Chapter 37: Mushroom Hide and Seek

Chapter 37 Hypha Hide-and-Seek

While Shen Ji was the subject of the shelter's collective concern, Li Zhiyan calmly and leisurely opened his eyes and stretched.

The Guard Team uniform jacket draped over him slid to the ground with his movement, but Li Zhiyan paid no mind, simply letting out a long exhale.

After finishing his stretch, he finally looked at his clenched right hand. In his palm was a faint, nearly invisible white-pink hypha, transparent with a crystal-like hue, so appealing it made one's mouth water... no, rather, it was utterly captivating.

The hypha tried to escape Li Zhiyan's grasp, fiercely biting his index finger.

Li Zhiyan was surprised; his finger stung from the hypha's bite.

This little thing could actually bite him hard enough to hurt.

Now he was truly captivated. He turned the hypha over and over, tugging at it as it frantically nibbled everywhere.

Thinking it could escape once in his hands?

Just as he was enjoying himself, the phone on the table rang. Li Zhiyan answered with his other hand.

"Hello."

"Captain..." Jiang Ying drew out her words, sounding as if she were on the verge of collapse. "You're awake? Can you handle the cleanup then?"

"Cleanup?" Li Zhiyan was puzzled. "What cleanup?"

Jiang Ying knew he would say this. "Everyone's asleep. If you don't wake them, there's no way I can wake them up. If you wait until you remember, they'll be asleep for three days."

Li Zhiyan suddenly understood. "Oh, right."

He placed the phone on the table and snapped his fingers mid-air. With a soft click, pale blue butterflies appeared before each sleeping person. They fluttered to people's ears and beat their wings just twice, causing those asleep to murmur in their dreams, while some woke up leisurely.

Jiang Ying watched as people at the meeting room door pressed their temples and opened their eyes, finally breathing a sigh of relief.

"By the way, help me ask the shelter," Li Zhiyan said. "Ask how Doctor Shen is doing now."

"Doctor Shen... he's unconscious." Jiang Ying tried to break the news gently. "After you entered the dream, everyone who agreed to the confession fell unconscious. They might be the only group affected by the peach tree incident so far."

"He's fine. I ran into him in Female A's dream," Li Zhiyan said, playing with the hypha in his hand while talking to Jiang Ying. "He disappeared from the dream later, so I assumed he woke up."

Jiang Ying's eyes widened. "He woke up?!"

"Are you underestimating him? His Talent level is definitely not lower than yours," Li Zhiyan said lightly. "Even if he fell asleep like the others, he’d shake off the effects quickly. Otherwise, why do you think I confessed to him when I wasn’t even sure?"

Jiang Ying hesitated for three seconds. "Because you had feelings you couldn’t express and wanted to use an excuse to confess your love..."

Li Zhiyan: ...

"Because I believed he’d be fine," Li Zhiyan sighed. "What weird stuff have you been inputting lately?"

"Blame Zhou Ye," Jiang Ying also felt she’d gone too far, covering her forehead and closing her eyes. "He’s always whispering in my ear about you failing to pursue love, swallowing your pride, even pretending our team has some easy daily life just to get him to join."

Li Zhiyan: ...

"Spreading rumors within the team, no discipline, no organization. Fine him a thousand."

Jiang Ying: ...

Ahem, sorry Zhou Ye, getting you fined twice in a few days.

After hanging up, Jiang Ying first contacted the shelter to confirm that Shen Ji had indeed woken up, even before Li Zhiyan resolved the pollution.

Jiang Ying was a B-level mutant, and even she was nearly affected by the Gardener's contaminated seed. This showed how strong the pollution was, yet Shen Ji managed to wake up on his own. It seemed Shen Ji's Talent level was very high, at least B-level, possibly even A-level.

She couldn’t help but marvel once again at Li Zhiyan’s sharp eye for people, singling out just one person in the entire Q City shelter.

This person was a mutant with a baseline of B-level.

As the Guard Team members woke up, Jiang Ying began reconnecting with various sectors, including Li Yan, who had been stationed under the peach tree.

"The peach tree has withered," Li Yan reported once he got through to Jiang Ying. "The tree is clearly dead. Roots exposed, petals scattered everywhere, leaves turned brittle, trunk shriveled. We just tried cutting it with a knife, and it left a mark."

"Good," Jiang Ying nodded. "Now cut the tree down. Once confirmed the pollutant is completely dead, send it to the Pollution Harmless Treatment Center."

