Internal Conflict

Tom escorted Yang Caishan in the middle of the team, followed by Zhao Xin wearing the Jade Rabbit Type II Awakener armor.

Kent, as the captain, led the gray wolf to the rear.

Everyone originally thought the factory director's office would be much cleaner, but was surprised when they entered.

There are many iron products placed in the office of Jianpu Decoration, and the most prominent ones are naturally various iron blocks and bars, many of which are placed on tables or walls. People may not see them very clearly because they are too high. However, what filled their eyes were spider webs, as if this castle had been dusty for centuries. The table, chairs, and walls are covered in spider webs, and when you look around, everything is a vast expanse of white.

"Don't move, look at the path clearly, don't touch those spider webs," Kent warned in a low voice. "Mooncakes, pay attention to the search path, and if necessary, use a flamethrower to open the way."

"Yes!"

Tom walked up to a spider web and used a small knife to cut off a piece of web. As soon as his hand touched it, it became sticky and flexible. The knife took a lot of effort to remove a piece without damaging the structure or causing vibration.

"These spider threads are not simple, Captain. I'm afraid we'll have to deal with mutated spiders."

Kent's face was gloomy. He expected the task to be difficult, but unexpectedly encountered difficulties in the final stage.

Everyone carefully walked around the spider web with their eyes wide open. After a while, the mooncake stopped again and said, "There's a cocoon over there."

"Spider eggs?" Kent wondered.

Tom leaned over and said, "No, it's a long strip... Zhao Xin, can you help me get a heavy machine gun? Let me take a look." He squatted down and carefully shaved open the cocoon made up of a long spider web that was one circle larger than me with a small knife.

"What if it's a mutated spider egg?" The gray wolf was just covered in little spiders and had a psychological shadow.

"No, it's very hard inside." Tom finally managed to cut open the opening, and a suffocating smell came out. He quickly held his breath and continued to carefully cut open, then saw a complete human skeleton, as well as fragmented pieces of cloth and some iron objects.

"Dead?" Kent leaned over, "What is this?"

"Metal tag." Tom lifted the metal pendant tag with a small knife, "Army?"

"No," Kent said, "from the Special Investigation Department, it has the number 143 on it."

"Special investigation department?" Tom suddenly realized, "Did someone from the shelter come before?"

Kent nodded and said, "Yes, they came down from the rooftop aboard the Jingwei ship. Two batches arrived and all were lost, which is why the mission was temporarily terminated."

"What?" The vulture was surprised when he heard this. "They lied to me and said it was very simple. Go in, get something, come out, go home. What happened? They died two groups of people, and Tema is an elite special investigation department."

The Grey Wolf was also very angry. "When I was summoned, he said it was very simple. It turned out that the Special Investigation Department had killed two groups of people, but they asked us to come and see them off. Let's go, go back, I need to go back, vulture. Can you leave?"

The vulture nodded and said, "Mooncakes, what about you?"

The mooncake remained silent, and the remaining two soldiers, "Wild Chicken" and "Firebird", also hesitated.

"Don't leave!" Kent walked back into the team, glaring angrily at the vulture. "Whoever dares to withdraw now, I'll kill him!" He pulled out his pistol.

The vulture immediately raised its gun and aimed it at Kent. "Mal'Gobi, you're deceiving us to come and die. We're all mutated spiders here, have you seen that? Even the most powerful people in Tetsuko are dead. If we delve deeper, we'll end up like them."

Seeing the vulture confronting Kent, the gray wolf next to him also raised his gun. He first aimed it at the vulture, then thought for a moment and turned the gun head to Kent. "I'm sorry, Captain Kent. Although I've been with you and know you're a better person in the foreign mercenary group,... I don't want to die here."

Kent glanced at the wolf and said, "Before setting off, you signed an agreement to use this mission to offset your debt. If you don't bring back the mission items, your debt will double."

"That's better than dying here!" The vulture shouted hysterically, "No big deal... I won't go back."

"Is there a safe place around here? You've participated in so many missions, and you don't know what's going on outside. With that gun in your hand, can you make bullets? How long can you use one bullet missing one?"

"I... I don't care, I can live for a day, it's a day! Duan Fei, what do you think?" The vulture suddenly drew fire to Tom, who was watching.

Tom was standing in front of Yang Caishan, still holding the pendant with a small knife. Seeing others looking at him in unison, it was obvious that the situation was deadlocked and he wanted him to break through.

"Duan Fei, didn't Miss Yang tell you? She must bring back the mission items no matter what, otherwise the people behind her won't let her go." Kent wanted to win over Tom and directly pointed out Yang Caishan's background, warning Tom that he knew Tom's background.

The vulture is naturally unwilling to give up Tom's support. Tom's strength and experience demonstrated today have convinced him. If Tom supports him, Kent will definitely back down because others are not really interested in moving forward.

Yang Caishan lightly touched him from behind, and he turned his head. She breathed a soft breath in his ear and said, "He's right. Yuan Feixing said if I don't bring anything back, I don't need to go back... Otherwise..."

