"My only request is that the gem inside belongs to me, and don't let anyone else know."
Upon hearing Tom's request, Baozi was surprised. "It seems like the secret of these gems is not simple at all, to make you go to such lengths. I specialize in searching for resources to bring back. Do you think I'd allow hoarding of items? If I open that door, how can I lead this team?"
"The gems, equipment, and clothes I have on me will all be surrendered by you. And then what? If it weren't for Zeng Shisan causing such a big incident, would Seventh Uncle be willing to give you these things? If you traded your life for the gems, would you be willing to hand them over and let them fall back into Zeng Shisan's hands? Don't forget, he only left Seventh Uncle with two useless yellow ones."
"Oh, so the other gems are useful?"
Tom became furious whenever Zeng Shisan was mentioned. Although dangers were inevitable when leading an expedition, having incidents occur twice in a row without any explanation or proper arrangements angered anyone. But at the moment, he had no gems, and his injuries prevented him from doing heavy work. What could he do other than endure?
In his anger, he inadvertently revealed too much while persuading Baozi.
"They are useful. The matter behind our shrinkage is not simple at all. We can discuss that later. In short, can we deal with this fly... or not?"
Baozi glanced at the mutated fly and licked his lips. "Your ribs are broken, I'm afraid you won't be able to run to the insecticide. And the gap in the door is too small to bring the insecticide in. I'll lure the creature, and you can spray."
Tom shook his head. "Since the gems are what I want, then I should take on the riskiest task. You saved me once, and I owe you a favor. Until that's repaid, I don't want to owe more."
Baozi nodded approvingly. "You're... something else! Uncle Wei didn't misjudge you. Alright, let's go check out the insecticide first."
So the two of them jumped out of the bathtub and returned to the bathroom door. Sure enough, there was a bottle of insecticide in front of the door. A considerable amount of liquid had been used, leaving only half. They managed to push the bottle over, and with Baozi's strength, they were able to spray the insecticide out, aiming it toward the door.
After finishing this, they moved to the nearby basin. The basin was under the steps, with clear water on top. When the time came, Tom only needed to jump in and wash himself.
After making these preparations, Tom also found some gauze and cut it into several pieces, changing his clothes and wrapping himself from head to toe, including his eyes and nose, like a mummy.
"Haha, if you die, I'll definitely wrap you up like a mummy and burn you."
Tom smiled back. "Then I'll be very happy."
After the preparations were done, the two of them returned to the bathtub. Baozi helped Tom climb into the bathtub before going down himself and returning to the insecticide.
When Tom saw Baozi leave, he took a deep breath, holding a thin needle and aiming at the mutated fly that was eating and defecating.
"It's so big, it must be a blue crystal."
He threw the needle, not expecting to hit the fly, especially since it had compound eyes that covered 360 degrees.
The mutated fly flapped its wings and rose up, swaying in the air as if drunk.
"There's a chance! It must not have adapted well to its larger size after the mutation, so it's not very agile in flight."
Tom waved his arms a few times, indeed catching the fly's attention.
Normally, the fly would be more interested in decaying flesh. But this was a mutated large fly, and it was obviously interested in live human flesh now. Its sucking mouthparts had also mutated, with Tom clearly seeing two rows of spikes.
Seeing the mutated fly flying towards him, Tom quickly ran to the edge near the plastic stool, then jumped down to the ground.
At this moment, the mutated fly also flew over, and Tom hurriedly ran, but due to his broken ribs, he was a bit slow. Even though the fly was flying slowly, it would eventually catch up to him if he couldn't reach the insecticide in time. And it wouldn't be able to catch up to Baozi.
Meanwhile, Baozi was watching from under the door gap as Tom limped and staggered, with the mutated fly chasing after him. His heart was pounding nervously. At this rate, before reaching the door, Tom would be caught by the fly. He regretted allowing Tom to take the lead. If Tom died, he would have to explore the secret of the gems himself. When he saved Tom before, he had touched a red gem and had a strange feeling about it. He instinctively felt that the gem held secrets, but at the time, he thought it was just an illusion. However, after surrendering everything, he found out that Uncle Seven had entrusted everything to Zeng Shisan, leaving him regretful. So when he learned that the gems were dug out of mutated organisms, he paid special attention when exploring outside. But the bugs around the compound had been swept away, and he couldn't find any. Now that he finally had a chance, he didn't want to miss it. Indeed, when Tom was about ten steps away from the door, he was knocked down by the mutated fly from behind. This made him very nervous, and he was about to rush up with the big knife, but then he saw Tom agilely roll away from the fly and continue to stagger toward him. "Tom, run! Run!" Baozi shouted loudly, inadvertently clutching the big knife tightly in his hand, wishing he could rush up to replace Tom.
