"Snowflakes drifting, the north wind whistling…"

As he hummed an off-key Yi Jian Mei tune, with one hand holding onto the steering and maintaining a speed of about 20 yards per second, Su Mo leisurely drove toward the south (T/N: A Spray of Plum Blossoms by Fei Yu-ching).

This direction led to the Lion people's base camp.

Based on Kento Maeda and Ying Xiong's words, the lion people should have already met the kobolds in battle awhile back.

Of course, the kobolds' current strength was definitely a bug-level existence in this land.

Su Mo still needed to see for himself what these two neighbors' interactions were like before the disaster struck.

He opened the window, and the faint cold breeze naturally blew into the car. Su Mo stuck a hand outside the car, feeling the "beauty" of the wasteland!

After running around for days, he had finally dealt with all the troubles near his shelter aside from the kobolds and lion people.

At least he would not have to worry about backstabbing from his fellow species in the short-term.

As for Chen Shen and his party heading toward the west shelter, Su Mo was not very worried either.

As laborers, they were unafraid of hard work and did not complain. They could endure hardships and were good workers.

As fighters, they had just experienced the trials of war. Each of them had more or less accepted the cruelty of the doomsday world and were warriors who get into combat positions at a moment's notice.

No matter which angle one looked at it, these people were core assets that a shelter needed the most. Even a small shelter would not reject the addition of these people.

As for the note he left, it was Su Mo's first time feeling things out and testing the composition of that shelter in the west.

When this snowy disaster ended, Su Mo would start trying to contact his fellow humans.

When that time came, he would pretty much know this shelter's level of "friendliness" from Chen Shen and his party's condition.

If they were friendly, everyone would be fine and unharmed. They would make deals and form alliances.

If they were unfriendly… Su Mo glanced at the saltpeter in Earth Tiger's storage space and smacked the car horn, revealing a smile that revealed that everything was under control.

The car drove along slowly.

After Earth Tiger crossed over the terrible, uphill road that led to the lion people, he finally arrived at the plains.

Compared to where the Underground Shelter was, these plains were even snowier and more delicate.

Endless white snow covered the area as far as the eye could see. Undoing his safety belt, Su Mo slowly got out of the car and looked toward the distance.

"A timely snow promises a good harvest! After this snowy weather is over, this land won't be so barren anymore, and maybe… I can try planting crops outside too!"

There was five times more nitrogen content in snow than in rain. Nitrogen could provide protein to plants and promote plant growth.

If there was less snow, there would indeed be a risk of frost damage. On the contrary, a large amount of snow like this could prevent heat loss and help maintain the temperature of the ground.

Without modern agricultural methods such as pesticides, soil sterilization and natural predators, heavy snow was the most feasible form of pest control.

Looking at the boundless snowy plains before her, Oreo hopped out too and rolled around happily on the snow.

She chased something completely non-existent ahead of her for a while, and then chased and bit at her own tail.

Because she could not bite her own tail, Su Mo saw Oreo gnaw on her hind leg like she was working off some of her energy.

Su Mo instantly felt his body relax—the road ahead was bright!

"Ah! Wasteland! I came!! I saw!! I conquered!!!"

He released a loud roar that shook the snow off some of the bushes and trees next to him. On the plains, the echoes gradually faded away into the distance.

With the reduced pressure, Su Mo felt incomparably relaxed when he thought of the large number of cores in the storage space as well as the future prospects of the Underground Shelter, as if his heart was bathing in a hot spring!

"Thankfully, I've dealt with Kento Maeda and damaged the kobolds again before the disaster. As for the lion people…"

He fished out his old phone. After switching to the lion people's signal, the little dots of the lion people were like stars that covered the sky on the phone screen, scattered all over the wilderness.

These positions were very much like…

Guerilla warfare!

Before the battery power dropped completely, Su Mo hurriedly switched back over to the kobold signal.

The little dots that were the kobolds were gathered in the southwest area, seemingly maniacally chasing after a group of lion people.

Based on the size of the dots, these chasing kobolds exceeded them by at least a whole 500 people, which was extremely terrifying.

Chirp…

The phone battery consumption was almost at a rate of 2% per second. Before Su Mo could switch back to the lion people, a low battery prompt popped up, and then the screen went black.

"Tsk, this power, this battery—enough! When I open the technology tree, I'll connect a core battery to you!"

He did not know what this old device was made from either—the battery could be removed at will within the ruins, but once he stepped out of the ruins, it was almost as if the back was welded on, leaving him no way to open it at all.

Su Mo summoned the storage space, put the phone back in, and started driving Earth Tiger again.

