After being tied up, the mushroom started hopping and struggling, as if the vine was making it very uncomfortable. Meanwhile, Lin Qiao held the other end of the vine leisurely and watched it hop.

That mushroom was able to spread poisonous powder and drill into the ground; moreover, it was quite smart! It would become very useful if it were trained well.

For that purpose, Lin Qiao didn't dig out its energy nucleus.

She dragged the vine and brought the mushroom to her space, then threw it into the woods.

The mushroom looked a little confused as it was thrown into a strange place. At first, it stayed where it was motionlessly for a few seconds, then started turning its mushroom cap from left to right, seemingly observing the surrounding environment.

Lin Qiao untied the mushroom and withdrew the vine. Once that happened, the mushroom ran away without leaving a trace. Lin Qiao didn't move, but crossed her arms before her chest and waited patiently. In less than two minutes, she saw the mushroom run back from another direction.

The mushroom rushed out of the woods and stopped abruptly at a distance away from Lin Qiao, then turned and ran toward the other side.

Right at that moment, a black figure darted out from the other side of the woods, chasing behind the mushroom.

Without needing to look at that black creature, Lin Qiao knew that it was Black who had woken up. Clearly, the snake had realized that it was poisoned by the mushroom just now. It darted over with anger at the sight of the mushroom.

The mushroom wanted very much to hide underground. However, the soil in the space wasn't deep enough. It was able to bury its roots, but couldn't hide its entire body in the earth.

The mushroom was so confused, but the others couldn't tell how it felt. With no better choices, the mushroom ran as fast it could. But, it somehow ran back to the terrifying two-footed creature. Without hesitation, it turned and ran in another direction, but then a giant worm started chasing behind it.

"Since you like running so much, Black will be running with you," Lin Qiao suddenly showed up on a tree in front of the mushroom, then lowered her head and said a few words to it before disappearing.

After coming out of the space, Lin Qiao checked her own location, then moved toward Xie Dong and the others.

She came out of the forest and stood by the roadside as she whistled. Soon, Xie Dong, Jingyan, Qiu Lili, and some others showed up around her.

"How's it going? What was it that you chased all over the hill? Did you capture it?" Qiu Lili floated above a small tree and asked with curiosity.

"It was a running mushroom?" said Lin Qiao.

"A mushroom? What? How can it be a mushroom?" Qiu Lili asked with surprise.

Xie Dong, Lu Tianyi, and the others all wore a surprised look as well.

"What can be normal in this post-apocalyptic era?" Lin Qiao rolled her eyes.

The others found her words reasonable.

Lin Qiao threw out the dead boar and said, "I only got this one. It's not enough for all of us. Let's try to find some more food."

"I want to know what you did to that running mushroom," Qiu Lili moved closer to Lin Qiao, then tilted her head and asked. With that, her long ponytails dropped to the ground.

"Oh, I didn't kill it, but put it into the space. I plan to train it. It'll become useful in the future," said Lin Qiao.

"Ah, you have all sorts of creatures in your space now. Zombies, mutated beasts… and now you have a mutated plant… hehe," Qiu Lili tittered.

Lin Qiao dug out the boar's energy nucleus and then began skinning the boar. The boar was only at level-four, yet it was chasing behind the mushroom. The mushroom was clearly playing with it, yet it didn't know.

That mushroom was at level-six.

Lin Qiao skinned the boar quickly and neatly, then cut off one of its trotters for herself. While slicing and eating the trotter, she spread her sensations to search for other energy sources in the surrounding. She was actually looking for other mutated animals or plants.

A short while later, she pointed in one direction and said, "Something is on that mountain, as high-leveled as the mushroom. The mutated creatures are upgrading speedily now."

She had seen quite some level-six mutated plants and animals recently. Zombies had reached level-eight so far. Mo Yan was the level-eight zombie discovered. A considerable number of level-seven zombies had emerged, and a few humans had entered level-eight as well.

A new phase seemed to have begun.

"Hm, I too have sensed faint energy from there," Qiu Lili nodded.

They waited a short while for the others to bring back their harvests. That group of human-like zombies skinned and ate those mutated animals that they caught, then headed toward the mountain that Lin Qiao showed Qiu Lili just now.

The mountain was actually a little far from where they were, at least thirty miles away.

Just as Lin Qiao led her team to the mountain and killed a level-six, giant mutated goat, another group of people arrived at West Lake District, entering the area where Lin Qiao's zombies gathered.

Those were tens of superpowered people, at level two and three, led by Li Honglin, a level-three fire power possessor.

Li Honglin was average-looking and scheming. He didn't have a good observation ability, and he cared about himself very much; he only cared about himself, actually.

Back in Hades Base, Wang Jian's men always got the news faster than the others. Li Honglin and his people could easily attain the information they needed by paying attention to Wang Jian and his men.

"Look! There are so many zombies in front of us! This huge crowd has blocked our way. We have no choice but to go through this zombie crowd if we want to move across this area." A man beside Li Honglin was observing the area through a telescope.

Through the telescope, he saw nothing but zombies. The zombie crowd seemed to have no end.

"What do you mean by so many? Give us a rough number." Li Honglin couldn't sense the number of those zombies as they were all ordinary zombies. So, he asked the man with the telescope.

The man handed him the telescope while saying, "It means a lot of them. See for yourself!"

Li Honglin took over the telescope and looked through it, only to see countless zombies crowding together. He turned from left to the right, but still failed to see the edge of the zombie crowd.

"This place isn't a zombie city, is it? How come there're so many zombies?" Li Honglin was a little surprised.

"You're right! Now, if we want to take a detour, we might need to cover a long extra distance. Besides, we don't know how big this crowd is, and where the edge is," said the man beside him.