Chapter 15: Black Snake List

Translator: Exodus Tales  Editor: Exodus Tales

South America’s Amazon Rainforest was sultry and moist. There would be heavy rain for 300 days of the year, while the other 65 days would be light showers.

The 700 million hectares of tropical rainforest were deserted and undisturbed by humans. The animals lived freely in the forest.

At the same time, this wasn’t merely the paradise for animals, it was also the paradise for the criminals and nacros.

In a hidden place of the rainforest, there were pieces of fields that were plowed out. The fields weren’t growing rice. Instead, they were growing the beautiful yet fatal opium poppy.

This was the season when the opium poppies were blossoming. Red, purple, and white beautiful flowers had all blossomed, and they were like beautiful decorations in the center of the forest.

It was unknown which ancient predecessor once said, “Beautiful things are as evil as they are beautiful.”

And the source of the evil was in an unassuming hut in the center of the fields.

Black Rhino was seated in the hut’s only sofa. This was the Black Snake Gang’s chief, who was 41 years old and had a thick and sturdy body. On his left cheek, there was a tattoo of a black snake spitting out a fresh red forked tongue.

Everyone else would hide the Black Snake Gang’s tattoo in a place that wasn’t as striking as the arm or leg. After all, they had to leave the Amazon Rainforest to enter the societies governed with laws. But this Black Snake Gang’s chief was bold enough to actually put the tattoo on his face. It was as though he was afraid that no one would know he was from the notorious Black Snake Gang.

“I don’t care! I will kill whoever that killed the seventh brother! No one can stop me! Xia Fei! Wu Long! And that bastard Andre all must die!” Black Rhino was enraged. His body was tall and sturdy, his temper was proportionate to his body weight.

Standing beside the Black Rhino was a cultured and refined gentleman. He had blonde curled up hair and a smile that was like the sunshine. Even in the hot summer, he wore this well-ironed suit along with a tie and leather shoes that were always so shiny.

“They deserve to be killed, but they cannot be killed by you. Leave this matter to me.” To actually speak like this when Black Rhino was enraged. This person must be the one called Forest Viper.

Forest Viper and Black Rhino were two entirely different kinds of individuals. This British gentleman received a good education and was born in a noble family in England. His father was the reputable Duke of Westminster.

No one knew why this outstanding student of the Eton College and the University of Cambridge would join this notorious Black Snake Gang.

The gang members feared Black Rhino, but they viewed Forest Viper with complete respect.

The Forest Viper’s intelligence and insight were the gang’s greatest reliance. Without Black Rhino, the Black Snake Gang would still be the same. But if Forest Viper weren’t around, the gang would already have been eradicated by the federal government on countless occasions.

The relationship between Forest Viper and Black Rhino was very subtle. Forest Viper was superior to Black Rhino in almost all aspects. However, Forest Viper was even willing to give up everything for Black Rhino. Even if Black Rhino asked him to die, Forest Viper wouldn’t hesitate at all.

“What plans do you have?” Black Rhino asked Forest Viper calmly. Black Rhino was always composed when Forest Viper made a suggestion. If it were anyone else, they would have received a torrent of abuse from Black Rhino.

“I have already investigated. Wu Long and Xia Fei, who killed the seventh brother, don’t have high ranks. Wu Long is a strength type Intermediate Star Light rank. Xia Fei is even worse and is only a speed type Primary Star Light rank. They have never served in the military. Wu Long has served as a private investigator and is considered to have some combat experience. Xia Fei is completely average, and one month ago, he was still riding his bicycle and delivering packages as a courier.”

“We couldn’t know about the exact situation back then, but I deduced that this duo was able to kill the seventh brother entirely because of luck. It is obviously not suitable for you to personally kill the duo. I think we can let Madman and Wild Rose do it instead.”

Black Rhino nodded. “Wild Rose and Madman are indeed a good combination to deal with a strength type and speed type.”

Black Rhino laughed heartily while his eyelids sank a little. “You shall handle this matter. I will return to have a few puffs of smoke.”

…

Xia Fei’s speed could be described as a spark from the flint and was at 85 m/s. This was already considerably beyond a human’s limit.

