Chapter 21.2: The Rich Creator God
The exploration team cut down rows of grass that reached up to their waists, occasionally taking care of zombies that suddenly emerged from the bushes. Before long, they had cleared the area of dense vegetation.
The cut grass was left behind; naturally, “scavengers” would come later to bundle it up and transport it back to Blue Sea.
“Scavengers” were usually people with lower combat ability.
“Lower ability” meant they couldn’t push into unexplored areas like the exploration teams, but they could still kill zombies alone, handle risks, and move quickly.
So scavengers operated in already-cleared zones, searching for valuable items and bringing them back to the safe city.
Toothpaste, lighters, broken radios, various tools—even tire rubber—all of these had uses when brought back.
The cut grass was also valuable: it could be used as animal feed, composted for farming, or dried for bedding. If not needed personally, it could even be sold to recycling stations for points.
Scavengers made a profit, and from the explorers’ perspective, they didn’t mind others picking through what they left behind.
For example, the exploration team’s goal was clear: kill zombies, obtain crystals, continuously open up new territory, and ideally locate the human base mentioned in the divine oracle. They had no interest in earning points from selling grass or miscellaneous supplies.
Once they had accumulated enough crystals, they could also hire these ever-present scavengers to transport them back to Blue Sea, where points would be added to their resident IDs.
To residents of other safe cities, this kind of trust—handing over one’s wealth to strangers—was simply incomprehensible.
But for Blue Sea residents, there were several safeguards.
First, tactical watches recorded the entrustment video. That could not be forged.
Second, during the transaction, both parties would know each other’s resident ID numbers. The safe city itself was fixed in place—so even if someone broke their promise, they could run, but they couldn’t hide forever.
Third, to ensure absolute security, both sides would solemnly swear an oath to the divine being.
A triple-layer guarantee—every layer solid.
The exploration teams therefore always traveled light. Occasionally, they would buy water from scavengers who carried enough food and supplies, then entrust them to carry the core crystals back while they continued their focused expansion outward.
After all, the first person to find the base would receive a reward of 10,000 points.
No need to approach it, no need to rescue anyone—even just seeing it from a distance and taking a photo would be enough to earn 10,000 points.
Every Blue Sea resident wished they had eighteen pairs of eyes so they could find that unknown base and rush back to report it immediately.
The exploration teams even spent considerable time blasting through an entire building just to reach the top floor, hoping that a higher vantage point would reveal clues.
But there was nothing.
No matter how they looked, there was nothing.
All they could see were endless fields of overgrown grass, wildly spreading trees, and tangled vines.
Aside from the areas around the four safe cities, there were no signs of human habitation at all—it was as if all the humans of Mianyan City had simply vanished.
The good news was that although the exploration teams hadn’t found the base, they had still killed plenty of zombies, and earned a substantial number of points.
Other teams were in similar situations.
As a result, crystals flowed back into Blue Sea like a river.
After the crystal exchange stations added points to the residents who had earned the crystals, they respectfully transported carts full of crystals to the temple, where they were offered before the statue of the Great Creator God.
—The Great Creator God had never been this wealthy before.
Cheng Qisheng looked at the more than 28,000 crystals piled up in the temple and became even more certain: managing Blue Sea really was something that should be left to professionals.
The military’s combat power was indeed strong, but the military had to be supported by the entire Blue Sea system.
If they really expanded recruitment to deal with Mianyan City, they would become even stronger—but the logistics system would come under unprecedented pressure.
Unless they were extremely lucky and managed to locate Mianyan City’s grain depot.
But Blue Sea had 360 million people. A single city’s grain storage simply couldn’t sustain that.
Things were different now.
The military had stepped back. Instead of directly deploying troops for suppression and centralized zombie-killing to obtain crystals, residents were now allowed to act freely.
At the same time, the government had introduced various point-based spending channels within the city, increasing people’s desire for points.
In essence, residents now treated “going out of the city” as a job, rather than being in a state of deployment and protection under the military. They were responsible for their own gains and losses.
They went out, killed zombies, obtained crystals, searched for supplies, and brought everything back to exchange for points.
Meanwhile, Cheng Qisheng could take the crystals brought back by residents and exchange them in the system store for supplies to meet the population’s needs.
Residents staying inside the city, seeing more and more people obtaining better resources, were also motivated to work harder in the city to earn more crystals.
And so, a positive cycle began.
Government and military pressure decreased dramatically. Citizens had more hope, their living standards improved, and Cheng Qisheng obtained a massive supply of crystals.
She had to admit—this really was the survival model best suited for Blue Sea.
Because after thinking about it, she realized this system was essentially the same as Blue Sea’s civilization during its primitive, wilderness-era stage.
It was nothing more than replacing hunting with killing zombies.
Replaced “obtaining the meat of prey” with obtaining more resources.
When danger arose, the people of the tribe would gather together; now when danger arises, the Blue Sea army would immediately be deployed.
However, to maintain this kind of state, the resources that Blue Sea residents want to obtain must exist.
This was Cheng Qisheng’s job.
First of all, she could finally afford an Air Tower!
The oxygen problem in the Safe City had always been Cheng Qisheng’s most pressing concern.
Although the government had been trying to address it after becoming aware of the issue—such as relocating population outward, deploying military forces to occupy territories and search for supplies, and sending large numbers of workers to cut trees and dig soil—
without an Air Tower, it could never be considered a permanent solution.
Just look at Mianyan City: after the Safe City relocation, everyone had to squeeze inside the city for a full two days. Only after a large open area outside was cleared, barbed wire was set up, and a portion of the army was stationed outside, could things stabilize.
If a level-three zombie suddenly attacked at that moment, that army would have been in an extremely dangerous situation.
