Chapter 182: Poaching - 1

"In one fell swoop, the Fierce Tiger Team lost over a dozen D-tier mainstays and several cadet squads that got dragged down with them and completely wiped out!"

Chen Dao gloated, "Even if the Fierce Tiger Team doesn't have its bones broken this time, its comprehensive combat rating will probably drop back below the second tier!"

Bai Yuxi was momentarily speechless. While he didn't hold any particular affection for the Fierce Tiger Team, a mission resulting in the deaths of dozens of transcendent warriors hardly seemed like something to celebrate.

The transcendent realm was inherently a place with an extremely high mortality rate. When transcendent warriors carried out transcendent missions, their casualty rate even exceeded that of certain small-scale conflict battlegrounds.

No one could ever be certain whether their turn would come next.

This was precisely why transcendent warriors, who lived with their heads tied to their waistbands and generally adopted a devil-may-care, live-for-today-forget-tomorrow lifestyle, would also desperately strive to enhance their own strength by any means possible.

The most tragic part was that, faced with those endless, high-risk transcendent creatures, it was not something you could avoid simply by choosing to run away.

Driven passively by the fear of death, they sank deeper and deeper into despair within this great, flesh-grinding mire known as the transcendent realm!

If your strength was low, you could only wait for death in attacks that might materialize out of nowhere at any moment.

Yet if your strength was high, you had to face even stronger transcendent creatures, and you still had no idea when you might be torn to shreds.

In this nightmare-like survival environment, probably not a single transcendent warrior who survived for long maintained a normal mental state; everyone had psychological issues of one shade or another.

However, Bai Yuxi and his companions felt no sense of belonging to the Firebird, so they had little resonance with the team's rating promotion.

In any case, whatever benefits the team received would likely never trickle down to fringe figures like them.

Seeing that everyone lacked interest and understanding their mindset, Chen Dao merely smiled and changed the subject.

Within the Gulu Lake encampment, hundreds of team camps from all over the country were stationed.

Those lingering here were primarily the logistical members of various teams, responsible for processing the spoils of war harvested from the frontlines by the combat personnel.

The corpses of transcendent creatures were themselves an exceptionally rare resource, especially those of high-risk mutated creatures, which commanded exorbitant values.

Take mutated snakes, for instance: their flesh could be used to extract carbon-based biological energy nutrient solutions, their blood to concoct biological serums, their internal organs like gallbladders and venom glands were crucial experimental materials, while their bones, venom fangs, and scaled snake skins could be processed into weapons and equipment.

The work of the logistics personnel involved dissecting corpses and processing materials, filling the camp with a towering aura of blood and an intensely fishy stench.

Fortunately, Bai Yuxi and his group had no demand for these biological materials, and after joining the Dragon Group, they were even less interested in team points.

Therefore, to save trouble, they had bypassed the Firebird Team entirely and sold their previous harvest directly to the special logistics forces, converting them into battle honors or base points, which could equally be used to redeem whatever items they required.

After wandering around the Firebird Team's camp to show their faces, seeing that the team members were either busy maintaining their equipment or seizing the time to rest, and with no one paying them any attention, Bai Yuxi and the others felt slightly bored and intended to leave directly.

Just as they were heading out of the camp, they noticed Chen Dao, who had just walked away, beckoning to them mysteriously from beside a tent.

The group exchanged glances and walked over to see what kind of mischief he was up to.

Lifting the flap and stepping inside, they found Chen Dao's Fourth Squad and Wu Yong's Fifth Squad all gathered there, though it was unclear what scheme they were hatching.

In contrast to Chen Dao's enthusiasm, Wu Yong, the captain of the Fifth Squad, appeared somewhat displeased that Chen Dao had dragged Bai Yuxi and the others over, and consequently, the cadet members under his command also gave the Seventh Squad a cold reception.

"Alright, everyone is here!"

"I called you all here because there's a matter I want to discuss with you!"

"The low-tier mutated snakes on the periphery of Shewae Island have basically all been cleared out, and only the high-risk mutated snakes along the inner few defensive lines are still being purged."

"From here on out, it probably won't have much to do with us F-tier cadets. Are you interested in teaming up with us to secure some benefits for yourselves?"

Chen Dao clapped his hands and lowered his voice. "I heard that Shao Yuxuan and his First Squad secretly entered the fourth defensive line starting yesterday to hunt E-tier mutated snakes. Should we go in and try our luck as well?"

"Didn't they say F-tier personnel aren't allowed to enter the inner defensive lines?" Lu Fei asked in some surprise. "Can we even get in?"

"That's why I said we're sneaking in!"

"I brought a particle disruptor. During the rotation, we'll quietly open a door on the barrier wall, slip in to hunt a few E-tier mutated snakes, and then retreat!" Chen Dao chuckled. "We won't get caught. Are you interested?"

"This..." Lu Fei hesitated. "Won't it be dangerous?"

"Danger is a given, of course!"

"However, the mutated snakes within the fourth defensive line have basically been mostly wiped out by the main forces of the various teams."

"Only a scattering of them have been deliberately left behind without being finished off by the main forces, specifically to give the cadet squads of various teams a chance at a challenge."

Chen Dao explained, "This is practically an unspoken understanding among the transcendent teams..."

"Why waste so much breath talking nonsense with them?" Wu Yong snapped, slotting the weapon he was cleaning back into the harness on his back, and said impatiently, "If you're afraid to die, just honestly stay in the camp!"

The members of the Seventh Squad were left speechless. What the hell did we do to provoke you? Why the terrible attitude?

"I believe the few of you should have reached F10 tier by now, right?"

"Although challenging E-tier transcendent creatures with F-tier combat power carries considerable danger, the rewards are equally massive!"

"As long as we don't run into transcendent creatures above E3 tier, with so many of us, we can grind it to death even using human wave tactics!"

Seeing the eyes of Chicken Leg, Xia Xiaoxiao, and the others in the Seventh Squad go wide and bristle up as if ready to explode, Chen Dao hurriedly smoothed things over. "If we really can't hold out, I also brought an E-tier barrier artifact. When the time comes, we'll trap the transcendent creature and just run back!"

"Oh?"

"Brother Chen is quite willing to invest heavily, aren't you?" Chicken Leg asked with great surprise. "An E-tier barrier, even a small-scale one, isn't cheap, right?"

"It's just a precaution against any emergencies!"

"An E-tier barrier is roughly worth two E1-tier X-crystals."

"In other words, as long as we can take down two E1-tier mutated snakes, we'll break even, and taking down three is pure profit!" Chen Dao chuckled. "As long as we don't have the bad luck of running straight into an E3 as soon as we step in, it's basically a guaranteed profit without any loss!"