Chapter 66: Chapter 60: The Sound of the Mutant Beast Group

"Are you never worried about mutant beast attacks?"

Tang Mo thought for a moment before asking tentatively.

"Mutant beasts? You mean those strange-looking animals? They’re not much different from the cats and dogs we used to have."

When Aunt Lin mentioned mutant beasts, there wasn’t a trace of fear in her voice.

If it weren’t for Tang Mo’s spiritual power being sensitive enough to perceive that Aunt Lin’s attribute value wasn’t very high, she would have mistaken her for some kind of hidden master.

"Then..."

"Tang Mo, the food’s here!" A somewhat hurried voice suddenly called out from outside the fence. Shen Xiaodong was standing there, holding a bowl of something and shouting for her.

"Well, Aunt Lin, I’ll be going then. I’ll come bother you again next time." Tang Mo said a polite goodbye.

Aunt Lin got up to see her to the courtyard gate and even exchanged a few pleasantries with Shen Xiaodong. It was clear that the relationships between people in Taoyuan Village were very harmonious and close.

"If you plan on staying here, don’t tell the other villagers about the outside world."

Shen Xiaodong thrust the bowl into Tang Mo’s hands and said grimly.

"They... don’t know anything?" Tang Mo was astonished.

’I’ve felt that something was off the whole time. So this is it!’

All of Aunt Lin’s reactions were completely unlike someone from an age of famine. Instead, she was as optimistic as if she were living in a golden age. It turned out she simply didn’t understand that it was the apocalypse.

’But that’s impossible. The ID Watches have all sorts of information. Even if no one ever leaves their home, they can’t be this isolated.’

"The people who stayed in the village are all elderly or children. After the ID Watches were issued, the village chief never distributed them for activation. We never collect relief supplies, so no one knows," Shen Xiaodong explained.

"What if people from the outside come back?" Tang Mo found it incredible.

"The bases in the cities are too far from us. At least so far, no one has trekked through so many dangerous forests just to come back to the village for a vegetable bun. If they want to contact their families, calling the village chief works just the same."

Shen Xiaodong’s face was full of self-mockery. Their Taoyuan Village only sounded nice; in reality, it was a place abandoned by their loved ones.

The elderly and children, the very people most protected in a prosperous age, were now the most troublesome burdens.

Some people did call to check on their families, but the moment the topic of bringing them to a base came up, they immediately gave up on the idea.

’Perhaps they just don’t have the ability. When you can’t even fend for yourself, it’s hard for everyone.’

Tang Mo could understand their way of thinking to some extent.

"Hasn’t the village chief ever considered gathering everyone and taking them to a base? Or telling them the truth? They have a right to know."

"These people have no survival skills. Let’s not even talk about whether they could make it to a base. Even if they got there, we’ve already looked into it; the bases are about to implement a policy where you trade for food.

"These old folks and children can’t do anything. They can survive now by being self-sufficient, but if they went to a base, they’d all die. Compared to death, a vegetable bun tastes pretty good."

Shen Xiaodong understood his father’s helplessness. As a village chief, he felt that no one was more responsible than his father. His father, Shen Qing, was his pride.

"As for the truth... you’ll understand once you’ve been here a while longer."

Shen Xiaodong’s last sentence carried a hidden meaning.

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Tang Mo didn’t fully understand, but she knew this wasn’t the time to press for answers, so she let it go.

Shen Xiaodong had brought Tang Mo four vegetable buns. They were called that, but they were really just a filling made from the mashed fruits of several plants, wrapped in the leaves of another.

They didn’t taste good, but they were filling. With a bit of salt, they were at least edible.

Tang Mo didn’t show any disgust, earnestly eating all four vegetable buns.

After finishing her lunch, Tang Mo once again sat in her chair and began training her spiritual power, losing all track of time as she practiced.

For the next week, Tang Mo lived a very disciplined life. During the day, she would find an empty space in the village to run, maintaining her physical fitness, practice her Sword Skill, and then go fetch water before returning home.

At night, she would focus wholeheartedly on training her spiritual power. Out of twenty-four hours a day, she slept for only five or six, dedicating the rest of her time to training.

’I can’t relax for even a moment.’ This was the standard Tang Mo set for herself.

In just one week of deliberate training, her spiritual power improved at an incredible rate. The white specks of light in her mind multiplied at a monstrously fast speed.

By now, Tang Mo’s Spiritual Attribute could be considered top-tier even among the Genius Level. It was no exaggeration to say she was one in a hundred.

Her other Comprehensive Attribute Values were also steadily increasing, fed by those Crystal Cores and her constant training.

During her days in Taoyuan Village, Tang Mo’s diet consisted of either vegetable lumps or the remaining snake meat from her Space. The snake meat was incredibly nourishing, causing her overall condition to improve even faster.

One night, a little over a week later, Tang Mo was once again in her chair, wrestling with the white specks of light in her mind.

As the specks of light increased, her ability to apply her spiritual power gradually strengthened, and the methods of application diversified.

Tang Mo slowly began to try and spread her spiritual power outward. Extending her spiritual power to scout her surroundings was something she had always wanted to do, but her power had been insufficient before.

At first, the specks of light were a bit mischievous, but after some adjustment from Tang Mo, they gradually converged into a thin, silvery thread that passed through the wooden wall and went outside.

In Tang Mo’s eyes, this thread was silver, but to outsiders, it was invisible.

Only someone with higher spiritual power could sense the presence of another’s. Anyone with spiritual power lower than Tang Mo’s would feel nothing from this silver thread.

Tang Mo manipulated the silver thread, guiding it through her house, over to another, and then through its wall to enter.

The scene inside the house appeared clearly in Tang Mo’s mind’s eye.

Aunt Lin was sitting on the edge of the bed, holding a crying child. On the bed sat a young woman.

Calling her a woman wasn’t quite right; she looked even younger than Tang Mo, just a young girl.

’People in the countryside tend to marry early. This must be the daughter-in-law Aunt Lin mentioned, the one who had just given birth.’

’But both the girl and the baby look to be in very poor health. In this age of famine, properly recovering after childbirth and producing enough milk is no easy feat.’

Tang Mo sighed, withdrew her spiritual power without looking any further, and continued to extend the silver thread.

Right now, Tang Mo only wanted to see how far her spiritual power could reach, so she didn’t spread it out over a large area, instead sending it onward in the form of a single thread.

Taoyuan Village had only about twenty-some households and wasn’t very large. The silver thread soon passed the village walls and journeyed into the unknown of the forest.

Just as Tang Mo was starting to feel the strain and was about to pull her spiritual power back, she suddenly sensed a massive, low-pitched sound.

The sound was coming from the forest nearest to the village. It felt familiar to Tang Mo, just like...

The sound of a Mutant Beast Group.

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