Bab 285: Chapter 285: Don’t worry, I’m here to pick you up
After dealing with another corpse, he began to concentrate on cleaning up the mess. Of course, he mainly dealt with the rotten things to prevent the breeding of germs and the like... As for the other debris, there was nothing he could do. He didn't have enough energy to deal with it.
Another thing was to collect some water, dirty water or anything, as long as it was water, and throw it all into the water purification device so that he could get some water for backup.
After that, he waited for a while by the water purification device. After collecting enough clean water, he dragged a bucket of water and slowly walked into the depths of the shelter.
He walked through the corridors covered with bloodstains, and after spending some time and effort on the half-broken control panel, he finally managed to open the door that led to the depths... After walking along a relatively clean and quiet road, he finally arrived at his destination—a "shelter" within a shelter.
In fact, it was just a deeper room. It was called a "shelter" only because of the turmoil. There was nothing special about this place itself.
As for who the people here were...
"sigh..."
He adjusted his breathing slightly, knocked on the door first to inform the people inside that there was someone outside, and then entered the password on the control panel outside and opened the door.
Then...
Snap—
The door was pushed open, a flash of cold light passed through his eyes, and a dangerous stinging sensation reached his neck in an instant, staying at a very close distance. Not far away, there were several people pointing guns at him.
"It's okay. It's me."
He looked at the men with guns not far away, then lowered his eyes and looked at the long knife resting on his neck. Following the cold light, he moved his gaze to the blade extending from the corner of his sight, and the pink-haired figure hidden behind the door, in the blind spot of his sight.
That's Sakura.
"I didn't expect you to be so skilled, Miss Sakura."
"...In the past, I was responsible for guarding Eden, so it shouldn't be surprising that I know some martial arts."
Sakura stared at him for a long while, and when someone raised their hand to signal her, she slowly retracted the long sword in her hand and spoke in a half-joking tone.
"Besides, no matter how good your martial arts are, they can never be better than guns, right?"
"That's hard to say. Didn't you see Kevin and the others were using swords or something?"
Seeing the men laying down their guns, he relaxed a little, responding to Sakura's joke while pulling in the bucket he was dragging.
"I purified all the water I could collect outside and brought it back. I think it can be considered a replenishment of resources. As for other things... you know, those guys destroyed and wasted a lot of them. Although there should be a lot left, I don't have the energy to look for them for the time being. You can look for them when you have the chance."
"They are different. And that thing is not a sword in the strict sense. It is a kind of activated power used to exert the power of the Herrscher Core. The sword shape is just a form of expression... Besides, doesn't that thing look like a gun?"
Someone responded like this, and at the same time looked at the bucket of water he was dragging, pursed his lips, and finally didn't say anything more.
He just took it and placed it in the corner, and quickly installed a small water pump to fill several pots of water. He gave one to his companions, letting them drink it, and the rest of them went into another room with Sakura...
Judging from the view vaguely revealed through the crack in the door, there seemed to be a lot of petite cuties inside, especially the overlapping pink colors were particularly eye-catching. One could also faintly hear the cheers of children and some obvious swallowing sounds.
"Okay, let's not talk about that nonsense anymore... How is the situation outside?"
Someone asked him this, drawing his attention back.
"One good news and one bad news."
He replied.
"The good news is that the situation outside has completely calmed down and we have successfully resolved the problem."
"Bad news... Ha, of course, everyone is dead, and I'm the only one who survived."
His tone was somewhat bitter.
"I just [dealt with] the last crazy person... This feeling is quite uncomfortable."
"...Thank you for your hard work."
Others could only respond in this way.
"Ha, it's okay... Never mind, let's not talk about this, it's too depressing... How are you? Have you contacted the base? Ah... If we still have a base."
"…We did get in touch, but it was both good news and bad news."
One person responded with a wry smile.
"The good news is that we have contacted the Fire Moth, and Dr. Mei and the others have told us that support will arrive soon, so we can establish contact with them... The bad news is that if we keep sending communications, we may attract the Kaiji, and we may even have been located by the Kaiji."
"All I can say is... we don't quite know whether Dr. Mei and her support came first, or whether the Kaiji arrived first."
"And Dr. Mei also said that after we meet up, she will have more important news to tell us... I have a feeling that it won't be good news, so... well, there will probably be one, or even several pieces of bad news, or even worse news."
"To put it simply, there is not much good news and bad news is waiting for us... It's really unlucky."
Someone shook his head helplessly, spread his hands, and summed it up in a somewhat funny tone... He himself didn't know why he was laughing, maybe it was because the situation was so bad that he was so angry that he laughed, or maybe it was because the helplessness in facing such a situation made him laugh.
