Wang Tai moved closer to the starboard side and carefully inspected the repaired hull.
The more he looked, the stranger he felt.
"Qin, why does your repair work look a little rough?"
It was repaired, all right.
It looked fairly sturdy, too, and there probably weren't any gaps that would leak.
But the haphazardly joined planks, the splinters in the wood, the bumps that hadn't been sanded down...
From a distance, it looked flawless. Up close, it was pure Syrian Style.
Qin Mao lowered his head and guiltily rubbed the bridge of his nose.
He gained another bit of understanding about the system.
Luckily, he hadn't bargained too hard earlier, only bringing the price down from 600 to 400.
Otherwise, the repaired boat definitely wouldn't have passed muster.
With a perfectly straight face, he blurted out:
"I told you, I'm in the [Apocalypse Shipwright] Sequence, not the ordinary [Shipwright] one. Anything I repair comes with a post-apocalyptic wasteland style."
Right.
He had already anticipated yesterday that the repairs might turn out less than satisfactory.
The art of speaking lay in always planning ahead and leaving yourself room to maneuver.
"Oh. That makes sense!"
Wang Tai asked no more questions.
Inwardly, though, he labeled Qin Mao:
Young, guileless, and vain.
The Apocalypse Style was one factor, but surely another part of it was that he had repaired two boats in succession, and one night hadn't been enough to fully restore the Transcendent Power he had expended last night!
He himself was also to blame for pushing too hard.
And Qin Mao had insisted on showing off.
As the owner of a small startup before the apocalypse, Wang Tai knew all too well how to deal with inexperienced young men like him.
Pretend to bare your heart, treat him like a brother, and tell him about your entrepreneurial experiences.
After three to five bottles of beer, he was guaranteed to regard you as his closest confidant and become utterly devoted to you!
Qin Mao had also labeled Wang Tai:
Most likely not a Transcendent.
The man was knowledgeable and could rattle off several Sequence names in one breath.
But aside from that gun, he had never demonstrated any Transcendent Power;
When Qin Mao deliberately brought up Transcendents, he deliberately avoided the details;
With another Transcendent aboard, given his personality as a captain with a strong desire for control, there was no way he wouldn't display his Transcendent Power to cement his position as boss...
With just a little thought, Qin Mao came up with a whole host of inconsistencies.
On the surface, the two still chatted cheerfully.
Qin Mao also learned a great deal from Wang Tai about Transcendents and the dangers at sea, finally no longer completely in the dark about the ocean.
But at that moment, there was something Qin Mao didn't know.
Among the survivors in ragged clothes on deck, a venomous gaze fell on him from time to time.
It would stare at him for a while, then shift away as though nothing had happened.
It mingled with the survivors' curious, searching, and admiring gazes toward their new First Mate.
Like a drop of water in the ocean, it went entirely unnoticed.
That afternoon, Wang Tai helped Qin Mao move into a private cabin.
His previous cabin had been on the third level.
Seven or eight survivors had been crammed inside. Not only was it crowded, it smelled terrible.
In the apocalypse, there was no way to bathe whenever and wherever you wanted.
And seawater had far too high a salt concentration.
If you didn't promptly rinse off with fresh water after bathing in seawater, the residual salt would dehydrate your skin, leaving it dry, itchy, and burning.
If you had sunburn, wounds, or allergies, it was twice as uncomfortable and carried a risk of infection.
Qin Mao learned from their conversation that the fresh water produced daily by the Hope's only remaining Solar Still wasn't enough for so many people aboard to bathe.
It could only cover the bare minimum for daily drinking water.
As a result, most survivors aboard the Hope were filthy and disheveled.
Many people's hair had become matted, forcing them to cut it as short as possible for convenience.
As for food, each person's daily ration was three wild fruits, plus one coconut a week.
The catch... was distributed according to the haul and heated on a Solar Cooker before eating.
There were more and more bizarre fish, and only a handful of edible varieties.
Often, what they caught was either a fish with three extra legs, kelp with hair, or a talking crab.
Someone had once become so hungry he couldn't stand it and ended up poisoned after eating some.
His body grew weaker and weaker, and three days later, he died.
Wang Tai had said that when they were lucky, they wouldn't catch a single normal fish for three to five days.
When they were unlucky, they hauled up aggressive, uncanny sea creatures outright.
The wild fruits and coconuts currently aboard had supposedly been gathered on the previous island.
The wild fruits were green and tasted astringent. Wang Tai called them "Green Fruit."
Because uncanny beings occupied the vast majority of islands, every supply run was a gamble with their lives.
Qin Mao couldn't help thinking of the boat that had previously taken him out to sea.
The fleet's rules had been completely different from the Hope's.
Over there, everyone gathered supplies by their own abilities.
The bolder you were, the more supplies you got. If you didn't dare gather any, you starved.
