QT: Grace To Grass Counterattack System

He Yuan's fist became tighter the more be tried to control his anger. He was in a precarious situation and killing at this moment would give most of the leaders an excuse to restrain him.

That was the only thing keeping Lu Ming alive. He took in a deep breath before walking ahead into the building. It was actually an old bungalow -at least that was what it looked like to him.

This caused Lu Ming's brows to furrow into a frown. "Du Ling? Aren't you going to say anything?!" He shouted after He Yuan but there was no response.

This caused him to grit his teeth and glare at the men assigned to guard the bungalow like the fact that He Yuan was ignoring him was their fault.

After standing and glaring at the men and building for several more minutes, Lu Ming clenched his teeth and walked away. Even if he didn't succeed now, he could still try later.

One way or the other, he must come out of this situation on top.

He Yuan made his way over to the room he'd been allocated and locked himself inside. The room was bare save for a bed and... and nothing else. The room was just bare. He laid on the bed and waited to time to fly.

Afternoon and evening meals were brought to their residence. He Yuan and Feng Huang had both meals together in total silence, each man dwelling in their own thoughts.

When the clock hit midnight, He Yuan slipped out of the house. He'd been expecting 888 to come to him but he'd seen no trace of the system all day. He was definitely sure that something was wrong now.

Before the men guarding the bungalow could say a word, He Yuan activated his psychic abilities and compelled them.

Once they had blank looks on their faces, He Yuan projected an image of 888 into the head of one of them.

The guard frowned before pointing in the direction of the East. "The building facing the base gate."

He Yuan nodded and slipped away. The building facing the base gate was the place the people on watchman duty slept to allow for easy change of shifts.

The zombies that he'd sent to scout the place months ago had given him the mental picture of 888 as a scavenger but it seemed things had changed from then till now. It was to be expected.

When He Yuan got close enough to the building, a large team of guards were patrolling the place so he stood in the darkest spot he could find an activated his psychic energy.

With how much his ability had improved over the months, he didn't need to be in the same building with a person in order to mind link them so he activated his ability and spread his energy throughout the area.

When he felt 888's energy, he immediately latched on to it and said calmly, [888?] There was no answer so he tried again, [888 it's me, He Yuan.]

There was a sigh and a short pause before a slightly annoyed voice answered, [What?]

He Yuan was a bit taken aback by the bite in 888's voice but he reserved that thought for later. [Come outside.]

An image of a high school boy trying to sneak his crush out of their house popped into He Yuan's mind but he quickly dismissed the silly thought with a helpless smile.

Soon after, 888 leisurely walked out of the building with both hands in his pockets. He was wearing a beige coloured shirt that was two sizes too big with black jeans. His silver rimmed glasses perched on his nose and his long silver hair was let down and swaying in the cool night breeze.

An indication that he was just about ready to sleep before He Yuan got here.

A couple of guards paused when 888 walked by but he paid them no mind and kept on walking. When he got close enough to where He Yuan was standing, He Yuan quickly grabbed his wrist and pulled him unto the shade.

888 grit his teeth when his host suddenly appeared before him. "Let me go."

He Yuan frowned. It was quite dark but he could make out 888's expression. The system looked the same as he mostly did -expressionless- and yet He Yuan could feel that there was a lava of rage pooling under that cool facade.

He let go of his system and scratched his nose. "What's wrong?"

888 only raised a brow at his host and remained silent.

He Yuan sighed. "Let's go back to my residence. It's more convenient there."

The two of them made their way to the other end of the base, making sure to keep to the shadows. When they arrived, the guards were still standing with daze looks. He Yuan snapped his fingers once him and 888 entered the house and the guards became clear headed once more.

Feng Huang was just stepping out of the kitchen area with a glass of water when the two of them came in. He looked from one man to the other before shaking his head slightly and walking over to his room. Mr. Du was really popular wasn't he?

He Yuan rolled his eyes at Feng Huang's silly display before leading 888 to his room. Immediately the door was closed, he turned to face the system. "Alright, speak up. What's wrong?"

888 raised both brows at He Yuan this time with hands folded over his chest, his expression one of annoyed exasperation. "You're asking me? Who was the one that just up and disappeared with no explanation whatsoever?!"

He Yuan ran a hand over his face. "Well I was going to explain that to you. You're giving me the cold shoulder without even hearing my side of things!"