Li Yan accepted the order without delay, immediately calling nearby staff to start cutting the tree with a chainsaw.

Halfway through, blood suddenly flowed from the trunk. Li Yan quickly had the staff stop. He cautiously crouched down, collected some blood, and ran a pollution test. The pollution detector read a pollution level of 0. They looked at each other, discussed briefly, and decided to continue cutting.

Avoiding the bloody areas, they sawed the withered peach tree in half. The trunk crashed to the ground with a crash, revealing something else.

In the center of the peach tree trunk was a hollow space, inside which lay a woman in a white dress. Her body was embedded in the trunk, eyes open staring at the sky, her white dress stained red with blood.

A large bloody hole was gouged into her neck, filled with withered vines. It was as if a seed had sprouted, rooted into the soil, then been forcibly ripped out, dragging soil and roots with it, leaving a distinct-shaped cavity.

Li Yan frowned, then relaxed his expression.

"It’s the Gardener’s contaminated seed."

Li Yan wasn’t high-ranking in the Pollution Prevention Center, nor was he part of the Special Operations Team, but he was a veteran in the Guard Team, having experienced large and small pollution incidents.

So he immediately recognized this wasn’t ordinary pollution but the Gardener’s contaminated seed.

"What is that?" a young new team member asked him. "Is Gardener the name of a pollutant?"

Someone else answered for Li Yan. "An S-class pollutant. So far, only four have been confirmed worldwide, and the S-class Pollutant Gardener from the 'Terrarium' is the most active one."

The young member was shocked. "This is an S-class pollutant?!"

"Don’t worry, this isn’t the S-class pollutant’s main body."

They gave the young member a thorough explanation.

The S-class pollutant "Gardener’s" plantation was both mysterious and not. Occasionally, humans who strayed into the plantation were released, most mentally disturbed, with contaminated seeds implanted in them.

To prevent greater disasters, the Pollution Prevention Center would issue execution orders to stop the seeds from sprouting and harming more people.

The Gardener caught on and started erasing memories of those released, making them forget their time in the plantation. This made it impossible for the Pollution Prevention Center to identify seed hosts among survivors.

Since then, by the time the Gardener’s contaminated seeds were discovered, they were already sprouting.

The hardest phase to handle, causing the most impact.

"Incidents involving the Gardener’s contaminated seeds are common, still erupting now and then," Li Yan summarized, sighing slowly. "It’s a cruel pollutant. It doesn’t infect humans through pollution sickness but prefers combining humans with other plants, creating monstrous hybrids."

"Look at her. She’s still human, but forced into the peach tree’s trunk."

Li Yan shook his head. "Now, go check if this body is the missing Lu Kexin."

But no matter what, with such a terrible pollution outbreak in Q City, they were fortunate Li Zhiyan was temporarily stationed there. If it had been another city, it might have turned into a wasteland overnight, with the Contaminated Seeds sucking dry everyone's life force in a single night.

The thought of this possibility made Li Yan shudder with fear, as he had personally experienced the process of losing control over his own thoughts.

It was time for the Pollution Prevention Center to raise its alert level for S-level pollution "The Gardener."

/

Li Zhiyan prepared a transparent glass box and placed the hyphae inside. As soon as they were put in, the hyphae instantly clung to the gaps in the box.

"So beautiful," Li Zhiyan murmured, crouching beside the glass box. "Let's keep them."

He nodded in satisfaction. "Yes, let's keep them!"

He stood up and carried the glass box to his garden's flowerbed, placing it right in the center. Sunlight poured onto the box, making it impossible to see anything clearly.

"As expected, its concealment ability is extremely strong," Li Zhiyan remarked, glancing up at the skylight.

Since the apocalypse began, some other organisms had appeared in the world, especially mutated plants. Even the pollution inhibitor developed by the containment facility was extracted from new plant species that emerged after the apocalypse. So, it wasn’t strange to see some unusual hyphae.

But what if these hyphae could roam freely in nightmares, completely unaffected?

What if they could even devour the pollution on Li Zhiyan’s body, swallowing little butterflies one by one?

How peculiar.

"Little one, what exactly are you?" Li Zhiyan tapped the glass box.

"Captain!"

Before Li Zhiyan could finish his monologue, a loud voice echoed outside the door.

"Captain!" Zhou Ye wailed. "Why did you dock my pay? No! Captain, please tell me this isn’t true."

