Wasteland: I Awakened A Plant System - Chapter 195: The Third Calamity Begin (GT Bonus)
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Begin
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“System, provide me with a construction plan for an observation room. It must monitor biological activity within a radius of at least two hundred meters around the territory and also work effectively at night without disturbing daily operations.”
[Ding! Plan formulated according to the host’s requirements.]
Plant-Based Observation Platform (Living Watchtower)
Core Structure: A tall, living observation tower grown from a giant Sentinel Tree. The tower will stand approximately 15 meters high, offering an unobstructed panoramic view of the surrounding area. The tree will be reinforced with dense, flexible vines and hardened bark for durability.
Observation Functions:
Verdant Eye Flowers: Multiple large, flower-like sensory organs will bloom at the top of the tower. These flowers possess high-magnification vision and built-in night vision capabilities through bioluminescent compounds, allowing clear observation even in complete darkness.
Sensory Vine Network: A wide network of extremely sensitive underground and surface vines will spread out in a 200-meter radius. These vines can detect movement, body heat, breathing, and abnormal energy signatures.
Thermal Bloom Sensors: Special glowing flowers that can detect heat signatures of living beings, even those hidden in vegetation or darkness.
Central Control Hub: A living control chamber grown inside the trunk of the Sentinel Tree, equipped with large glowing leaf-screens that display real-time information from all sensors.
Alarm System: When abnormal activity is detected, the tower will release a special pollen mist and emit a low-frequency warning sound through its branches, alerting everyone in the territory without causing panic.
Total Construction Cost: 15,000 Plant Essence
Daily Maintenance Cost: 500 Plant Essence
Vikram reviewed the plan carefully. Although the cost was quite high, it was still within an acceptable range considering the strategic importance of the observation tower.
After confirming he had enough Plant Essence, he gave the order without hesitation.
“Build it.”
[Construction commencing…]
A powerful surge of green energy erupted from the ground on. A massive seed rapidly sprouted and grew at an astonishing speed. Thick roots spread deep into the earth while the main trunk shot upward. Dense vines and branches extended outward, forming a sturdy, living watchtower.
Within just ten minutes, a majestic 15-meter-tall Sentinel Tree stood proudly beside the gate.
Its canopy bloomed with numerous glowing Verdant Eye Flowers, and countless sensitive vines spread out in all directions like a spider web beneath the soil.
The central control chamber formed inside the thick trunk, complete with soft, leaf-covered seats and large, living display screens made of translucent leaves.
Seeing that the Observation Tower was completed, Vikram immediately went to test its functions.
Pushing open the living vine door, Vikram stepped inside the central control chamber. Several large, glowing leaf-screens were currently in a dormant state.
As expected, this would become the main place to observe the outside world from now on.
Vikram placed his hand on the central control vine. With a soft glow, the entire chamber came to life. The leaf-screens lit up with a gentle emerald light, and the scenery outside the territory instantly appeared before his eyes.
It was currently night, yet thanks to the Verdant Eye Flowers blooming at the top of the tower, which possessed natural night vision capabilities, the outside environment could be seen clearly.
Vikram tested the controls by touching different glowing runes on the wall. The view on the screens shifted smoothly, allowing him to observe in any direction. It truly achieved 360-degree monitoring with almost no blind spots.
Not only that, the tower also possessed a wide-range sensory ability. One of the leaf-screens displayed a radar-like map formed by the Sensory Vine Network spread underground and on the surface. Any movement within a 200-meter radius would be detected immediately, and the tower would release a special pollen signal as an alarm.
Vikram nodded with satisfaction, muttering to himself, “With this Living Observation Tower, we won’t need to go out blindly to investigate every suspicious sound anymore.”
Although he was confident in handling most threats personally, if a large horde of zombies or powerful mutated creatures ever approached the territory, having early warning would be crucial.
The observation range of the tower extended roughly 400 meters in all directions, which was more than enough for now.
Overall, Vikram was extremely pleased with the new structure. He could hardly find any flaws in its functionality.
The only slight headache was the energy consumption. Although the tower was a living plant and drew most of its power from sunlight and moonlight during the day, maintaining the Sensory Vine Network and keeping the Verdant Eye Flowers active at night still required 500 Plant Essence daily.
“Still… it’s worth it,” Vikram murmured.
With this new Living Observation Tower standing guard, the safety of his territory had risen to another level.
Returning to the territory, Vikram went where his three wives were resting.
He also thought he should continue looking for new seeds and also a variety of things.
Thinking this, he opened the chat channel again.
He had been busy for half the day, and unknowingly, it was almost midnight.
Guesses about the situation of the natural disaster began to emerge in large numbers in the channel again.
However, Vikram just treated them as entertainment, merely looking at them without taking them to heart.
He already had some expectations regarding the natural disaster.
The three of them sat together on the sofa, quietly waiting for the changes to appear.
As expected, the voice rang out again precisely at midnight.
[The Third Calamity, Black Fog officially begins.]
[The Black Fog will last for four weeks.]
[At the same time, Wasteland Survival enters its third phase.]
The first two sentences were still the same, and Vikram’s ears were almost calloused from hearing them.
However, just as he was dismissing it, the next piece of information made his eyes widen.
Not only that, but the two members beside him were equally incredulous.
[From now on, in the Wasteland World, killing any creature will no longer drop resource boxes, except for relic treasure chests.]
[And the number of zombies will gradually increase from now on.]
[Survivors, continue to enjoy your journey of survival.]
