Chapter 114: Proxy Purchase

Chapter 114: Surrogate Purchasing

Gao Wanli's livestream was met with a wave of boos, with many netizens from Nation M frantically spamming comments in the chat.

"Host, you must keep the camera on at all times. Don’t turn it off under the guise of respecting personal privacy while secretly stuffing your face under the covers."

"Ugh, all I can say is the host is really suffering. That’s China for you—completely ignorant of democracy, always forcing its will on the people. The host doesn’t want to livestream in such a ridiculous way either, but what choice does he have? He’s being pressured by the base."

"The host is truly pitiful. The homeland he fought so desperately to return to turned out to be hell. Only after going back did he realize just how free and democratic Nation M is. Compared to China, Nation M is heaven!"

"China must be running out of food, so the higher-ups in the base came up with this watery nonsense to trick residents into thinking it’s Nutri-paste. It’s literally just water. The idea that one tube can keep you full for a day is just mind games—self-deception at best."

"I really don’t understand why China insists on perpetuating this obvious scam when everyone already sees through it."

Of course, for every critical voice, there were many more in support—far more than the handful of comments from just a few days ago.

"Some people from Nation M, open your eyes and look at the world. China has already developed flying cars that can jet from China to Nation M in the blink of an eye. How can you still pretend not to see this?"

"Is it really so hard to admit that China’s technological advancements have left every other country on Earth in the dust?"

"The host looks great—his energy and demeanor clearly show he’s not under any threat from any organization or individual."

Gao Wanli paid no mind to these comments because he knew that in a month, everything would change.

Gao Wanli said, "Alright, let’s begin the experiment. I’m going to drink this one-month supply of Nutri-paste. Honestly, this is my first time trying the one-month dose—I’ve only ever had the one-day version before."

He unscrewed the cap and drank it in one go.

"It tastes like corn," Gao Wanli remarked. "It’s been so long since I’ve had corn that I’d almost forgotten what it tastes like. But honestly, corn seems to be a staple crop in the Beijing Base—corn-flavored Nutri-paste is the most common and cheapest here. If you want fruit-flavored paste, you’d probably have to spend over a dozen Beijing Base credit points."

Addressing questions in the chat, he explained, "Why? Well, I’ve heard that Nutri-paste is made by directly extracting and purifying the nutritional components from food, creating nano-compounds that can be absorbed by the digestive system without waste.

"So, the flavors aren’t artificially added later—they come directly from the original food source. In other words, apple-flavored paste is made by extracting nutrients from actual apples."

This statement instantly sent M-base residents, who hadn’t seen an apple in years, into a rage, breaking their composure entirely.

"Host, cut the crap. Talk is cheap, huh? ‘Extracted directly from fruit’—does the Beijing Base even have apples? Let me ask Gu Jinsheng—does he even know what an apple is?"

"I was actually starting to like this host because of the flying cars, but this is next-level delusional. Even an idiot would shake their head at this!"

"Is the host treating us like fools, or is he just a fool himself?"

"This has to be scripted, right? This is some Beijing Base propaganda, isn't it? Doesn’t the writer feel embarrassed? And props to the host for spouting this obvious BS with a straight face. Tough job!"

Gao Wanli saw these comments—he even read them aloud—but he didn’t care in the slightest.

"Have you ever heard the story of *the frog in the well*? It’s about a frog born and raised in a well who thinks the world is only as big as the well’s opening. Then a bird flies by and tells the frog how vast and amazing the outside world is, but the frog refuses to believe it, arrogantly insisting the world is tiny. No matter what others say, it won’t open its eyes to see for itself."

"I remember the last group this stubborn was the R-base. Strange—I don’t see any comments from R-base residents today. They’re usually the loudest." Of course, Gao Wanli knew exactly why—the R-base had been overrun by clone armies, leaving only clones and zombies behind. His question was deliberate, meant to rub salt in the wound.

This only further enraged Nation M residents, and the chat exploded with vitriol.

But Gao Wanli just smirked. In fact, he felt amused—he’d clearly hit a nerve. Hahaha…

After drinking the Nutri-paste, Gao Wanli went about his routine tasks, making sure the camera always captured his full-frontal view.

This was the advantage of using a terminal instead of a phone for livestreaming. Unlike a phone, which had to be held or fixed in place while constantly adjusting angles to stay in frame, the terminal automatically auto-tracked his facial movements. Even if he faceplanted, the terminal would close-up on him face-planting.

So Gao Wanli was completely free to do whatever he wanted.

