Embark on the Road

by Tai Baiyang

  The leader couldn’t find any fault in Zhang Mu’s partly-true statement. It was a common understanding that the first would always have a better benefit than the rest of the people behind him. Hence, some of his doubt was cleared but he still didn’t agree to the suggestion.

  Zhang Mu noticed this and said in a stable tone, “if you now that you can eat my brain and become an Era Merchant after reading my memory, you will have done that long ago. But, you didn’t. You are afraid that once you kill me, you will realise what I said is the truth and you will not be able to become an Era Merchant without my recommendation. By then, there will be no more chance for you to become an Era Merchant and you will definitely regret your actions.”

  The leader slowly turned around and looked straight at Zhang Mu. He opened his mouth and showed his white teeth, “I have one last question. If you can give me a satisfying answer, I will trust you this time.”

  Zhang Mu signaled him to continue. The leader stared into Zhang Mu’s eyes and asked, “you mentioned that the Era Merchant shop would automatically choose the nearest evolver as the substitute for a dead Era Merchant. Doesn’t that mean that I can just stay around the Era Merchant shop or kill all the evolvers within the area and I will become an Era Merchant?”

  Zhang Mu gave a silent laugh, “I am not sure if the Era Merchant you ate was too low in ranking and all you could see was a string of codes, but it would be too naive of you to think that the Era Merchant shop doesn’t know how to make any judgements right? If you do that, you would be discriminated by the Era Merchant shop and your chances of becoming the Era Merchant will be stripped permanently. Most of the Era Merchant was chosen personally but some were chosen by chance. Three days after the Cataclysm, the Era Merchant will be chosen randomly, no on a first-come-first-serve basis.”

  The silver-haired leader tried to find hints of emotions in Zhang Mu’s eyes but was unable to detect any. Besides that, Zhang Mu’s answer was logical and there were no loopholes to be found. His speed of talking was also very fast and didn’t look like he was lying.

  Zhang Mu saw the leader deep in thought and decided to push him further, “if you don’t believe me, you can follow me to the Era Merchant shop and see it for yourself. You might have followed the memory and visited the area already so why did you not go into the shop and become an Era Merchant like what you said just now? I can tell you confidently that if the Era Merchant shop didn’t choose you personally and you don’t have someone like me to recommend you, you will never be an Era Merchant even if you squat outside the shop your whole life.”

  Zhang Mu’s words moved the leader. It was not that he was scared of Zhang Mu. He knew the full abilities of Zhang Mu and knew that he was no match for him. What he found scary was how calm Zhang Mu was. Even when he changed his tone to provoke him, the leader could still feel how composed Zhang Mu was. The only thing that moved was the leader’s own emotions.

  He couldn’t see through the calmness. What’s more, he could detect a sense of danger from it. He didn’t even feel any sense of danger when he was facing a huge mutated animal.

  However, there was no choice. What Zhang Mu said seemed to be the truth. Every second he dragged would decrease his chance from achieving his target. He had been to the Era Merchant shop but he was unable to enter the place. When he tried to use his spiritual power, the shop would swallow all the power and it was as though nothing had happened.

  After much analysis, his cautious nature finally believed everything Zhang Mu said.

  He could just go and give it a try first. If what Zhang Mu said was fake, he could just kill him later. He had planned to kill him after becoming an Era Merchant to see if he could become the first Era Merchant. He had a feeling that the brain of someone so clever would definitely be very delicious.

  “Let’s go. You will walk in front. If I find anything wrong with what you said, I will have you as my supper today. I have not had any evolvers for quite some time. Although I am worried that my ability is improving too fast, eating you shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “Sure, let’s go. If you want to drag the time, there is nothing I can do too.”

  Zhang Mu finished his sentence and immediately turned around and walked away, not caring about what the leader was thinking.

  “Stay here,” the leader ordered the people behind him.

  Zhang Mu heard the footsteps chasing after him. His heart leaped in joy but there was no change in his expression.

  Was he finally fooled?

  Chapter 98: Era Merchant Shop

  When the silver-haired leader caught up with Zhang Mu, Zhang Mu turned around and looked at him. He talked to him as though he was talking to an old friend. There were no hints of the displeasure that happened just now.

  “Seems like you are still very eager about it. I thought that you really didn’t care?”

  The leader didn’t put Zhang Mu’s mocking in his heart. He felt that the things Zhang Mu portrayed were all very ambiguous. This was why the leader was still guarding against Zhang Mu although he was stronger and more powerful than him. This ambiguous feeling made him very uncomfortable.

  Zhang Mu saw his serious face and appeared shocked. He continued, “are you still scared? What is your power for then? If you are so weak fellow, you should just stay in your survival base and enjoy being the most powerful man there. Why are you doing this to yourself?”

  “I have my own judgment. You do not have to play with my emotions and try to confuse me. You should know that such small tricks shouldn’t be used twice. We have been probing each other for so long and nothing came out of it. Why are you still doing this?”

