Chapter 450: Zero Nutrient Absorption Plan: Achieved
Over the next few hours, somebody consulted Harry about the absorption rate ranking on the odd occasion. Whenever Harry answered that cluster 1 was the last in rank, Lin Sanjiu didn't know whether she should be relieved or not.
It seemed that everyone had only needed to wait for the arrival of the tenth day. However, Number 46 gave no leeway for stopping and insisted that they should continue to demolish the greenhouse.
"What if she is tricking us? What if she just wants all of us to drop our guard so that we won't chase after her? What we should do if she wears her number tag at the last minute on the tenth day?"
Nobody from the crowd could refute Number 46's sarcastic reasonings. All of them looked at each other and saw a similar concern in each other eyes. They couldn't help but sigh as they had to confess that they couldn't ignore the probability.
"A long delay will cause more trouble," The bulge-eyed man's injuries had already recovered, he spat, "I suggest we should kill her straight away once we spot her, no need to search for the number tags."
As he said, he gave Lin Sanjiu sidelong glance as if she was the origin that pushed them into the mare's nest they were in right now. If she could have killed the woman when she had the chance, they wouldn't have to go through so much trouble. However, Lin Sanjiu was unfazed by his gaze, sitting in her place with frowning eyebrows, locking herself in her thought.
"What's your thought?"
Number 46 walked closer. As his shadow loomed over her, it tore her away from her musing.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Are you guys ready to go?" Lin Sanjiu raised her head to looked at Number 46. He had lost quite a bit of his weight though he had only been in the greenhouse for a few days. She played with the card in her hand as she said, frowning her brows, "I've been thinking about the exchange between that woman and me… and the goal of that traitor."
The woman had escaped her twice with the same ability. Nevertheless, Lin Sanjiu felt the second time was a little bit different from the first time.
If she could detect the differences...
"Initially I couldn't wrap my mind around when the cluster 1 was in the first place. Now, I have seen the light when they've fallen to the end of the tail," Number 46 said, as a solemn expression dawned on his face, "... When I think about it, I found that if the woman were in the position to hide until the end of the game, there would be no need for her to risk herself to steal our number tags; our number tags have no use for her. Thus, why would she bother to come? Obviously, she and the traitor are attempting to create a smoke screen, a humbug that will make us believe that our plan is going bear fruit in the end once we have gotten her number tag. It's conceivable that once we've lowered our guard, she and the traitor will put on their number tags in the final moment and most of us will lose the round. Perhaps the traitor has a vendetta against somebody among us, I don't know, or he has a reason that he must eliminate that person… That might be the explanation of why the traitor is so keen on frustrating the zero nutrient absorption plan."
"Aside from the woman in sportswear, everybody has already handed over their number tags, so how is the traitor going to wear his number tag while everybody is watching him?" Lin Sanjiu mumbled to herself, "Besides, you guys have cleared the greenhouse halfway. Soon enough, the woman will have nowhere to hide."
Number 46 did not remark on Lin Sanjiu's words as he didn't have an answer for it. After a short while of thinking, he whispered to Lin Sanjiu, "You clear on what should you do later?"
Lin Sanjiu nodded in assent.
Though everything was still shrouded in the dark, the time didn't give them any elbow room to iron everything out. It was time for the big troop to venture out. As such, both of them had to drop whatever they were talking about right now.
To prevent themselves from losing any more number tags, Number 46 convinced everybody to give their number tags to Lin Sanjiu to keep in a satchel. Then, she would turn the satchel into a card. Meanwhile, her own "number 49" tag was passed to the red-shirt guy, who was part of the demolishing team.
Although they firmly believed that there was no reason for the woman to ambush them again, clusters 2, 3, and 4 still left their members with relatively higher combat power behind at the rendezvous point. They were Baldhead, the warm-hearted muscle bloke, and a quiet, bob haircut girl from cluster 4.
Nevertheless, no matter how eager Baldhead was to vent his anger about losing his number tag to the woman, all they could see or hear was only the dying wail of the falling plants in the distance. The woman in sportswear didn't show up.
While the rest of the people were busying chatting, Lin Sanjiu had excluded herself from the chatter and stayed alone in a corner, staring at the card in her hand.
