Housewarming gift

While Yanlong was involved in chatting with her friends, Rufeng concentrated on retrieving the cactus thorns from the corridor.

Yanlong jumped back in fright when one of the cactus thorns came flying at her pointy side down.

She glared at Rufeng, then returned to talking with her friends.

Rufeng concentrated this time, even so, he was barely able to stop the thorn from smacking him in the face with it's flatside.

Though one says flat side, the cactus thorns are as long as a man's arm, and almost an inch thick. The pointy side glinted wickedly, almost like a metal.

The flat side looked like a roughly broken branch, far too many sharp wood slivers. If it impacts a person at high speed, even this will get embedded in their skin.

On top of that, the broken slivers will be hell to remove from any person's arms.

The next thorn, he was able to stop at the door of the room.

Yanlong observed, but said nothing.

On one side, cactus thorns piled up.

Yanlong opened her phone, and settled her tasks.

First, deliver the fire gem, and a few of these cactus spears to her friends on the third floor.

If nothing else, with the help of wuli, they can make spears to kill the zombies.

So, Rufeng and Yanlong set off once more, this time with a space bead full of cactus thorns, and the fire jade.

Crawling through the ceiling is not a big problem, but going down using only the ladder to the third floor is truly a harrowing task.

They had to rest on every floor in between.

Yanlong moved straight to the bathroom on the third floor, and removed a foam tile on the false ceiling.

Rufeng is on the otherside. Yanlong did not let him peek.

She made sure there's no one in the room before letting Rufeng move both cactus thorns and the fire jade.

Then, she sent a message to Huo Mei.

[ Yanlong ] : Come to the bathroom on the third floor, alone.

[ Yanlong ] : *** Alone ***

▬ ● ◘ ◘ ● ▬

In their new room, Huo Mei looked around after receiving the message from Yanlong.

Damn, they even go to the bathroom in pairs, to avoid facing surprising situations.

This is at Yanlong's directive.

"I am going to the bathroom." Huo Mei got up.

"Again? You just went half an hour ago." Biyu piped up, about to get up.

"I have forgotten my brush there - I will be back in a moment. No need to get up." Huo Mei said, pushing Biyu down.

Biyu sat down, watching Huo Mei in confusion.

It is Huo Mei who made a big deal of following all of Yanlong's directives, and she is hell bent on not missing a single one.

Biyu looked confusedly at HuoMei, who was moving away extremely fast.

The others stopped what they were doing, and they all concentrated on Biyu.

They looked at each other, and in that single moment, they came to the same conclusion.

'Secret Meeting' !!!

There's no other reason for HuoMei to be this secretive.

Mingzhu is the one who took initiative, and put her fingers to her lips, shushing them all.

Then, she gave the anime finger directions, saying they should follow HuoMei.

They all took their weapons, and slowly inched towards the bathroom.

▬ ● ◘ ◘ ● ▬

Yanlong sent the message again.

[ Yanlong ] : Take a left when you enter the bathroom.

[ Yanlong ] : The shining red ball you see on the floor is yours.

[ Yanlong ] : It contains fire energy, and I purified it for you.

[ Yanlong ] : Take it and put it away first.

She watched HuoMei through the little gap she created in the ceiling frame.

HuoMei picked up and kept the fire jade away.

Yanlong closed the ceiling frame gently, without even disturbing the dust on the frame.

[ Yanlong ] : In the third bathroom, there are wooden spear heads.

[ Yanlong ] : They are extremely sharp, you could probably make use of them to create defense structures.

[ Yanlong ] : Especially for the metal half door you create on the second floor.

[ Yanlong ] : Also, there is a small crystal in the head of every zombie.

[ Yanlong ] : This is a precious resource. Collect it, and store them with you.

[ Yanlong ] : Take care while storing the zombie nuclei. It is not good to absorb them directly, for that makes a person go mad.

[ Yanlong ] : They need to be purified.

[ Yanlong ] : If a crystal bead has black smoke in it or even the mildest amount of black, it can not be put together with rest of the nuclei.