"I see…"
He nodded as if he understood, and then murmured something in a low voice.
"Then it seems we have to hurry up..."
Then he raised his head again and said with a smile.
"Heh... I guess our support must have arrived first."
"I hope so..."
"Hey, don't look so sad. It would be embarrassing if the kids saw it."
"…True."
"…"
"…Just talk about anything, otherwise I'm afraid we'll repeat the same mistakes and become like those people before us."
"What you said is too horrible..."
"Just tell me if there is such a possibility."
"…Yeah, so what should we talk about?"
"Um... good question. I don't know either."
"Tell a joke or gossip?"
"Want a joke?"
"No, thank you. Even though we are in the desert, we don't need to cool down yet."
"What a shame. I had prepared a collection of bad jokes."
"Why, are you going to tell this to Kaiji and embarrass them to death, or are you going to tell this to us and embarrass us so much that we'll use our feet to knock you out of a four-bedroom, two-living-room apartment?"
(TL: "I'll knock you out of a four-bedroom, two-living-room apartment" is a humorous exaggeration, usually suggesting that someone is going to hit or confront the other person so hard that they'd end up far away from their comfortable or luxurious living situation. It's often used to playfully suggest a strong or dramatic reaction without any actual intention of harm. The mention of a "four-bedroom, two-living-room apartment" emphasizes the comfort or status the person might lose, adding a layer of irony and humor to the joke... Well~ it's not a funny joke haha)
"Isn't it a three-bedroom apartment?"
"You're not happy with a bigger one, right?"
"Yes, yes, yes. I'd rather not miss this house that I got for free."
"Are you telling me a crosstalk here?"
"What is crosstalk?"
"You don't know? Oh... yes, you're not from Shenzhou. Anyway, you can just compare it to a talk show between two people. It's pretty much the same."
"Oh...that's interesting."
…
Under each other's deliberate control, everyone opened up their chatboxes, joked with each other, talked about their past funny stories, or recalled their past happy times...
In the end, even Sakura and the soldier who took care of the child joined in, chatting about random things, relieving each other's stress, and trying to relax as much as possible to avoid the accumulated stress driving them crazy... They had seen related examples and tasted the corresponding consequences, so they must not repeat the same mistakes again.
"Hey, come to think of it... Miss Sakura, you seem to be wearing that thing all the time."
Whether intentionally or unintentionally, or simply because he saw that everyone's interest in chatting was gradually waning, he glanced at the somewhat special hair accessory, or headdress, on Sakura's head, smiled, and opened up another topic.
"And the pendant too. You can see those two accessories almost every time you appear on camera. I remember seeing them in a few issues of magazines before."
"Ah, yes."
Sakura was stunned for a moment but had no objection. She just subconsciously raised her hand and touched the hair accessory on her head. A smile appeared on her face involuntarily, and she spoke slowly in a tone as gentle as falling cherry blossoms.
"After all, these things... have a special meaning to me, so I will always carry them with me."
"To be honest, my agent was almost mad at me at the time. After all, the original plan did not include these two items in the accessories of the costumes. But at that time, I had just received them and did not really want to take them off, so... haha, now thinking about it, I am still a little embarrassed."
Sakura looked away somewhat embarrassedly. After all, this matter was her own problem.
"I see. It seems like Nozomi is really lucky to be liked by so many people."
He nodded and spoke with some emotion.
"...Um?"
Sakura frowned in confusion... Did she ever mention that these two pieces of jewelry were given to her by Nozomi?
"Ah, you may not know yet when Nozomi was designing accessories for you, he often ran back and forth between the Engineering Department and the Operations Department, saying that he wanted to add some functions to the accessories that even I couldn't understand... After going back and forth like this, we have all seen what the accessories he designed look like."
He explained this, and the subtext of the last sentence also explained why he knew that the accessories on Sakura were given by Nozomi.
"Is that so? I didn't know he had to put so much effort into this..."
Sakura was stunned for a moment, and then subconsciously touched her headdress, as if she could feel the love he had left behind...
Although she still didn't understand what the empty space above the headdress was for, she initially thought she had accidentally lost a part, but the headdress itself was like this... she really didn't understand what Nozomi based his design on.
Did he want her to grow an extra pair of ears? On her head? Or wear some other... uh... headdress?
Isn't that too weird?
When she thought of this, Sakura couldn't help but frown, revealing an expression that was both helpless and amused... After all, this problem of headwear had troubled her for a long time.
But... what can we do now?
