Weird Object - Bus

After taking a few steps back and staring for a long time at the spot where the old woman had vanished, Jiang He quickly pulled himself together.

In the apocalypse, death in any form was commonplace.

The first lesson it taught humanity was to control their emotions!

Jiang He retrieved the Lightning-Struck Wood he had planted in the ground and prepared to see whether the buses could still be repaired.

Jiang He had observed them the night before. The Weird Driver had only been controlling the buses and scraping them back and forth.

Aside from the one the old woman had damaged at the start, the other three probably hadn't been in any collisions.

Just as he stepped forward and looked ahead, a glimmering object in the grass caught his attention.

It was right where the old woman had fallen!

Curious, he walked over and picked up the glowing blue vial.

"What is this?"

Looking at the orange liquid sloshing around inside, Jiang He couldn't help asking the system.

After a brief scan, the system brought up a dialog box.

[Orange Sequence Potion: Taking it can raise the level of a Superpower Sequence user. If consumed by a mutated person, it allows them to retain their sanity.]

[Side effect: If consumed by a mutant beast, it will permanently dissipate when killed by any weapon and will be unable to revive!]

A Sequence Potion?

Was this why the old woman had turned human again before she died?

Jiang He raised the blue vial to eye level, removed the cap and gave it a sniff.

It didn't have much of a smell, but unfortunately, there wasn't much left...

The old woman had probably obtained this small vial of potion by chance and drunk most of it, allowing her to suppress her beastly instincts after transforming.

He didn't know why she hadn't finished it all, though, leaving nearly a fifth behind.

He put the Sequence Potion in the backpack in his system space. This was a real treasure; he would study it when he had time!

The immediate priority was to see whether the buses could be repaired!

According to Jiang He's experience in his previous life, the longer people stayed in one place, the more likely they were to attract Eldritch Horrors...

And their group had already spent an entire night at this gas station!

They had to pack up and leave immediately!

"Fortunately, only the bodywork and seats were damaged. None of the vehicles' core components were damaged!"

After checking all three buses in succession, Jiang He breathed a sigh of relief.

Losing a vehicle in this apocalypse could be deadly!

Even a bicycle was a treasure people would fight over.

As fuel continued to be consumed, these fuel-powered vehicles would eventually be phased out.

Instead, bicycles and electric vehicles that could be charged by solar power would become the main modes of transport in the later stages of the apocalypse.

Thinking of the bicycle convoys he had seen in his previous life, Jiang He considered whether he should find a mountain bike ahead of time...

"Bicycles have quite a few drawbacks. Cars are still better for comfort, but gasoline really is a big problem!"

Just as he was worrying about the future gasoline problem, he suddenly heard a notification from the system:

[Ding]

[Weird Object - Bus detected (number unavailable due to damage). Repair?]

Huh?

Jiang He abruptly came to his senses and looked at the damaged bus number three before him.

The bus was a complete wreck.

Its detached door, bent body and deeply caved-in engine compartment all showed that it was beyond repair.

"This is... the Weird Driver's Weird Object? I'd better appraise it first!"

Jiang He didn't rush to press the repair button. Instead, he first spent fifty system points to appraise it.

Although he now had as many as eleven thousand system points, he still couldn't squander them. He needed to see whether the bus was worth repairing first!

[Ding]

[Bus - Number: 4295, the Weird Driver's exclusive vehicle]

[Level: Lv3]

[Skill 1 - Bloodthirst: Requires no fuel to operate! Feeding it dead humans or supernatural creatures provides power and repairs damage! If not fed in time, it will enter a state of hunger]

[Note - State of hunger: Speed decreases by 90%. It will actively devour occupants to obtain power]

[Skill 2 - Extreme Speed: Consumes its stored energy to enter a rampage state. During the rampage, speed increases by 100% and energy consumption increases by 80%]

[Skill 3 - Toughness: A skill exclusive to the rampage state. Consumes 50% of its own energy to increase the vehicle's toughness value by 150%]

[Drawback: Once bound, it cannot change to a new host before its current host dies. Any unfamiliar creature no higher than level two that enters the bus without authorization will be devoured]

"Holy shit!"

Even though Jiang He had mentally prepared himself, he still couldn't help feeling stirred after reading the bus's appraisal results.

He stroked the bus's dented metal body as though he were a man who had been yearning for his wife for a long time and had finally seen her.

He wanted to grip it hard, but was afraid of hurting it...

It was no wonder Jiang He reacted this way. The bus's abilities really were heaven-defying.

Leaving everything else aside, if the first skill, Bloodthirst, were revealed and other survivors found out about it, a bloodbath would be unavoidable!

As for its drawbacks...

A loyal bus had merely gotten greedy and swallowed a few intruders. What had it done wrong?

"You really are my precious baby. You knew your master couldn't bear to spend system points repairing you, so you evolved the ability to repair yourself!"

Looking at the survivors' remains scattered in the distance, Jiang He now saw those formerly useless things as mountains of gold and silver!

He waved a hand, intending to put the bus into his system backpack, but found that it didn't budge.

After looking into it, Jiang He discovered that storing the bus required six storage slots, while he only had five...

That meant that if Jiang He wanted the bus, he either had to spend system points or give up on leaving immediately!

After thinking it over for a long time, he decided to take a gamble!

If he didn't gamble, what was the point of living?

With that thought, Jiang He strode toward the camp.

Jiang He wasn't worried about the bus being stolen. Nobody else knew it was a Weird Object, much less how to make it recognize a master.

Those people probably wouldn't even spare a scrapped bus a glance...

As for the other three, Jiang He didn't care much about them anymore...

Back at the scene of last night's incident, Jiang He searched around for a container that could hold the corpses.

He soon found a huge white plastic barrel. It was probably a container the survivors on the bus had used to collect rainwater.

"That damn spendthrift Weird Driver!"

Only when he got closer did he notice a large hole in the bottom of the barrel. After voicing his complaint, Jiang He found himself in a quandary...

[Spend fifty system points to repair and enhance the ordinary plastic barrel?]

Confirm!

After thinking it over for a long time, he decided to repair it.

He was bound to collect more remains in the future, and having a container would make things more convenient.

[Ding]

[Congratulations, host. You have obtained Waste Barrel ×1. Capacity: 1,000 liters]

Looking at the white plastic barrel, which had suddenly tripled in size, Jiang He couldn't help remarking that the fifty system points had been well spent!