be the 198th Division of the Federation Second Army Group. That's the Chen family's elite force," the old man said. "The South has always been the Chen family's private territory. Spade's help to the Wilderness People and Time Walker rebuild their homes here will inevitably provoke them."

"Most of them should have already chased them into Forbidden Zone No. 002," Qing Chen asked doubtfully. "Isn't it said that the Federation Group Army doesn't usually enter Forbidden Zone to hunt down Wilderness People?"

He remembered very clearly that Ding Dong's mother was driven into the Forbidden Zone by the Federation Group Army, which allowed her to escape the pursuit and eventually give birth to a new life in the Forbidden Zone.

At that time, the Federation Group Army was stuck on the edge.

Without a mission like Qing Huai's, no one would idly enter the Forbidden Zone.

The old man said, "This Forbidden Zone No. 002 is located on Chen's territory. They know this place quite well. In the early years, Chen used prisoners to test the rules of the Forbidden Zone."

"Wait, can prisoners be taken out of the prison?" Qing Chen asked curiously. Yi shouldn't allow such a thing to happen.

"They weren't already in jail," the old man explained. "They used the PCE Security Committee to arrest the suspects, then instead of bringing charges, they directly imprisoned them in Chen's secret prison to await further use."

Qing Chen was stunned for a moment. Private punishment?

Sure enough, humans will always find various ways to evade Artificial Intelligence.

Since Artificial Intelligence is so impartial, why not just not send prisoners to Artificial Intelligence- controlled prisons, but instead set up secret prisons?

The old man thought for a moment and said, "We have no grudge against them. The car also has the Qing family's logo on it. They shouldn't bother us. We can just go around them."

However, no sooner had the old man finished speaking than Qing Chen took out "Winning People Over with Conquer by Virtue" and fired a shot at the Federation Group Army's convoy.

The group of Chen's direct troops immediately got into their vehicles and gave chase.

The old man was bewildered. "What are you doing?"

Qing Chen did not answer. He did this simply because he remembered what Li Shutong had said when he first climbed the Green Mountain Cliff: "You are still missing an opportunity."

Now, Hu Xiaoniu and Li Ke are also lacking an opportunity.

There will be another chapter at 11 PM.