The roads on the plains were good and had fewer obstacles that knocked against the chassis. Without much effort, the car quickly already reached within four to five kilometers of the Lion people's base camp.

If he moved further forward, he would leave large tire marks in the surrounding area of the Lion people's base camp and would very likely expose himself.

Driving the car to higher ground, and after checking the surroundings a few more times, Su Mo climbed to the top of Earth Tiger.

Standing firm, Su Mo stretched his hand out toward the void. Light flashed, and a pair of binoculars appeared in his hand.

Observing the situation at the Lion people's base camp clearly from this distance, about 4km away, was indeed a little difficult with binoculars that only had 5x zoom.

After observing for a while and realizing he could only vaguely see traces of a big battle inside, in addition to not being able to get any other news, Su Mo began to focus and summoned the system.

The binoculars' property panel popped out.

[Lens-type 5x Zoom Binoculars]

[Description: Refracts the light that passes through the lens and converges it through a small hole to form the image, which is then transmitted through the magnifying lens.]

[Function: 5x zoom]

[First upgrade option: Upgrade the prism structure, enhance the light transmittance and image quality, increase the zoom factor, and slightly increase the size of the binoculars. Survival points required (120)]

[Second upgrade option: Change the structure of the binoculars. Adds counterweight, focus wheel, tripod, rangefinder and equatorial mount. Greatly increases the observation distance. Survival points required (1980)]

[Comment: Its power in your hands would not lose to Yukikaze's binoculars!] [T/N: Yukikaze is a character from Kantai Collection]

"As expected, things like binoculars have simple structures—the upgrade options are either to make it portable or to make it larger, thicker, and stronger!"

Su Mo gnawed his teeth. After analyzing the pros and cons of the two options, Su Mo made up his mind and mentally selected a different upgrade direction.

This time, he realized that increasing the 5x zoom to 10x only required 35 points.

Without any hesitation, Su Mo's confirmed the selection, and green light shone out and began to modify the lens in the binoculars. 

The powerful system could even create things out of thin air, so this small matter was naturally not difficult for it.

A few seconds later, the green light retracted and Su Mo could clearly see 10x on the scale, although its outer appearance had not changed.

This time, when he brought the binoculars back in front of his eyes, the 10x zoom allowed him to see at least some details, although he still could not say he could see the Lion people's base camp very clearly.

After sweeping a glance over the camp and looking at the various traces of battle nearby, Su Mo was shocked.

"Tsk, seems that the kobolds had a lot of pent up anger!"

The Lion people's base camp, which was originally a village, had now been razed to the ground by the kobolds' fireballs. There were charred pieces of wood that had not been fully burnt everywhere.

The large logs that surrounded the camp had all disappeared as well, and the entire camp was empty. It looked as if it had been robbed by bandits.

As he continued to patiently observe the charred ruins, he saw some mutilated corpses of lion people, scattered among the desolation.

The village had originally been a patch of gray-brown land, but now it had been dyed dark red. It was very frightening.

As for the most important thing in the clan, which was the lion people's core shelter... It had already turned into a large pit.

Even if he did not personally walk to the front of this pit, Su Mo could imagine the dozens of Kobold Mages standing before it and bombarding the inside.

"These great bastards! The kobolds seem to have gone mad!

"Still, it's true that such a loss can only be recovered through violent war. With the gunpowder developed by ol' dog Kento Maeda, the strength of the kobolds completely overpowered the lion people, who were also of alien race, and completely broke the balance."

After observing for a while and making sure that all traces of the battle, as well as the messy footprints on the ground, were recorded in his diary, Su Mo packed up his binoculars and jumped off the roof of Earth Tiger.

The kobolds wanted to fight the lion people?

Then let them fight!

After all, based on the information displayed on the old phone's map scanner just now, the lion people's current formation was not something the kobolds could do anything about.

After spreading themselves out, an individual lion person's combat abilities would completely crush a kobold. They were only at a disadvantage when it came to group battles.

This meant this battle between the kobolds and the lion people was destined to be prolonged.

"When this disaster is over, I'll find an opportunity to wipe out these alien beasts, but for now...

"Oreo! Time to go home and sleep!"

Patting the roof of the car, Su Mo made an enthusiastic expression.

Oreo, who was still rolling about in the snow beside him, got up quickly, poised herself, and then jumped into Su Mo's arms.

Caressing the affectionate Oreo, Su Mo turned and got into the car.

As Earth Tiger's engine began to roar, a burst of black smoke came out and its wheels began to roll steadily.

A moment later, as a breeze blew by, the traces on the ground could no longer be seen clearly anymore...