Tom nodded to show his understanding, and then said loudly, "We may not care, but I believe Captain Kent would rather have a conflict than let us leave. If the conflict breaks out, it is very likely to lure the mutated spiders hidden in the dark, making it even more difficult to escape. We all know that there are many spider eggs outside. Each spider egg means there is a mother spider, and nine out of ten of these female spiders are mutated."

"But..." The vulture was unwilling.

"I believe that if we avoid the difficult place without completing the task, and Captain Kent is not around, our fate will definitely be very unpleasant. Or, would you be willing to go into exile outside?" Tom didn't care, but now that it's about his sister's whereabouts, he guesses that the previous owner of the rabbit pendant must be in the shelter, so he still needs to return to the shelter.

"Since we have all come here, should we be afraid to back down because the people from the Special Investigation Department have died?" Tom didn't even notice that he rarely stuttered when speaking in front of people, even unfamiliar vultures and others.

"But there must be quite a few of these spiders around us. If we were surrounded, there would be spider webs all around us, and people would not be able to break free by sticking to them on their own... Eventually, they would be wrapped in cocoons..." The grey wolf swallowed his saliva and continued, "and we would be sucked into a human trunk."

"We have weapons, we have minds," Tom encouraged. "These are all the fruits of wisdom. We used to be able to kill them with one finger, but now we should be afraid of them?"

The vulture saw that the gray wolf had loosened, and its eyes immediately became anxious. "Grey wolf, no way, we will die. Mooncakes... although we haven't seen you before, you are still exploring the way ahead today. You don't want to be eaten by mutated spiders later, do you?"

Mooncake shook his head and said, "I don't want to die, but I know that if the nine of us have an internal conflict, then the possibility of dying next is even greater. Think about the corpses outside, and then think about the mice outside the factory."

"Mouse..." Upon hearing the mouse, the vulture became discouraged. "Yeah... and the mouse... even if we get the mission item, how can we escape the mouse?"

"Perhaps the key to our escape lies in the mission items," Tom said. "I believe the captain knows best, that's why he insists on retrieving the items."

Everyone looked at the tall white mercenary in unison. Kent hesitated for a moment and said, "There is something inside that may indeed help us escape, so I insist on completing the task. The specifics will be known to us all when Miss Yang opens the safe."

"No problem, right?" Tom struck while the iron was hot. He didn't want the team to start infighting right now, as it would only give the mutated spiders lurking in the dark corners a chance to kill and eat them one by one.

The vulture dejectedly put down the assault rifle, and the gray wolf also sighed and slowly put it down.

"Let's keep moving forward," Kent said. "We've wasted too much time and we have to go back to the safe house at the sentry post before it gets dark. Let's go!"

The team continues on the road.

Originally, this office was not large, but in order to carefully bypass the intricate spider web, they had to be careful to avoid touching it.

As for the flamethrower, Tom has tested it, and these spider webs are thicker, more sticky, and more flammable. Such a dense spider web, using fire recklessly may quickly spread to the entire house, and if the mutated spiders do not come, they may be burned to death in this house.

The distance from the original straight line has changed to seven twists and turns, which takes more time. But for safety reasons, we have to be careful and cautious.

As he walked, Tom slowed down and landed next to the vulture, then whispered, "Aren't you five together?"

"No, it's not." The vulture was very frank and didn't hold any grudge against Tom for not supporting him in his escape just now. "Although we all belong to the security department, they belong to different units. I heard that the pheasants and the flamingos are from the third team, I am from the eleventh team of the second team, and the gray wolves are from the thirteenth team. That mooncake... well, it's from the seventh team of the sixth team."

Tom remembers Ouyang Haotian saying that a portion of the combat troops in the security department were recruited as veterans in the name of security guards a year ago. Part of it was recruited by the security department half a year ago from the general workers of other factories in the Fumao Industrial Zone. There is also a portion of foreign mercenaries hired by Vice General Manager Shen Liansheng from abroad, and there is no doubt that Captain Kent is such a person.

These are all armed reserves made by Haiwei Mini Industries for the upcoming micro disaster, so that they can have sufficient weapons and manpower to carry out various actions after the disaster occurs.

The remaining part is a regulation passed by General Manager Shen Jiayi after the micro disaster, which selects suitable adults from survivors to join the security department as a supplement to fresh blood. It is said that there are some police officers and gang members among them.

"Duan Fei, I think you are more reliable than Captain Kent," the vulture suddenly said, "so I am willing to believe your words and continue to complete the task."

Tom felt a bit ridiculous. Along the way, besides a few people like Liu Lian, many of the people he had just met didn't like him. "Why do you think I'm reliable?"

"Because of your gaze." The vulture glanced around, "Your gaze is very sharp when looking at things. My grandmother once said that if a person has divine eyes, they must be thinking about things frequently. When problems arise a few times, you react faster than the captain."

Tom smiled and the vulture pointed out a problem.

Kent is the commander of the team, and Tom's previous exploration life has made him take on the role of leader of the team. Unconsciously, he surpassed Kent and issued orders to others first. It's also fortunate that Kent didn't care, otherwise it would trigger another open and secret struggle.

"I'll pay attention..." Before Tom could finish speaking, he suddenly heard a soldier shout, "The firebird is missing!"