"We need to form an alliance." Ku Er slid the twin scimitars into the sheath at his back. The itch to toy with them vanished—no matter how fine the blades, they were nothing beside a single gunshot.
"What kind of alliance?" The Widow turned her scar-pitted face toward him. Ku Er's greedy gaze traced her sinuous figure, but when it reached her face, a chill prickled his spine and he looked away without thinking.
Her rasping voice sounded like frosted glass grinding together. Broad stretches of bare skin were caked with dust; she looked grimy and spent.
"If one of us drops," Ku Er said, "the rest attack him at once."
An offense–defense pact—sensible enough. A sniper couldn't shoot everyone at the same time; even with quick follow-ups, he needed intervals.
No one answered. Trust a bunch of scavengers? They'd sooner trust the snakehead who trafficked them here.
"I want to know where he got that rifle," someone piped up—a squat figure with an oversized bald head, body and skull comically out of proportion, a silly dinosaur cap perched on top. "If he has the pull to get a gun, why's he still rotting in this dump?"
Beneath his brim, the Hunter's eyes skimmed the chunks of hyena meat scattered around. "Who cares. If we don't move, that kid will pick the place clean."
…
Li Yu sifted through junk, a flicker of distaste on his face now and then. He flicked away a transparent condom and, from the corner of his eye, clocked the scavengers edging closer.
They kept a curious order, each claiming a patch without poaching. Li Yu's patch was the largest.
Picking trash was the kind of work you could disappear into. When he finally looked up, the sky had grown heavy, and the huge sack on his back was stuffed full.
This cake-splitting lasted only a day. After that, the place would be swamped with small-time pickers; it wouldn't be the big hunters' playground anymore.
"That should about do it…" Li Yu tore an arm off a so-called domestic service robot, weighed it in his hand. The synthetic skin felt slick; the realism was high. The casing was striped with whip marks.
One strike had nicked the energy core, scrapping the unit. The valuable chips were long gone. Its… special usage would tempt plenty of people here, but Li Yu wasn't interested.
He hefted the bulging sack and started toward the deeper heaps. Behind him, figures along the trash slope slowly straightened their hunched backs and watched him leave.
…
"Blue-trace alloy wheel hubs, two—two thousand credits…"
"Magnetic heating unit, one—two thousand five hundred…"
"This hard drive's dead. Worthless…"
Scavengers had no papers. If the Wardens shot one of them, no one would complain. They couldn't go into the city; they could only sell to the dump's black-hearted broker.
The broker was a fat man. His swollen gut strained the buttons on his suit, pale flesh bulging through. His hair was greasy. He wore a business suit with a pair of pink house slippers at least two sizes too small.
For all that, he controlled the entire garbage field, monopolizing every scavenger's haul.
It was a cushy racket—flip the goods and double your money.
"You're cutting too hard." Li Yu frowned at the fat man's numbers.
Those hubs were worth at least three thousand. "Fatty Three" was chopping them to two.
Fatty Three chuckled, rubbing his hands. His eyes narrowed to slits as he glanced at Li Yu. "Old Lu's boy—you made quite the splash today."
Li Yu's face didn't change. He simply looked at him.
"But you seem to be missing something…" Fatty Three's tone snapped hard; he nearly snarled, "I call the shots here. I don't care whose strings you think you're pulling—no one replaces me. You take what I pay, or you can… roll."
So that was it. He figured Li Yu had backing and meant to threaten his seat, so he was putting the kid in his place.
"Third Brother—" A syrupy voice drifted from a three-story metal prefab nearby. A woman in sheer white sleepwear glided over, legs so white they almost gleamed, bare feet whispering on the metal.
"You ran off with my slippers…" Half-lidded eyes, a flush on her cheeks; taller than the fat man, she leaned into him naturally, voice sweet and coy.
A few scavengers waiting to sell widened their eyes, letting their gazes roam over her.