Before going to bed, Gao Wanli said, "It's time for me to take a bath and sleep..."

Before he could finish, the live chat exploded again with comments: "I knew it! The host is definitely pulling this trick so he can sneak off-camera and stuff his face. It's only been half a day, and he can't even handle the hunger anymore? Seems like food is really scarce in the Capital Base. Otherwise, if the host could eat his fill back at the base, he’d at least last three days without food. But just half a day? Guess he’s been drinking water to stave off hunger every day since returning to the Capital Base. Oh, right—even water costs resources in the post-apocalyptic world. So, host, can’t even get your fill of water, huh?"

Gao Wanli read the comments aloud and replied, "Don’t worry, keyboard warriors from M Country. Our Capital Base’s high-tech devices are way more advanced than your phones. If I don’t want you to see my nude body during my bath, you won’t."

Then, to everyone’s shock, Gao Wanli actually livestreamed his bath. The most incredible part was that the device only focused on his face—nothing below his neck appeared in the video.

The viewers were stunned. Many spammed "666" (an internet slang for 'awesome' or 'well done') in the chat.

Even more astonishing, Gao Wanli kept the stream running while he slept, letting hundreds of thousands of netizens watch him the entire night.

After living under the watchful eyes of hundreds of thousands with zero privacy for seven days, the trolls from M Country finally couldn’t take it anymore. They switched tactics, relentlessly urging Gao Wanli to eat.

"Host, don’t gamble with your health. Going this long without food or water can kill you. Even superpowered individuals are pushing the absolute limit."

"The Capital Base is not even human behavior! How can they treat their residents’ lives so carelessly?"

Seeing these comments, Gao Wanli simply headed to a training facility to work out.

This move freaked out M Country. The screen was flooded with comments begging him to eat.

But Gao Wanli didn’t. Instead, he started training daily. A full month passed with him living under the public eye, not eating or drinking a single thing. By then, even the most stubborn M Country residents couldn’t find a reason to accuse him.

Charles was once again driven to madness, executing another batch of base members.

On the final day, the livestream had technically ended. Whether he ate or not no longer mattered. Gao Wanli chuckled and said, "The month’s over. Honestly, I was a bit worried during this stream. Even though it’s a month’s dose of nutritional supplements, we all know the energy expenditure between training hard versus sitting around is totally different. I didn’t expect the solution to last a whole month with my intense daily workouts.

"But to be honest, my stomach's growling now. I didn’t before, but I could power through for another day if needed, folks."

The chat went wild. Netizens from all over the world were desperate—they wanted the nutritional supplements, craved them madly. Other technologies could wait; those were higher-tier needs. Only with full bellies could they think about enjoyment. Right now, they just wanted to eat.

"Host, please, I’m begging you—help me proxy purchase some nutritional supplements. I’m starving! I haven’t eaten in almost seven days!"

"Host, I’m a new mother. I don’t care what happens to me—even if I starve to death right now, so be it. But my baby… he just came into this world, just begun to see the world. He’s innocent. He shouldn’t have to die so young. Please, have mercy—help me proxy purchase some nutritional supplements!"

These pleas were exactly what Gao Wanli had anticipated. He wasn’t surprised. Ji An had already told him that if people begged for proxy purchases after the stream, he could agree—just that the fees would be steep.

Gao Wanli said, "It’s possible, but the amount of nutritional supplements you get depends on the payment method. Take a look: trading food is the most cost-effective. One day’s worth of food gets you three days’ worth of nutritional supplements."

The Capital Base could extract far more than three days’ worth from that food. The Capital Base wasn’t doing this out of charity—it was mostly for profit and to destabilize M Country.

"As for paying with Zombie Cores, that’ll be much more expensive.

"Of course, if you have contamination-free plants or animals, you’ll get the most nutritional supplements in return.

"Our Capital Base does honest business—fair deals for all."

Gao Wanli’s inbox exploded. The orders were overwhelming—he couldn’t handle them alone. He had to bring it to Ji An's attention, who then had Gu Jinsheng assign a few reliable people as customer service reps to filter through the requests.

Those who relied purely on sob stories were ignored by Ji An and the others.

It wasn’t that they were heartless. In the apocalypse, countless people went hungry. Even in China, not everyone had access to nutritional supplements—only the residents of the Capital Base had just begun living without scarcity.

If they had the means to help others, their own people came first.

So when prioritizing orders, their priority was: contamination-free plants/animals > food > Zombie Cores > jade/precious stones > others.

After finalizing the list, Ji An confirmed the addresses with these individuals—all transactions were to take place at the entrance of their respective bases.