It was a pity that Xia Fei’s current body condition wasn’t enough to maintain a full sprint for too long. Thirty seconds would already exhaust him, and his legs would feel as though they were as heavy as lead. If the speed were reduced to 60 m/s, he would be able to maintain the speed for around 60 seconds.

After returning to the hotel for a shower, just as Xia Fei was planning to venture out, he received a phone call from Wu Long, who sounded somewhat nervous.

“Big Brother Wu, what is wrong with you? Why are you so unhinged? Could someone be chasing after you?” Xia Fei asked in a joking manner.

“I have obtained some reliable information. The bastards from the Black Snake Gang have placed you, me, and Andre on the Black Snake List.”

“Black Snake List? What is that?”

“The Black Snake Gang members aren’t just Ability Users, they also have great military strength, and they smuggle drugs. They have a huge amount of cash, and the Black Snake List is their bounty list. As long as our heads are brought to them, cash will be paid directly.”

Xia Fei’s eyes lit up. “How much is my bounty?”

There was a brief silence…

“Brother, the Black Snake Gang’s strength and methods aren’t just for show. This old brother isn’t joking with you. They are truly determined to kill us.”

“Big Brother Long, I am not joking with you too. How much is my bounty?”

“Mine is 10 million, Andre is also 10 million. Your bounty is 1 million.”

“Bastards!” Xia Fie couldn’t help cursing, “These people are looking down on me. Why is my bounty only 1 million? This is too humiliating.”

Wu Long, who was on the other side of the phone call, was completely speechless. It was evident that the higher the bounty, the greater the danger. Xia Fei should be rejoicing.

After he ended the call, there was a subsequent phone call from Andre, and he also talked about the Black Snake Gang wanting their lives. They arranged to meet at Andre’s house in the evening before Xia Fei walked out of his room.

Originally, Andre had only arranged a caucasian driver for Xia Fei. This morning, the driver had been replaced by two tall and sturdy, black bear-like African-Americans. Their armpits were bulging, and it was obvious they were equipped with weapons.

Furthermore, two more sedans followed the limousine. Each car had four burly chaps who were wearing suits. All of them looked fierce, and there wasn’t a need to guess that Andre was worried about Xia Fei’s safety and had assigned bodyguards for Xia Fei.

The federation’s A-class Citizen Management Office’s headquarters was located in New York. After going through the procedure to rent the AI computer, Xia Fei grabbed the virtual reality helmet before going into the room alone.

“It is truly troublesome to visit this place whenever I wish to log into the interplanetary internet. I should purchase an AI computer as soon as possible.” Xia Fei muttered to himself.

The virtual reality helmet was truly extraordinary, and when he logged into the interplanetary internet with the helmet, it was as if he came to a virtual world. All of the sceneries were incredibly surreal, even the gluttonous worms on the leaves looked vivid and lifelike.

After logging into the Endaro Poetry Hobbyist website, Xia Fei immediately saw a message from the administrator. The website’s administrator was rather great at business as he wasn’t in a hurry to extract profits from Xia Fei.

They proposed that if Xia Fei could guarantee that he wouldn’t release his poems on other websites, the website would change the allocation of profits from 50% to 80%. They would refund all the excess transaction fees that were collected previously.

Xia Fei accepted the conditions in a straightforward manner and in just a few minutes later, 7.6 million star coins worth of transaction fees were refunded to Xia Fei’s account. Right now, Xia Fei’s account was close to 20 million star coins!

There was another familiar pink message. Xia Fei couldn’t understand why Avril’s message was in the special pink color?

Message from Avril: “Are you mad at me? Why did you use such an unpleasant poem to deceive me? Did I do something wrong?”

“This young lady seems to be ignorant of the ways of the world.” Xia Fei shook his head and talked to himself.

Xia Fei then conveniently replied: “It doesn’t matter if I am mad at you or not. It doesn’t matter if you have done something wrong or not. We are just strangers, and that poem is a proud work from my friend. This is the same as offering a gift. You should be grateful that I am giving you something, but instead, you are criticizing my gift. How is that reasonable? In any case, I don’t owe you anything.”

