Stripping Scam

Ren Anhua stared at the pale little hand she was holding, and then at her other ear, feeling an inexplicable sense of detachment.

“This… is it really not needed anymore?” she asked, swinging the severed hand a couple of times.

“Your hand has already grown back, what are you going to do with that?” Ke Xiaoshan sounded a little helpless.

“My ability heals you directly; it doesn’t reattach your old limbs.

Hurry up and throw it away, it’s really scary to look at.”

It had to be said, Ke Xiaoshan’s healing ability was the most unreasonable thing Ren Anhua had ever seen.

She had already braced herself for the possibility that her arm might not be very obedient in the future, but who knew that Ke Xiaoshan would just make her grow a new arm and a new ear, as if it were a game.

She squeezed her own severed hand; her body temperature still lingered on it.

Just a few minutes ago, it had been attached to her body, and now it was to be thrown away.

Ren Anhua felt an inexplicable reluctance.

But thinking about it, there was no use in keeping it, so she finally tossed it aside.

After learning of Song Zhiyang’s death, the Red Blade Team retreated with considerable speed.

Their actions were directly related to their team’s composition and philosophy.

The Red Blade Team was a group built purely on strength and self-interest, a gang of thugs Song Zhiyang had assembled with his power after the apocalyptic order had stabilized.

There was no deep camaraderie between them, so there was no talk of avenging their leader.

In this regard, Ren Anhua’s Survivor Camp was very different.

Her subordinates were still so loyal that they wanted to sleep with her.

The location where the RV team had been intercepted was already quite close to the aquarium.

After the battle ended, it didn’t take much time to reach the final destination of their mission.

However, the atmosphere in the team became quite strange after this battle, or rather, it became strange because of Ren Anhua.

The reason was that Ren Anhua had finally noticed that peculiar experience of being unable to remember her own name.

Although Ren Anhua didn’t know the specifics of what had happened, she was certain that the RV team had done something to her body and had hidden it from her.

And she had indeed been feeling abnormal for the past two days.

But if possible, she really didn’t want the atmosphere to be like this.

She was quite fond of this team.

The painful experience of betrayal was enough to go through once.

She felt that if what the RV team had done wasn’t too outrageous, she could still forgive them.

After all, it was just a few little girls being willful.

Ren Anhua could roughly guess their purpose: they hoped she could continue living as a woman, thinking her current appearance was cute and more likable, and didn’t want her to change back to her original body.

After all, they had even discussed how to brainwash her in front of her.

In Ren Anhua’s eyes, the thoughts of these little girls were often quite simple.

They probably had no malicious intent, but just felt that the team would rather have a cute and reliable moe girl than a hot-tempered big brother figure.

To be honest, if she were to put herself in their shoes, given the same strength and personality, if she were to find a long-term teammate, she would also hope that the teammate would be a moe girl, not another person like herself.

But if Ren Anhua herself had to be that moe girl, she wouldn’t be happy about it.

A moe girl was for others to look at, not for herself.

Most importantly, in terms of her true nature, she was still not used to a female body, especially after having lived as a male for over twenty years and now becoming like this… she didn’t know how to describe it.

She would always substitute her past perspective, so that now her inadvertent actions, how others treated her, and the feedback she received from her own behavior all gave her a strange sense of incongruity and oddness.

All of this made her eager to change back to her original body and return to the “normal” state she was familiar with.

Ren Anhua felt that after she changed back to a male, she needed to be appropriately gentle with her teammates.

The team was mostly composed of female comrades, and it was unlikely that she would lose her temper randomly.

She had to make them feel that even if they didn’t have a moe girl as a teammate, having a gentle big brother leading the team was also quite good.

She wasn’t a narrow-minded person.

The little tricks they had played on her these past two days would naturally become meaningless after she changed back to a male.

No matter what they did, she was still the same Ren Anhua.

The powerful Ren Anhua, representing high temperature and strength.

Strength was the most important thing.

As long as she was still that fire-type Awakened, then she had nothing to fear.

The battle with Song Zhiyang had further deepened his conviction.

If… she was still that fire-type Awakened.

Ren Anhua felt that the familiar, scorching and violent power was rapidly draining away, replaced by an unfamiliar, gentle, and healing power that was irreversibly and gradually filling her body.

“I’m sorry for hiding it from you all along.

Actually, the thing that can truly dispel Ke Xiaoshan’s Cold Poison… is your ability,” Lu Shanshui’s voice was full of apology.

He didn’t even dare to look directly at those cherry-colored pupils.

After entering the aquarium, the RV team quickly found the target of their mission—the mutated Kapok tree.

The reason was simple: the tree was too conspicuous.

Its branches were thick, its flowers and leaves were lush, and it grew wantonly, ignoring the laws of nature and biology, almost occupying the entire open-air hall.

Ren Anhua could hardly tell that it was a Kapok tree, but there were no other plants here.

Under the shadow of this tree, all other plants had turned into nutrients.

Even some animals had been preyed upon by this tree, bound by its roots, and turned into corpses.

For example, the current Ren Anhua and Ke Xiaoshan.

Although Ren Anhua hadn’t discovered any “flame alteration” characteristics in this tree, out of trust for the RV team, she still did as they asked and stood on the roots of the tree.

Confident in her own strength, she felt that even if something dangerous happened, it wouldn’t be difficult for her to escape.

But Ke Xingmei directly activated the “powerless” effect of her Biological Transformation.

What was worse was that this tree’s true nature was the “Ability Stripping” rumored in Pingding County.

Ke Xiaoshan was also bound by the tree roots, and she, along with Ren Anhua, entered the Ability Stripping state.

But unlike Ren Anhua, she was a volunteer.

The Kapok tree’s Ability Stripping was an instinctive behavior of absorbing nutrients, without any thinking ability or conscious control, just pure instinct.

And this meant that this behavior could be controlled and utilized.

As long as after the Kapok tree performed the Ability Stripping and before it began to absorb the ability, it was given sufficient energy to “stuff its mouth,” the stripped ability would become ownerless and could be exchanged between people.

And what the RV team was doing was this kind of “ability exchange.”

The large number of crystal cores they had collected earlier, almost at the cost of their lives, was for this moment.

The loss of power made Ren Anhua feel an unprecedented sense of unease, an unease even greater than when she had turned into a girl.

However, the current situation could not be changed.

The pile of crystal cores collected for the ability exchange even had her own contribution.

In this situation, it could be said that she had walked into it step by step on her own.

Was she going to become a healer like Ke Xiaoshan in the future?

As long as she was in close proximity, would she cause unconditional healing to the other party?

Would all her attack behaviors become healing effects?

Would she not even be able to kill anyone with a gun?

Ren Anhua couldn’t imagine such a self, even though she had… trusted this team so much.

“Actually, we didn’t want to hide it from you either, but Ke Xiaoshan’s situation is really… not optimistic.
And according to the information we collected, you would absolutely not voluntarily exchange abilities with Ke Xiaoshan, so we… in short, you don’t have to worry.
You are still an important member of our team.
We will protect you like we protected Ke Xiaoshan in the future,” Lu Shanshui’s tone was very sincere, but Ren Anhua still couldn’t accept it.