Li Zhiyan: ...

He sighed, leaving the hyphae and the glass box behind to go deal with this big cat who had just returned from a business trip only to have his salary cut.

Inside the glass box, the hyphae quietly observed Li Zhiyan, making sure he had really left before frantically scurrying around the box.

Wahhh! We’ve been caught! Master, come save us!

Shen Ji was awakened by the containment facility staff and took most of the hyphae back with him the moment he woke up. But a few strands of hyphae were accidentally left behind in the dream. They hid on Lu Kexin’s body, nibbling on the residual pollution while waiting for Li Zhiyan to leave. Little did they expect that Li Zhiyan would lure them out with a butterfly.

Wahhh, but the butterfly was delicious, and the butterfly was pretty. Seeing the butterfly made them forget to hide!

The little mushroom didn’t mean to!

Now that the big butterfly was gone, they had to find a way to escape quickly!

The hyphae condensed together, forming a mushroom. The mushroom was pinkish-white and translucent. They opened their caps, releasing spores into the air. In the next moment, countless mushrooms instantly grew inside the glass box, filling it entirely within seconds.

They continued to reproduce until the glass box was forced open by a crack.

Crack! The glass box shattered, and the hyphae scattered and fled in an instant.

They swarmed over Li Zhiyan’s entire flowerbed. To reproduce, they used the pollution stored in their bodies, which caused them excruciating pain. So, after escaping the glass box, they immediately started nibbling, devouring all the Contaminated Species in the flowerbed.

What? These flowers actually didn’t have much pollution?

The little mushroom didn’t understand, the little mushroom didn’t care! They just had to nibble!

Crack! The pollution inhibitor installed at the top of the flowerbed cracked open. The next moment, an alarm sounded from Li Zhiyan’s communicator.

"Warning! Pollution inhibitor has stopped working. Please address the issue immediately!"

Li Zhiyan glanced at his communicator in confusion and raised a hand to stop Zhou Ye’s complaints.

Zhou Ye blinked, cautiously studying Li Zhiyan’s expression to make sure he wasn’t angry before speaking. "Boss, your communicator is still connected to the pollution inhibitor? Which one?"

"My garden," Li Zhiyan replied, turning to head back.

Zhou Ye hesitated for three seconds before deciding to follow and see what was happening.

When he reached the flowerbed, Zhou Ye realized: some things are better left unseen!

Li Zhiyan’s precious flowerbed had been completely torn apart. Broken branches and withered leaves were scattered everywhere, flowerpots were shattered, and the plants lay half-dead on the ground. Many roots had been unearthed, and the slightly self-aware contaminated flowers swayed their leaves as if crying in complaint.

Li Zhiyan frowned slightly and looked up. The hyphae had already found the window, and the moment he glanced over, they slipped through the window and vanished.

Not even a single mushroom spore was left behind.

Blue butterflies quickly condensed in the air, simultaneously darting out the window to chase after the fleeing hyphae.

Sensing Li Zhiyan’s low pressure, Zhou Ye didn’t even dare to ask about his salary anymore. He cautiously retreated, step by step, trying to leave this troublesome place.

"Stop," Li Zhiyan said, looking at him.

Zhou Ye froze instantly and shook his head vigorously. "Captain! This has nothing to do with me, I don’t know anything!"

"I didn’t say it was your fault," Li Zhiyan replied, glancing at his messy flowerbed and then at the big cat beside him.

Well, asking a cat to tidy up a garden was probably too much to expect.

Li Zhiyan crouched down and turned over the flowerpot closest to him. "You’re Contaminated Species, you’re not so fragile that a little fall would kill you, right?"

"...Huh? Where did the pollution on you go?"

Li Zhiyan fell silent for a second, then frowned again. "Was it eaten?"

Just then, ding-dong, the doorbell rang again.

Li Zhiyan placed the flowerpot aside and walked over to open the door. The moment he opened it, he saw a familiar face.

Shen Ji was standing at his doorstep, holding a little girl in his arms.

Shen Ji, who worked at the containment facility, rarely wore anything other than his uniform. The facility’s attire made up the majority of people’s impression of him. But on the rare occasions when he wore other clothes, it always caught people’s attention—like the light tan overcoat and white shirt he was wearing now.

The white shirt made him look proper and aloof, while the light tan overcoat gave him a strangely gentle aura. He always liked to use elegant things to embellish his appearance.

