The Great Merchant in the Cataclysm

Chapter 160: Revisiting The Coal City

The tremendous number of first-ranked walking dead that Zhang Mu saw earlier was on his mind throughout the journey. It was like a heavy stone pressing on the weakest and softest part of his heart.

If only he had time! He had to make every minute and second counts so that he could compete against the walking dead herd and the intellectual type walking dead.

With an intellectual type commanding the herd personally, not only would the strength of the entire mob would be unified, but the most crucial factor was that it would share the resources. For example, those walking dead who had a stronger body would be given priority so that they could advance to the second rank faster.

Once these selected walking dead had progressed to the second rank effectively, then except for those cities that had the era merchant shop, the base from the other towns would suffer a devastating blow from them.

Zhang Mu knew long ago that there were only 99 era merchant shops in the entire world and only 20 era merchant shop had assigned to China based on the population it had. But if you thought about the number of cities in China, even if they encountered the Catastylcm, how much population would remain? How was it possible to stuff the whole population into these 20 cities? Currently, the human did not know the differences of each city as they did not discover the protection that the era merchant shop naturally gave.

Once these five figures, or even expended to a six-figure walking dead herd, started to follow orders and devoured the human city, those cities with the era merchant shop would suffer a bloody shuffle.

The strong remained while the weak get out!

If you want to live, you could. Either you display your power, or you spend money in exchange for safety. It was also a form of survival of the fittest. The strong would become stronger. While the weak, would be eliminated automatically.

In his past life, Zhang Mu saw that these bases truly had done this.

Without a capable person to control the overall situation, who would be convinced when all of them were evolver with skyrocketing strength? The walking dead herd have not arrived yet, the human had an internal conflict within themselves.

That was something that Zhang Mu did not wish to see, as well as a scene that he hoped to avoid.

When the human race became stronger, he, Zhang Mu would then have the opportunity to be even stronger.

Otherwise, was he going to negotiate and do trading with the intellectual walking dead or the mutated animal?

Obtaining a mutual benefit with the enemy was something that, he, Zhang Mu would not engage in. He was not stupid enough to fall to that stage.

No eggs could stay intact under an overturned nest!

Even a powerful lone ranger could not be separated from the entire human society. One was the limited variety and quantity of resources they could obtain, while the other, was the deep sense of loneliness.

With many thoughts on his mind, Zhang Mu tried to calm himself down as much as possible and concentrated on his journey.

There was no use for him to think anymore. He could only speed up the completion of his task before this ticking bomb exploded. If he could unlock the entry level of the era sub-merchant identity and authority, then his path would be a lot easier.

He did not mention the appearance of the intellectual type of walking dead to Yuan Rui and the others. Because in their understanding, there would be a low possibility for this to appear. The walking dead was already so terrifying, and if they add another advantage, which was intelligence, then how would the human continue to survive?

But the reality, was just that cruel.

The selection of the Paradise Era did not necessarily have to be the human being, that was the most influential aborigines living on Earth originally.

Giving you the same condition, you must be careful as the winner takes everything.

Therefore, in Zhang Mu’s past life, he couldn’t imagine how humans could survive without protection from the era merchant shop.

There was only one route for the fate of mankind, and that was extermination!

It was not Zhang Mu making an inflammatory statement, but that was the common conception of the defeatism amongst the human at that time. A weak human being, was doomed to die!

Without a powerful human being, they were doomed to fail, be dumped, and be exterminated.

Moreover, there were more people that had a negative mindset than those who were optimistic and positive. Because those people that could live until Zhang Mu’s lifetime, were the group of people remained after the elimination.

They were the ones who actually had a near-death experience and understood the tremendous gap between getting help from the era merchant shop, and without the help from them.

They didn’t believe that the era merchant shop would grumble about the human all the same. Even the mindset of the era sub-merchants was the same.

But what if the era merchant had reached the limit of collecting the Earth’s spiritual essence and what if the Earth’s spiritual essence were finished?

Then what was the point for the era sub-merchant to exist? The era general goods itself was a benefit given for them to facilitate their evolution.

So don’t even mention about the human losing the protection from the era merchant shop, the era sub-merchant would lose everything once the era local goods were gone too.

When that time comes, the human would be accustomed to hole up in this tiny little world and had no desire to improve themselves. In addition, there would be many people sitting around waiting for death.

When the era merchant left, they would be attacked by a massive mop of walking dead or mutated animals that were watching like a bloodthirsty tiger nearby. So what would be the end?

Perhaps one day, the human being would actually become the Earth’s rarest animal on this planet.

The mutated animal or the walking dead would be pointing at the humans held in cages to show their descendants and tell them that this was the previous dominator on Earth. How ridiculous and pathetic would that be?

Zhang Mu himself was a defeatist from head to toe. He believed that the development of the human being was bound to fail.

At first, he was on the negative part of the defeatist. But after his rebirth, he changed his mindset. Although he still believed that the human was bound to fail, he would try to make changes from the start.

Once Zhang Mu put on his gloomy face, Yuan Rui did not dare to bother him. Furthermore, it should be the second-ranked vigor that Zhang Mu and the Obsidian Beetle released. Therefore, Zhang Mu did not saw any mutated animal appearing before their eye along the way.

And that happened to give him time to ponder a lot of things.

When the night was about to fall, Zhang Mu finally saw the big river where he lost his arm in his dream.

However, he did not feel any fear now. Even if he swam in it now, there would not be any second-ranked mutated animal in the river.

A first-ranked mutated animal, even if they were at an environment that gave them an advantage, they would not cause any threat to Zhang Mu now.

Besides, Zhang Mu had a cheat tool. Moreover, it would be troublesome if their clothes were wet too. So for safety reason, Zhang Mu summoned Little Black and made use of its power. Although it was somewhat hard for it to cross such a big river with Zhang Mu and the mutated wolfdog on each of its claw, they managed to cross safely the Coal city’s first line of defense.

The city was right in front of their eye!

The Coal city, Shan Xi!