stjorthotic Chapter 417 - 402: Someone from the Gu Family
Chapter 417 - 402: Someone from the Gu Family
The great earthquake had devastated a vast area of City A. The entire base and the nearby safe zones had all suffered immense losses.
Even though the higher-ups had received advance warning and most of the populace was evacuated in time, preventing major casualties, more than half of the base’s infrastructure was destroyed.
After Shen Yue took over disaster relief, even with the help of superpower users, he could only manage to build a few resettlement points in a short time to house the vast number of surviving victims. As for the safe zones that had been reduced to rubble by the earthquake, they required professionals to survey and redesign them from scratch.
Therefore, the vast majority of victims from the hardest-hit areas were now centrally resettled in a district in the southern part of the city.
The population density here was extremely high, and it was a motley crew. Outsiders often came by to scrounge for relief food. With Shen Yue busy with disaster relief and post-disaster reconstruction, the work of organizing and registering the people in this area had undoubtedly fallen behind.
Of course, the possibility that this was deliberately caused by certain people couldn’t be ruled out.
Mi Le lived in the northeast corner of this district.
Perhaps as a sign of their satisfaction with his cured meat dish, Gu Xi and Shen Yue showed their appreciation for the old chef by sending him a large quantity of ingredients that were now considered extremely precious.
There was so much that he couldn’t possibly carry it all by himself. Thankfully, Shen Yue was very considerate and had assigned a staff member to help him carry it back.
After returning to his simple stone house, Mi Le sent the staff member who helped him off with a grin. He turned to look at the ingredients piled high throughout the room, smiling so widely his eyes nearly disappeared.
He perfectly embodied a chef’s adoration for precious ingredients.
Night fell. Mi Le made himself a simple dinner, then squatted by his door and chatted with his neighbors for a bit. Only when the night grew quiet and everyone had returned to their homes to rest did he go back inside his own house.
In the dim stone house, the simple stone table, once piled high with ingredients, now held an exquisite tea set. A man sat with his back to the door, leisurely brewing tea by the moonlight.
A unique tea fragrance filled the entire room.
But strangely, not a single wisp of that soul-refreshing aroma escaped the room.
"You’re here." Mi Le sat down across from the man, poured himself a cup of tea, and took a small sip. He closed his eyes in contentment and sighed softly, "Good tea."
The man opposite him looked up, revealing a plain, unremarkable face under the cold moonlight.
But his aura was exceptionally unique and completely at odds with his face—the kind of aura that was clearly cultivated by wealth and power.
"Did you see her?" The plain-faced man sat by the window, swirling the blue-and-white porcelain cup in his hand. Tender tea leaves unfurled as they tumbled in the boiling water. Under the moonlight, his unremarkable face, shrouded in the rising steam, took on an air of mystery.
"I did." It was rare to drink such fine tea, so Mi Le shamelessly poured himself another cup. One had to understand, this was top-grade Da Hong Pao tea. Even before the apocalypse, it wasn’t something ordinary people could afford.
An opportunity like this was rare; there was no harm in drinking more.
Fine tea should be savored slowly. To some, Mi Le’s chugging was a crude way to treat such a fine beverage.
The man across from him frowned slightly but quickly regained his composure.
"What’s your assessment?" He lifted his cup and took a sip.
Mi Le wasn’t blind to the condescension in the man’s eyes, nor the deeply concealed disdain.
But so what?
They were just partners in a business relationship.
Besides... while the other party looked down on his crude way of drinking, he found the man to be overly pretentious.
’Who has time for such formalities at a time like this?’
But Mi Le showed nothing on his face. Acting as if he hadn’t noticed, he poured himself another cup. Whoops, there wasn’t much left in the zisha teapot now.
"I couldn’t get a word in," Mi Le said while drinking his tea. "While I was cooking, that Wei Heng was watching me the whole time. The Qin Family sisters also stuck close to her. It seems to be on Shen Yue’s orders."
Speaking of which, he suddenly remembered something and added, "And that little girl from the Qi Family."
He looked up at the man across from him. "Didn’t you say that girl was a bit strange? I thought about it and didn’t dare make any extra moves..."
The man nodded. "The other things aren’t urgent. The most important thing right now is to find a way to stay by her side."
The Gu Family was not united in their attitude toward their young cousin. He had come in person this time to confirm for himself whether his little cousin could truly be of use to the Gu Family.
But he couldn’t stay away from the old family estate for too long.
Ever since Mr. Gu’s health began to decline, the relationships between the uncles and cousins in the family had become... delicate.
Recently, the third and fifth branches had been watching him very closely. They even bribed one of his assistants. It was only because he discovered it in time that a major mistake was avoided.
He had used the matter of the Superpower Seed as a pretext to come to City A this time.
But he couldn’t stay for long either.
For one, Mr. Gu’s physical condition was not optimistic. As the eldest grandson of the eldest branch, he couldn’t be away for too long, lest he give others an opportunity to exploit his absence.
For another, they had an agreement with a certain "someone," and that person would not allow a direct descendant of the Gu Family to stay in City A for too long.
Otherwise, they wouldn’t have settled for second best all these years and propped up that idiot from the Liu Family to run A City Base.
Mi Le was well aware of the Gu Family’s internal struggles.
In the end, Mr. Gu was old and could no longer suppress his children and grandchildren.
But knowing was one thing; he had no intention of getting involved.
Ultimately, he was just one of the many "skilled experts" the Gu Family had supported over the years, paid to solve their problems.
In any case, life in the apocalypse was hard. He was just trying to make a living; there was no need to risk his own life for it.
"How has Mr. Gu’s health been lately?" Mi Le asked hypocritically, thinking of all the benefits he had received from the Gu Family over the years.
The man narrowed his eyes, his expression unreadable. "Mr. Gu’s body should be able to hold on for a while longer." But not for too long.
That was why he was so desperate to win Gu Xi over.
As long as he could bring her back to the Gu Family, Mr. Gu would surely look at him in a new light. After all, Mr. Gu’s body was now in a state of utter ruin. Even the few High-level Healing System users the family kept on retainer at great expense had hinted several times that there was nothing more they could do.
But someone had once said that Mr. Gu’s only chance of survival now lay with Gu Xi.
But Mr. Gu had craved power his entire life. Even though he was the eldest grandson of the eldest branch, and even though the old man’s health had been failing for some time, Mr. Gu had never handed over all of the Gu Family’s resources to him. As a result, now that Mr. Gu was on his deathbed, the uncles and cousins from the other branches were all eyeing his position like hungry tigers.
To be honest, his situation as the eldest grandson of the eldest branch was far from optimistic.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have set his sights on his little cousin.