My Dating Sim Just Got an Update - Chapter 26

Mu Ning heard Ren Chenxi say her wound was painful. Although she desperately wanted to go over and check the injury again, she noticed Ren Chenxi still flinching away from her. Ultimately, she only managed to drop a cold, stiff remark: “Then get some proper rest!”

“Yes, Sister Xi, why don’t you try to get some more sleep? You used up the most ability points while we were dealing with those mutant wolves, and then you got hurt. It’s only natural for you to be exhausted.”

The observant Jian Dan gave Ren Chenxi a gentle tug. Ren Chenxi took the cue and shuffled closer to Jian Dan, putting some much-needed distance between herself and Mu Ning.

However, Ren Chenxi had already slept for quite a while in the van after losing consciousness. Now, she wasn’t sleepy at all. Plus, the intermittent stinging from her wound made it impossible to drift off. Since she couldn’t sleep, she decided to find something to kill the time. Looking at the dark sky, she knew it would be a while before dawn.

Ren Chenxi tried her best to ignore the occasional glances Mu Ning shot her way. She hunched her shoulders, leaned against the wall, and half-closed her eyes to pull up the game interface. Earlier, while Mu Ning and her teammates were clearing out the mutant beasts and zombies, she had fished in troubled waters by throwing quite a few stones. Now that she was idle, it was the perfect time to check her loot.

Since her backpack had started filling up, Ren Chenxi had carefully categorized it. However, she usually kept the first two rows—forty slots on the first page empty. While the “Auto-Loot” feature was convenient, it wasn’t thoughtful enough to organize dropped items into specific categories for her. Normally, anything picked up by the system was simply dumped into the nearest empty slot. If the first few slots were full, items would stack in the back, making it a hassle to find things. Sometimes, she’d even find random items in her bag without knowing when they got there.

Below those empty slots, the next three rows were reserved for cards and various odds and ends she used for throwing, ensuring she could grab a weapon instantly in case of danger.

As soon as she opened her backpack, Ren Chenxi went straight to the first page to check the crystal nuclei she had gained in those newly filled slots.

The first wave of thirty-odd mutant wolves consisted of three Level 4 wolves, while the rest were low-level. Ren Chenxi had managed to “hit” almost every single one of them. During the second wave of beasts and zombies, she had been unconscious in the van for a while, but after returning to the house, she managed to “hit” about thirty targets. Although the second wave was larger, they were all low-level. Consequently, her backpack now held 3 Level 4 nuclei, 13 Level 3 nuclei, and over 20 each of Level 2 and Level 1 nuclei.

After converting all these nuclei, she now had a total of 6,845 crystals! Looking at her balance, Ren Chenxi’s mood brightened considerably.

However… when she thought about using those 6,000-plus crystals for gacha draws… she could only afford six pulls. Her mood immediately plummeted again. Tsk, she got five free draws every day anyway; in that context, 6,000 crystals really wasn’t that much!

Sigh, she just hoped that the dropped nuclei she hadn’t been able to pick up because they were too far away wouldn’t despawn by morning.

Ren Chenxi only moped for a moment before forcing herself to look at her other rewards. After all, these monsters dropped extra items besides nuclei. She had initially assumed only humanoid monsters like zombies would drop extra items they carried. But after converting the crystals, she realized the auto-loot had also picked up extra drops from the beast-type monsters.

Naturally, the mutant wolves hit by the “Grease Card” were guaranteed to drop a bottle of gasoline. Besides oil, she had also gathered a dozen pieces of fresh wolf meat, several wolf skins, wolf fangs, and other miscellaneous items. The drops from other mutant beasts were similar, but to her surprise, she also found several goose eggs!

Looking at the eggs, Ren Chenxi remembered that among the mutant beasts attacking them was a small flock of mutant geese. Back in the countryside, geese were essentially the “village bullies.” Now that the apocalypse had arrived, these mutant bullies actually dared to compete with wild beasts for prey? And even then, why were the ones carrying eggs running out to hunt?

Well, she decided not to overthink the logic of mutant animals. According to the system backpack’s identification, the meat and eggs were all edible. In the apocalypse, you could never have too much food.

Compared to the beasts, the drops from the humanoid zombies were rather underwhelming. Most of them dropped watches, rings or necklaces—items that were worthless in the post-apocalyptic world. Only a few dropped small knives, daggers, or scissors that they had been carrying as weapons.

In Ren Chenxi’s eyes, the most useful and practical item among the humanoid drops was a bottle of unopened light soy sauce.

So, did this zombie turn into one while on its way to buy soy sauce, or was it bitten after the purchase? Regardless of how it happened, it must have been a long trek from a human settlement where one could buy soy sauce all the way to this suburb.

At the same time, Ren Chenxi confirmed that the number of mutant beasts and zombies in H-City far exceeded what she had seen in other cities. Was it because H-City had a larger population? Was that why creatures from other provinces and cities were being drawn here?