Whatever supplies you obtained belonged entirely to you. You could barter with others, or beg them to show you kindness.
Sometimes, Qin Mao felt as though they had returned to a primitive society.
Money had completely lost its use in the apocalypse. Prices fluctuated wildly, and survivors bartered goods.
They even... killed and looted!
The Hope, on the other hand, pooled everyone's supplies and distributed them equally.
It was hard to say which method of distribution was better.
Forget it. He should just find a way to save up Kill Points!
Qin Mao's newly assigned private cabin was a small room toward the interior of the second level.
It was roughly six or seven square meters, and a bed and a narrow wooden table took up nearly all the space.
There were also little odds and ends on the table, like a solar-powered flashlight and an alarm clock with a dead battery...
Before the apocalypse, this would have felt too small even for a bathroom.
Now, however, it was a precious private room.
He felt like a caterpillar trapped in a cocoon, struggling desperately, unable to break free.
Meanwhile, outside the cabin.
"Boss Zhang, here's some Green Fruit as a token of my respect."
A young man bowed and scraped as he offered Zhang Qing his fruit ration for the day.
"Pah, pah, pah! What boss? Don't go calling me that! There's only one boss on this boat-Wang Tai, Boss Wang!"
Zhang Qing put on a stern face and scolded him, though there was little genuine anger in his voice.
Clearly, being called "boss" had hit just the right spot.
But he hadn't lost his head over it. Instead, he said mildly.
"Zhu Yu, if you want something, just spit it out!"
Smiling sheepishly, Zhu Yu pressed the fruit into Zhang Qing's hand.
"Well, I figured the new First Mate just got here and doesn't know how things work. I'd like to help him out for a few days. Do you think..."
Zhang Qing drew out an "Oh" and cut straight to the point.
"Pretty crafty, ain't you! Looking to latch onto First Mate Qin?"
Zhu Yu stammered, "Ah... yes... no..."
"Hmph, don't you try fooling me!"
Under Zhang Qing's prolonged stare, Zhu Yu finally buckled under the pressure and said with difficulty, "Brother Zhang, even if I'm ammunition, I'd still like to scrape by a few days longer."
Zhang Qing immediately fell silent and didn't respond for several seconds.
"Dumbass!"
Swearing, he stuffed the fruit into his pocket, turned around with a grim face, and walked away.
Who on this boat wasn't ammunition, every last one of them?
He might suck up to Wang Tai for all he was worth and stay close to him.
But all that did was move him farther down the firing order in the magazine!
That night.
A survivor on night watch spotted a Rotgill Corpse climbing aboard the Hope.
By the time the alarm was raised and Wang Tai reached the deck, one survivor had already been bitten to death.
Qin Mao kept far away, his heart tightening.
He had seen these things before and knew they were hard to deal with.
He was just wondering how to stay alive when he heard a bang.
Wang Tai fired once, and the Rotgill Corpse dropped to the deck.
A streak of eerie light sprang from the dead crewman's body and entered the gun.
The skulls on the gun had dropped to six, then returned to seven.
He... dealt with it that easily?
Qin Mao was stunned.
During the four days he had sailed with the previous fleet, torrential rain had fallen one night, and he had seen three Rotgill Corpses sneak aboard at the bow.
They looked like human corpses with fish gills, covered in murky slime. Blades, clubs, and even handgun shots struck them, only for the damage to be easily shed.
In the blink of an eye, three unlucky souls had been mauled to death.
Back then, Qin Mao and Su Miaomiao had huddled at the stern, trembling.
They had watched five snow-white skeletons appear out of thin air in the pouring rain and trade wounds with the Rotgill Corpses.
In the end, relying on their superior numbers, they had taken a long time to finally batter the three Rotgill Corpses apart.
Afterward, he had heard from people in the fleet that the person controlling those five skeletons was named Yan Qi.
He was the leader of the boat Qin Mao and the others had been aboard.
He... was a Sequence Transcendent!
And now, Wang Tai had taken down a Rotgill Corpse with one shot, when even a Transcendent had struggled so hard against them?!
Was this what a curio in the top three thousand of the Curio Ranking could do?!
It was far too powerful!
Damn! If only I were a Sequence Transcendent!
Or... having a weapon that powerful would work too!
Qin Mao was incredibly envious.
In this increasingly uncanny apocalypse, formidable strength was the essential guarantee of survival!
He returned to his cabin and lay on the bed.
He remembered similar reports online two years before the apocalypse broke out, saying that someone had awakened as a Sequence Transcendent, but everyone had treated them as AI videos back then.
There had also been posts saying ordinary people could awaken Transcendent Power with a Sequence Potion.
But such precious potions were clearly beyond the reach of an ordinary person like him.
I need... strength!
Qin Mao thought silently.
Amid the ocean's uncanny, soft whispers, he gradually fell asleep.
Before you continue