Apocalyptic Island - Chapter 40

Chapter 40

The cold pierced into her consciousness.

Vision was the first sense to return. Wen Yishu saw herself lying in a human-shaped depression, surrounded by crushed ferns that seeped a milky-white sap from their broken stems. Ten meters above, the smashed canopy formed a skewed circle of light, and drizzle fell from the opening, splashing into her eyes.

The leaves of the banyan tree shifted slowly; her glasses had been lost somewhere in the fall, and she couldn’t see clearly what lay above.

Wen Yishu felt pain racing to burrow into every one of her pores. She didn’t know if her internal organs were injured; falling from such a height and being scraped by branches all the way down had left her disoriented. Reason told her it was best to lie still on the ground for now, but she had to get up. If she stayed here all night, she would most likely be frozen into an ice sculpture by morning.

Her arms had no sensation at all, and she could only voice out with great difficulty: “Team… Leader…”

Her parched throat felt like it was on fire. Wen Yishu forced her mouth open, not caring if the rainwater was contaminated, using it to moisten her throat first. After a while, the only answer was the sound of the wind through the canopy. The drizzle fell on her exposed neck like countless tiny needles pricking her skin, a cold that felt like a biting sting.

Her senses of taste and smell woke up simultaneously; the metallic scent of earth mixed with the bloody taste in her mouth rushed into her nasal cavity, and Wen Yishu couldn’t help but cough twice. She felt a sharp, agonizing pain in her abdomen due to the coughing, unsure of where the injury was.

Wen Yishu struggled to swallow the bitter, bloody froth in her mouth. As the wind blew into her ears, she realized her earpiece had been lost in the fall as well.

She lay on the ground for a while before slowly sitting up. Fortunately, the impact pillow had worked wonders; her head was uninjured. The branches had buffered the force of her fall, and the mud on the ground was relatively soft, not yet frozen hard. This spot felt like a natural greenhouse; once her sensation returned, she felt that her hands and feet were not as stiff anymore.

Wen Yishu sat dizzily for a moment. Once her vision fully recovered, she saw the String of Pearls on her body, snapped into two sections. She slowly raised her hand, nudging the drooping leaves of the plant. It must have hooked onto countless branches to be broken so severely.

The other half, which had lost its roots, had already withered; the leaves were shriveled and devoid of moisture, and the originally sturdy main stem had gone limp, losing all its strength.

Wen Yishu spoke with a trembling voice: “Little Pearl?”

No voice responded to her; there was only dead silence by her ear. It looked like the most ordinary plant from before the apocalypse, lying limp and prostrate in Wen Yishu’s palm. The nutrient soil, no longer held by a root system, slipped loosely through her fingers.

She poked the leaves of the String of Pearls cautiously with her finger; there was still no reaction. That pink crystal nucleus was in her pocket; her wound-covered hand pulled it out. Holding it with effort, she saw the crystal’s volume had shrunk by half, now only the size of a fingernail.

The fact that she had survived the fall was likely due to the crystal’s merit; perhaps if she absorbed what was left of it, her injuries would heal faster. But the String of Pearls couldn’t wait. She felt as if the energy in her body had completely dried up; she couldn’t output or absorb even a trace of her ability. She could only rely on the plant itself. She carefully placed the crystal at its roots.

As expected, the scene of the crystal being absorbed did not occur. The roots, lacking soil and exposed to the air, began to wither faintly the moment they touched the crystal. It wasn’t obvious at first, but after a few seconds, Wen Yishu noticed the roots of the String of Pearls were shrinking, looking lifeless as if undergoing plasmolysis.

She immediately took the crystal away. She realized this was “root burn,” something that only happens when there is an excess of fertilizer. In other words, the String of Pearls, like her, was in an extremely weakened state and could not autonomously absorb the crystal.

Seeing the plant in her hand grow weaker by the second, Wen Yishu was consumed with anxiety. She braced her body and stood up, looking around in an attempt to find a way to save it. Her body was extremely frail; before she could stand firmly, she stumbled and was about to fall again when several branches twisted from aerial roots caught her by the arms and pulled her up.

Wen Yishu felt herself become weightless in an instant, pulled up onto a massive branch of the banyan tree. She didn’t feel any pain; the moment she made contact with the banyan, the pain in her body felt as if it had been numbed by anesthesia, slowly vanishing. She felt as if she were lying in a cradle as soft as a cloud; the aerial roots had formed a cradle-bed like one for a human infant, gently rocking her.

If she weren’t looking at the dense canopy above her head, Wen Yishu would have had the illusion of being at home. She reached out to touch the aerial roots beneath her, trying to communicate with the banyan.

She was held up high, feeling as if she had merged with the banyan tree. By simply shifting her gaze, she could see the vast land below and the labyrinthine jungle of the banyan forest. The sensation was extraordinary. Wen Yishu braced herself and sat up, and a somewhat aged yet kind and gentle female voice echoed in her ear: “Does it still hurt?”