Just as Ren Chenxi was wondering about this, Tang Ying and the others took advantage of the rest period to ask Chen Gu for information about H-City. Coincidentally, they asked why there were so many zombies and beasts, and why there seemed to be so many Level 4 variants.

Chen Gu’s answer confirmed Ren Chenxi’s suspicions. H-City was densely populated, which naturally attracted zombies and beasts. When other “dead cities” lost their human scent, the creatures would migrate toward nearby cities where humans still resided. If zombies gathered based on the instinctual pull of human flesh, mutant beasts did so to hunt and grow stronger.

Just as human ability users relied on nuclei from beasts and zombies to level up, mutant beasts could prey on each other or on humans to satisfy their hunger and evolve. Therefore, the areas surrounding large-scale bases were always teeming with far more monsters than sparsely populated small towns.

At this point, Chen Gu added with a bitter smile that because their South Sea Base had such a massive population, they had even faced a zombie tide a few months ago. At that time, almost every ability user in the base was mobilized, and even ordinary people without powers took up arms to defend their home. It was during that battle that their leader killed the most zombies and advanced to Level 5.

“Then, are there many Level 5 ability users in your base?”

“Not many. Just two. One is the base leader, and the other is our Boss.”

“Are there Level 5 mutant beasts or zombies in H-City?”

“I’m certain there are; we just haven’t encountered them yet. After all, while we are leveling up, the zombies and beasts are evolving too. Since they far outnumber humans, their leveling process is bound to be easier.”

Chen Gu’s words cast a shadow over the group of young people who had been full of hope for the H-City base, plunging them back into silence. In that deathly quiet, Ren Chenxi curled her lips in a mocking smile.

How naive. It was already the end of the world; did they really expect a “safe zone” that was as absolutely secure and stable as the peaceful era?

Ignoring the sighing youths, Ren Chenxi refocused her attention on her backpack. She knew that if she wanted to survive this cruel world, improving her own strength was the only key. Currently, her only reliance was this game system—her “Hit” skill and the cards from the prize pool.

If she had SR-grade cards, she wouldn’t have been so pathetic when facing the Level 4 mutant wolf, or the Level 4 mutant leopard earlier. She wouldn’t have been so utterly helpless in a life-or-death crisis, only to be saved by the one person she least wanted to see.

However, to get higher-grade cards, she had to keep drawing. The free draws weren’t enough to sustain her usage, let alone provide enough to fuse more R-grade or SR-grade cards. Therefore, she had to get more nuclei for gacha! But to get more nuclei, she needed high-level cards to ensure her safety. It was a complete catch-22.

Unless she could keep doing what she did today: clinging to the thighs of a Level 5 ability user and mooching some nuclei for free.

Thinking of this, Ren Chenxi hesitantly peeked toward Mu Ning again, only to lock eyes directly with Mu Ning’s dark, brooding gaze. Those eyes were as deep as ink, looking as if they could swallow someone whole, startling Ren Chenxi into immediately retracting her gaze.

Whoa, no way! If possible, she really didn’t want to rely on that “Ice Goddess”!

Ren Chenxi shrunk back, waiting for that burning gaze to disappear before continuing to look through her few remaining cards. If she remembered correctly, she had used up all her “Grease Cards” and “Flash Cards” during the fight against the wolf pack. She should have two “Explosion Cards” left. When she was dragged out the window by the Level 4 wolf, she had considered using one, but then realized an R-grade Explosion Card wouldn’t kill a Level 4 wolf in one hit, so she hadn’t wasted it, opting for her dagger instead.

Looking back, she must have lost her mind—her life was almost over, yet she was worried about wasting cards? If the Ice Goddess hadn’t saved her, all the cards in her bag, including those two Explosion Cards, would have been wasted anyway… Eh?

Wait… when did she get five more Explosion Cards? And they were placed right after the R-grade ones, which meant they weren’t auto-looted from monsters. Then these cards…

Wait, wait, wait!!! Why are these cards SR-grade? R-grade Explosion Cards are blue, but these new ones in her bag are purple! And besides these five SR Explosion Cards, there were also five SR Recovery Cards!

Where did these come from?

Suddenly, Ren Chenxi remembered the system notifications she had heard while she was blinded by the Flash Card.

Could it be that in her moment of life-and-death crisis, the system had a change of heart and gifted her some kind of “Narrow Escape” bundle? If that was the case, she really shouldn’t have ignored those notifications! No, from now on, she shouldn’t ignore any system prompt ever again!

Wait, something still felt off. If the system wanted to give her a “Narrow Escape” bundle, the timing was terrible. In such a critical moment, who has time to rummage through a backpack for cards? If the system truly wanted the player to survive, wouldn’t it be better to just grant an invincibility buff? Why bother with a bundle…

While Ren Chenxi was grumbling internally, she continued to scroll through the game panels. After some searching, she finally figured out where these ten SR cards had come from.

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