Sakura lowered her eyes, and her originally gentle look suddenly became lonely.
The person she loved disappeared, died, and was even taken over by the Herrscher...
her best friend was also kidnapped by "Kaiji"...
The former head of the family, good friends, companions, agents, colleagues... all the people related to her were drowned in the attack of "Kaiji."
The only thing she had left was the Rin...
Yes, everything is gone... everything that was once beautiful, everything she once had... is gone.
Only Rin is left...
It seemed that nothing had changed, as if everything had returned to the original point, as if... everything she once had was just an illusion.
"...Alright, alright, that's enough."
Seeing that Sakura's mood was rapidly declining, he quickly waved his hand, trying to interrupt the atmosphere.
"We have just rested enough. Let's go find some other resources. The resources we stored in advance may not be much. We can't let the children starve... Hmm?"
He stood up, tried to steer the conversation elsewhere, tried to draw everyone's attention back to the current issue of survival, and then... he frowned.
Tick-tock——
It was very obvious, the sound of water dripping.
What followed was... the sound of continuous rain and the smell of dampness that suddenly flooded into the room.
Although there were thick walls between them and the room didn't even have a window, they could still clearly hear the sound of rain falling on the yellow sand.
"(obscene words)..."
He seemed to have seen something very horrible and couldn't help but curse out loud.
But other people no longer cared about his strange behavior... After all, along with the sound of rain and the feeling of dampness came an extremely terrifying sense of threat.
The kind of terrifying existence that poses a huge threat to people just by its mere existence... As long as they can sense it, they will understand who they have met.
"alright..."
The voice was as gentle as water... no, it was even gentler than that tone, and it felt like it could melt and dissolve a person.
"Don't worry..."
Sakura felt a slightly cool and damp feeling suddenly come from behind her as if she was wrapped in a cloak that had not yet completely dried.
It should have been an uncomfortable and strange feeling, but she had a very familiar feeling... as if she had done this many times before.
And... she didn't feel any threat like the others did, only gentleness like water, and a slight sense of apology and guilt... as if he felt guilty and he was apologizing to her for being late.
"Sakura..."
He kept repeating her name.
"I'm here to pick you up~"
'Ah... I know. I know who he is.'
Obviously, at this moment, she should have simply stepped back, avoided his hands, avoided his hug, then drew the blade at her waist, turned around to attack, and finally cooperated with her companions to repel him as much as possible... Although all this may be useless and will not produce any effect, it can at least take some time for the children to leave.
But...but...
she couldn't pull out the knife… There was no way… she put her hand on the handle.
she didn't even want to take a step forward, to leave, to avoid his embrace...
It's like... this is how it should be.
It's like... everything is as it should be.
Maybe something was wrong with her.
She opened her mouth, wanting to shout out, wanting her companions to stop caring about her, to just resist and fight back.
But before she could shout, before anyone else raised their weapons... he, the one who came back from outside, the only one who came back alive during the turmoil... his "companion", instantly drew the gun from his waist.
Boom boom boom!!!
Just like a cowboy in a movie, he fired from his hip at an extremely fast speed, and each shot accurately hit his companions - except Sakura, of course.
The "ammunition" spewed out of the gun was not metal, but a sticky, alive, blue... "water ball"?
After hitting someone, it would quickly sink into the person's body, and then that person would fall down in astonishment and uncertainty... and finally be wrapped in the azure water and turned into a water ball.
Everything happened in an instant, making it difficult for people to react, let alone respond.
What appeared before her eyes were bubbles pouring out of her mouth in a strange posture and floating upwards.
What emerged before her eyes was the azure blue water that enveloped her vision.
'Rin...'
Before being swallowed by the water, Sakura wanted to shout her sister's name. What flashed through her mind was the inhuman treatment that Rin might suffer... In that instant, she seemed to have gained strength. Her limbs that were gradually losing perception and her consciousness that was gradually becoming dizzy began to become clear.
Even if it was just a split second, it was enough for her to grab the weapon... Even if it was just one strike, even if it was just one strike! At least let her put up a corresponding resistance, let her delay a little bit, even if it was all in vain, that would be...
"Don't be afraid, I'm here."
However, as if he was too familiar with her as if he already knew what she would do, before she could move her hand, he held it and interlocked their fingers.
It seemed to comfort her, but also to cut off her thoughts. The meaning behind it was somewhat... indescribable.
And in the end, the only thing she could remember was what that special "companion" said to her...
"You two are playing tricks on me, right?"
PERTIMBANGAN PENCIPTA 
Elysia_Husband
Elysia_Husband Hope you enjoy~
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