Sickly Girl Doesn’t Die in Zombie Simulator 287

Chapter 287: Drunken Huayibai

The cave at the mountaintop opened into a vast cavity, as if half the mountain had been hollowed out. Countless beige mycelium clung to the walls, making the entire cavity resemble the stomach of some enormous creature.

At the bottom were two pools, one large and one small.

The large pool was filled with a murky, repulsive mixture of dark red blood plasma, plant matter, and the corpses of zombies and humans. Lin Jiayao even spotted a mermaid among them.

The smaller pool, in contrast, contained a clear, beige liquid, like a “broth” brewed from the contents of the larger pool.

A beige mycelium pathway spiraled down the cave wall from the entrance, leading directly to the smaller pool of clear liquid.

It seemed quite cooperative, understanding the concept of honesty being the best policy.

Lin Jiayao wasn’t worried about any tricks. After all, against the overwhelming power of two A-ranks, any schemes from a B-rank blood crystal seemed childish.

Lin Jiayao, holding Huayibai’s hand, descended the mycelium staircase into the cave.

The further down they went, the stronger the pungent smell became.

It wasn’t the stench of decay, but a fermented, almost alcoholic, aroma, with a hint of damp mildew.

Compared to the contents of the larger pool, this smell was surprisingly mild.

This fungus had a varied diet… Lin Jiayao even saw a large chunk of soil in the larger pool. It not only ate plants, but even dirt.

As they descended, Lin Jiayao observed Huayibai’s reactions.

As a fungal lifeform, Huayibai’s perception of these things would be different from Lin Jiayao’s.

Since entering the cave, Huayibai had been staring intently at the smaller pool, as if it contained some delicious treat.

The last time Lin Jiayao had seen such a look of longing on Huayibai’s face was when she first tasted Lin Jiayao’s blood.

The liquid in the small pool, unlike the contents of the larger pool, had a fresh, herbal scent and a strong, fermented aroma, not at all repulsive.

“Do you want to drink it, Huayibai?” Lin Jiayao asked as they walked.

“Yes!” Huayibai nodded, glancing at Lin Jiayao, but her eyes remained fixed on the pool below.

This small turn of her head showed Huayibai was trying her best to restrain herself.

Soon, they reached the bottom of the cave. In the sunlight filtering through the opening above, Lin Jiayao could see several mycelium tubes connecting the two pools.

Perhaps because Goldie wasn’t a fungal zombie, she showed no interest in the translucent liquid in the smaller pool, more drawn to the zombie corpses containing blood crystals in the larger one.

Huayibai, meanwhile, stood transfixed by the smaller pool, unable to move.

Lin Jiayao held Huayibai’s hand, preventing her from jumping in, and then released a golden flying insect from her hand.

The moment the golden flying insect appeared, the mycelium on the cave walls trembled, and a few small rocks fell into the larger pool.

It seemed this beige fungus was wary of insects.

Lin Jiayao controlled the flying insect to the edge of the smaller pool and had it take a sip of the translucent, beige liquid.

Hmm… the effect was slightly weaker than the system’s Blood Crystal Serum, but there were no side effects.

However, compared to the Blood Crystal Serum exchanged from the system, this beige blood crystal liquid had its advantages.

The system’s Blood Crystal Serum could only be exchanged with Blood Crystals.

But this liquid produced by the beige fungus could be made from zombie corpses.

Clearly, drinking this liquid was more efficient than directly devouring corpses, though it lacked the corrective effect of the Blood Crystal Serum, which could fix distortions in blood crystal evolution.

This was genuine yellow blood crystal liquid. Although it couldn’t correct errors, it was still very effective for healing injuries and converting into her own blood crystal liquid.

“Go ahead and drink,” Lin Jiayao said, releasing Huayibai’s hand and patting her shoulder.

Huayibai had consumed a lot of Blood Crystals flying across the Pacific and had even deliberately saved a lot of blood crystal liquid for her.

Although Lin Jiayao had later asked her to devour more, she still refused to take too much for Goldie’s evolution.

Now, there was a pool of yellow blood crystal liquid here, perfect for Huayibai to recover, and Huayibai seemed to really like this liquid.

With Lin Jiayao’s permission, Huayibai rushed towards the small pool, stumbled just before reaching it, quickly picked herself up, and then ran back to Lin Jiayao.

“Mommy, together!” Huayibai tugged at Lin Jiayao’s arm, her little feet shuffling impatiently.

Although eager, she hadn’t forgotten to invite Mommy to share the treat.