"Oh my sweet darling, why'd you come out…" Fatty Three's eyes crawled over her body as he yanked her into his arms. "These are a bunch of trash pickers. What if they steal a look at you?"
He raised his voice as he spoke, as if deliberately drawing every gaze to her.
He shot a sidelong look at the ring of scavengers, their heated eyes tracing the woman's curves, and felt something stir with crude satisfaction.
Then his gaze hit Li Yu, and his face shifted again. He slapped a grimy bundle of credits onto the table. "So, are you walking out with your junk, or the cash?" He pinched the woman viciously and stared at Li Yu, voice going cold. "Or you want to try putting that sniper round through my skull?"
Li Yu gave him a flat glance, pocketed the credits without a flicker, and turned to leave.
"Heh…" Fatty Three sneered. "Old Lu's boy—remember what I said."
He buried his head in the woman's chest, rubbing to elicit a peal of giggles. She covered her mouth as she looked down at his greasy hair, and a spark of disgust flashed in her eyes.
Li Yu's step paused, but he didn't look back. "My name is Li Yu."
"Wretch!"
"Heh heh… heh heh…"
Fatty Three ignored him and, still pawing at the woman amid a wash of springtime lewdness, disappeared into the prefab.
"Master, Master—how did Noisy do?!"
As soon as Li Yu got "home," the little bot rolled up, clamoring for praise.
"Impressive." Li Yu gave a thumbs-up, and Noisy circled him several more times in delight.
"Here—your reward." Li Yu pulled out the robotic arm and handed it over.
"A new arm… My dear master, Noisy's going to cry—this is so touching!" Noisy squealed, clutching the arm and scuttling off to tinker.
Li Yu smiled faintly and slipped the sniper rifle into the system's storage space—one small perk.
Night fell. When he first crossed over, the three moons in the sky—each a different size—were what convinced him he wasn't on Earth.
Moonlight washed the heaps almost as bright as day. On the largest moon, whole crater rings stood out stark and clear.
"Twelve thousand five hundred credits. Add Old Lu's forty thousand, and that covers the shelter fee…"
"But after flashing the sniper, the scavengers here—and Fatty Three—are all hostile. When the time comes…"
He thought a moment, told Noisy his plan, then burrowed into a trash mound. No scavenger fixed a permanent address; that was just asking to die.
At dawn, after settling Noisy, Li Yu impatiently opened the system panel. He didn't have to wait long—the cooldown had ended.
Host: Li YuAvatar: 1 (Deployable)Talent: Random ActionTitle: Guardian of the Chrysanthemum
"Let's hope this one doesn't go like last time." He muttered a quick prayer and pressed Deploy.
Searching for deployment world… Parsing data… Locking coordinates: Biohazard (Resident Evil) World… Opening clandestine transit through world barrier… Success. Please select avatar loadout. Talent and title may be carried over and will affect final evaluation.
Li Yu winced at the lone talent he'd earned last time. Random Action… is that a blessing or a curse? With only the one talent, he gritted his teeth and loaded it.
The title, of course, he would carry. Even if it was just an avatar, Li Yu intended to protect his… chrysanthemum.
Selecting avatar route…Beep—Route selection disabled due to talent interference. Deploying… Deployment successful. Please wait for log refresh.(Note: Time flow in the current world differs from the host world at a ratio of 1:2.)
Li Yu froze. He remembered having route options the first time: follow the protagonist, diverge, antagonize, and so on.
Following the protagonist obviously kept you alive longer. Why was it gone this time? Damn talent!
It felt like he'd bitten the wrong bullet. But the avatar was already away; all he could do was wait for the log.
He stretched, slipped through twisted steel frames with practiced ease. The first light of morning was the gentlest, not yet scorching. He narrowed his eyes at the red sun burning on the vault of the sky.
A shadow peered down from the heap above, backlit so Li Yu couldn't make out the face: a gray swim-cap pulled low, a black scarf around the neck, a ragged gray shell jacket zipped tight, crammed with pockets.
