The house, which had originally only covered the sixteenth floor, now actually covered from the eighteenth floor down to the fourteenth floor — five whole floors! Two extra floors above and two extra floors below!
Seeing this, Sang Wenhao also jumped out onto the balcony and stepped onto the iron box platform. He, too, was stunned by the suddenly expanded domain.
Seeing Fu Erdie’s reaction, Cen Xiyang and Han Zhi seemed to realise something and jumped out to look as well.
The moment they saw it, they understood. “The domain has grown a lot.”
Fu Erdie nodded and led everyone back to the balcony. She put away the iron box, her eyes curving with a smile. “Over the past half month, we killed more than twenty ability zombies along the way, so the domain expanded too.”
Fu Erdie gave the two of them a look and did not say more. Cen Xiyang and Han Zhi knew some of the inside details, so naturally, they did not ask further.
When the new companions learned that Fu Erdie’s domain had expanded fourfold, they all congratulated her, thinking that Fu Erdie herself had become that much stronger. In truth, Fu Erdie knew it was not her. It was simply that the house had become that much stronger.
Unlike the plant babies, the house’s growth could not rely on all kinds of food or nutrients. It could only rely on crystal cores or Fu Erdie’s ability.
But Fu Erdie’s energy each day was limited. Aside from the occasional time she could practise push and pull with the house, most of the time she was maintaining Sang Wenhao’s floating box-van ability, or recovering the abilities and energy the two of them had consumed.
Because of this, Fu Erdie had given all the water-type crystal cores they obtained along the way to the house. She had also selected some other crystal cores, adding up to ten in total, nearly half of their total gains. And the final result was very pleasing: the house’s domain had expanded!
Everyone ate lively, introducing themselves to each other. After Fu Erdie started the conversation and let everyone chat naturally, she remained deep in thought about the house and the plant babies.
Before, she had not known the level of her own ability, and she had been very afraid of the outside world, always feeling that danger was everywhere.
Facts had proven that this was indeed true. It really was dangerous.
But if Professor Zhao had not made the ability detector, Fu Erdie still would not know that she and Student Sang had already become terrifying existences.
Professor Zhao had said that the top ability users in a base were third-rank. And Sang Wenhao and the house had already become third-rank.
With Fu Erdie’s enhancement, their ability level would become fourth-rank.
In other words, whether it was the house or Student Sang, they were already extremely top-tier existences.
Fu Erdie could not detect her own ability, probably because she was attribute-less.
But just like Professor Zhao had said about attribute-less zombies: because they had no attribute, they were weak at the same level. Yet also because they had no attribute, they could completely absorb crystal cores of every attribute.
When other ability users or ability zombies absorbed crystal cores with mismatched attributes, they only had a ten percent absorption rate. But Fu Erdie absorbed every type of crystal core at one hundred percent. So her level must actually be the same as the house and Student Sang, or even higher.
She no longer needed to be especially afraid or timid. She could truly go out, search for more crystal cores to improve herself, and also improve her companions, the house, and the plant babies.
And everyone truly did have the strength to grow outside now.
Among the ten buildings in the residential complex, including the buildings Cen Xiyang and Han Zhi had cleared after she left, they had only cleared five in total. There were still five buildings left uncleared.
Fu Erdie felt that, from now on, her goal could not only be searching one residential complex. She also had to expand her territory.
Not only for more resources, but to maintain an advantage.
After all, there were so many ability users and ability zombies. Only by constantly absorbing crystal cores and becoming stronger could they avoid being defeated by beings that might be even stronger.
For example, if the university town ability squad that had attacked the complex back then had encountered Sang Wenhao after he reached third-rank, or even fourth-rank with her support, they might not even have been able to pass the sniper rifle blockade.
There were also the plant babies. If they could all be raised to second or third rank, then that ability squad would not have been able to fight their way in either.
After bringing her grandmother back, they would need to start bravely pushing outward and collecting more crystal cores, while also daring to pull enemies inward, luring zombies to Building Seven to be killed and absorbed by the plants so they could keep growing and levelling up.
As she thought through all these scattered matters, the meal ended amid the lively voices of her companions. Then they began assigning rooms.
Cao Bingqing and Fu Chenghong chose 16-7. First, it had three bedrooms and two living rooms, so it was relatively large. Once they brought Grandma back, she could live with them. Second, 16-7 was right beside 16-8. Sang Wenhao and the others entered and exited through the balcony there, so the couple felt that although they did not have abilities, they could still help out by living nearby.
In addition, 16-8 could be considered the dining room and meeting hall. If anything needed cleaning or organising, the couple could do whatever they were capable of.
Professor Zhao chose 16-10. It was a large two-bedroom, two-living-room apartment of two hundred square metres, large enough to store many materials and pieces of equipment, and also spacious enough for Zhuang Licheng and the sports student to come over and do research together. The tomato’s main body was also there. If Professor Zhao wanted to do infrastructure work, she could not do without observing and recording the plants. Although living together would be rather noisy, she still chose this room with the idea of having more contact and gaining more understanding.
The sports student and Zhuang Licheng went to the neighbouring 16-9, making it convenient to contact Professor Zhao at any time.
He Xuan and the short-haired woman, Ye Jia, went to 16-4. This room was opposite the little old lady’s apartment and was also on the same side of the sixteenth floor as Fu Erdie and the others.
The reason given openly was that they wanted to help the little old lady cook and do odd jobs. In reality, they felt that the closer they were to Fu Erdie and the others, the more it was like living in the inner circle. It was as if being physically closer to the boss also brought them closer to the core circle in terms of relationship.
The technical department was already proving its value. They had to hurry too.
When they arrived at the residential complex, it was afternoon. Now that they had finished eating and settling in, the sky had already turned dark.
The house happily flickered with fluorescent light, quiet and peaceful.
Clearly, for the house, returning to the place where it had been born was still the most comfortable.
Fu Erdie’s mood was also calm in a way it had not been for a long time.
She sat at the table, looking at the route to the D City base on her tablet.
She had already asked Professor Zhao to tell the D City base that, in two days, two women and one man would bring supplies over to look for someone, and that they hoped to look at the base’s list of ordinary survivors.
These two women and one man did not include Fu Erdie and Sang Wenhao. They were He Xuan, Ye Jia, and Zhuang Licheng.
Fu Erdie did not feel at ease leaving these three relatively powerful ability users in the residential complex. It just so happened that, this time, when they went to pick people up, she could have them pretend to be people from the H City base searching for someone. Meanwhile, Fu Erdie and Sang Wenhao would get off alone shortly before reaching the D City base and sneak inside to investigate the situation.
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