888 looked a little guilty at that and he decided to listen to He Yuan. When He Yuan started speaking of his time in the lab, 888's eyes softened and his guilt deepened. When He Yuan got to the part where he'd sent the zombies to scout the military base to find the system, 888's anger returned.

In full force.

He took off his glasses and walked over to He Yuan, poking the man's chest repeatedly with the same hand that held the glasses. "You're telling me that you had sent your zombies to find me and when they did, you did not think to leave me some kind of message or signal to indicate that you were okay?!

-I spent almost two years worrying for your safety and mine! Did you ever remotely think that I would need reassurance?!"

He Yuan gulped in guilt. Admittedly, he hadn't thought to reassure 888 because he thought that the better option would be explaining face to face so he looked for a way to get into the military base instead.

It had taken him over six months to do that and now looking back on his decision, he felt quite foolish. That decision was indeed very irresponsible. 888 was a system that had spent all of his existence in the soul realm filled with nothing but souls that mostly minded their own business.

Fighting in the soul realm was actually prohibited and doing so would lead to total annihilation so the fact that 888 was suddenly thrown into a task realm filled with so much fighting, death and despair must not have been easy for him.

Even if the system knew a myriad of different fighting techniques, knowing it and actually putting it to good use were quite different.

He Yuan groaned and ran a hand over his face again. "Goodness, 888. I'm so sorry. I didn't actually try to think of this from your perspective."

Most of 888's anger drained at He Yuan's apology so he took a step back and adjusted his glasses on his face once more.

"It was reckless of you to come into the base with tons of greedy humans present. There's no telling that they wouldn't ally with each other to capture you." 888 said calmly as he perched himself at the edge of the bed and crossed his legs.

He Yuan smiled brightly at the system's change of discussion. This meant he was no longer angry, right? "Don't worry, I stationed an entire army of new humans outside this-"

"New humans?" 888 cut in. "What's that?"

He Yuan's smile brightened even more. "We can't keep referring to them as zombies now that it has been proven that they still have human consciousness. In fact, they are not much different from normal humans." He pointed at himself, "As you can clearly see.

-The only major difference being that zombies that had cultivated to a light brown core and above become less stiff and more flexible, all of their features become even more advanced than normal humans. They're faster, stronger and are able to better harness their abilities."

888 nodded as he took it all in. He Yuan didn't look much different from normal humans. The only indication that he was a zombie was his gray fingernails and really pale skin -not forgetting the pointed canines. Although they were retracted, they were still very pointed, quite different from the canines of a normal human.

888 nodded again. "You were saying?"

"Oh," He Yuan continued, "I stationed an entire army of new humans about three hours away from this base. I also have three of them currently hiding in this base. If anything goes wrong, they'd be more than ready to mobilize my army and rip any over ambitious idiot to shreds."

888 shrugged. "At least you managed to think this decision through," He said with spite and He Yuan gave a sheepish smile.

They went on to discuss about so many other things and bring each other up to date. They both agreed on the fact the Du Ling's soul thread was responsible for 888's physical manifestation.

When they were both updated on the plan, 888 stood up to leave but He Yuan stopped him.

"You can use the bed. I plan to cultivate for the rest of the night anyways. I can use the floor." He didn't say anything before but he was aware that 888 had been having trouble sleeping, he had light eye bags under his eyes and he looked a little drained.

He Yuan felt quite guilty.

He also knew that the fact that 888 was sleeping in the building next to the base gate with the watchmen always shuffling about must have been unbearable for the system. Even if 888 would never admit it, the system was quite spoilt and would never get used to certain things.

888 stared at the bed for a while. He Yuan's residence was peaceful and quiet, something that he hadn't had in almost two years. He was very tempted and he wasn't one to let himself suffer a loss so he agreed and quickly got under the covers.

He Yuan chuckled and settled down on the floor and began cultivating.

Early the next morning, He Yuan compelled the guards once more and 888 returned to the base gate. If people were to see him with He Yuan at this stage, they might peg the both of them to be partners for some fucked up conspiracy theory.

They weren't ready to deal with other peoples' paranoia

Lu Ming stared as Ren walked away and he gripped the bento box tightly in his hands. Du Ling had always adored his cooking so he'd gotten up real early to make this.

He quickly brought it over here because he didn't want people to see him communicating with Du Ling and report to Du Jian or the base leader.

The bento box in Lu Ming's hands turned frozen and shattered to pieces but he didn't notice. He was too busy cursing in his mind.

That Ren was truly a certified slut wasn't he?