It was still better to ensure that residents could live safely inside the city.
Cheng Qisheng chose a location and spent 10,000 crystal to purchase the Air Tower she had long been thinking about.
In an instant, a large pile of crystal that had been stacked like a mountain in front of the temple was greatly reduced.
The Air Tower really did look like a tower—about several dozen meters tall—and appeared directly on the selected open ground.
At the same time, a line of text appeared beside it:
[Facility Name: Air Tower (Level 1)]
[Function: Supplies the air required by the current civilization]
[Coverage: 500 million people]
[Service Life: 50 years (1 minute used)]
Cheng Qisheng was not inside the Safe City, so she couldn’t personally feel the effects of the Air Tower. She could only go and observe the reactions of the residents who were inside.
At that time, most of the residents were working.
Their work mainly consisted of building walls, carrying bricks, and repairing houses.
As they were working hard at lifting bricks, someone suddenly looked up.
“Strange… does anyone else feel like the air has become fresher?”
The colleagues beside them sniffed the air.
“Yeah, I think so. It doesn’t feel stuffy anymore… and it’s even a bit cool.”
Someone else covered their head in surprise.
“I feel like my brain has become clearer!”
“Me too!”
“It must be the blessing of the Great Creator God! The Great Creator God has made us smarter!!”
Cheng Qisheng: It’s not that you became smarter because of a blessing. It’s just that low oxygen was making your attention drop and your brain run sluggishly.
Now that there’s enough oxygen, your brains that were basically forced offline have simply come back online.
In the planting zone, Zhang Xiongyuan, who was standing in front of a stretch of farmland recording data, suddenly looked up.
He worked in agriculture, so he immediately sensed the change in oxygen levels in the air.
The next second, his newly acquired phone let out a “ding.”
Although he now had a phone, Zhang Xiongyuan still couldn’t fully understand Blue Sea script in such a short time. He could only recognize the two characters for “notification,” so he had to ask the translator Li Zhangmu for help.
Li Zhangmu read it aloud:
“AI notification: The Air Tower has been activated and is now available for all city residents. Personnel in the planting zone no longer need to forcibly oxygenate nutrient solutions or regulate photosynthesis. All staff are requested to adjust cultivation plans according to the current atmospheric oxygen levels.”
After finishing, he froze. Zhang Xiongyuan also froze.
“What do you mean… Air Tower?”
Li Zhangmu shook his head.
“I’ve never heard of it. Wait, I’ll check the official website.”
The AI had rebuilt an official website for Blue Sea. In the areas covered by the AI, there was still no private chat function yet, but residents could use the website to look up all kinds of information.
Li Zhangmu opened the Blue Sea official website, navigated to the “Facilities” section, and scrolled down item by item.
“Air Tower… Air Tower… Air Tower… there it is!!”
A clear photo of a towering structure appeared, along with a brief description.
It didn’t say much—only that the Air Tower could support five hundred million people, and that no one was allowed to approach it.
“I saw this empty lot when I was riding the bus this morning. It was just an empty space back then—how did a tower suddenly appear there??”
Li Zhangmu was shocked, and Zhang Xiongyuan was even more shocked.
Although he worked in agriculture, as an academician he still had some understanding of technology-related matters.
But an Air Tower—he had never even heard of such a thing. Even if there were a large-scale air purification machine like that, shouldn’t it take time after activation for the city’s air to gradually improve?
How could it go from nonexistent yesterday to installed today, with the air immediately becoming different?
Zhang Xiongyuan said, “It’s incredible. This is definitely beyond modern technology.”
A tower only a few dozen meters tall—how could it possibly provide air for five hundred million people?
Before this, Zhang Xiongyuan had only thought that Blue Sea was just slightly more advanced than Velvet Star in terms of technology.
But now, he truly understood why Li Zhangmu kept saying how fortunate it was to enter Blue Sea.
Imagine a place that can even control the air—just how powerful must it be?
Zhang Xiongyuan was still trying to process the Air Tower when a staff member from Velvet Star came running over with an extremely excited expression.
“Have you heard?”
Li Zhangmu immediately responded: “I’ve heard of it! The Air Tower, right? That’s amazing. I always felt things were a bit stuffy with so many people before—now there’s nothing to worry about.”
The staff member shook his head with a smile.
“That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the weather control device.”
“It has been specially approved to use 500 mu of land for the weather control device. Our group has 2 mu within the usable range—things are going to get much easier from now on!”
Zhang Xiongyuan: “…W-what? Weather control device?”
“Yes! It was bestowed by the Great Creator God. It can make it rain whenever it wants to rain, or make the sun come out whenever it wants. It’s extremely convenient and especially useful for the planting zone!”
Zhang Xiongyuan: “……”
Weather control device. Air Tower.
Li Zhangmu had worked in other Safe Cities before, but he had never seen anything like this.
No wonder the people of Blue Sea firmly believed that the Creator God truly existed—these things sounded almost scientific.
And yet… weren’t these basically miracles?
At that moment, Zhang Xiongyuan’s previously firm, non-religious mindset began to waver.
Sensing a faint rise of faith, Cheng Qisheng glanced over.
Seeing that it was Zhang Xiongyuan, she wasn’t surprised.
This agricultural expert had actually always been quite cooperative—he just hadn’t had the right trigger to believe before.
Good, good. Another talented person gained.
But there was no time to celebrate.
She was still in the middle of shopping.
Cheng Qisheng withdrew her gaze and looked back at the shop interface filled with dazzling goods, falling into deep hesitation.
She still had a little over ten thousand crystal nuclei left. Her goal was to both keep enough for weapons and also improve the residents’ quality of life.
She also needed to make them realize that hard work truly brings rewards.
So… what should she buy next?
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