After clicking on the send button, Xia Fei took out a handheld computer from his pocket. This small computer was bought by Xia Fei yesterday, and it contained nearly all of Earth’s poems.

Xia Fei then started to patiently upload each poem on the Endaro Poetry Hobbyist website.

Poetry was something that wasn’t mainstream, and most of the buyers came over after seeing Enya’s program. The passions of these people were hard to maintain for a long term. As such, Xia Fei planned to strike while the iron was still hot and leave after obtaining a huge profit.

Most of the poems were about the reminisce of a certain person or the description of a certain beautiful place. These types of poetry were very hard for extraterrestrial people to understand. After all, they didn’t reside on Earth and wouldn’t understand the things and social customs of Earth. Therefore, the sales volume would be very low.

Xia Fei would specifically upload those poems that were expressing emotions. Extraterrestrial people would also feel happy or sad, making it easier for them to understand these poems.

The AI computer’s input method was by thoughts. Once you think of something, the corresponding words would appear on the screen. Furthermore, it would automatically analyze which thoughts were the words to be keyed in and which were the brain’s temporary thought waves. It allowed for a rather fast speed to input the words.

Using the entire morning, 1,300 poems were uploaded onto the Endaro Poetry Hobbyist website. After resting for a short moment and eating lunch, Xia Fei entered the interplanetary internet.

“Alright, let’s go to the medicinal ingredients market for a shopping spree,” Phantom said excitedly, and his attitude showed that he didn’t care if Xia Fei were going to be bankrupt.

“No, I want to shop at the other markets first before purchasing the medicinal ingredients. With your spending pace, by the time I come out from the medicinal ingredients market, I will not be left with any money.”

Xia Fei disregarded Phantom’s protest and arrived at a rather big computer mall.

The virtual attendant led Xia Fei inside, and the plethora of merchandise was too much for Xia Fei’s eyes.

“I want to purchase an AI computer.” Xia Fei stated.

“Please take a look, these are all the latest AI computers. May I know what model you require?”

There was a flash in front of his eyes, and over 1,000 different types and models of computers appeared in front of Xia Fei. They came in different sizes and shapes.

“Eh… I wish to buy a smaller one. It will be best if I can bring it along with me.”

“Then what about these three models?”

The attendant waved his hand, and all the computers vanished, leaving behind three small computers placed in a row.

Among the three computers, the biggest one was the size of a cigarette box, and the smallest was in the shape of a watch.

Xia Fei touched the old digital watch on his wrist. Xia Fei had been wearing this imitation Casio watch for over seven years. The wordings on the surface of the watch were already mottled, and it should be preserved in history museums instead of being worn on the wrist.

“What are the functions of that watch-shaped computer?”

“Sir, you truly have great taste. This is the latest microelectronics equipped with a processor and a skeuomorph system that has 128 super floating points. Apart from that, it can also serve as a timekeeping device. The error rate is less than 1/10,000th of a second. It could also display the current atmospheric moisture, temperature, pressure, and analyze the air’s composition. It also has an artificial pacemaker for emergencies. If the user has heart disease and has a sudden onset, it would release electric currents to help the heart regain the heartbeat. It can also…”

Xia Fei stopped the virtual attendant from talking. There were so many functions… Was this still a computer?

“I don’t have any heart disease, but I will buy this computer. Can it connect to the interplanetary internet?”

“The connection to the interplanetary internet is subscription-based service which needs to be purchased separately from the AI computer. Please take a look at the price list.”

Xia Fei took a glance at the price list. A class 1 interplanetary internet service could allow the computer to connect to the internet in the entire star region. The price wasn’t high either and was 10,000 star coins. The class 2 service could connect to three star regions in the vicinity, but the price was 100 times higher and required one million star coins! The class 3 service was even more ridiculous as 10 million star coins were required to connect with six nearby star regions!

Since connecting to three star regions wasn’t really useful for Xia Fei right now. Therefore, he chose the class 1 service.

The microcomputer cost 45,000 star coins while the class 1 internet service fee was 10,000 star coins. The total cost was 55,000 star coins.

After handing over the money, Xia Fei was about to leave, but his eyes flashed when he noticed something in the corner of this shop.

“Eh? What is this?” Xia Fei was very curious.