God only knows how they survived these past three days.
To prevent themselves from slipping away in their sleep like some others in the region due to the extreme cold, they implemented a rotation system.
They switched every two hours. Under such conditions, there was no way anyone could get a decent night's sleep.
“Wait, Captain Li Wufeng, the room is too small. Can all of us even fit in here?” someone asked in confusion.
“Of course not. But we can sleep in two shifts. We just have to push through it during this emergency,” Li Wufeng replied.
He had already planned for this.
“Will the fuel last if we sleep in two shifts?”
“It’ll hold. If we run out, I’ll just ask Shang Chuan for more. Don’t worry about that, but the daily gathering quota cannot fall short, understood?”
Li Wufeng nodded dismissively before casting a stern look around the room at everyone.
Although they received free resource rations from Shang Chuan, they were required to go out and perform gathering tasks for him in return.
To put it bluntly, they were a gathering squad recruited by Shang Chuan.
At a time like this, if anyone slacked off for the sake of comfort, Shang Chuan might not punish them directly, but he would cut off their rations.
Everyone knew exactly what they had to do.
As for why the two brothers, Zhao Dulay and Li Wufeng, were here, one person had to be mentioned.
That person was none other than the ‘Giant’ Mickey, who had once threatened Lan Qingyou.
Back when Mickey wanted to expand his influence, he had absorbed many people from the surrounding area.
His actions had prompted many others to form their own groups for self-preservation.
It was during that time that the two brothers began to gather people around them.
However, because he knew exactly what kind of place they were in, Li Wufeng had been exceptionally careful during the recruitment process.
So even now, they only numbered about twenty people.
Fortunately, Li Wufeng had managed to establish a connection with Shang Chuan and became a member of one of Shang Chuan’s gatherer squads, securing a stable source of income.
Because of this, they were able to survive the sudden mana tide.
“Alright, let’s divide up. Me, Kam, Otto, Zhao Dulay... we’ll take the first watch. The rest of you, get some sleep.”
At Li Wufeng’s command, the seven or eight people he named stayed on duty.
The others couldn’t wait to grab their bedding from the other small partitions and bring it over, collapsing into sleep the moment they lay down.
Any concerns about propriety between men and women were long gone; all they cared about was getting a good night’s rest.
In reality, Li Wufeng’s plan was simple.
He split the group into two: one team would sleep while the other stood guard, swapping after six hours. In the morning, they would go out to gather together, and they would return together in the evening.
After all, there were only about ten hours of daylight suitable for gathering anyway.
For most people, six hours of sleep was more than enough.
As for asking Shang Chuan for another heater, he had already brought it up.
But that profiteer insisted that unless they gathered more materials or found a mineral vein to mine, he couldn’t provide any more.
Li Wufeng understood his position.
After all, Shang Chuan was supporting over twenty mouths in their group alone, providing everything from food to the mana potions they used last time and the heater they had now.
And Shang Chuan supported many other groups like theirs.
He was essentially the CEO of a company, while Li Wufeng was a manager for one of the project teams.
In short, they had gone from being students who hadn't even graduated on Blue Star to becoming beasts of burden on the Kalim continent.
The bitterness of it all was beyond words.
Furthermore, Shang Chuan had mentioned that this cold snap might be temporary. If the temperature remained low and the snow continued after the mana turbulence ended, he would consider equipping them with another unit.
...
The night passed in silence.
By the time the sun rose the next day, Li Wufeng and his team had fully recovered their energy.
One by one, they stepped out of their home carrying worn-out axes, pickaxes, and saws.
Because the sudden cold had kept them indoors for the past few days, everyone had to head out today. they had to take action to repay Shang Chuan for the gift of the heater.
And, of course, to help the boss afford a new car sooner.
After all, only about a hundred heaters were sold a day, and even the fuel was limited.
Yet they had received a heater for free and were given an unlimited supply of fuel. If they didn't work hard, they wouldn't be able to look that heater—the very thing that let them sleep peacefully—in the eye.
Clang! Clang!
Thud! Thud!
Although they couldn't use their individual Harvesting skills due to the mana turbulence, gathering through primitive methods was still perfectly fine.
Fortunately, the forest was rich in resources, with plenty of trees, stones, and vines.
Especially wood.
With their current setup, even just lopping off some branches was enough to net them over a thousand units of basic timber.
“With snow this thick, it’s amazing these herbs haven't withered. This magic world really is something,” a young girl responsible for gathering herbs remarked.
“It’s probably because of the mana. As long as mana exists in this world, these plants won't wither,” a boy replied.
In this place, whenever you saw something you didn't understand, blaming it on mana was always the right move.
This was the ‘blame-shifting method’ summarized by many people during their month or so since being transported to Kalim.
“Cutting wood is so tiring...” Zhao Dulay complained, putting down his axe and shaking his wrists.
“Because we're family,” Li Wufeng, acting as the project manager, replied without missing a beat.
“Please, it’s already cold enough without your dry jokes.”
Zhao Dulay shuddered as he spoke, a chill running down his spine.
He then checked his personal information and saw that time was almost up.
“The potion's duration is about to end. Get ready to take the next dose.”
“Got it!”
“Understood!”
The others responded one after another, pausing their work to pull an Apprentice Frost Resistance Potion from their coats. They uncorked the bottles, downed the liquid, and went right back to work.
These potions were from the second batch produced by Lan Qingyou. Shang Chuan hadn't sold a single one, giving them all to his gathering squads.
After all, he couldn't just keep supporting them if they weren't doing anything, right?
Moreover, compared to selling them, the gathering squads could more effectively collect the specific resources he needed—especially the herbs Lan Qingyou required.
In this freezing weather, gathering materials was difficult enough; who would bother gathering herbs just for a single potion?
This was exactly where the value of the gathering squads became apparent.
“Captain, we found a cave up ahead.”
Just as everyone was huffing and puffing while logging and mining, one of the men responsible for digging stone returned.
“What is it?” Li Wufeng asked.
The leader of the stone gathering team looked at Li Wufeng with a strange expression.
“We were just digging for stone when we uncovered a cave.”
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