“You go first, Mommy will look around.” Lin Jiayao smiled, rubbed Huayibai’s head, and gently nudged her forward. “Go ahead, sweetie.”

This time, Huayibai couldn’t resist the temptation and, after nodding at Lin Jiayao, rushed to the edge of the pool and plunged in.

“Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle…”

As Huayibai lay at the bottom of the pool, drinking and blowing bubbles, Lin Jiayao squatted down by the edge, scooped up some of the beige blood crystal liquid, and poured it onto the mycelium blanket beside her.

The mycelium blanket parted, revealing the stone beneath.

The beige blood crystal liquid flowed across the stone without any stickiness, seeping into the surrounding soil, neither solidifying nor transforming into Blood Crystals.

It was similar to the tree sap of the vascular network.

But unlike the vascular network’s sap, which could only be used for plant blood crystal evolution, this beige blood crystal liquid could be absorbed by other blood crystals.

It was a pity that she couldn’t reverse the process and turn this liquid back into Blood Crystals. Otherwise, she could decompose a large number of zombie corpses, convert them into this beige liquid, and then convert it into Blood Crystals.

This would double Lin Jiayao’s blood crystal collection speed.

But unfortunately, Lin Jiayao hadn’t found a way to reverse the conversion yet, and she hadn’t even figured out how tree sap was converted into Blood Crystals.

After having Goldie drink a few mouthfuls of the beige blood crystal liquid, Lin Jiayao sat by the pool, quietly waiting for Huayibai to finish devouring.

And the beige fungus that produced this liquid could only tremble in place, watching as the nutrient solution it had accumulated for who knows how long was rapidly devoured, powerless to stop it.

It couldn’t even escape. Although the cave seemed peaceful, the entire mountain outside was covered with insects of all kinds, watching its every move.

Lin Jiayao’s original plan was to have Huayibai devour all the beige blood crystal liquid, but when the pool was almost half empty, she noticed something amiss.

Perhaps to increase the contact area with the liquid, Huayibai had transformed back into her larger form.

But unlike the Huayibai Lin Jiayao remembered, her face was now unusually flushed.

Seeing Huayibai’s strange appearance, Lin Jiayao frowned, then relaxed.

When Huayibai drank her blood before, she also seemed to have this kind of overloaded reaction, both mentally and physically. Perhaps she had simply drunk too much this time.

“Huayibai,” Lin Jiayao called out from the edge of the pool, but received no response.

After a moment of thought, Lin Jiayao removed her windbreaker and boots before stepping into the pool.

After all, this was for Huayibai to drink. It wouldn’t be good to contaminate it with the mud on her shoes.

Although it wouldn’t affect the efficacy, it was still unpleasant.

The beige blood crystal liquid reached Lin Jiayao’s thighs as she waded towards Huayibai in the center of the pool.

Just as she bent down to pull Huayibai up, Huayibai in the water seemed to sense something and slowly opened her eyes.

Lin Jiayao, not noticing anything unusual, saw Huayibai’s outstretched hand and instinctively took it.

As she grasped Huayibai’s hand and was about to pull her up, she felt a strong force pulling her down into the water.

“Splash—”

Caught off guard, Lin Jiayao was pulled under. Before she could even struggle, she was enveloped in a tight, warm embrace.

Huayibai, lying in the water, held Lin Jiayao tightly, her long white hair floating around them. She opened her mouth slightly, seemingly saying something to Lin Jiayao underwater.

Lin Jiayao naturally couldn’t hear Huayibai’s words underwater, but, reading her lips, she understood.

It seemed to be, “Mommy, drink too.”

Lin Jiayao tried to pull away, but Huayibai’s embrace was too tight. And Goldie wasn’t a strength-based blood crystal.

She wouldn’t use her flying insects against Huayibai.

After staring at Huayibai for a moment, Lin Jiayao, giving in, took a mouthful of the blood crystal liquid and nodded at Huayibai.

It was as if to say, Mommy drank it, let go now.

But Huayibai didn’t seem to accept Lin Jiayao’s perfunctory gesture.

Perhaps it was the blood crystal liquid, but Huayibai was much bolder than usual.

Seeing that Lin Jiayao wouldn’t drink, she opened her mouth wide, took a large gulp of the beige blood crystal liquid, and then moved towards Lin Jiayao’s mouth, as if to force-feed her.

“Buzz——”

Before Huayibai’s mouth reached hers, several flying insects emerged from Lin Jiayao’s hand, swam to Huayibai’s mouth, and blocked it.

This little one was acting like she was drunk…

There was no other way. To prevent Huayibai from doing anything more strange, Lin Jiayao also began to gulp down the blood crystal liquid, replenishing Goldie.