  Zhang Mu laughed. He seemed like a different person entirely. He was no longer the calm and composed Zhang Mu but appeared to be a cynical and playful youth. He gave the leader the impression that he was an experienced old man trapped in the body of a youth. He would have thought that Zhang Mu was like him, eating other people’s memory and gaining their experiences if he didn’t know that he was against cannibals.

  Actually, he was quite near the truth. Zhang Mu’s existence was an even bigger BUG than him being able to gain people’s power and memory through eating them.

  The Zhang Mu before had experienced and been through many things. This caused his mentality to be more mature than his actual age of 28. He wouldn’t say that he had seen through the vanity of the world, but he had no desires besides the few bottom lines that he had in his heart. He just wanted to peacefully finish his mission as an Era Merchant and survived through the hard times after the Cataclysm.

  He had to prevent the Era Merchant ring from sucking him dry. However, he was the fifth Era Merchant and was always the last to choose his supplies. Most of the time, there were no good supplies left for him and the distance between them grew. Because of this, Zhang Mu always wished that someone would leave some supplies for him or someone would despise the supplies and leave him a set. That way, he would be able to complete the basic mission of an Era Merchant.

  However, in reality, there were no supplies left for him. He would always experience the same hopelessness when the robotic voice told him that all the supplies were gone. Hence, he could only run between the various Era Merchant shops and used quantities to cover up his lack of quality. He had no time to wait for opportunities and this was why he could complete the minimum golden leaves mission every time just before the deadline.

  The desire to live and the despair towards the future allowed Zhang Mu to see through many things and he started to hold lesser desires.

  When Zhang Mu returned back to his younger body, he realised that he didn’t need to live so tiredly anymore. His body was still young and energetic and this subconsciously changed his way of thinking.

  Because of this change, Zhang Mu’s personality and aura was filled with contradiction and harmony, making him hard to understand.

  The reply by the silver-haired leader caused both of them to become silent. In the end, it was Zhang Mu who broke th
e silence.

  “What is your name? I can’t be calling you ‘hey’ or ‘silver-hair’ or ‘old man’ all the time. From your looks, I think that you are slightly above 40?” Zhang Mu grinned at him and said to him. The leader was speechless. He felt that he needed to relook at Zhang Mu’s personality again. However, he also thought that what he said made sense and replied to him.

  “I don’t have a name. I felt that I have too many people’s memory all combined together. If you didn’t bring it up, I would have forgotten about my name. There was no use for it in the survival base and I can’t use it to talk to the walking dead or the mutated animals either.”

  “Why not call me zero then. I didn’t expect you to ask this question and was a bit unprepared for it.”

  The leader thought for a while before replying Zhang Mu. He had tried to think about his name before but was confused by the other memories and reached no conclusions.

  “Zero. That is a good name.”

  Zhang Mu replied and started thinking at the same time. He had captured a piece of important information. This man who named himself ‘zero’ seemed to be in a worse state than he had imagined.

  He didn’t have a main conscience. Zhang Mu thought that no matter how much memories Zero consumed, his conscience would be controlled by his main body or identity. However, this didn’t seem to be the case. If he continued to absorb more memories, Zhang Mu predicted that he would become a monster.

  Zhang Mu felt a tinge of sorrow. This method of increasing your power was fast, but the consequences were high too. In order to get greater power, Zero was slowly losing himself.

  This might be the reason why he wanted to find a stable source of power so urgently.

  He must have realized that he didn’t have much time left.

  The two men were deep in thought but they didn’t slow down. In the blink of eye, they reached the Era Merchant shop.

  Chapter 99: Finally Falling Into the Trap

  It was still at the people’s square. Just that this time, there was almost no one in sight. There was an eerie silence.

  Zero seemed to notice Zhang Mu’s curiosity and slowly said, “ever since the mutated animals attacked us, this area had become a spot where mutated animals would always come and visit. However, after the Era Merchant in the crimson blue cloak came, the situation changed completely. Almost all the mutated animals within the area were wiped out and those that were left retreated in fear out of the Luoyang City. After that, this area was encased by a certain power which prevented people from going near it.

  “After that, rumors say that those people who were killed by the mutated animals died a terrible death and their hatred accumulated together to form this phenomenon. From the start, people were scared of the mutated animals in this area so when the rumor spread, everyone living around here moved away, including those regular-sized survival base.

  I came here once before and wanted to look for the era merchant’s shop that was in the memory of the Era Merchant. However, even after using all my spiritual power, I still can’t enter this place. I could only give up.”

  Zero explained in detailed to Zhang Mu in order to find out the truth from Zhang Mu’s mouth.

  When Zhang Mu heard Zero’s last sentence, he sneered.

  Is the Era Merchant’s shop’s boundary something that you could enter and leave as you please? If it was, there was no point in opening the shop anymore. That was because it was so powerful, no humans would be their match. Even if people more powerful than he became, such as those level 5 and level 6 evolvers, they would not be able to cross the boundary too.

  If not, during Zhang Mu’s era when there were many high-level evolvers everywhere, why did they only target era merchants and not the Era Merchant’s shop?

