Goodies in the Bathtub

Unfortunately, they didn't find any clues or traces left by Zeng Shisan and his group until they reached the room where Baozi mentioned there were good things.

Baozi squatted down in front of an iron door, peering inside through the crack, then waved his hand, signaling Tom to come over.

Most of the tenants' doors were old and dilapidated wooden doors with large gaps underneath, allowing even smaller people to crawl in and out. Surprisingly, this iron door had a narrow gap at the bottom, only allowing a view inside but not enough space to crawl through.

Tom crouched down to look inside. It was pitch black, with barely any light visible.

"The light was on when we came here before, so we could see inside. But now that the power's out, it's hard to see," Tom remarked.

"This is... the landlord's place?" Tom pondered.

Baozi immediately gave him a thumbs up, praising, "You're sharp! No wonder Li Qiang relies on you to survive for so long."

Since it was the landlord's residence, there were bound to be plenty of goodies inside. But Tom detected a hint of a rotten smell. "There's a corpse inside..."

Baozi snapped his fingers. "If there's a rotting corpse, it means it's safe, right?"

Indeed, the fact that the body had rotted without being eaten meant that there hadn't been cockroaches, rats, or even ants. But there was another possibility: fly larvae.

While Tom pondered, Baozi's men had already started swinging the rope they brought with them.

The rope was made by the aunties twisting strands of thread into a thick cord, with a hook tied to it, making its purpose clear.

The windows were only about a meter high, usually too high to throw anything up to. But this twisted thick rope was heavy enough. After a few swings, they managed to throw it up to the window successfully.

It seemed that Baozi's men were both strong and skilled. Without the ruby, Tom wouldn't have been able to do it.

Unfortunately, the hook didn't catch onto the window ledge on the first try, and the rope fell down. But the burly man didn't give up. After another attempt, the hook finally caught on.

Baozi tugged a couple of times to make sure the hook was secure before waving to the thinnest member of the team to climb up.

The slender man was agile and climbed up in no time, leading Tom to speculate about his identity.

Baozi noticed Tom's thoughts and chuckled, "That's right, haha, this kid is a habitual thief. Climbing ten floors bare-handed to steal things is a piece of cake."

Well, each had their own strengths.

With someone up there, the rope became more secure, making it easier for others to climb up. Four more people climbed up, and Baozi asked, "Tom, can your injured bones handle climbing? Otherwise, stay outside. I'll leave two brothers to watch over you."

Of course, that wouldn't do. Smelling the strong stench of decay, Tom had another guess in mind and naturally wouldn't miss this rare opportunity. He had to grit his teeth and climb up.

Enduring the pain in his chest, Tom climbed onto the windowsill. By then, they had successfully smashed a hole in the glass with an iron rod and were enlarging it with a needle.

"Tightwad, the glass is still the old thin type. We wouldn't be able to break it without our strength," Baozi exclaimed excitedly. "But broken glass is dangerous. Be careful when you climb. If you get cut, I'll make you cry for three days, just like A Zheng."

The other brothers laughed, and Tom noticed that everyone laughed, indicating that A Zheng wasn't among them. "Where's A Zheng...?"

Baozi casually replied, "A Zheng is currently enjoying himself at home with Zeng Shisan."

So it was one of those four. Speaking of which, Tom raised his question, "Baozi, about those four brothers of yours..."

"Brothers come and go; even the underworld has personnel changes," Baozi said nonchalantly.

With that said, the big guy beside him couldn't hold back anymore. "Brother Bao, those four bastards are simply exploiting others..."

Before he could finish, Baozi slapped him on the back, shutting him up.

"Less nonsense, get to work. If you want to live long, stop whining. How many times do I have to say it?"

"Yes, yes!"

There was a reason why the landlord didn't replace the glass. His windows were of the old type, with a whole piece of iron grating installed on the window surface. Even if the glass was smashed, it would be blocked by the mesh-like iron grille. The grille was also of an old design, but Tom found it quite durable.

However, the grille wasn't sealed. It could be opened in the middle by pulling out the pegs from below. Two burly men flipped in, pulled out the pegs with force, and then pushed the iron grille open from the inside.

They lowered a rope, tied it to a handcart below, and Tom and Baozi descended to the floor inside through the rope.

Inside the house, with the window open, the small people could see more clearly. The room was decorated luxuriously, in stark contrast to the dilapidated old house outside, as if stepping into another world through a window.

"Oh my, this old man really knows how to enjoy himself. Uncle Wei said he often brings some young models back to sleep, and the people downstairs have to listen to his bed rocking every few days."