Without inside help, Ji An's hovercraft couldn't penetrate the base's protective shield; otherwise, they would have assassinated Charles long ago. Their only task was to appear outside the base at the agreed-upon time—exiting the base wasn’t difficult for those inside, as everyone needed to raid outside to hunt zombies and exchange cores for supplies.

Ji An, Gu Jinsheng, and the other commanders couldn’t abandon their duties to act as couriers. However, sending inexperienced superpowered individuals was a gamble—Gu Jinsheng feared they might walk into a trap.

Ji An said, "Let Thunder Dragon handle it. Thunder Dragon is your spiritual manifestation—it can’t stay away from you for too long. But delivering with the hovercraft only takes about ten minutes, so it should be fine.

If anything unexpected happens, whatever it sees, you’ll know. You can command it remotely."

Gu Jinsheng pressed his lips together and glanced at Ji An. "A general in the field may disregard orders from the emperor."

Ji An burst out laughing. He thought of Thunder Dragon’s shifty, scheming eyes and knew it’d pull this stunt. Gu Jinsheng was naturally a force of nature, though he had since bound himself with self-imposed chains—knowing what he could and couldn’t do.

As Gu Jinsheng’s spiritual manifestation, Thunder Dragon was the embodiment of his untamed spirit, bound by nothing—truly reckless in its actions.

"I’ll have Jiao Jiao accompany it. Thunder Dragon seems to listen to Jiao Jiao more."

Gu Jinsheng gazed deeply at Ji An. "The more I obey you, the more Thunder Dragon will obey you—and even more so, Jiao Jiao."

Gu Jinsheng was getting smoother with his sweet talk, but Ji An still turned beet-red at his words.

Ji An chided, "You’ve been dropping the act a lot lately."

Gu Jinsheng shook his head. "No, I’m just calling it like I see it. If Jiao Jiao told Thunder Dragon to assassinate me, even if it knew we’re one and the same, it would do it."

This was practically a pledge of loyalty—that he would hand over his life if Ji An asked for it.

Ji An glared at him, flustered. "Jiao Jiao would never want your life—it’s not worth the trouble anyway."

Gu Jinsheng laughed, his eyes brimming with amusement.

Thunder Dragon was bouncing off the walls to go out with Jiao Jiao alone, yammering endlessly and occasionally butting Jiao Jiao affectionately with its big head.

He Tao gawked and remarked to his companion, "Don’t you think Commander-in-Chief Gu’s Thunder Dragon is a bit too human-like? It’s like a real dragon."

Meanwhile, Thunder Dragon whispered to Jiao Jiao, "He Tao usually seems slow on the uptake, but he’s actually pretty sharp, huh?"

Jiao Jiao sighed. Thunder Dragon was being way too obvious—only an idiot wouldn’t notice. It had to act dull, pretending to be nothing more than a superpower projection.

The hovercraft arrived at the designated location in the M Nation base in the blink of an eye. A crowd was already waiting. Just as He Tao was about to take the nutrient rations down, Thunder Dragon snatched the basket and shot down first. Worried it might cause trouble, Jiao Jiao followed.

Thunder Dragon, who had planned to scare the group, had to bite its tongue.

It tossed the supplies to them, checked that the goods matched the list, then returned to the hovercraft.

Thunder Dragon drummed its claws on the tablet—*tap-tap*—and He Tao peeked over to see a single word: Go.

"Oh, right. Understood, Commander-in-Chief Gu."

Since superpower projections weren’t supposed to have independent thought, He Tao assumed Gu Jinsheng was controlling Thunder Dragon’s actions.

Thunder Dragon rolled its eyes and muttered to Jiao Jiao, "Just when I thought he was smart, he goes and acts dumb."

Though He Tao couldn’t understand its words, he could *feel* Thunder Dragon looking at him like he was an idiot.

Thunder Dragon recorded the entire delivery, and Ji An uploaded the video online—though all buyers were pixelated to protect identities.

This delivery service was like water splashed into boiling oil—the reaction spread like wildfire.

The nutritional supplements flowed into M country's market, allowing M residents to truly experience their wonders firsthand. Many things began to change as a result.

When Gao Wanli started another livestream, someone immediately asked about immigration.

"Streamer, I'd like to inquire about immigration. What are the requirements to apply?"

The requests for purchasing agents were within Gao Wanli's expectations. Even he himself, when he was in M, would have gone crazy trying to buy the nutritional supplements if he had known they were real.