A giant banyan tree appeared before her eyes; it seemed to have been rooted here for hundreds of years. From a tiny sapling, it had been carefully planted in a courtyard. As time passed, the house was demolished and the owners moved away. Yet it remained in place, having bid farewell to that family, spending long years watching the bustling crowds come and go.

It grew slowly, gradually passing from the old era into the new society. The city changed with each passing day; because of its massive size, it was eventually enclosed. In the beginning, there were only flower beds, and naughty children would swing from its aerial roots. Standing in the center of the street, it watched shops open one after another, high-rise buildings spring up, and human transportation tools undergo many generations of updates.

Later on, the surrounding residents changed batch after batch. The once lively area gradually became quiet due to urban planning. It still stood in place, becoming a local landmark. Unlike banyan trees growing elsewhere, it had deeply experienced human life. Young couples would date beneath its branches; elderly people who enjoyed the cool air in summer would play chess in its shade. Children laughed and played, chasing and running around it. It had become a watcher of the city, seeing generation after generation of people being born, growing up, aging, and dying.

Humans had been quite good to it, never restricting where it grew; when it fell ill, the local area had also done its best to treat it. It had always peacefully accommodated all people. Wen Yishu began to understand why it would save her and why it hadn’t actively harmed humans after the mutation occurred. Its memories had determined its friendliness from the start. Being near it made Wen Yishu feel extremely comfortable.

She wiped the crystal and placed it on the cradle of aerial roots, then pressed her face against the tree root, thanking it sincerely: “Thank you.”

The life force of the String of Pearls was still ebbing away; perhaps before long, it would completely die in Wen Yishu’s hands. There was still no ability in her body, so she placed the plant inside her relatively warm collar, trying to make it more comfortable.

With the crystal placed on the banyan tree, this bit of energy was like a drop of water in a pond to it—insignificant.

“Can you help me again?” Wen Yishu braced herself against the trunk, her fingers sinking deep into the soft moss. She felt the life force possessed by the String of Pearls growing weaker, almost impossible to sense. Those once emerald-green, plump leaves had shriveled and become wrinkled, feeling weightless against her.

The aged voice spoke again, whisking away the pink crystal placed there: “This is not enough.” Her voice was still maternal and warm: “I need to take more. Saving you and saving it are two different things.”

Wen Yishu’s lips began to tremble. She put the String of Pearls down and quickly searched her entire body, hating herself for not hunting more variants.

An aerial root extended before her, tapping her wrist: “I am curious, is the blood in your body the same as mine? I sense the aura of a kindred spirit from you, yet you are truly human.”

Wen Yishu understood its meaning almost instantly. She pulled out her short blade without hesitation; the moment it touched her skin, the blade was snatched away by an aerial root.

Wen Yishu looked toward where the blade had gone in confusion, only to hear the banyan’s kind voice again: “Just a joke. Next time, don’t wait until it’s nearly dead to ask.”

The soil brought up by the aerial roots completely enveloped the root system of the String of Pearls. A miracle began to happen; the originally shriveled branches and leaves began to turn lustrous and plump again, and fresh green shoots grew rapidly, soon becoming a large cluster. Even more miraculously, several small, white, bell-shaped flowers appeared at its tips, looking fuzzy and very cute.

The consciousness of the String of Pearls gradually woke up, and the first thing it did was scream: “Master, don’t die!”

Wen Yishu squinted, her expression pained; her ears really couldn’t take it, but she was still incredibly happy to hear such worried words. The aerial root retracted, and the String of Pearls fell right back into Wen Yishu’s hand.

The short blade fell along with it. Wen Yishu picked up the blade: “Is it no longer needed?”

“No need, just joking with you. You have already paid the price.” It brandished the crystal, which completely melted into the aerial roots.

The crying of the String of Pearls started up again: “What price? Master, don’t abandon me, waaaaah!”

The String of Pearls hugged Wen Yishu’s face directly, like a green mask, even thoughtfully leaving two air holes for her. Wen Yishu’s mouth twitched as she peeled it off her face. Apparently, the banyan had also heard the plant’s voice, as the surrounding aerial roots all stayed far away from the two of them. If Wen Yishu weren’t still sitting on it, perhaps the one below would have been retracted too.

She felt her cheeks heating up, feeling ashamed for the first time by the talkativeness of the String of Pearls.

The banyan gave a soft laugh: “You two have a rather good relationship.”

Wen Yishu breathed a sigh of relief, glad it wasn’t angry because of the noise. She silently prayed that the String of Pearls would stop talking, and she took some soil from her pocket, rolled it into a ball, and stuffed it into its roots.

The String of Pearls seemed to misunderstand something and cried even harder: “I don’t want to go with this Grandma! I don’t want to go with this Grandma! Please, Master, don’t leave me!”

Wen Yishu’s face turned as red as a boiled shrimp; her heart finally gave up, and she completely lost the ability to smile.

An aerial root flew back rapidly with a whistling sound, slapping the String of Pearls away. It traced a green parabola through the air. The serious atmosphere from before vanished instantly, and the voice became a bit younger: “Who are you calling Grandma!”

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