It feels like someone is driving.

Su Ziyu didn't respond, instead he reached out to take the money pouch and said to Jiese beside him, "Take me to find a place to stay."

Jiese smiled and said, "Stay at my place."

"I still have a vacant room there, the inns here aren't great anyway."

That works too.

A group of onlookers were still amazed at the head of the Death's Claw, clicking their tongues in wonder. Many people rarely leave the gathering place in their daily lives; those willing to venture out are quite brave, and it was the first time seeing a Death's Claw for many of them.

The monk's place was in the Chinese District.

There were about two thousand Chinese people at the Elk Gathering Place, most of whom came from the Chinatown gathering place. Matty's place was right at the edge of the Chinese District. Compared to other ethnic gathering places, it was much safer for a young girl like her to live next to the Chinese. Before parting, Su Ziyu gave her share of the reward. The little girl happily took the money and said to Su Ziyu, "Would you like to go take down the Mirelurk Queen? I'm quite familiar with that area!"

"Uh."

"This time I'll only charge 100 bottle caps."

Oh wow.

She even gave a discount.

Su Ziyu smiled, ruffling her hair, and said, "Sure."

"That's settled then!" The little girl looked very pleased, brushed off his hand to tidy her hair, and said, "I'm heading back now."

Many unfamiliar Chinese people greeted Su Ziyu.

He didn't know them, so he just nodded slightly in response. Jiese, however, seemed able to chat with anyone and even picked up a business deal while walking. Someone had passed away, and he would be going to chant scriptures for them the next day.

Huh?

As Su Ziyu walked, he suddenly furrowed his brows, gently bumping Jiese with his elbow, and whispered, "Who are those two?"

There were two burly-looking white men on the second floor not far away.

"Not sure," Jiese whispered, "They've been staying in a hotel in the Chinese District for several days, not sure where they're from."

Su Ziyu nodded slightly, not knowing what he was thinking.

Just earlier, when those two were looking at him from the window, Su Ziyu noticed a mark on their wrists, a peculiar triangle that was half-crossed out.

— "Brotherhood."

The symbol was slightly different from the Brotherhood mark in his memory, but those two should be members of the Brotherhood.

At the hotel.

A rather burly man clamped a cigar in his mouth and said, "Doesn't that man look a bit familiar to you?"

"No," the young man beside him lazily leaned against the wall, "to me, all Chinese look somewhat similar."

"We've already wasted two days."

"The mission target still hasn't been found! Are we just going to stay in the hotel every day?"

The man with the cigar got up, picked up a pen, and quickly sketched Su Ziyu's portrait on a piece of paper. It surprisingly had a seven to eight-tenths likeness. Without turning back, he said in a deep voice, "The Academy's people are nearby too."

"Don't act rashly!"

"The two of us might not be able to deal with those bionic transformed humans!"

The young man reached into his pocket, pulled out a dagger, and toyed with it, looking at the sketch, "Do you think the Academy's people are crazy? Why are they still researching old-era mutant technology?"

"I don't know." The burly man frowned at the sketch in front of him and said in a deep voice, "Mutant technology was a super soldier plan from the old era."

"It's said to resist radiation mutation."

"But all the created mutants turned into mindless butchers without reproductive abilities. The higher-ups are sending people to investigate the Academy, and it's said they successfully created a perfect mutant that can completely immunize against radiation pollution while retaining normal human intelligence."

"The high-ups are quite divided now too."

"Some believe we should promote bionic technology and usher humanity into the mechanical bionic era."

"Others think we shouldn't abandon our flesh bodies, believing there must be another way to resist the pollution of radiation mutation."

"Matters like these aren't something we two small figures can influence."

"It concerns the future direction of humanity."

With that, he picked up the sketch and examined it for a while, muttering, "I really feel I've seen this person's photograph before."

"Bring the transmission equipment over."

"Let's send his image back to the division for checking. This person should be quite extraordinary."

The young man beside him took a closer look, frowned, and thought, "Is he someone marked in the database? I have no impression at all!"

"Not clear. Let them check." The man said in a deep voice.

Jiese's place.

Upon entering, Su Ziyu immediately saw a Buddha statue, but instead of holding a magical artifact, the statue held a six-barrel Gatling heavy machine gun. Jiese approached and bowed devoutly, then lit three sticks of incense for the statue.

He turned around and smiled, "Sit anywhere you like."

"Dinner will be ready soon."

At that moment, a woman's voice, quite hoarse, came, "Back already? Dinner will be ready in a moment."

Three children, not very old, came out.

One Caucasian, two Chinese, they curiously examined Su Ziyu. Then a woman, probably in her forties, came out, a Caucasian woman. Upon seeing Su Ziyu, she quickly covered her face with her hand. Still, Su Ziyu managed to glimpse her features, which bore obvious signs of radiation mutation, with half her face sagging like paralyzed, and her exposed arms had some bluish spots, likely from past radiation exposure without timely treatment.

"These kids are orphans."

"They're with me temporarily to have a bite to eat, and once they're sixteen, they fend for themselves." The monk sat down with legs wide open and pointed at the kids.

Though he took them in, he didn't treat them as his own children.

The children seemed a bit afraid of him.

The woman brought over some food and then sat at another table with her own portion.

"Sit."

"Want a drink?" The monk chuckled.

Su Ziyu shook his head, "No need. Just a little to eat is fine."

He said this while his mechanical wristwatch scanned the food. The pollution level was thankfully low, likely because of purified drinking water, with much of the food here being self-grown and reared, much less polluted than outside. In the Wasteland Era, wild game hunted in the wilderness was cheap, and truly expensive were the artificially reared livestock.

The taste was mediocre.

However, the monk had quite the appetite, eating meat, drinking, and lighting a cigarette. Seeing Su Ziyu eat little, he handed a big piece of meat to the children, whispering, "Eat up."

"After eating, head to Old Bob's, he probably has quite a bit of work now."

Jiese sat back down, pointing at the kids, saying, "They're learning from Old Bob, getting some skills so they won't starve in the future."

Education in the Wasteland Era was severely lacking.

These low-tier orphans didn't have the opportunity to learn knowledge; gaining some practical skills was already fortunate.

After eating.

Jiese took off one of his arms and came up to a machine tool, holding his mechanical prosthetic and performing some simple maintenance and repair. Noticing Su Ziyu's gaze, he grinned and said, "No choice. Mechanical limbs are not as good as bionic ones. If you don't maintain them regularly, you're done for when they malfunction at crucial moments."

Su Ziyu curiously watched him tinkering with his mechanical prosthetic limb.

Compared to his first visit, the technology of mechanical limbs in this Wasteland Era had improved significantly, likely due to the mechanical transformation technology from back then being somewhat disclosed. However, it was unclear why bionic technology was not widespread.

Probably due to the constraints of the era's productivity, mechanical transformation was evidently more cost-effective.

.........

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