What intrigued Gao Wanli the most was the immigration issue. Hadn't M and Charles been suppressing China all along? If their citizens started immigrating to China en masse, things would get interesting.

Gao Wanli's eyes gleamed as he said, "I just checked the IP address of the netizen who asked about immigration—it's from M. You probably know that tensions between M and our China have been high. So, while we might accept immigrants from other countries without issue, if it's someone from M, we don’t mind, but Charles would probably lose his mind."

The viewer quickly replied, "Streamer, I’ve sent you a private message. Please check it."

Gao Wanli read the message, his excitement growing.

"Since you’re serious, I’ll help you ask," he said.

Gao Wanli had Ji An’s contact; he messaged him directly. Ji An, thrilled, agreed immediately.

The thought of Charles seething every time someone joined China delighted Ji An, and he was more than happy to add to his frustration.

Ji An brought the issue to Gu Jinsheng, who also found it feasible and approved the immigration. Ji An temporarily took over Gao Wanli’s terminal and went to the command center to discuss with Gu Jinsheng how to bring the person over.

Ji An showed Gu Jinsheng the message from the applicant: "This person claims he was a noble before the cataclysm. When the disaster struck, his family lost their castle because few of them awakened abilities, and they were driven out."

"But he says that even though they were expelled, they still managed to hide a lot of treasures and supplies before leaving, thanks to some family members who awakened abilities. He’s willing to hand over half of these as immigration fees."

Ji An projected the images sent by the applicant, allowing Gu Jinsheng, Zhou Qin, and other base commanders to see them.

Wan Xueying remarked, "The supplies in the pictures are substantial. Even without immigrating, this person could live very comfortably in M. Why does he want to come to China?"

Zhou Qin voiced his suspicion, "I find this strange too. Could there be something suspicious?"

Gu Jinsheng said, "Ask him for his reasons."

Ji An initiated a video call, which the other party answered. A handsome, melancholic face with the air of an old-world noble gentleman appeared on the screen.

After greeting everyone, the man introduced himself, "My name is Rilway, from an old noble house. You may have heard of my surname or even visited my castle before."

Both Ji An and Wan Xueying recognized the name.

Rilway smiled. "Since you’re willing to consider my immigration request, the supplies I showed you—your base can claim half."

Ji An replied, "Certainly. If you’re willing to pay such a high fee, we’ll provide your entire family with a high-end residence for free upon arrival."

"Once you immigrate to our base, you’ll enjoy all the same privileges and safeguards as any other resident."

Then Ji An’s tone shifted. "However, there’s one condition you must meet."

Rilway’s expression turned serious. After a brief pause, he said, "If it’s not an unreasonable demand, my family will do our best."

"My condition is easy yet tough," Ji An said. "Immigration isn’t just about the body—it’s about the heart. Joining our Jing City Base means becoming fully Chinese, identifying fully as one of us, not just living here but pledging allegiance to M."

Rilway was stunned. He had expected demands for more supplies or intel on M, but completely unexpected was Ji An's request.

Ji An continued, "If war ever breaks out between M and China, I hope you’ll remember where your loyalty lies!"

After a long pause, Rilway nodded. "I understand. Once I immigrate, my interests will be tied to China’s. I won’t betray my adopted country."

"When the day of war truly comes, I will definitely protect China and the Jing City Base."

"Good," Ji An agreed immediately, and the two set a time for the pickup.

In reality, after the previous purchasing incident, Charles had already had a meltdown once and tightened security measures.

But it was utterly useless. Unlike the thriving and prosperous Jing City Base, Country M's base had far fewer factories providing jobs for its residents. Most people still had to venture out to hunt zombies for their cores or kill uninfected mutated beasts for food.

People mostly went for the latter. Country M secretly cultivated zombies, though the public remained unaware. However, some Zombie Cores leaked into the market, flooding the zombie core market and causing their value to plummet.

Thus, in Country M, the most valuable commodity was mutated beast meat.

Mutated beasts were inherently altered animals with high superpower levels, making them difficult to hunt. Country M no longer had any green vegetation, and such a barren environment was unsuitable for mutated beasts to thrive. These factors combined made the chances of successfully hunting a mutated beast extremely slim.

This meant that no matter how furious Charles became, he couldn’t stop the base residents from leaving to hunt.

The nutrient packs caused a massive uproar in M Base, making Country M the third base—after R Base and Jing City Base—to experience mass demonstrations across the entire base.

The Rievel family disguised themselves as a hunting team setting out to kill mutated beasts. They left the base and boarded a Jing City Base hover vehicle a few hundred meters away, returning safely to the Jing City Base.