Tom ran, stumbling and crawling, dodging the clumsy attacks of the mutated fly one after another, which made Baozi watch with trembling nerves. Each time he narrowly escaped being hit by the fly, barely avoiding it. It was only because Tom was slowed down by his injury that he didn't just attack the clumsy fly directly. If it were him facing such a clumsy fly, he would have fought it head-on without needing insecticide.
Finally, they reached the gap in the door, but this time Tom's luck ran out as he was knocked down by the mutated fly again. Baozi didn't have time to think, he ran back behind the bottle and pressed hard on the pressure button. The nozzle of the bottle jammed into the gap in the door, just under pressure, and the insecticide immediately sprayed out in a mist, dousing both Tom and the fly.
One press wasn't enough, so Baozi released and pushed again, three times in a row, before nervously grabbing the big knife and slipping it through the gap in the door.
Tom flipped over and slid through the gap in the door, landing in the basin under the steps.
Baozi didn't have time to attend to Tom. He lifted the big knife and swung it at the fly's head.
"Bang!" The knife was deflected. Baozi was surprised to find that the fly's exoskeleton was so tough that the knife bounced off.
The mutated fly struggled to retaliate, but the insecticide took effect quickly, slowing its movements even further. So Baozi still had the opportunity to continue striking with the knife. However, each consecutive strike to different parts proved ineffective. It seemed like the fly's body was covered in thick iron plates that the knife couldn't penetrate.
Baozi was relieved by this. If it weren't for the insecticide reducing the fly's reactions, he might have been licked all over by the fly by now.
Seeing the mutated fly struggling to get up, Baozi felt that he couldn't continue chopping and should run away, or else he wouldn't be able to escape once it recovered.
Just then, a pair of hands landed on his wrist, and Tom's voice came into his ears, "Put the knife under it and flip it over, quickly!"
Without thinking much, Baozi immediately followed suit. He wedged the big knife under the mutated fly's body and, using the floor as a support, levered it over.
As soon as it was flipped over, Tom grabbed an iron nail and, holding it with both hands, thrust it into the fly's mouthparts. With each downward press, sweat dripped from his forehead, presumably from aggravating his rib injury.
Baozi immediately stepped forward to help him push the nail down. As the nail went deeper, the fly's struggles became more intense, until finally, it went completely still.
"Huff... huff..." Baozi let go and sat on the ground, "Finally killed it... I didn't expect the fly's exoskeleton to be so tough. Or maybe we're just too weak after shrinking?"
"It's mutated. When insects with exoskeletons mutate, most of them will strengthen their exoskeleton hardness. It's normal for the knife to not penetrate, but there are always weak points. The mouthparts can be said to be one of the weakest points for most insects. I've killed so many, and it's always effective."
"Rest for a while, it's quite exhausting after these strikes."
Tom shook his head. "No, get up, let's find a gap to dismember it immediately."
"No rush, we have plenty of time. They won't finish what they're doing in a short time and won't bother me."
"Have you ever swatted a fly? Sometimes, even if you knock it down, it might just be stunned, and it'll wake up and run away soon. We can't be sure it's really dead, so we have to dispose of it quickly!"
Hearing Tom's words, Baozi thought it made sense and immediately crawled up, asking, "How do we do it?"
"Still the mouthparts. The nail is still halfway out. We'll use the big knife to pry it open from the opening and use the nail as a support to pry open its mouth."
"That's simple!"
They immediately got to work as Tom instructed. After a few strenuous attempts, they finally managed to pry open the fly's mouthparts. Then, they hacked away at the opening, splitting the fly's head in half. Now, the mutated fly was completely dead.
Baozi wiped the sweat from his forehead, then looked at Tom. "Hey, do you have to be so violent? It's just a fly. Is it necessary to be so gory?"
Tom shook his head, too lazy to argue with him, and grabbed the big knife again, continuing to dig into the fly's head.
Watching Tom dig into the corpse expressionlessly, Baozi felt another wave of nausea and quickly moved away. "Your tolerance for this is really twisted."
Tom continued digging for a while, but couldn't find the gem in the head. It must be in the body. Taking a break, he glanced at Baozi, who was hiding far outside the door, and then continued to dig into the fly's body.
Now it can be confirmed that for these oversized bugs, once they mutate, the crystals inside their bodies are indeed crystals, and they are all hidden inside the body, not the head.
But it makes sense. With such a small body like ants, besides the head, the body can't fit such large gems.
Finally, Tom dug out a big piece, it was indeed a crystal, but it was held in his hand, not the backpack-sized crystal from the mutated rat's body. Nevertheless, Tom was still very happy.
Now he needed to find a basin of water quickly, wash his whole body clean, and then wash the crystal clean to see what color it was.