Tom looked around the room, admiring the luxurious furniture while carefully discerning the direction of the putrid smell. He walked and sniffed, while Baozi watched him silently with interest.

Some of the brothers wanted to ask Baozi what to do next, but he waved them off, allowing them to act freely while he followed Tom leisurely with his hands behind his back.

As the smell grew stronger, Tom knew he was getting closer to the body, and his heart rate involuntarily increased. The mutated ants were nowhere to be found, but at least there were some mutated flies for him to deal with.

Climbing up the high steps and crawling under the glass door of the bathroom, Tom walked to the large bathtub, where the putrid smell became even stronger.

Looking at the bathtub, which was over forty centimeters high, Tom sighed. It seemed like he needed something to climb up there.

"It seems like you really have a lot of secrets!" Baozi suddenly spoke behind Tom, startling him.

Tom took a deep breath to calm his pounding heart. "Didn't you say you didn't want to bear other people's secrets?"

"Yeah, but people are naturally curious. When you put a secret in front of me, the curious me might not be able to resist exploring it," Baozi replied.

Tom felt like he had been too comfortable lately, not even noticing Baozi following him. If it had been a cockroach or rat following him instead, he would have been eaten by now.

"You have your ideas, and I have mine."

"So you're suddenly interested in the corpse in the bathtub."

"Give me a hand and help me climb up. I have a feeling there's something good up there!"

"Mutated bugs?" Baozi looked around. "How about this?"

"Good stuff!"

In addition to the bathtub, there were two plastic stools in the bathroom. From Tom's perspective, they were about five meters high, but in reality, they were only about 20 centimeters. These small plastic stools were usually placed in the bathroom for users to sit on while someone else scrubbed their back, very lightweight.

Tom and Baozi pushed the stools to the bathtub. With a height of 20 centimeters, they could easily reach it with a running jump. However, the edges of the stools were rounded, making it a bit difficult to climb. Baozi failed to climb up twice, slipping and falling down, until the third attempt when he finally made it and reached down to pull Tom up, who had more difficulty climbing due to his broken ribs.

Once on the stools, climbing into the bathtub presented the same problem. With the experience from the first attempt, the two of them climbed up smoothly.

As they climbed up, Baozi covered his nose in disgust and looked away.

There was a highly decomposed body, similar in size to the administrator's body that Tom had initially seen, but much smaller than their current size. By now, the body had become a bloated, decaying giant, with its tongue sticking out and eyes bulging, emitting a strong putrid smell.

"I can't believe you can stand this smell," Baozi said in amazement. "I believe you really crawled out of hell."

Compared to the swollen body, Tom's attention was on a large fly above it, a green one.

This fly, which was two sizes larger than Tom, was obviously mutated, monopolizing the decaying body alone without any other flies in sight. However, there were plenty of white maggots floating on the surface of the water soaking the body, also likely mutated.

At the moment, the fly was obliviously licking the decaying flesh, completely unaware of the presence of Tom and Baozi. It surely had the gem or crystal that Tom wanted.

But how to kill this mutated fly was a problem. Besides not having the ruby to enhance his strength, how could he fight with broken ribs? More importantly... despite Tom's resilience, he was unwilling to swim into the water soaked with decaying bodies to get close to the fly.

Baozi also noticed the large fly and leaned close to Tom, asking in a low voice, "Are you thinking of dealing with this mutated fly?"

"Yes," Tom nodded.

"Are you crazy? How are you going to kill it? Do you have a gun?"

Tom glanced outside the bathroom door and smiled, "Do you think mutated flies are immune to insecticide?"

"Insecticide? Is there any here?"

"Yes, right beside the bathroom door. I saw it when we came in. It's in a plastic bottle. With your strength, you should be able to squeeze it out. I'll lure the fly over, and when it lands on me, you can spray the insecticide."

This insecticide was more accurately called insecticidal water, dispersed as a mist.

"Are you insane? That stuff is toxic. We used to be fine because we were big, and the dose was small. But now, at our current size, it's easy to inhale an overdose and die."

"This stuff is water-soluble. There's a basin nearby. After spraying, I'll jump into it and take a bath immediately."

"What if it doesn't work?"

"Then I'll die. If we don't try, when Zeng Shisan takes over, we'll all die. I have a feeling that yesterday's incident wasn't simple. You have that feeling too, right?"

Baozi waited for Tom angrily. "You're really crazy!"

"So that's how I've managed to survive. Don't call your brothers here. If it doesn't work, you run. If it works, my only request is that the gem inside belongs to me, and don't let anyone else know."