Especially when he was holding a little girl, it added to his gentle demeanor, making him instinctively trustworthy.

Indeed, good-looking people look good in anything.

"So when are you going to notice that I’m here too?"

Li Zhiyan turned to look beside him. Chu Ye, wearing the Pollution Prevention Center’s uniform, was staring at him gloomily. "You only have eyes for Doctor Shen, right?"

Li Zhiyan blinked in confusion. "When did you get here?"

"Do you respawn or something?"

Shen Ji: "…"

Chu Ye: "…"

"…I give up, anyone who's friends with Li Zhiyan really are pitiful!"

/

Shen Ji was in a state of empathic link with the hyphae. Originally, he had been awakened from his dream by the shelter's personnel and had already started celebrating after escaping the protagonist, but the very next moment, the hyphae were caught by Li Zhiyan.

Those little things were actually lured out because they were greedy for Li Zhiyan's butterflies, so Shen Ji, who shared senses with the hyphae, was up all night with heart palpitations and a headache, unable to sleep for even a second.

Shen Ji had no choice but to figure out how to bail out the hyphae.

Coincidentally, the security team came to ask to borrow Chen Guo's help from the shelter. They begged and groveled, following Director Wen around, their gifts piled high in the office, just hoping Chen Guo could pitch in for a bit. Now, in the entire Q City—no, the entire Q Province—Chen Guo was the only near B-rank psychic mutant left!

In the end, Wen Jingyu was badgered so much that he went to get Chen Guo's okay. Only after little Chen Guo agreed did he nod.

But they couldn’t let Chen Guo, a child, go to the security team alone. Chen Guo’s mother was an ordinary person, so at this point, Shen Ji stepped up, saying he could take Chen Guo.

No one knows what Wen Jingyu was thinking—he gave Shen Ji a few uncertain looks but finally agreed.

Just before leaving, he told Shen Ji not to forget to come back, that the shelter would always be his home.

…It felt like seeing off a foster son.

"But now that the hyphae have escaped on their own, we don’t need to take any extra action for the time being. That’s a good thing. It’s easy to get caught making a move in front of the protagonist."

Shen Ji, however, let out a silent sigh.

Although the hyphae had escaped, they hadn’t made a clean getaway. The butterflies chasing after them made them too scared to return to Shen Ji’s side. They could only run while wailing loudly, absolutely miserable.

Every single one of them was crying for their master to hurry up and bite the big butterfly! To get back at it for them!

Shen Ji: "…"

If he really tried to bite Li Zhiyan, he wouldn’t need to expose himself—Li Zhiyan would have him committed to the shelter's psych ward.

"What do you want?" Li Zhiyan looked at Chu Ye. "I still need to straighten up my garden. We had a break-in today."

Then he turned to Shen Ji. "Dr. Shen, want to help tidy up the garden? Even though they look a bit rough now, your photography skills can definitely work miracles!"

"Huh? There are thieves daring enough to break into your house?" Chu Ye cut in. "You’re a full-fledged S-Class Mutant!"

"And they ate several of my butterflies," Li Zhiyan sighed. "So what are you really here for?"

Chu Ye was speechless. "Wait, you actually forgot? I’m the person in charge of this pollution incident!"

Li Zhiyan thought for a moment. "Oh! I remember now."

"The S-class Pollutant 'Gardener' problem, is that it?"

After recovering, Chu Ye returned to work at the Pollution Prevention Center. It was around this time that those buried memories started coming back bit by bit.

He suddenly remembered seeing strange plants in that mysterious polluted area. He even vaguely recalled being scared witless by something and took a fall, and tried to grab a vine from a tree.

It seemed like some bizarre voice had once echoed in his mind.

Even though it was hazy, based on experience, he figured the pollution that had been messing him up for so long was probably the doing of the S-class Pollutant Gardener!

So he insisted on heading up this case himself. He was determined to find that plantation and look for his missing squad.

That was why he was here now.

Li Zhiyan opened the door. "Alright, come in."

Watching Li Zhiyan turn to leave, Shen Ji, holding Chen Guo, looked at Chu Ye.

"What's his deal?"

As the protagonist, Li Zhiyan might be a weird guy, but he shouldn’t forget things related to pollutants. Yet today, he had to ask twice why Chu Ye was even here.

He even had no clue why Shen Ji had brought Chen Guo.