"Heard you killed the Dog King yesterday," the figure said, flipping down lightly and landing nearby with a half-eaten apple between his teeth. "Word is you've got connections in the city."
The apple looked fresh—rare here. Who knew where he'd dug it up.
"City connections?" Li Yu shook his head. "Just rumors."
The other didn't press. He took a crisp bite; juice burst under his teeth.
"Thanks to you, when the Titan garbage ship dumped its load, the old hands weren't in the mood to pick. Lucky for the rest of us."
His hair was cropped short; he looked sharp. His eyes were a bright, uncommon green.
He tossed Li Yu the half-eaten apple. It still held most of its weight, fragrant and full—some special variety.
Li Yu's mouth twitched. He caught it and immediately tossed it back. He had no interest in food right now—who knew what clung to it.
"I saved that for you," the man said, puzzled. In the green depths of his irises, Li Yu's reflection wavered.
"No need. Thanks." Li Yu's expression was odd. He edged back half a step—I'm not into men—then changed the subject. "Haven't seen you in days. Where've you been?"
His name was Mo Duo, a casual acquaintance. They'd crossed paths a few times while scavenging. Scavengers didn't bare their hearts; everyone kept a margin of caution.
Mo Duo wiped the apple and took another big bite, juice running down his lips. He spoke around the pulp. "I'm not as lucky as you. Turned over a few hills of trash and finally found enough scraps to pay the shelter fee."
Li Yu's gaze flicked over him. Turned over a few trash mountains and found leftovers?
What did he think the others were—amateurs? Every heap had been picked a dozen times. And he could still "find leftovers"? Maybe he was the lucky one after all.
Like Mo Duo, Li Yu didn't pry. He fished a big bottle from a rubbish drift; there was still a little clean water inside.
"I don't get you," Mo Duo said, green eyes glinting oddly. "Down to your last rags, and you still need clean water to wash your face and brush your teeth."
The previous owner of Li Yu's body had something called cleanliness. Conveniently, that meant the transplanted Li Yu never suffered much from the filth.
"Elegance never goes out of style." He wiped his face with a towel. Instantly, the film of grime between him and the world felt thinner.
Mo Duo swung onto a stack of rubber tires, long, reed-thin legs dangling. "Fatty Three's not happy with you. Thinks your backers want his cut."
Li Yu frowned, eyeing Mo Duo's improbable proportions with a private click of the tongue.
"All that in one night?" It felt fast. Even rumors needed time to ferment.
Mo Duo hesitated, then said, "He's forcing it. Wants to make you cough up the rifle—to put the fear of him into people."
"So…" Li Yu's hands stilled. He looked up at Mo Duo on the tires. "You're here to pass the word?"
A flicker of contempt crossed Mo Duo's face and was gone. He shook his head. "No. I just heard."
"The one who actually came to pass it…"
"Is me." A clear voice took over. Not far away, the Hunter tipped the brim of his cowboy hat and walked over.
He arrived without a sound; neither Li Yu nor Mo Duo noticed when he'd gotten there.
Li Yu's expression turned peculiar, half a joke caught behind his teeth. Mo Duo hopped off the tires, drifting to Li Yu's side, shoulders slightly hunched, wary.
The Hunter's gait had a strange rhythm. He avoided every bit of litter underfoot, making no sound at all.
That was where his name came from—the jungle predator who appeared from nowhere to claim his prey.
Like Ku Er, he was F+ class—among scavengers, that made him a hand worth counting.
"You…" Li Yu wet his lips and finally said it. "Do you keep that brim down so no one sees your eyes darting around, hunting for useful trash?"
The Hunter's step faltered. Mo Duo's heart hitched—but for some reason he wanted to laugh. The image of the Hunter's eyes skittering beneath the shadow of his hat brim struck him as absurdly funny.
The pressure the Hunter brought seemed to evaporate, and Mo Duo felt suddenly lighter.