The more blood crystal liquid Goldie had, the more she could use during the next descend. It wasn’t a complete waste to let Goldie drink it.

Seeing Lin Jiayao drinking the blood crystal liquid, Huayibai seemed to calm down. She closed her eyes blissfully and, together with Lin Jiayao, began to gulp down the blood crystal liquid in the pool.

With two A-ranks devouring without restraint, the small pool, which had accumulated for who knows how long, was quickly drained, most of it ending up in Huayibai’s stomach.

Until finally, Huayibai couldn’t even hold any more. She had already recovered to her peak state by devouring the beige blood crystal liquid.

And Goldie, after devouring quite a bit of the beige blood crystal liquid, had also replenished the loss from her promotion, recovering more than half of her strength.

But unfortunately, the amount of blood crystals didn’t affect Goldie’s strength much, because Lin Jiayao’s mental power wasn’t enough for her to use mental severance twice.

Huayibai, drenched, hugged the equally drenched Lin Jiayao tightly, and they lay quietly at the bottom of the now-dry pool.

Huayibai’s eyes were closed, as if she had fallen into a brief dormancy, and it wasn’t until Lin Jiayao called out that Huayibai drowsily opened her eyes.

“Huayibai.”

“Mmm~”

Perhaps because her mind and body were extremely comfortable and relaxed, Huayibai’s response was very soft, like she was acting coquettishly.

“Finished drinking.” Lin Jiayao moved her shoulder, signaling Huayibai to let go. “Let’s go.”

“Mmm…” Huayibai seemed reluctant. She seemed to want Lin Jiayao to stay and sleep here with her, but as if remembering that Lin Jiayao always had to go to a designated location to rest when controlling a clone, she slowly released Lin Jiayao from her embrace.

After feeling Huayibai’s iron-like grip loosen, Lin Jiayao supported herself and stood up shakily.

Perhaps because Goldie wasn’t a fungal blood crystal, this beige blood crystal liquid was basically no different from ordinary blood crystal liquid to Goldie, so Lin Jiayao didn’t feel the same drunken dizziness as Huayibai.

After pulling Huayibai up from the ground, she walked towards the edge of the pool, preparing to put on her windbreaker and boots.

As for the blood crystal liquid on her body, she could let the insects devour it all later, and then let the insects return to her body, to avoid wasting it.

Just then, Lin Jiayao heard Huayibai’s footsteps behind her, and her slightly stammering voice.

“Mommy… let me help you…”

Lin Jiayao, who was about to climb ashore, was suddenly picked up from behind by the larger Huayibai, and then, she felt a warm tongue licking her neck.

Soon, not just her neck, but a large amount of blood-red mycelium, like tiny tentacles, instantly surged over Lin Jiayao’s entire body, not only wrapping around her clothes, but also covering every inch of her body.

Before Lin Jiayao could even stop her, after a slippery and warm sliding and touching sensation all over her body, the mycelium was completely retracted.

And all the blood crystal liquid on her body and clothes had disappeared, and even her clothes and hair were completely dry, as if they hadn’t been wet at all.

Her feet also touched the ground again.

A red light flashed behind her. Just as Lin Jiayao turned around, wanting to scold Huayibai for her recklessness, she found that Huayibai, who was holding her, had returned to her small form and was now leaning against her shoulder, falling asleep again.

“Uh… sigh…” Looking at Huayibai’s face, Lin Jiayao couldn’t bring herself to wake her up and scold her, so she just supported Huayibai with her hand and let her sleep on her back.

Jumping out of the dry pool, Lin Jiayao put on her boots, and directly draped the windbreaker over Huayibai on her back. After doing all this, she walked towards the cave entrance along the mycelium stairs on the inner wall.

While walking up, Lin Jiayao looked down from time to time, and quite a bit of liquid had been secreted from the larger pool through those mycelium tubes, and there was a thin layer of blood crystal liquid in the originally dry small pool.

Although this conversion efficiency wasn’t as good as the system’s, it was still okay.

After walking out of the cave, Lin Jiayao looked at the mycelium blanket covering the entire mountain, and then at Huayibai on her back.

Without Huayibai’s translation, how could she communicate with the fungal blood crystal under her feet?

Lin Jiayao needed quite a bit of its spores and mycelium blanket. The spores were to be brought back to Kun City and cultivated there.

And the mycelium blanket was for A4 to devour, to see if she could inherit its low-consumption, infinite mycelium splitting ability.

To be honest, it was quite difficult for Goldie to deal with this kind of mindless fungal creature, especially those below A-rank.

