“Lately, the mountain villa has been unusually quiet. What’s going on?”
At a construction site in Ying City, several two-star evolved sat on the edge of a half-dug pit, smoking cigarettes one of them had just spun from a wheel. They chatted while gazing in the direction of Cloud Peak.
Construction sites like this were everywhere now. The entire Ying City had become a massive construction zone, and the distant city walls were growing taller by the day.
Rumor had it that once Ying City was completed according to plan, it would resemble an ancient, majestic city capable of housing over five million evolved.
This was an astonishing number, considering that evolved were not like ordinary people from the past. Their daily lives and training required much more space, and the city would need to establish large areas for various facilities, such as training grounds, trading markets, barracks, battle beast camps, and more.
In short, once completed, this city might become the largest evolved habitat in the entire nation—or even the world.
Building such a grand city naturally required a massive workforce, which Cloud Peak recruited through various channels.
Ye Zhongming adopted an active invitation method to prevent infiltration by hostile forces. Preparations had begun long ago, with Cloud Peak inviting small-scale teams or low-level evolved to live in Ying City. Under a certain degree of protection, these people lived relatively comfortable lives. Previously, many forces in Ying City believed this was Cloud Peak’s way of solidifying its foundation. After all, with people, everything else could follow.
The arrival of these people did bring benefits to Cloud Peak. They needed low-level equipment and potions, which Cloud Peak had in abundance. Due to their low strength, they were willing to do tasks that other forces wouldn’t touch. They also brought in a certain amount of tax revenue for Cloud Peak.
Cloud Peak, or the original forces of Ying City, naturally handled core areas and projects. However, basic construction and less critical areas could be delegated to these laborers. Cloud Peak provided some compensation based on the amount of work done, and these people were more than willing to take on the tasks.
Take this group of two-star evolved, for example. They had already fallen far behind in terms of evolution level. In a sense, they had been eliminated. In the post-apocalyptic world, they couldn’t hunt many mutated lifeforms, making further evolution extremely difficult.
But Cloud Peak gave them hope. As long as they completed the construction of Ying City, they would receive three-star evolution potions and, depending on their performance and efficiency, one to several pieces of good equipment.
Although they lacked many machines, the superhuman physiques of the evolved compensated for this. Each team had clear targets; on average, after working in Ying City for two months, they would receive the promised rewards.
They had food and drinks made from mutated lifeform ingredients that were extremely beneficial to their bodies. They could sleep soundly at night without worrying about being bitten in the head by zombies in their dreams. Those who performed well received additional rewards and could even join the major teams in Ying City on a priority basis. After two months, they could steadily increase their evolution level.
They had only dreamed of such good fortune, and their enthusiasm for work was extremely high. As a result, the construction of Ying City progressed rapidly.
So far, at least 20,000 evolved ranging from one-star to three-star were working at various sites in Ying City.
After being here for over a month, these people had grown accustomed to the large groups of Cloud Peak personnel passing by. They looked forward to those moments the most, as they saw hope in these Cloud Peak warriors, who were at least five-star evolved. Perhaps that was their future.
However, in recent days, Cloud Peak’s combat teams had seemingly vanished, rarely appearing. Only essential staff remained in Ying City.
“Heh, I heard some news from the foreman of our section.”
One of the men stubbed his cigarette on the ground with his foot, looking quite pleased with himself.
Humans always feel a sense of pride when they possess information unknown to others, which is especially true for Chinese people.
The others immediately turned to him, asking what was going on.
“Heh.” The man chuckled but remained silent, his eyes fixed on someone’s pocket.
“You, Old Wang, always have your eyes on my good stuff.”
The person being stared at cursed under his breath but still took out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and handed one to Old Wang.
Old Wang immediately took it, sniffed it, and, reluctant to smoke it right away, tucked it behind his ear.
“See that?”
Old Wang pointed to the distant sky, where a small black dot was moving irregularly at a slow pace.
Though far away, evolved had excellent eyesight—nearsightedness didn’t exist among them. After looking, they all said it was Mr. Ye’s dragon, which they had occasionally seen before. What was so special about it?
The person who had been in Ying City for the shortest time, about half a year, was protected by Cloud Peak and could go to Puxing Town daily to take on simple tasks to earn money. He was filled with gratitude toward Ye Zhongming and spoke with great respect.
Old Wang clicked his tongue. “You brainless fools, you could see it before, but can you see it every day like now?”
“Also, what did that dragon do before? It was either playing or going around looking for food. But now, it hasn’t left the airspace above the mountain villa at all. It’s patrolling!”
“Hey, what’s going on? Stop beating around the bush,” the person who had given the cigarette slapped his friend.
“I heard that Cloud Peak is on high alert because… Xia Lei and the others are about to evolve!”
Hearing this, the group was stunned momentarily before realizing what it meant. Their expressions turned to shock.
Previously, Xia Lei and the others were seven-star evolved. If they evolved again, then… wouldn’t that mean…
“That’s right; they’re about to become eight-star evolved!”
The group sighed in amazement. While they were still stuck at the two-star level, others were about to reach eight stars, just one step away from the legendary realm.
“Mr. Ye… Xia Bai, this time, several people?”
Someone repeated the question, and after getting a confirmation, they exclaimed how incredible it was, saying that perhaps only Cloud Peak Mountain Villa in the entire nation could obtain so many eight-star evolution potions at once.
“But…” Old Wang stroked his chin, looking thoughtful. “This time, it’s said that many people are also evolving to six and seven stars… Don’t you think that with Cloud Peak launching attacks everywhere lately, hunting who knows how many high-level mutated lifeforms, and now such a large-scale evolution, it feels like something big is about to happen?”
The group debated fervently. Some said it was just normal evolution, while others agreed with Old Wang, believing that such a concentrated wave of evolution must have a purpose.
Just as the discussion heated up, some commotion erupted from the front, accompanied by the roars of battle beasts.
The group quickly stood up and ran to the intersection of their street to see what was happening.