"You'll be staying here from now on."
With a crisp click, Homa unlocked a door at the very back of the workshop that was usually kept shut.
It was a single bedroom. Inside was a narrow bed fitted with a soft mattress, with a work desk and a storage cabinet beside it.
Judging by the layer of dust on everything, though, it had clearly gone unused for a very long time.
"So this is actually a living room—well, a bedroom," Jiang Qi said, a little surprised. He had noticed the room before, but since it had always been locked and tucked away in the back, he had assumed it was some kind of storage room.
And the living conditions here—
ordinary enough by the standards of his previous life, perhaps, but in the Wasteland, this was already exceptionally good.
After all, these were proper furnishings. Compared to his own place, where almost everything had been cobbled together from scrap, this room might as well have been luxury housing.
"Yeah. It just hasn't been used in a long time, so it's pretty dusty. You'll probably need to clean it up a bit..." Old Homa said, looking at the room's furnishings with a complicated look in his eyes.
"That's fine. I can sort it out myself later," Jiang Qi said with a smile.
"Mm. For the next while, try to stay here as much as possible," Homa said. "You saw what happened just now. Those few idiots will probably be very interested in causing trouble for you soon."
"I know," Jiang Qi nodded.
Just moments earlier, after White-Claw Crow had settled the matter, he had clearly intended to leave.
And the instant they saw that White-Claw Crow was about to go, the few people who had been on decent terms with Natuba immediately began to stir.
Fortunately, Old Homa had anticipated this. Before White-Claw Crow had even gone far, Homa had grabbed Jiang Qi and hauled him straight toward the workshop.
Those men had originally meant to chase after them, but Bauer and his people blocked them off, sparing Jiang Qi from being dragged into that mess.
"But honestly, you handled something that huge all by yourself. I doubt these little lackeys can really do much to you," Old Homa said, leaning against the wall and letting out a long breath. "You really are something, kid. I can't decide whether to say you're impossible to stop worrying about, or that you're too reassuring."
"Haha... well..." Jiang Qi scratched his cheek, unsure how to answer that.
Old Homa looked at him, smiled, and shook his head.
"Forget it. What matters is that you're fine," he said. "I'm not going to ask where that S-grade core of yours came from. Handing it over to White-Claw Crow was the smart move. That thing was way too hot for you to hold onto."
"With that core as compensation, White-Claw Crow probably won't come looking for trouble with you anymore. He won't let his men make things difficult for you either."
"As for those few friends of Natuba's, they were all from his old squad. For a while, they'll probably keep thinking about you, but their friendship with him wasn't really that deep."
"If nothing unexpected happens, once they get assigned a new squad leader, they'll gradually forget the whole matter."
"So for the next stretch of time, as long as they don't catch you alone somewhere, there shouldn't be too much of a problem."
"Understood," Jiang Qi nodded seriously.
Seeing how earnest Jiang Qi looked, Old Homa knew the boy had truly taken his words to heart.
After giving a satisfied nod, he continued, "We're not having class today. By tradition, after dinner tonight White-Claw Crow should organize Natuba's funeral."
"Truth be told, not many people actually care about him, but the gang definitely won't miss a chance to drink themselves senseless. By then, most of the gang will be there."
"That makes this your best opportunity to move."
"Those few bastards probably know that too. I'm not sure whether they'll skip the funeral just to come make trouble for you, so I'm planning to take some people and keep an eye on them myself."
"As long as we pin them down at the scene, they won't dare stir up anything with White-Claw Crow present."
"Oh, right. Can you drive?"
"Drive? I guess so..." Jiang Qi rubbed his chin.
He had gotten a driver's license in his previous life, after all—and for a manual transmission, no less. He had never driven a vehicle from this world before, but with his Appraisal ability, every lever, pedal, and component was immediately obvious to him.
Thinking it through, driving probably wouldn't be that hard.
"That tone of yours makes it very hard for me to trust you," Old Homa said, raising an eyebrow. "Forget it. Just drive it around and let me see. If you can handle it, I'll lend you my Heavystep for the move. That should make things much easier."
"Really?!" Jiang Qi brightened immediately.
That Heavystep was one of Old Homa's treasures. Jiang Qi had seen him maintaining it countless times. He genuinely hadn't expected Homa to be willing to lend it out for something as mundane as moving house.