It was a long time after the mysterious voice ended that Vikram took a deep, sharp breath.
The environment inside the house was originally warm, but at this moment, he only felt a chill creep up his spine.
He had thought that the natural disaster’s ability to affect zombie physique was already troublesome enough.
Now, the Wasteland World had even canceled the reward of dropping supplies from killing monsters.
Although new resources had appeared, Vikram knew how difficult new resources were to find.
So far, driving with his headlights on, he had only discovered one resource point.
The difficulty of acquiring supplies had increased by more than a dozen times compared to before.
Not to mention, many of the supplies harvested from these new resource points couldn’t even be utilized.
Looking at the three people beside him, Vikram found that they also looked bewildered.
Seeing Vikram look at them, both of them unreservedly showed anxious expressions.
Upon seeing this, he just shook his head helplessly, having no good ideas about it either.
He could only open the chat channel to see the reactions of other Survivors.
[Holy crap, this is too outrageous! Zombies are already hard to kill, and now they’re taking away the rewards? How are we supposed to live now?]
[This time, we’re really going to be eating dirt and gnawing on tree bark, brothers.]
[Oh my god, I just checked the trading market, and a lot of trades have disappeared.]
[Resource acquisition difficulty has increased, so now no one is willing to sell their items.]
[Really? I still have supplies listed. I’m not chatting anymore, I’m logging off.]
Watching their messages, Vikram immediately switched the screen to the trading market.
As he expected, the trades there were much quieter than before.
Especially for food resources, not only had the number of sellers decreased, but the remaining sellers had also doubled their prices and more…
This made Vikram secretly curse, as he had previously planned to stockpile more seeds, diesel and other items.
Now that the market had changed drastically, if he didn’t seize the opportunity to buy from some Survivors who hadn’t yet reacted and delisted their goods, he might not be able to buy such cheap supplies later on.
“Quick! Help me acquire diesel, at most double the previous price,” Vikram roared, his hands not idle as he swiftly scrolled across the screen.
Seeing this, the three immediately followed Vikram’s steps and began acquiring diesel in the market.
Fortunately, diesel was a relatively niche item at this stage, as most people didn’t need it.
When it was his turn to trade, there were still some sellers who hadn’t delisted their items.
He didn’t even plan to waste time contacting sellers to haggle; at this point, being able to successfully collect these supplies was already good enough.
Even if he had to buy at inflated prices, Vikram accepted it.
Soon, his backpack contained an additional 86 liters of diesel, at the cost of about 40 kg of vegetables.
The quantity wasn’t too much, but it was already the maximum he could acquire.
Looking back at the market now, prices had already soared to an unacceptable level.
As more survivors reacted, the price of goods in trade changed almost every second.
What made him most speechless was that some Survivors, blindly following the trend and raising prices just to make a quick buck, even pushed the prices of goods to a completely disproportionate level.
Here, a trade involved half a kg of food for ten units of steel, while over there, a seller of steel listed a trade of one unit of steel for one kg of food.
Looking at the selling prices of goods in the market, Vikram shook his head; everything was in chaos.
At the same time, he secretly made up his mind that he might not touch this function again for a while, until the market self-regulated.
“Oh my god, these sellers are too crazy. It feels like the disaster hasn’t even arrived, and these people are already fighting to the death.”
Divya, who had helped Vikram snatch a lot of diesel, said with lingering fear.
“Survival in this Wasteland World is really going to become more and more difficult,” Anjali muttered, hands on her hips, staring at the chat screen.
Surprised that Anjali could still ask such a constructive question, Vikram shifted his gaze from the market to her face. “What do you mean?”
“Look,” she didn’t explain, but brought her left wrist close to his eyes.
On Anjali’s Survival Platform screen, it was the group chat interface.
In the group, Kashif Ali, who hadn’t appeared since the last extreme cold, once again issued a reminder.
[Kashif Ali: Friends in the group, I have something important to say. This might concern the quality of your survival going forward.]
As soon as this was said, the previously chatty group members immediately fell silent.
After all, no one would take their future survival environment lightly.
[Kashif Ali: During this time, I’ve been analyzing the connection between the Wasteland World and the Survival Platform, and my hypothesis is that the two are likely in a relationship of mutual antagonism.]
[Kashif Ali: And this change also confirms my hypothesis; the change has already affected the operation of the Survival Platform.]
[Kashif Ali: What I want to say is, this change is very likely a precursor, and the situation of the Survival Platform might become even worse due to changes in the Wasteland World.]
[Director Aditya: Boss Kashif, do you mean that the functions of the Survival Platform might be lost due to future changes?]
The other party paused before continuing.
[Kashif Ali: There isn’t complete conclusive evidence yet, but I think it’s highly possible.]
The group, which had already been quietly listening to Kashif Ali’s analysis, became even more silent.
The Black Fog had already begun, and they hadn’t even fully understood the horrors of this disaster, yet other troubles were already surging in like a tide.
[Kashif Ali: In short, I advise everyone to stockpile supplies as much as possible. Besides this, there’s no other good solution now.]
With that, Kashif Ali’s avatar darkened, indicating he had left.
[Director Aditya: Everyone has heard. The situation will only become more severe in the future. If you want to survive, then stockpile supplies.]
[Director Aditya: As for the group chat, everyone should chat less during this period. I will inform you if there’s any news.]
The message ended there, and no other group members were in the mood to chat.
Vikram believed that their feelings should all be equally complex right now.
