ATDIWR Chapter 26
by Volare“Spatial storage item?” Shen Mo walked up to Chen Chen with a gloomy face, looking down at the disheveled Chen Chen from above, as if looking at an ant.
From this angle, Shen Mo could clearly see the necklace on Chen Chen’s neck. Shen Mo condescended to squat down and roughly pulled off the necklace. “This is the treasure that the General Commander Chen exchanged for seventy percent of the entire warehouse supplies of the Third Base?”
Chen Chen watched as the necklace was snatched away, his eyes bloodshot. He struggled, he roared, but it was all in vain, only earning more violent punches.
Shen Mo held it in his hand and fiddled with it a couple of times, then he knew how to use it. His ability easily suppressed Chen Chen’s injured ability and successfully erased the contract Chen Chen left on the necklace.
Actually, Ji An did this on purpose. He intentionally misled Chen Chen into using a contract method that could be re-contracted. With this kind of contract, if the original owner died, or if someone with stronger ability or mental power than the original owner came along, they could easily wipe away the mental imprint left by the original owner on the necklace and re-contract it.
Chen Chen had just gotten the space back and hadn’t had time to move more things into it. Currently, there was only a bit of temporary food for Chen Chen and Mother Chen inside.
Shen Mo revealed a satisfied smile. “It really is a good thing. No wonder General Commander Chen went to such great lengths to get his hands on it.”
Shen Mo’s gaze turned to Tang Tang, who was also being roughly held down on the ground and not given any special treatment just because she was a girl. He twirled the necklace in his hand. “Your Space-type ability came from this, right?”
Tang Tang’s eyes were filled with terror, not daring to answer.
It was Song Pengcheng, who was also roughly held down, who shouted loudly, “Chen Chen is a disgrace to the Base. I didn’t know about anything he did. I swear I didn’t participate in anything at all. If I had known, I would never have gone along with them!”
Shen Mo looked at Chen Chen with interest and said with a smile, “General Commander Chen, what does it feel like to be bitten by the loyal dog you raised in the past?”
Chen Chen closed his eyes and remained silent, understanding that the winner takes all.
Tang Tang’s eyes darted around. Seeing Chen Chen not refuting anything and looking resigned, her little scheme slowly began to resurface.
“General Commander Chen, do you know that your sins are too deep, so you don’t want to argue about anything and are directly pleading guilty?” Shen Mo stood up. “Very well, then we will proceed according to Base rules and abolish his abilities.”
Chen Chen’s eyes were filled with horror, but no matter how he struggled, a special silver helmet was placed on Chen Chen’s head.
One end of the helmet was connected to a special device.
When the switch was pressed, a blue electric current instantly climbed along the wire to the helmet. Chen Chen felt thousands of electric currents drilling into his brain, frantically absorbing the Power User Crystal Core within his brain.
The pain was as if someone was using the sharpest knife in the world to cut out his brain matter bit by bit. It hurt so much that Chen Chen wanted to vomit.
It only lasted for dozens of seconds, but Chen Chen felt as if ten thousand years had passed. Someone took off the helmet, but Chen Chen didn’t even have the strength to sit in the chair and fell directly to the ground, like a pile of mud.
Song Pengcheng and Tang Tang were both frightened. Song Pengcheng screamed frantically, “I don’t know about those things, you can’t do this to me. At most, I followed the wrong person. I am willing to voluntarily leave the Command Post, and I can also reveal everyone that Chen Chen was secretly hiding.”
Shen Mo smiled, seemingly agreeing to Song Pengcheng’s conditions. He turned to look at Tang Tang, like a devil. “Then what about you, Miss Tang Tang? What are you going to exchange?”
Tang Tang was already scared stiff, with a puddle of brownish-yellow urine winding on the ground.
“I, I am a Healing-type Ability User. As long as I have a Healing-type ability, I can upgrade my ability. I can serve the Base, I am willing to serve you, I am willing to be your ox and horse, I will do anything you want, please don’t kill me!” Tang Tang cried and begged for mercy, tears and snot flowing, without any beauty, but rather looking extremely ugly.
A Healing-type Ability User was still very important for the development and stabilization of the Base, whether for its development or for stabilizing people’s morale. Shen Mo had to consider it carefully, and finally, he kept Song Pengcheng and Tang Tang.
“Throw them out. Remember to take back the houses they lived in. From now on, these people are ordinary citizens of the Base and will no longer enjoy any special treatment.” Shen Mo wasn’t being kind; he just wanted to deliberately humiliate Chen Chen. Without his abilities, this former high-ranking General Commander had fallen into the mud, and countless people were waiting to step on him.
Shen Mo was waiting to see his future misery.
“Oh, right.” Shen Mo snapped his fingers, as if he had just remembered. “Also drive out that annoying old woman from General Commander Chen’s house.”
Perhaps those people who drove them out were deliberately tormenting them. They first threw Chen Chen into the lowest, most distant slum, where there were naked homeless people everywhere.
