Chapter 347: Weather

“Hello? Can anyone hear me? Code phrase 1413232. Swift seeks the nest. If you’re on the same path, you should know…”

The moment he heard that familiar voice, Zhang Wenda sprang into action without a second thought. After operating alone for so long, he had finally found a companion.

Right now, Zhang Wenda was standing on the roof of the Youth Palace, holding his radio high, trying to pick up the invisible brainwaves Hu Maomao was broadcasting through the air.

The signal was extremely weak. It often took a long time to clearly receive even a snippet, but it was always there.

As time ticked by, he managed to pinpoint the direction the signal was coming from. Zhang Wenda immediately began moving in the direction where it was strongest.

Hu Maomao’s signal continued. As the voice grew clearer and clearer, Zhang Wenda couldn’t help but feel a surge of excitement.

He didn’t know why he was so excited, but he was. He desperately wanted to see Hu Maomao again—the elder who was both a mentor and a friend.

As he pressed forward, the visibility began to drop. The sky turned a hazy gray, and the giant elevated structures in the air and the massive, mountain-like concrete buildings on the ground became faint and indistinct.

Just then, the radio suddenly filled with static. Zhang Wenda immediately had the Youth Palace stop, and he listened with his full attention.

Amidst the crackling static, a muffled voice sounded again. Just as Zhang Wenda thought it was Hu Maomao, he realized it was a very hoarse man’s voice.

“You will walk the path of eternal silence… The blizzard is coming…”

The more he listened, the more familiar the voice became. Soon, Zhang Wenda realized it wasn’t Hu Maomao’s voice. It was the voice of the cement head he had fought before.

He turned to look at the limbless, square cement head lying motionless on the ground. “So, you’ve been playing dead all this time? You can talk?”

The hoarse voice crackled from the radio again. “The blizzard is coming… Leave this area…”

Zhang Wenda grabbed it by its tattered cape and lifted it up, studying its featureless head. “Don’t play games with me. I don’t care if there’s a blizzard. Even if it were raining knives, I’d still go. Someone is waiting for me.”

“Blizzard… is a weather phenomenon… destroys all things… leave…”

Before Zhang Wenda could ask any more questions, the red figure scouting nearby let out a roar and pointed at the ground.

Zhang Wenda quickly walked to the edge of the Youth Palace and looked down. In front of a magnificent building, several numbers were written in blood-red: 507.

At the foot of the Bureau 507 building, another short code was written in numbers—it was the exact same code phrase Hu Maomao had spoken.

Zhang Wenda sent the Youth Palace back to his Inner World and leaped down toward the numbers.

After getting a clear look at the numbers and confirming he hadn’t made a mistake, he connected it to the signal Hu Maomao had been broadcasting. Zhang Wenda understood instantly. He knew what Hu Maomao had come here for—she was looking for allies!

‘Veterans of Bureau 507? Weren’t they almost all dead? Why would they be here in Area 4? Could this be another piece left on the board by Old Tan?’ A flood of thoughts raced through Zhang Wenda’s mind, and he pictured a back covered entirely in shogi pieces.

‘There’s nothing here needed for human survival—no fresh water, no food. If there really are remnants of Bureau 507 here, it must mean they’ve solved that problem. This might even be a major stronghold!’

The more he thought about it, the more excited Zhang Wenda became. He turned to leave, but just then—CRASH! A colossal, charred black pillar, hundreds of meters thick, plummeted from the sky. With a crack of shattering concrete, it slammed straight into the ground.

The giant pillar missed his head by mere centimeters.

Zhang Wenda struggled to look up. He followed the pillar with his eyes, only to find it seemed to have no end. Like a forked bolt of lightning, it snaked upward and vanished into the hazy sky. ‘What in the world… is this?!’

Just then, the radio in Zhang Wenda’s hand crackled to life again with the square head’s voice. “This… is the blizzard… a weather phenomenon…”

As soon as it finished speaking, a bleeding red sun slowly rose into the sky, accompanied by a vibrating, low-frequency hum as it moved.

That thing was alive! The weather phenomenon in the plains of Area 4 was a living creature! It was alive!

Accompanied by the low-frequency hum, the hazy sky was torn open again and again as pillar after pillar smashed down toward the ground. Chunks of shattered concrete flew through the air, tearing everything apart.

Under this disastrous climate from the sky, the once-silent, desolate plain was rapidly transforming into a scene from the apocalypse.

When he saw the pillars spreading into the distance, Zhang Wenda’s heart sank.

‘Oh no! They’re heading in Hu Maomao’s direction!’

Hu Maomao specialized in the Spiritual Domain; her physical constitution was not her strong suit. If she were caught head-on by this blizzard phenomenon, her chances of survival would be slim to none!

Watching the black pillars continuously fall from the sky ahead, Zhang Wenda stomped his feet on the ground without a moment’s hesitation. His legs quickly became digitigrade.

The radio crackled again with the cement head’s voice. “You’re committing suicide… The climate will destroy everything…”

“I refuse to believe it! I don’t care what it is! I’m going to race this thing and see what happens first: me rescuing her, or it crushing her!”

With another stomp, the concrete cracked beneath Zhang Wenda’s feet. He shot forward, stepping on materialized clusters of thought in mid-air, streaking through the disaster zone like a bolt of red lightning.

‘Faster! Even faster!’ Zhang Wenda flipped his body, practically launching himself off the top of a falling pillar. At such high speed, everything in his peripheral vision stretched and blurred.

As he moved, he pressed the radio tightly to his ear, trying desperately to gauge the distance between himself and Hu Maomao.

Behind Zhang Wenda, the concrete plain had been utterly torn apart by the blizzard, transforming into an apocalyptic black forest.

Zhang Wenda was fast, but the blizzard was faster. Some of the giant pillars were already landing in front of him. At times, he even had to use the falling pillars themselves as stepping stones to dash forward.

“Hello? Can anyone hear me? Code phrase 1413232. Swift seeks the nest. If you’re on the same path…”

Hu Maomao’s voice was crystal clear now, with almost no static. She was nearby! He was almost there!

“Maomao! Levitate! Get airborne!” Zhang Wenda’s roar echoed across the landscape, his voice carrying far into the distance.

The instant Zhang Wenda shouted, the voice from the radio suddenly stopped. It was immediately replaced by Hu Maomao’s surprised and delighted voice.

“Wenda?!”