Because their mental power was too weak, so weak that Lin Jiayao was afraid that if Goldie used a little too much force, their minds would be directly erased or they would go berserk.

Forget it, she still needed Huayibai.

“Huayibai.” Lin Jiayao patted Huayibai’s butt with her hand and called out.

“Hmm?” Little Huayibai, whose head was resting on Lin Jiayao’s shoulder, slightly turned her head and looked at Lin Jiayao, responding softly.

“Have it hand over its spores.” Lin Jiayao pointed to the mycelium blanket on the ground.

“Huh???” At this time, Huayibai, who had her eyes narrowed, was completely awakened. She suddenly opened her eyes wide, stared at Lin Jiayao, and asked, “Mommy is going to raise other mushrooms again?”

It seemed that Huayibai had a strong reaction to Lin Jiayao always bringing new mushrooms back from other places. She definitely didn’t want to see more mushrooms appearing at home.

After all, there were already enough little mushrooms at home.

“Don’t you want to drink that stuff from before anymore?” Lin Jiayao also looked at Huayibai’s eyes and asked back.

Sure enough, after this question was asked, Huayibai’s expression instantly became conflicted.

On the one hand, she definitely didn’t want more little mushrooms to appear around Mommy.

But on the other hand, the food made by this mushroom sister was really too delicious… Especially since Huayibai had basically never eaten anything that a proper mushroom should eat, these beige blood crystal liquids were still quite tempting to Huayibai.

After struggling in her mind for a while, Huayibai pursed her lips and said softly, “Okay… but…”

“But what?”

“Can we also put Little Yellow’s clothes on it?” Huayibai asked in a negotiating tone.

“Okay.” Lin Jiayao nodded.

Seeing Lin Jiayao nod, Huayibai finally breathed a sigh of relief.

As long as the other little mushrooms were all put into strange skin suits like Little Yellow’s, then only Huayibai could show her body in front of Mommy.

Mommy definitely wouldn’t like them without their mushroom appearance!

Huayibai, feeling that her scheme had succeeded, smiled again, jumped down from Lin Jiayao’s back, squatted down directly, and began to communicate with the fungus on the ground.

Soon, the fungus at the bottom trembled, and after a while, it returned to calm.

A large mass of mycelium slowly condensed beside Lin Jiayao, and then took root on the spot.

A round cap slowly emerged from the top of the mycelium, and a slender white stem slowly lifted the beige cap. The pitted cap was like the surface of cheese, looking tender and appetizing.

As the cap slowly shook, three round, but pitted, pale yellow balls rolled down and rolled to Lin Jiayao’s feet.

As these spores formed, in Lin Jiayao’s flying insect vision, the large mycelium on the entire mountain began to wither and die, almost half of it gone.

Those were the mycelium blankets and mycelia that died from nutrient loss. Creating fruiting bodies and spores consumed too many nutrients, so it couldn’t supply so much mycelium anymore.

Three golden flying insects flew out from Lin Jiayao’s hand, picked up the spores on the ground, flew into Lin Jiayao’s coat pocket, and stored these spores.

The Safehouse couldn’t directly store these spores, but during extraction, Lin Jiayao could put them into the Item Storage Box in the warehouse in the settlement interface.

Now that the spores had been obtained, there was no need for Lin Jiayao to cut off a few pieces of the mycelium blanket.

Even rabbits bite when cornered. In order not to push this fungus too hard, Lin Jiayao decided to cultivate the spores after bringing them back before cutting, at least to let it recover, to avoid over-exploitation.

Lin Jiayao was quite experienced in how to reasonably exploit intelligent life.

“Let’s go, Huayibai.” Lin Jiayao extended her hand towards Huayibai, not intending to continue wasting time here.

She had already wasted an hour here. Although Goldie and Huayibai had recovered a lot of the blood crystal liquid consumed by their bodies, Lin Jiayao hadn’t gotten a single Blood Crystal.

She had to seize the remaining extraction time and quickly see if there was any place where she could get more Blood Crystals. After all, she was only a little more than a hundred Blood Crystals away from upgrading the Control Center.

Now that she was on the west coast, she could fly south along the west coast towards Los Angeles and see if there were any landed seabed zombies along the way, or if she could encounter the survivors of the Hand of Freedom.

Perhaps she could go to the original headquarters of the Hand of Freedom. After all, they evacuated in a hurry and might not have taken all the Blood Crystals…

And by the way, she could see if there was really an A-rank driving the seabed zombies to land there.

If there was, then Lin Jiayao could start planning her next target.