Gu Xi, however, suddenly asked him, "Mr. Huo, when did you receive the news?"

Huo Changzhou froze for a moment, then said, "Just now. I rushed over as soon as I got the news..."

Before he could finish, Yang Chi cut him off. "Mr. Huo, did you receive the message over at the office building?"

Hearing this, Huo Changzhou’s expression changed slightly. He had clearly realized something was amiss, but Yang Chi gave him no chance to speak, immediately feigning confusion with a soft "Huh?"

"Running from the office area to here..." Yang Chi muttered as if to himself. "That would take at least half an hour."

"Mr. Huo certainly has great stamina." Recalling the little silent show he’d just witnessed, Yang Chi added with particular earnestness.

At this, the way everyone looked at Huo Changzhou grew suspicious.

These were people who had been tested and tempered by the apocalypse; no one was a fool. If the matter was truly so urgent, why didn’t Mr. Huo just call Miss Gu? Why insist on taking the time and effort to run all the way here and notify her in person?

Someone generous might say he ran all the way here himself to show how seriously he was taking it. But an observer might just as well think he was deliberately wasting time.

Clearly, something was fishy.

The crowd’s gazes on Huo Changzhou grew even more skeptical.

But Huo Changzhou’s reaction was incredibly fast, as expected of someone with a Ph.D. He abruptly slapped his forehead, his face a mask of chagrin and self-reproach. "Ah, it’s all my fault. I was in such a rush that I wasn’t thinking straight. I was so focused on getting the news to you, Miss Gu, that I forgot to ask anyone for your contact number..."

The implication was clear: he didn’t have Gu Xi’s contact number, so he had no choice but to run over in person.

Gu Xi gave him a look but said nothing. She turned to several nearby Wood Element ability users and pointed to the mutant cactus, which had now been spurred to a height of over ten meters. "Now, try to control it with your abilities. Make it attack Wei Heng..."

Across from them, Wei Heng had already braced for combat and gave a nod in their direction.

Gu Xi had the crowd fall back, leaving the field open for the ability users.

Huo Changzhou was frantic, but for some reason, whenever he met Gu Xi’s calm, profound eyes, a chill would inexplicably run down his spine, and he couldn’t force out a single word.

’This is insane.’

The area was quickly cleared, and the round-faced girl from before was the first to step forward.

Her power had already been exhausted from spurring the mutant plant’s growth, but Miss Gu had said that if you want your ability to break through and develop quickly, you have to push it to its limits, squeezing and grinding it out bit by bit...

The round-faced girl glanced at Gu Xi. Seeing her nod, the girl gritted her teeth and began to channel her power...

Gu Xi watched from the sidelines for a moment before offering guidance. "Gather all the power you can currently draw upon and keep it within your conscious control. Don’t just pour it all out at once. In a real fight, you can’t afford the slightest waste..."

The girl bit her lower lip, and the towering cactus beside her began to tremble unsteadily...

A moment later, countless cactus spines shot toward Wei Heng like a torrential downpour.

A series of gasps erupted from the distant crowd. After all, ever since the zombies were wiped out in the twenty-eighth year of the apocalypse, ordinary people living in the safe zones rarely had a chance to see ability users in combat.

For his part, Wei Heng threw up an earth wall and easily deflected the cactus spines. The girl gritted her teeth, about to attack again, but she suddenly staggered and nearly fell.

A nearby ability user quickly steadied her. "Why don’t you rest for a bit? Let us have a try." Opportunities like this were rare; who wouldn’t want a chance to test their skills?

The others were all eager to try, but the round-faced girl just shook her head slightly. "I’m fine. I can go again."

’This is a rare opportunity. I can’t waste it.’

The girl placed her hand on the giant cactus once more.

Gu Xi took it all in without a word. She had said what needed to be said; whether they could cross that threshold was now up to them.

Just then, Qin Yi suddenly leaned close to Gu Xi and whispered, "Gu Xi, are you planning to train these ability users to fight the mutated beasts in the mountains with mutant plants?"

Yang Chi leaned in as well, glancing at the group of rookie ability users. "Are they really up to it?"

Gu Xi looked up at them and said cryptically, "Before the apocalypse, there was a game called Plants vs. Zombies..."

Yang Chi and Qin Yi exchanged a confused glance. Qi Xiang, however, looked thoughtfully toward the towering mutant cactus in the middle of the field.

’If Gu Xi doesn’t intervene, these low- and mid-tier ability users alone are certainly not enough to fend off the mutated beasts from the mountains. But what if they had high-tier mutant plants to help them?’

’She’d once seen videos in the research institute’s database from the early days of the apocalypse. For the first twenty-odd years, mutant plants were practically invincible because of their terrifying regeneration speed. Even the fierce, bloodthirsty mutated beasts that shared the mountains had to give them a wide berth.’

’If they could use the abilities of Wood Element users to weaponize these high-tier mutant plants again... wouldn’t that perfectly compensate for their own lack of offensive power?’

’And in the wild mountains and forests all around, what was the most abundant resource...? Naturally, it was the mutant plants that blanketed the entire landscape!’

’Compared to the sheer number of those plants, a few hundred mutated beasts were nothing. Even thousands or tens of thousands would just be delivering themselves as fertilizer!’

Qi Xiang’s eyes lit up with startling intensity. Previously, her special ability had been purely supportive, offering her no offensive power of her own, which made it feel rather useless. But now, her body had also fused with certain plant characteristics. If...

’Could she control those high-level mutant plants, too?’

Qi Xiang was so excited her heart skipped several beats. She walked over to Gu Xi, her gaze bright and resolute. "Gu Xi, I want to try, too."

"Of course." Gu Xi retrieved the seed of another high-tier mutant plant suitable for her from her storage space and handed it to Qi Xiang.

Qi Xiang took the seed and happily went off to one side to tinker with her ability. Qin Yi sidled up and asked curiously, "Gu Xi, how do you have everything in your storage space?"

Gu Xi smiled. "Just a habit."

After the apocalypse began, resources grew scarce, forcing everyone to become a pack rat. Gu Xi was no exception. Combined with the fact that her storage space was enormous, she had developed a habit of subconsciously shoving anything she came across into it, whether it seemed useful or not.

As a result, her storage space was filled not only with a large quantity of mutated beast carcasses, but also with the remnants of high-tier mutant plants—seeds, flowers, branches, leaves, or root systems... mostly from plants she had personally slain.

At the time, Gu Xi hadn’t been saving them intentionally; she had simply tossed whatever remnants were left into her space after a kill.

Now, they were finally coming in handy.

For example, there was the mutant cactus she gave these Wood Element ability users, and... the mutant piranha plant she had just tossed to Qi Xiang.

When it came to dealing with mutated beasts in the mountains, they were naturals.

——Unrivaled.