Chapter 90: Sweet Rewards

Chapter 90: Sweet Rewards Pain brought clarity, and hatred could fuel one’s desire to survive even more. To stay alive, Shia’s eyes turned vicious as she suddenly bit her cracked lips. Warm blood spurted out, flowing into her mouth... "Gulp!" "Gulp!" She was actually swallowing her own blood! Quenching her thirst! In the other iron cage, the gray-robed old man was equally thirsty and hungry. Shia’s action of drinking her own blood immediately caught his attention. He incredulously rubbed his old eyes, shocked internally: "Terrifying woman! So ruthless to herself, imagine what she’d do to others..." He thought of their previous conflict and secretly considered how to get the jump on her. As for patching things up? That was never within a traitor’s consideration. ... "My... my lords, have mercy and give some water! I’m dying of thirst!" The gray-robed old man pitifully called out to the shield guards who were cutting down monsters. No matter how thirsty he was, he hadn’t lost his mind like Shia. Currently, this group of monsters still needed them for guidance—they couldn’t just let him die of thirst. "..." The gray-robed old man’s cries first caught Shia’s attention. Dimly, her reason came back somewhat. Was she doing something stupid? Already seriously hurt, this self-deceptive way of quenching thirst was like a double-edged sword, no doubt making her body worse! But the unexpected ’sweetness’ in her mouth made her hooked, and she couldn’t help continuing to swallow... After hearing the old man’s pleas, the shield guards showed no reaction. They neither stopped to rest nor showed any intention of taking out water bags, continuing to hack monsters with clanking sounds... "My lord? My lord?" Calling out over and over, not a single shield guard responded. The gray-robed old man had a sinking feeling. Could it be... these monsters really didn’t give a damn about their lives!? "Hehehe! Old man, your method doesn’t work!" Seeing the gray-robed old man’s desperate expression, fellow iron prisoner Shia looked gleeful, her face showing a weird expression of being high. "Lunatic! You’re another damn lunatic!" The gray-robed old man’s face was ugly as he cursed internally. Wasn’t there a single normal person among the traitors? Not to mention the already dead nutcase Murr. This woman in front of him was also gradually losing it, actually drinking her own blood to quench thirst and getting high off it? Was this something a normal creature could do? The gray-robed old man had no mood to argue with this damned woman. He was trying hard to think if his way of calling out was wrong. "It shouldn’t be. Since that lord had us guide ’Number 1,’ it means it can understand our words. If the guide dies of thirst, how could it have no reaction?" At this point, to survive, the gray-robed old man could only continue begging: "My lord... I’m going... going to die of thirst..." "Just one... one sip of water..." "..." The voice was so miserable, the longing for water so obvious that anyone hearing it would feel sorry for him. But unfortunately, surrounding them were skeletons who had no emotions, only the instinct to carry out their master’s commands. They had received two commands: 1). Advance quickly based on directional information provided by these two people while slaughtering the monster tide. 2). Don’t let monsters approach the iron cages while preventing these two from escaping. There was no command to provide water to the traitors, so the shield guards naturally ignored it. Moreover, they didn’t need to drink water, so Carlos naturally wouldn’t have them carry water. Even if he wanted to provide it, he couldn’t. The gray-robed old man begged for a while, but the skeleton monsters showed no reaction. His mouth grew increasingly dry, and his heart gradually sank to rock bottom... He gave up hope... ... While flying toward the team, Carlos noticed what was happening through Purple Thornblade Shield Guard #1’s vision. "They’re this thirsty after such a short time? And they still have energy to shout and hurt themselves—could there be some conspiracy?" Carlos subconsciously forgot that these two traitors were already beat up with their Psionic Energy shut down. Add the scorching sun overhead and the burning sand wind from rapid travel. That they’d lasted this long showed incredible toughness. "If they really die of thirst, that would be kind of a pain." After brief consideration, Carlos urged his crimson-gold wing bones to speed up again. Soon he approached the team’s airspace. He deliberately went around the team to the front, deploying the Tulip Shield Guard with two water bottles to wait... ... Meanwhile, in the traitors’ hidden camp some distance from the shield guards, weird activity was happening... At the camp’s center was a high platform. A traitor stood on it, pointing at a tall sand board, loudly introducing: "...Above are the new collection tasks assigned to you. You must complete them within the specified time! Submitters will receive sweet rewards!" As soon as he finished speaking, several people in the crowd of traitors below cooperatively shouted excitedly: "My god, there are actually spirit gear rewards!" "And precious alchemical potions rare in human society!" "Quick! Quick, I want collection task #3!" "Why should you! I want it too! The spirit gear is mine!" "Collection task #5! Nobody compete with me!" "..." Immediately, the atmosphere became chaotic. The traitors rushed forward to claim tasks, some even fighting... Not far from the platform stood a dark brown sand building that looked like it had been there for quite some time. On the building’s highest floor, two figures stood by the window. Looking down from above, watching what was happening at the platform. The person on the left wore a mask, body completely wrapped in a dark brown robe. "Thank you for your faction’s support." A mechanical voice like an alchemical device—impossible to tell if male or female. Standing alongside the brown-robed person was a burly man in heavy armor with fierce, cruel eyes giving off green light. Seeing his subordinates scrambling for tasks like they’d never seen the world, he felt really embarrassed and said coldly: "Good methods. Just bribing a few people to create excitement, you’ve driven these idiots to compete. Truly good methods!" The brown-robed person was really good at reading people and immediately noticed camp leader Dunro’s discomfort: "Hahaha, leader, you jest. These are just trivial tricks not worth mentioning. Your subordinates are clearly participating enthusiastically because of your orders. The few people I arranged merely added icing on the cake—not worth mentioning." Hearing these bootlicking words, Dunro’s mood improved. He no longer paid attention to those idiots below. "Hahaha, you’re absolutely right! Quick! Quick, take a seat!" Turning back to the table, he invited the brown-robed person to sit. "Thank you, leader!" Seeing Dunro no longer bothered, the brown-robed person internally sighed with relief. This was a crucial period of close cooperation between both sides—there couldn’t be the slightest screw-up, or the terrible consequences... The brown-robed person couldn’t help but shudder.