"That Talent of his—if he uses it too many times at once, he turns his brain to mush," Chu Ye whispered to Shen Ji, spilling the tea. "Many at the Pollution Prevention Center say it’s because his Talent is too broken that he pays such a price. Every time he uses it, his memory gets spotty for a few days."

"Just like now—he needs to be reminded several times to remember something."

"But this state only lasts about a week. He’ll be back to his old self soon."

Shen Ji pondered. "So that’s how it is."

But the source novel never mentioned Li Zhiyan having this condition.

Or rather, he never noticed Li Zhiyan being in such a state in the original story.

"Probably it exists," the system ran a full-text search again. "The text mentions the protagonist being in poor condition after dealing with pollutants—out of it and doesn't want to leave the house, usually recovering within a few days. The author just didn’t focus on this, so readers didn’t notice."

"This might be foreshadowing the author dropped early on. Yes, I’m going to bring up that issue again… because the story got axed, this plot thread was never resolved."

"Now that the novel has become reality, it’s automatically filling in the blanks on its own."

Shen Ji hesitated for a few seconds, then turned to Chu Ye.

"Should we get him some supplements?"

Chu Ye was stunned. "What?"

"Something to help his brain recover," Shen Ji mused. "Ginseng? Realgar wine? What about some Donkey-hide gelatin?"

Chu Ye: "…?"

Ginseng, okay, but realgar wine? And what’s Donkey-hide gelatin??

"You mean ginseng is better?" Shen Ji dumped Chen Guo into his arms and turned to leave. "I’ll go buy some now."

Heh, who needs to bite someone to get even? He could also throw some shade his way for turning into an idiot, right?

And so, Li Zhiyan was staring dumbly at the ginseng on the table. He stared at it for a while, then glanced at Shen Ji, before finally looking at Chu Ye, who was trying to make himself small in the chair opposite.

Chu Ye was looking anywhere but at him—at the ceiling, the floor, the clock.

This jerk was running his mouth again about him turning into an idiot.

"Dr. Shen, want some water?"

Waste not, want not—Li Zhiyan opened the ginseng and broke off a piece into his cup.

Chu Ye very pointedly picked up the cup and poured water for himself, making darn sure he didn't give Li Zhiyan the chance to pour water for him and get back at him.

Shen Ji shook his head. "I'm good for now."

Li Zhiyan poured himself some water with a sigh and sat back in his original position. "So what's the situation now? Why is Doctor Shen here too? Did you also participate in this plan?"

"No." Shen Ji jostled Chen Guo slightly, who was sitting on his leg. "I came with her."

"You should drink more water." Chu Ye said helplessly, "Chen Guo is a psychic mutant, who I went through a lot of trouble to get here. Doctor Shen is just here with her. Don't go scaring them off."

Li Zhiyan took a sip of water. "So the higher-ups are really planning to deal with the Gardener this time?"

"Naturally."

When it came to serious matters, Chu Ye finally got serious. "Recently, the Gardener's Contaminated Seed incidents have been popping up more and more. It's not just Q City; many regions have experienced outbreaks of its seeds, causing some really serious damage. It's getting bolder and bolder."

Humans always test others' boundaries, let alone pollutants.

After humans repeatedly failed to handle its contaminated seeds, the Gardener finally concluded that human forces are just ants beneath their feet, not even worth noticing.

It began spreading contaminated seeds incessantly, using increasingly cruel methods.

The Pollution Prevention Center had finally had enough and resolved to eliminate it.

Shen Ji listened to their discussion and after a moment mused to his system.

'Seems like the story's shifted, yet also like it hasn’t.'

"What?"

'The human side can’t tolerate the S-class pollutant’s recklessness anymore and, at the end of their rope, sends the protagonist to eliminate it.'

'It’s just that this S-class pollutant has changed from the pollutant to the Gardener.'

"The apocalypse is like this."

"One pollutant falls, and another rises to take its place, continuing to be another problem for humans to clean up."

"But for us, it’s different."

The system grew excited. "As long as the protagonist’s focus is entirely on the Gardener, we can easily make it through the death flags from the original novel!"

Shen Ji: ...

Oh, this hopelessly naive system.

Even if they get through the original plot, Shen Ji is still the pollutant. As long as he stays in containment, there’s a risk of exposure. You can't hide fire with paper—sooner or later, his identity will be exposed. It’s just uncertain whether he’ll be seen as public enemy number one or if someone will actually believe he’s a pollutant.

Of course, Shen Ji is shooting for option two.