Then they drove Mother Chen out of the house and truthfully informed her of Chen Chen’s true situation. But no matter how Mother Chen cried and begged, they just wouldn’t tell her where her son had been thrown.
The Third Base wasn’t particularly big or small, about a thousand square kilometers. It was like searching for a needle in a haystack for Mother Chen to find someone; it wasn’t that easy.
Song Pengcheng and Tang Tang did know where Chen Chen was thrown, but these two people didn’t care about him at all.
Tang Tang was like a dodder vine. She couldn’t seem to live without depending on someone.
Without Chen Chen, she could only find someone else. She couldn’t help but look either. She had no money and was a young, beautiful girl without any abilities. If she walked out of the safe zone, her fate was almost predictable.
“Brother Pengcheng.” Tang Tang threw herself into Song Pengcheng’s arms, taking the initiative, no longer being distant as she was in the past. “I only have you now. From now on, I only have you. Please don’t leave me, okay?”
Song Pengcheng had always had impure thoughts about Tang Tang before, and furthermore, Tang Tang was once the woman of the highest Commander, so her status was somewhat different. It was as if sleeping with her and cuckolding Chen Chen would put the man with the highest status in the Third Base beneath him.
Song Pengcheng’s eyes were filled with desire and malice. He roughly embraced Tang Tang. “From now on, you are my woman!”
“Mhm,” Tang Tang replied, clinging to him like a small bird.
Song Pengcheng took Tang Tang into a shady hotel. That small shady hotel didn’t have private rooms; it was a large communal sleeping area, where the lowest class of ordinary people lived. But it was indeed cheap, costing only twenty credit points per person per night.
They had no credit points, but Song Pengcheng had hidden a Tier 1 Power User Crystal Core, and the boss agreed to let the two of them stay for a month.
Tang Tang had never lived in such a dirty and messy place since living with Ji An and Chen Chen. Moreover, this place wasn’t separated by gender, or rather, almost everyone staying there was male.
Seeing a shirtless man with messy hair lying on the large communal bed, snoring loudly, Tang Tang felt both disgusted and scared.
“Brother Pengcheng, there are people here. How… how can I stay?”
Song Pengcheng’s eyes widened. “This is already good enough. I have no money left. If you don’t want to stay, then leave.”
Song Pengcheng’s attitude had changed completely. When facing Tang Tang, he was no longer subservient as he was in the past. He was arrogant and seemed to want to reclaim all his past subservience in one go.
Song Pengcheng’s eyes flashed with malicious light. “Do you believe that as soon as you step out of this room, those homeless people in the slums who haven’t seen a woman in hundreds of generations will immediately violate you on the street?”
Tang Tang of course knew her own situation; otherwise, she wouldn’t have clung so tightly to Song Pengcheng. Song Pengcheng was the most snobbish man. If you were powerful, he would lick your backside. If you were down and out, he would not only kick you while you were down but also check if the stones hit you and if you died miserably enough.
Even when dealing with women he had a good impression of, it was the same. Perhaps it was because before the Apocalypse, no woman would look at him. Song Pengcheng had a twisted hatred for women; on the one hand, he hated women and wished that all women in the world would fall into the dust, allowing him to insult them at will. On the other hand, he wanted to possess women.
Tang Tang really had no other way, which is why she chose to be with him. Chen Chen couldn’t even protect himself; it was uncertain who would protect whom if she stayed with Chen Chen. Only Song Pengcheng was the Power User with the highest ability level she could cling to at this moment. By following him, she would only be humiliated by him alone. Tang Tang dared not imagine what would happen if she left on her own.
Song Pengcheng smiled smugly. “Alright, with me here, no one dares to do anything to you.”
Song Pengcheng pulled Tang Tang over and pressed her onto the large communal bed. He didn’t care that there were strangers sleeping next to them and started tearing off Tang Tang’s clothes.
Tang Tang struggled, and Song Pengcheng slapped her directly across the face. “If you don’t let me sleep with you, then get out!”
Seeing the woman under him stop struggling, Song Pengcheng smiled smugly. “Women are just cheap!”
Tang Tang had never been so humiliated. She was being humiliated by Song Pengcheng, and people nearby were even watching.
Afterward, Song Pengcheng actually pushed away the naked Tang Tang and cursed obscenely, “MD, she was acting like such a pure and chaste woman just now. I thought she was a virgin, but it turns out she’s a rotten goods who’s already been used up!”
After cursing, Song Pengcheng turned over and fell asleep soundly.
Tang Tang wrapped her body with the torn clothes, enduring the lecherous gaze of the other man and the hand that intentionally or unintentionally reached out to touch her, tears streaming down her face.
At this moment, lightning and thunder suddenly flashed outside, and heavy rain poured down.
Tang Tang didn’t understand how her life had suddenly turned out like this. Just this morning, she was still that high-ranking little princess, living a pampered life, being adored and carefully flattered. How could she have fallen into such a state in the blink of an eye?
When did things start to go wrong? Tang Tang thought carefully. Her bad days seemed to have started from the day Ji An left.
