What Pangu Project? Just a Dying Fantasy

"After Dawn City's army discovered Shelter 189, they sent troops to Black Mountain multiple times to clear it out. The mutated beasts here either died or fled, naturally reducing the danger by a great deal. Otherwise, I wouldn't have dared come here."

Bai Ye nodded. That explained it. The mutated beast attack on Gray Soil Town had ultimately been Dawn City's fault.

"Then why haven't we seen Dawn City's troops along the way?"

Gao Bancheng smiled. "Because most of the troops have withdrawn."

"Withdrawn?"

"Mobilizing an army is no simple matter. Food alone is enough to give people a headache. And Black Mountain's dangers aren't limited to the mutated beasts out in the open—there are venomous insects, poisonous miasma, and more. Those invisible threats are the deadliest.

"Dawn City may be powerful, but it can't inject every soldier with genetic drugs. At the end of the day, even trained soldiers are only ordinary people. They can drive away mutated beasts with guns and ammunition, but surviving in Black Mountain for long periods is difficult for them.

"I heard Dawn City had been unable to open Shelter 189's doors for a long time. Then they made too much of a commotion, causing the news to leak. Forces from all sides, even extraordinary organizations, bounty hunters, and the like, came swarming in. Everyone wants a share of what's inside the shelter.

"Dawn City has Apocalypse Technology Corporation behind it. Though powerful, it can't offend everyone at once. So they stopped blockading Black Mountain, leaving only a group of elite experts here to wait for an opportunity."

At this point, a trace of mockery surfaced on Gao Bancheng's face. "If you ask me, Apocalypse Corporation clearly knows it can't open the shelter's doors, so it's letting capable people from all over North Mang come here and use their strength to open it. Once those doors open, that's when Apocalypse Corporation will bare its fangs.

"After all, Black Mountain lies within Apocalypse Corporation's sphere of influence. Unless the major factions tear off all pretenses and truly start an all-out war, who can possibly outcompete them on their own turf?"

Bai Ye's gaze flickered. He hadn't expected this rich fat man to have some brains. That was indeed Apocalypse Corporation's plan, and he had long learned it from Ying.

Back then, Ying had said that only Tyrant Yang Jie could open Shelter 189. Then, after the doors opened, he would snipe Yang Jie.

"Since you know Apocalypse Corporation's scheme, why did you still come wade into these muddy waters?"

Gao Bancheng chuckled. Riding on Xiao Kui's back, he was jostled so hard that the fat on his face trembled. "Apocalypse Corporation's goal is the Pangu Project. They won't care too much about the other things in the shelter. Every faction has sent people to Black Mountain. Surely they can't slaughter everyone over a few trifles?

"In other words, as long as we don't try to get our hands on the Pangu Project, we won't come into direct conflict with Apocalypse Corporation."

"You're quite open-minded. You can even resist the temptation of the Pangu Project?"

"Heh heh heh... What Pangu Project? In my opinion, it's all a rumor. Brother Bai, do you know how many times the Pangu Project has supposedly surfaced?"

Bai Ye froze. "How many times?"

Gao Bancheng held up five chubby fingers. "Five times!"

What the fuck!?

Bai Ye's heart instantly sank halfway. If there was no Pangu USB Drive in Black Mountain, hadn't he wasted all this time for nothing?

"A full five times. This thing is a huge scam. Shelter 112, Shelter 134, Shelter 181, and two others I can't remember. Anyway, whenever those shelters surfaced, people claimed they contained the Pangu Project. And what happened? It was all bullshit!

"If you ask me, the Pangu Project doesn't exist at all. It was merely a dying fantasy of people from the civilization era.

"If the Pangu Project truly possessed the power to create heaven and earth as the rumors claimed, how could the civilization era have perished?"

The other half of Bai Ye's heart went cold as well. He even felt Gao Bancheng made sense. In an era where civilization had shattered, the decision-makers might indeed have fabricated a lie called hope in order to preserve humanity's embers.

Wait. Even if the Pangu Project was fake, the Pangu USB Drive should be real, right? People from the civilization era couldn't possibly have failed to preserve that precious knowledge.

He let out a breath. There was still a sliver of hope.

"People ahead!" Li Baitian, who was scouting at the front, suddenly lowered his body and signaled for everyone to keep quiet.

People?

Bai Ye followed the others over. Encountering people in Black Mountain wasn't strange. They were already close to Shelter 189, so there would naturally be more and more people.

"Two groups are facing off," Li Baitian said quietly. The experienced bounty hunter somehow produced a pair of tactical binoculars and began observing in silence.

"One group has eight people, all dressed uniformly. They should belong to the same bounty hunter team. The other group... has only one person, a young man carrying four swords on his back."

"Let me see." Bai Ye took the binoculars. The others were curious too, but because of Li You's intimidating presence, they could only let Bai Ye look first.

With the binoculars, Bai Ye quickly spotted the two groups Li Baitian had described. The young man carrying four swords held a ginseng root in his hand, still stained with fresh dirt. He had probably dug it up not long ago.

The other group of eight had their guns aimed at the young man. Both sides seemed to be saying something.

Bai Ye roughly read their lips. It seemed they were fighting over the ginseng.

"Brother Bai, let me have a look too." Gao Bancheng looked impatient, like a nosy bystander eager to watch the drama.

Bai Ye handed him the binoculars and told everyone, "They seem to have found a ginseng root in Black Mountain and started a dispute over it."

At that moment, Gao Bancheng exclaimed, "I know that man carrying four swords. He's the Swordbearer, Xiao Yi!"

Li Xiao narrowed his eyes, a dangerous cold glint flashing within them. "The extraordinary individual with an eighty-five-million bounty from the East Continent Federation? The Swordbearer, Xiao Yi?"

Gao Bancheng nodded, looking somewhat excited. No one knew what he was so excited about. He handed the binoculars to Li Xiao. "That's him!"

Eighty-five million!?

Li You, who had been pretending to be an expert the whole time, nearly lost his composure at that astronomical figure. If Bai Ye hadn't coughed softly beside him as a reminder, his entire persona might have collapsed.

Bai Ye was no stranger to the East Continent Federation Gao Bancheng had mentioned. More precisely, anyone living in this wasteland knew of the East Continent Federation.

The continent they lived on was East Continent.

The East Continent Federation was East Continent's highest governing body, an institution jointly established by the various factions to maintain balance.

It appeared supreme, but its control over different regions was in fact extremely loose. The major factions each ruled as kings in their own domains.

As for bounties, they were an open scheme specifically implemented by the East Continent Federation to divide and control extraordinary individuals, genetic modifiers, and other beings possessing immense force who refused to submit.

Since ancient times, martial artists had defied the law through force. In this era of great catastrophe, extraordinary individuals and genetic modifiers were even more so. To stabilize its rule, the Federation had established a series of strict regulations for such people: they could not profit from extraordinary abilities, could not display them before ordinary people, had to submit to supervision every month...

Anyone who violated the regulations would have a bounty placed on them.