"On the condition that you actually can drive," Old Homa said. "And let me make this clear, kid—don't force it. If you scrape or dent it, I'll make your coursework hell."
"Don't worry. I'll be careful!" Jiang Qi declared, thumping his chest.
And it turned out he really didn't disappoint Homa.
Jiang Qi discovered that driving in this world wasn't all that different from driving in his previous one.
Probably because both the designers and the drivers were human, even though they came from entirely different worlds, the operating logic of the vehicles was astonishingly similar overall. Only a few details were different.
Jiang Qi got the hang of it very quickly.
And he drove with remarkable smoothness.
In fact, perhaps too much smoothness.
He was, after all, an "academy-trained" driver who had learned in a proper driving school in a peaceful era. Compared with the wild, instinctive, rough-edged hunters of the Wasteland, Jiang Qi's style behind the wheel was so mild and disciplined that even Old Homa found it strangely unsettling.
At one point, he actually wondered which of the two of them was supposed to be the old man.
Still, Jiang Qi's driving style reassured him greatly. After handing over the keys, Old Homa simply left.
From a distance, Jiang Qi saw Bauer waiting with more than a dozen men. Once Homa joined them, they all headed together toward the center of town.
Watching their backs, Jiang Qi felt an unexpected sense of solid reassurance rise in his chest.
He didn't waste any time after that. He drove straight back home.
Time was short, the tasks were many, and he needed to move as quickly as possible.
Of course, the difficulty wasn't the moving itself.
The real problem was that Jiang Qi didn't just need to move house.
He needed to take the house apart too.
Because for a scavenger, their house was, in a sense, their savings.
Wasteland nights brought fierce winds. If they didn't want their whole shack blown away while they slept, then scavengers had no choice but to make their homes as sturdy as possible.
Which meant that whenever scavengers found large pieces of metal or rubber, they usually wouldn't sell them off. Instead, they would use them to reinforce their houses.
And in the Wasteland, those same materials were also among the most valuable of all common materials.
Of course, even if one said a scavenger's house was their savings, most people would never touch those savings in their entire lifetime.
If something ever forced a scavenger to start tearing materials off their own house to sell, that meant they truly had no other choice left.
Jiang Qi had never thought he would remain a scavenger forever, so he hadn't imagined those "savings" would remain untouched forever either.
Still, he certainly hadn't expected the day of withdrawal to come this soon.
After parking in front of his home, Jiang Qi stood looking at the place that had sheltered him for the past several months, and couldn't help feeling a little emotional.
Back when it first started, this "house" had been nothing more than a few long plastic poles holding up some sheets of plastic tarp.
Over the last few months, he had slowly accumulated materials, patching and reinforcing it bit by bit until it had finally become what it was now.
Even now, though, it still couldn't really be considered finished.
Some places still didn't have enough reinforcement piled on, and that had been exactly what led to the whole Natuba-peeping incident.
"I was originally planning to decorate you properly and celebrate the day you were finally finished," Jiang Qi said, hopping out of the vehicle and patting the wall of the house. "Sorry, buddy. Looks like you won't be making it to that day."
Join here to read ahead.
In Star Rail, Ultra-Beast Armored — Have I Caught "Equilibrium"? l (Chapter 80)
Uma Musume, But I Only Have Five Years Left to Live (Chapter 150)
Zenless Zone Zero: I'm a Doctor, Not a Bangboo (Chapter 115)
Ben Tennyson Wants to Join the Justice League (Chapter 110)
TYPE-MOON: Redemption Beginning with the Holy Grail War (Chapter105)
Yu-Gi-Oh! — Transmigrated into the White Dragon Girl (Chapter100)
"Is this chat group even serious?" (Chapter69)
I, Lord Ravager, Utterly Loyal! (Chapter95)
Can Playing Games Save the World? 65
Crossover Anime Multiverse: The Demon Hunter of an Unnatural World 70
From Junkman to Wasteland 55
Weekly Refresh of Overpowered 31
I'm Grinding Proficiency Like 40
From Kiana, Lord Ravager, Onwa 45
Honkai: Is This Still the Prev 42
Elf: My Starter Pokémon Is Inc 32
Warhammer: My Primarch Is Remi 31
From Demon Slayer to Grand Ass 31
My patreon : patreon.com/queen_sin