  This was because the boundary was too powerful. Normal attacks would not do any damage to the boundary. Of course, there were people who provoked the Era Merchant owner to attack them. However, there were not many people who did it.

  Zhang Mu remembered that the number one fighter from a survival base who was a level 6 evolver wanted to get into the Era Merchant’s shop. The evolver followed an Era Merchant but was stopped outside the boundary. He was arrogant and immediately attacked the boundary, wanting to break the boundary set up by the Era Merchant’s shop.

  A level 6 evolver was already considered the top tier in terms of abilities. That time, a level 4 Zhang Mu was just a dispensable ant.

  Indeed, he was powerful enough. But, when the boundary of the Era Merchant’s shop was broken, everyone was stunned.

  Time seemed to stop. A long gun slowly came out from the boundary. Although its movement was slow, the evolver was just like everyone else. He couldn’t break free from the boundary and could only watch as the gun slowly stabbed towards his throat and pierced into it. As his life dwindled away, his head started falling lower and lower.

  The long gun shook as though it was shaking off a piece of garbage and the well-respected level 6 evolver was shook off the gun.

  His body was discarded on the ground. None of the people around him had regained control of their body. They could only feel fear in their hearts.

  After that, the long gun retracted into the boundary as if it never appeared before.

  When the long gun disappeared totally, the people around finally managed to heave a sigh of relief. They felt as though a huge rock was placed on their chest just now.

  However, the next second, everyone dispersed, They were afraid of provoking the person inside the Era Merchant’s shop again. The death of level 6 evolver was too shocking. Even the people from the same survival base didn’t dare to go any closer. They didn’t even have the courage to retrieve the body. If they were implicated, it would not be worth it.

  The level 6 evolver was also an overlord when he was alive. Although he was restricted by the leaders of the survival base, he was still high above everyone else. Yet, he was killed just like that.

  Who dared to go over and intrude the Era Merchant’s shop anymore?

  At that time, Zhang Mu was among the crowd too. Although he knew that the Era Merchant’s shop owner would not do anything to him, he still wanted to keep his status a secret. In order to not appear too prominent, he retreated together with the crowd and left the Era Merchant’s shop area.

  That was the first time he saw the owner striking and it formed a deep impression in his heart.

  Zhang Mu kept repeating the scene in his mind. He kept repeating the unstoppable power of the long gun and scoffed at Zero’s statement. However, he didn’t show it. He still needed to complete a mission.

  “Okay, we have reached. Let’s go in.”

  Just as Zhang Mu wanted to walk forward, Zero suddenly waved his hand and looked at Zhang Mu funnily, “wait, I remember that in my memory, you era merchants have only one chance of entering the era merchant’s shop every month. Starting from the day Doomsday started, it has only been 28 days.

  How can you go in? What games are you trying to play?”

  Zhang Mu gave an indifferent look and irritating look and shrugged, “I am number one.”

  “Is this reason enough?”

  This simple sentence stopped all the suspicion that Zero had because he knew that the first era merchant had many privileges. He might really have some privileges in this area. He could only believe Zhang Mu now.

  “I warn you, do not have any other intention. If not, you will die a terrible death.”

  Zhang Mu didn’t reply to him. He just walked forward by himself.

  Actually, this was not Zhang Mu’s privilege. All the era merchants could have this privilege. That is, to use their era merchant’s ring to enter the shop once before the date of the exchange.

  However, the cost was high too. You would need ten gold leaves, which means that you need to finish all your missions. Normal people would not do such a stupid thing but Zhang Mu had no choice. This was his last chance.

  This function was not announced to the era merchant
s. It was just being hidden by them but it still existed.

  Zhang Mu reached forward with his hand into the boundary and his era merchant ring started to have a reaction. It started shining dimly.

  At the same time, a space that was able to contain one person appeared in front of Zhang Mu.

  As Zhang Mu was stepping in, his right arm was grabbed.

  Zhang Mu didn’t struggle and let Zero follow him in.

  In a corner where Zero couldn’t see, Zhang Mu smiled.

  Finally, you have fallen into the trap.

  Chapter 100: Finding The Solution

  After stepping in, their world started spinning and then, they arrived at the era merchant’s shop.

  It was still the same boundless blue galaxy. Zhang Mu woke up quickly. He shook his hand and shook off Zero who didn’t have much power now. On the other hand, Zero was shocked by the vast galaxy. The era merchant that he ate had never seen this before because his number was at the back. Hence, he ignored Zhang Mu’s presence and just admired this majestic galaxy by himself.

  However, a voice shocked him and woke him up. He slowly turned his head and looked into the direction of the voice.

  “Number 001, why have you reach ahead of schedule? There is still a lot of time before the next exchange.”

  Zero was sizing up the man who suddenly appeared. The man had an elegant and noble aura around him.

  “I think I told you before that you can’t come back here before the date of the exchange. Although I never told you what the punishment was, someone with your personality shouldn’t be so forgetful.

  No. 37’s voice was like music to Zhang Mu’s ear. He controlled the emotions in his heart and said, “I remembered it. However, first, take a look at the man I brought.