The drawing on the [Planar World] depicting the amputated arm was lifelike. The contours, shades, hairs, skin, and the muscle linings… It was worth calling the depiction the tour de force of an artist that had mastered the essence of art.
Below a blank white space which had no uses read a simple description: An amputated arm from a posthuman. Like a lizard that shed their tails as a decoy for their predator, the posthuman could drop any of her limbs to buy herself enough time to escape.
The description did not provide any useful details for Lin Sanjiu. She sighed and deactivated the card. Then, a female arm dropped into her embrace.
Lin Sanjiu threw the arm into the air, and the palm beaten around along the swing. She studied the arm meticulously yet she still couldn't figure out any differences between the two times the woman in sportswear ambushed her.
In the next second, Harry's voice suddenly rang out of thin air, giving her a huge fright. As if to confirm that her ears didn't fail her, Lin Sanjiu turned over to Baldhead, her face filled with perplexion and shock.
"What did he... What did Harry just say?" She gulped and asked dryly, "Number 56 from the cluster 2 is dead? I didn't hear it wrong, did I?"
Baldhead's eyes were widened like two large balls as if he didn't understand Harry's announcement at all. He didn't look at Lin Sanjiu, and he only regained his senses after a few seconds, "Oh my, Number 56 is dead?"
Lin Sanjiu's heart sank. Number 56 was the red-shirted guy, the one who had her number tag.
"Does that means that my number tag is lost as well?"
As if somebody had pushed the pause button, the plants in the distance stopped falling the moment Harry made his announcement. The whizzing chainsaw petered out. There was a half-fell plant hanging mid-air. The smoke and the flame continued to lick the air but it was dissipating, and soon it would melt into thin air. Clearly, even the demolishing team was not expecting this announcement.
Lin Sanjiu threw the arm away and stood up. She suddenly looked down as if she had remembered something. When she raised her head again, she saw several shadows slaloming at full speed towards them.
The other three were still in a daze. When the shadows came to light, they realized, with much shock that all of them were cluster 5 members.
Leading the pack was Number 46, whilst Number 45 and Number 47, who had recovered most of his vitality, were trailing closely behind him. There were a few more shadows far behind the three; all of them were traveling at high speed. It looked like the three of them in front were being hunted by those at the back.
Baldhead and the other two people finally realized something was not right and all of them rose to their feet. However, Lin Sanjiu was a tad faster to respond than them. She quickly jumped to another leaf and rushed up to meet the trio.
"Destroy it!"
Number 46 shouted when he saw Lin Sanjiu. One of the shadows that trailing tightly behind them suddenly picked up his speed and pounced on Number 45, who was the last person of the pack in the front. Number 45 turned over her shoulder and stretched open her mouth large enough to fit in a human head.
"A duoluozhong!" The pursuer gasped in shock, and he almost fell from the edge of the leaf.
Thanks to the short delay, Number 46 and Number 47 arrived in front of Lin Sanjiu.
"Call the card out!" Number 46 shouted at Lin Sanjiu again, "Destroy it!"
Lin Sanjiu immediately called the shabby satchel out from her card and placed it near her [Vibroblade]. When the group of pursuers finally arrived, they stood in froze when they saw the satchel. Spring Bean, the leader of the herd, stared at the satchel. His expression was grim.
"Hold up! What are you guys doing?" Hissed Spring Bean; his words were thick with indignation. He swept his dark and murky eyes across the members of cluster 5 from one to another before continuing his outburst, "Why do you want to destroy our number tags? Was the death of Number 56 from cluster 2 your doing?"
The demolishing team consisted of ten or so people yet nobody saw how or who killed the red-shirted guy. They only knew the number of indigo flower in their possession remained the same. Spring Bean's mind was all jumbled together, and he had too many questions in mind that he didn't know where to start.
Number 46 looked at Lin Sanjiu, giving her a nod to hold up first before turning back to Spring Bean.
"What did we do to that guy? That should be my question," Number 46 sneered with his usual derisive tone, "Do you all still not understand the situation now? Let me tell you; there's a traitor among us. Without the traitor, the woman from cluster 1 would never know our assembly point, the time we venture out, and most of all, the details of our plan. The reason she could get away from us every single time is that one of you have betrayed us, and she and the traitor are the culprits for killing Number 56."
