Chapter 129 Two Sides of the Story

Let's leave that for a moment...

After a rather long and monotonous desert journey, a populated area finally appeared ahead of the Hell Front Squad...

Compared to the desert stronghold that was the size of a small city, the place Feng Bujue and his team arrived at could only be considered a small village.

The village was located in a mountain gorge. The towering rock walls on both sides protected the people from the sun and wind, and also allowed the village to avoid the eyes of many bandits.

Various shacks, rock shelves, and caves that were tightly integrated with the terrain formed the unique architectural style of this place.

The rabbits living here looked like the more law-abiding residents. Most of them wore coarse cloth clothes or woven items, and their physiques were clearly different from those of the slave traders in the desert.

It wasn't that these villagers were a different species of rabbit from those bandits, but because these people (rabbits) could barely fill their stomachs with hard work on a daily basis, their physique was naturally not as strong as those who could live a life of plenty by robbing.

Dang dang dang dang dang...

"The slave traders are here! Everyone, hide!"

When the members of the Hell Front Squad approached the entrance of the mountain gorge on their motorcycles, the sound of iron being struck immediately rang out in the village, and they could clearly hear someone shouting loudly, warning the villagers.

"Brother Jue... it seems like we've been misunderstood..." Xiao Tan said, turning his head.

"It's probably because we're riding motorcycles," Feng Bujue replied.

"It's also possible that the members of the Second Squad of Corpse Blades entered the village ahead of us and told the villagers something," Xiao Ling added from the side.

"Eh?" Upon her reminder, Xiao Tan immediately exclaimed in surprise, "Then aren't we very likely to be ambushed?"

"Don't be nervous..." Feng Bujue said in a relaxed tone, "Even if the Corpse Blades people have really been to this village, at most they would have just said some bad things about us to the villagers. An ambush is clearly you thinking too much... unless the enemy knew in advance that we would definitely come to this village, otherwise, who would they ambush?" He paused, then continued, "Taking a step back... assuming they really knew we were coming and planned to ambush us here..." He turned his head and gestured towards the front with his eyes, "...then how would we see this 'startling the snake' scene before us?"

"Oh..." Xiao Tan understood quite quickly, "That's right..."

As they spoke, they had already arrived at the entrance of the village, and the defensive line formed by the villagers was already in place.

A "mobile wall" made up of a mixture of scrap metal, stones, and plastic products had been lowered, blocking the players' path. The wall also had many protruding sharp objects, making it look quite intimidating.

Behind the wall was a row of "fully armed" villagers, both male and female. The weapons they held were mainly sticks and homemade spears (usually just a sharpened stone or metal spearhead tied to the end of a long stick), and the armor was various simple sports protective gear and homemade shields (including garbage can lids, manhole covers, plastic boards, etc., some of which had obvious holes in them). The few guys holding crossbows should be considered the most combat-capable among these people (rabbits), but they were obviously no match for the players.

"Stop! You slave traders! Don't come near our village!" Before the players could park their motorcycles, they heard a delicate shout.

Feng Bujue took a closer look and saw that the one shouting was a female rabbit-person holding a crossbow, standing in the center of the defense line.

"Heh..." Brother Jue smiled slightly and replied in a relatively gentle tone, "Everyone, please don't misunderstand, we are not slave traders." He pointed to the motorcycle under him, "We stole this vehicle from a group of slave traders."

Who knew that the other party would immediately follow up with, "Then you are robbers?"

In a sense... that logic was indeed correct...

"Nay~ Nay~" Feng Bujue still maintained that calm and amicable demeanor. Even while being glared at by dozens of hostile rabbit-people with their weapons drawn, he still appeared unhurried and at ease; and this calm, leisurely attitude... was undoubtedly part of his negotiation skills, "The four of us... are just travelers who came to your planet by accident. Because we were attacked by slave traders not long ago, we had to use force to resist. As a result, those guys were no match for us and left their motorcycles and ran away."

"Who would believe that?"

"Don't think we're easy to fool!"

"Yeah! Get back where you came from! Don't come near our village!"

Clearly, these few words were not enough to convince these NPCs.

"Hehe..." Brother Jue naturally wouldn't turn around and leave just like that. He had enough courage, a thick enough skin, and enough strength. Say whatever you want... anyway, he wasn't leaving, "Everyone... you have no reason to doubt my words." He spread his hands, putting on a very sincere look, "Look... none of us are Rabbit-Star people. To put it bluntly... what reason would we have to specifically run to a deserted planet to be robbers?"

After these words were spoken, the villagers' clamor subsided somewhat, because what Feng Bujue said was common sense... Even if those villagers had deep prejudices against outsiders, they couldn't deny such an obvious fact.

"Everyone... we really don't have any malicious intentions. We just want to find a place to rest in your village." Seeing that the other party's attitude had softened slightly, Feng Bujue immediately pressed on, "If you're worried that we're going to plunder your food and water, then you can rest assured..." As he said this, he lowered his head and gave Xiao Tan a meaningful look.

Xiao Tan immediately understood and took out a few packets of snacks from his bag, "Yes, yes, we have plenty of food ourselves..." He seemed to have suddenly remembered something, and then took out a large bottle of mineral water from his bag, holding it up high and saying, "Look~ we have water too."

As soon as they saw the bottle of water in Xiao Tan's hand, the rabbit-people's eyes turned red.

It had been a long... long... time since they had seen such clean, transparent water...

The water that the villagers usually used was 80% well water from deep underground, which was more or less polluted and not available in large quantities. Most of it had to be used to irrigate crops, and only a small portion could be used for drinking. And the remaining 20%... was treated recycled water. You can imagine how it was recycled... anyway, this water could only be used for washing things, not for drinking.

In short... for these law-abiding villagers living in the post-apocalyptic world, a bottle of clean water was a luxury item, far more valuable than gold.

And Xiao Tan didn't expect that his unintentional act would become the key to their entry into the village...

"In that case... you wait here..." The leading female rabbit-person was stunned for a few seconds, swallowed her saliva, and her attitude softened somewhat, "I need to ask the 'Elder' first."