But Ji An was clearly a stumbling block on her road to happiness. Without him, she could marry the highest Base Commander and become the woman with the highest status in the Third Base, from then on having absolute authority, second only to one person and above everyone else.
Why, after she had gone to great lengths to remove Ji An, that large mountain pressing down on her, her good days not only didn’t come but instead came to an end?
If she had known that Ji An’s departure would make her life completely unrecognizable like this, she wouldn’t have used every possible means to deal with him.
However, thinking that Ji An’s life might also be difficult now, and even very likely already killed by someone, Tang Tang felt a strange sense of comfort.
Since the spatial necklace had been snatched away by those masked men, then as the original owner of the treasure, Ji An’s end definitely wouldn’t be good. Perhaps it would be ten thousand times more miserable than hers, and even if he died, he wouldn’t have a good death.
At the same time, Chen Chen lay in the heavy rain like a dead pig. Just now, the homeless people who were also lying next to him had found shelter from the rain. Only Chen Chen couldn’t move at all and could only lie in the heavy rain, allowing the rain to rage and wash over his body.
He thought Tang Tang would have some affection for him, and even if she couldn’t help him much, she would at least help him find a place to shelter from the rain. But Chen Chen was disappointed; the figure of the woman never appeared in the heavy rain.
At this moment, Chen Chen couldn’t help but think of Ji An. Suddenly, Ji An’s kindness was so clear, so clear that it felt as if those things had happened yesterday.
For him, in order to go back to his hometown to find his parents, Ji An gave up the safest capital at that time and followed him to his hometown.
For him, Ji An killed zombies, gave up his dignity to beg strangers for water and food…
If Ji An were here, even if he couldn’t do anything, he would stay by his side in the heavy rain.
No, if Ji An were here, he would never let them fall into such a miserable situation.
Chen Chen thought carefully. It seemed that when he was with Ji An, no matter how difficult or hellish it was, his life was never miserable, at most it was just a little tough.
Ji An always seemed to have a way to break through difficulties and open up new territory, unlike Tang Tang, who always waited for him to shelter her from the wind and rain.
Chen Chen regretted it. He really regretted it. He shouldn’t have given up on Ji An.
Mother Chen, who was also thinking of Ji An, couldn’t find her son and cursed heaven and earth, cursing Ji An.
But no matter how she cursed, she knew in her heart that if Ji An were here, he would definitely have a way to solve all problems and would never let their mother and son fall into this current situation.
Mother Chen walked through the streets one by one, braving the heavy rain, praying that in the next moment she could see her son!
Ji An thought that his grudges with Chen Chen and Tang Tang had ended here and they would not meet again in the future. Without seeing it with his own eyes, he knew that after that video was broadcast, Chen Chen and Tang Tang’s lives would not be easy.
But he didn’t expect that someone would even record the fate of Chen Chen, Tang Tang, Song Pengcheng, and Mother Chen and show it to him.
Although he didn’t see what happened after Tang Tang followed Song Pengcheng to the shady hotel, Ji An could roughly guess that it wouldn’t be good. That kind of shady hotel didn’t separate men and women.
Looking at Chen Chen lying motionless in the heavy rain, unsure of whether he was alive or dead, and Mother Chen walking miserably through one street after another in the heavy rain, Ji An knew that his story with them had completely ended at this moment.
“The newly replaced General Commander of the Third Base is quite sensible, isn’t he? He knows what we want to see and even specifically recorded it and sent it over.” Kong Zhongcheng looked at the video feed and was very satisfied with the fate of these scumbags.
However, this wasn’t Shen Mo doing it deliberately; it was just a coincidence. He certainly couldn’t have guessed that Ji An was the one secretly causing trouble behind the scenes.
Even though Ji An was a rare Mental-type Ability User, in Shen Mo’s understanding, he was only a Tier 1 Ability User when he left the Base, and his level was too low to be of much use. Even though his combat power was decent, it was only in their small area. Upon reaching the Jing Shi Base, which was full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers, he was nothing.
Shen Mo sent someone to deliver it because he thought it might be Chen Chen, that idiot. He had said something idiotic when he came to the Jing Shi Base before, and these people were annoyed with him, so they deliberately pulled this stunt to torment him and also implicitly promote spatial abilities through him.
They might want to see Chen Chen’s miserable appearance, so they sent it over like this.
Of course, even if the Jing Shi Base didn’t intend to do this, sending it over wouldn’t hurt. At least it showed his unwillingness to offend them and wouldn’t cause any aversion.
As for Ji An, in Shen Mo’s mind, he was equivalent to dead. Even if he wasn’t dead, he might have become the plaything of some man among the high-ranking officials of the Jing Shi Base, given his beautiful appearance.
“Alright, in exchange for this gift, we’ll let bygones be bygones regarding what that idiotic Commander did in the past,” Kong Zhongcheng said with satisfaction. “Given how sensible this newly appointed Commander is, give him an invitation to the auction so he can broaden his horizons.”