The crowd was stunned, including Baldhead and the other two people that were rushing in from behind them. All of them stopped moving forward.
"Before we set out today, Number 49 and I had set up a trap for that traitor when all of us are handing in our number tags," Number 46 said as he gazed across the crowd. His eyes had no temperature, "It's exactly because of this trap and the action of that traitor that allowed me to confirm that number tag Number 49 snatched from the woman in sportswear is hers."
A low murmur immediately spread across the crowd.
"When I asked all of you to hand in your number tags, you all were present, so you all saw with your eyes that Number 49 put all the number tags into the satchel," Number 46 said as he emphasized the "all" word, "... including the number tag belongs to the woman.
"I supposed the traitor must have been delighted when he saw that. He must have thought that Number 49 had unmindfully mixed all the number tags, so he, or maybe she, immediately cook up a scheme to help the woman to reclaim her number tag. That's why they killed the red-shirted guy since he was the one holding Number 49's number tag," Number 46 grinned, and paused before continuing, "... Since the traitor has associated himself with the woman, he must help her to regain her number tag; otherwise, their association will fall apart. According to the traitor's playbook, Number 49 should be furious when she found out that her number tag was gone since the red-shirted guy (Number 56) is dead. Next, if everybody urged her to return their number tag at that moment, she wouldn't be able to take note of a lot of things when her heart was all tangled up. And when a person's mind is in a chaotic mess, negligence is bound to appear. The traitor was going to take advantage of the chaos to sneak the woman's number tag away. However, little did he expect that the moment I heard the announcement of the death of the red-shirted guy (Number 56), I understood everything. Hence, I immediately rushed back here to have Number 49 destroy both the traitor and the woman's number tags. As long as their number tags are destroyed, our victory will be warranted. It's just that you bunch of doofuses thought we murdered the red-shirted guy."
After he'd heard what Number 46 had said, Spring Bean's lips quivered but he said nothing. He exchanged glances with a few besides him and took quite some time to digest the hefty amount of information he received just now. After all of them had discussed the traitor and what Number 46 had told them, Spring Bean opened his lips and spoke on behalf of the crowd, "... So, you still don't know who is the traitor?"
"Unfortunately, no. I don't know." Number 46 gave him a grin, "But I don't have to know anyway. All we need right now is destroy this satchel. We already know that the woman's number tag is inside the satchel because of the death of the red-shirted guy. Since everybody was present when we handed in our number tags today, and we could only hand in our own number tag, we can say that the person who objects to destroy the satchel must be the traitor. Otherwise, why wouldn't he want to vanquish this pocket dimension with everybody?"
"But… what about our vitality…" Somebody from the crowd murmured.
"We have four more—oh no, three more days until the end of the maturation stage. After we destroy the satchel, we don't have to demolish the plants anymore. We can rest until we leave the pocket dimension, so our vitality won't be affected." Number 46 said sternly, "Besides, in between vitality and your life, which one would you choose?"
It was an arduous but fruitless task to refute against Number 46. Also, nobody from the crowd could find any flaw in his logic. However, they couldn't bring themselves to allow him to destroy the satchel.
Number 46 was getting more and more impatient.
Just when he moved a step forward and opened his mouth, just when everybody thought he wanted to say something, Lin Sanjiu, who was standing silently behind all along suddenly activated her [Vibroblade] and sliced the satchel, along with the number tags inside, into two pieces.
Everybody gasped when they saw the scene, but the number tags were destroyed, so they couldn't say anything now. Bathing under the curse from the crowd, Lin Sanjiu emotionlessly put her [Vibroblade] away.
Right now, cluster 5 had no number tags and their absorption rate became zero, tying with cluster 1 at the bottom of the rank. Then, Number 46 demanded the rest of the people who still had their number tags to give him their number tags. They didn't want to; however, Number 46 gave no carte blanche regarding his demand. His reasoning being that cluster 5 was the cluster that wished all of them would survive together the most, and they were the best candidate to be the keeper of the number tags. Hence, the trio could only give their number tags to him reluctantly.
Ever since they had entered the greenhouse, this was the first time everybody's absorption rate remained at zero.
The atmosphere was serene; nobody made any moves despite the heightening tension and they managed to maintain a stable condition until the evening of the tenth day.