[ Yanlong ] : It will ruin any and all crystal nuclei it touches. You must not touch it with bare hands either. A black crystal nuclei's power to make a person go mad is ten times that of normal crystal nuclei.

[ Yanlong ] : So, you must never ever touch a black crystal bead with bare hands. Have wuli make special tongs or something to pick up crystal nuclei, and let MeiBing make a cover.

Yanlong paused when she heard extremely soft footsteps.

In her previous life, she has never been this sensitive.

'Is it because I am awakened as a power, or is it because I have lived in an apocalypse for ten years, and it has become a habit to be on guard twenty four seven?'

Yanlong wondered.

All the same, she stopped sending messages.

"What are you doing?" Biyu asked from behind HuoMei.

HuoMei reacted badly.

A fireball flew right at the head of Biyu, redirected at the last moment due to HuoMei's effort and MeiBing's fast guard.

Even so, most of the hair on the right side of Biyu is burnt.

"Don't surprise me ! It's dangerous!" Huo Mei exclaimed.

Biyu could only nod in shock.

It is only after an entire minute they recovered from the shock.

"That… I am sorry." Huo Mei apologized awkwardly.

"Sorry! You think just a sorry would cut it? " Biyu said in anger.

Everyone but Wuli and Huo Mei could tell it's mock anger.

"Then… Pay you money..?" Huo Mei asked doubtfully.

She wondered if money will even have value in this kind of environment.

"Pay in hot water! Pay for a month.. No no! Pay for a year." Biyu increased her demands exponentially.

Listening to her nonsense, Huo Mei caught on.

"Little girl! Hot water for a year? Dream on." she poked fun at Biyu.

"Then a month?" Biyu wondered.

Huo Mei poked Biyu's forehead as she answered, " When ever you want.".

Biyu when she understood what she said, gasped in surprise, and did a swoon action with her hand on her heart.

"Warrior Huo Mei ! This little girl's body is yours from now on. Do this, that or anything else, this young girl shall never reject your advances." Biyu said lewdly, as she shook her hips, puffed out her chest, and played with her hair.

The others nearby made both vomiting motions and puppy barks as they mocked Biyu.

"Enough now! Yanlong sent us a present. Come see!" She said, opening the third bathroom's door.

The cactus thorns are put in a pile, pointy ends towards the door.

Biyu picked one up curiously, and as soon as her hands touched the wooden handle, the bottom three inches of the foot long thorn came undone like threads.

"Wow!" Biyu exclaimed.

The others looked at her curiously.

"My power is weaving. I can weave, and unweave any and all organic items, but it seems I can not unweave past this mark. From Yanlong's common knowledge, this kind of thing happens only when a lower level being tries to undo a higher level being's work." Biyu answered.

They all digested the words, when Mingzhu exclaimed.

"Girls! Do you understand what this means?" she asked.

"There's a plant higher than us? " Suyan offered.

"There's a plant whose offence is such an impregnable defense that we will not even stand a minimum chance of surviving if we fight head to head with it." Mei Bing offered.

"It would not be easy to travel out to our parents, will it?" Huo Mei summarized for them.

In their little university, which is almost devoid of plant and animal life to make way for the skyscraper buildings, there is already such a plant.

What happens when they go through the virgin forest where man has not stepped foot in despite modern technology?

If the little harmless potted plants turned like this, what would thousand year old pitcher plants and venus fly traps turn into ?

They shuddered in horror.

"We are stuck here." Wuli said in despair.

At this moment, Yanlong sent a message to the common room.

[ Yanlong ] : That is why we must eliminate the zombies as fast as possible.

This..

"Hey! Yanlong!" all the girls exclaimed.

"Come out! Come on out! Yanlong! Where the heck are you hiding?" random words popped through all over the place.

Yanlong did not move from where she was.

After some time, all the noise faded away.

Even so, Yanlong did not open any of the false ceiling boards.

She walked without noise towards the vent, but Rufeng … as he crawled, a ceiling board made a sound.

The next moment, a head popped up inside the ceiling frame.

"A child ? " Huo Mei exclaimed.

While the rest went away, she came back just to figure out where in the world Yanlong was hiding.

She did not expect to see Yanlong the baby.