Although Liam was confident that he would one day surpass that giant beetle, he was still extremely weak right now.

  "I only got an ability with so many flaws—I still have to keep working hard!" Liam smiled self-deprecatingly, then took the black-shelled giant beetle back to the tree to practice the subtle control of his ability...

  The next day, Liam decided to patrol the red forest thoroughly. After all, he was going to live here for a while, and it would be better to guard against any dangers in advance.

  "Black Shell, keep moving forward."

  Liam sat on the back of the black-shelled giant beetle, giving it orders.

  In fact, he didn’t need to say it out loud—he just had to think, and the black-shelled giant beetle would receive his command. But as a social creature, Liam felt lonely from time to time. Even though he knew the beetle could hear his thoughts without him speaking, he still liked to talk to it.

  He had named it "Black Shell" on the day it was born. But from the information Black Shell fed back, he knew that Black Shell still had two evolutionary stages. Once it accumulated enough energy, it could evolve into a pupa, and then into a butterfly—but that was still a long way off.

  Liam pressed his hair against the ground. This way, he could sense all movements within a hundred miles through his hair. So his patrol this time was quite relaxed, nothing like the caution he had shown the day before.

  "Boom... Boom... Boom..."

  Suddenly, Liam felt a slight vibration coming from the ground. He immediately told Black Shell to stop, then used his hair to lift himself high into the air.

  This was the first time Liam had stood so high looking down at the forest below. His eyesight was excellent, and he immediately noticed a giant tree in the center of the forest. Liam realized that compared to this giant tree, the giant beetle he had seen yesterday didn’t seem that big anymore...

  After landing on the ground, Liam decided to go check out the giant tree—and the sound was coming from that direction too.

  "Black Shell, head that way, and hurry up." Liam pointed in the direction of the giant tree.

  When Black Shell heard Liam tell it to hurry, it immediately started running at full speed—faster than a race car. If there weren’t so many trees blocking the way, it could have gone even faster.

  As they approached the giant tree, Liam finally figured out who was making the "boom" sound.

  Under the giant tree, a small, thinly clad girl was constantly slamming her head against the trunk. She would hit it three times with all her strength, then stop for a moment, as if she was dizzy—but once she felt better, she would hit her head against the tree again.

  Liam jumped down from Black Shell’s back and approached the girl cautiously. From her ruddy complexion, he could tell she was a living person—not a zombie that had mutated to look like a normal human. Liam’s thought was simple: if the girl didn’t have serious mental problems, he would take her in and protect her. After all, Liam was a healthy young man, and in the lonely apocalypse, having a companion would be a comfort...

  Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

  The girl heard Liam’s footsteps and turned around warily. When she saw Liam, she immediately bared her teeth and growled softly, as if warning him not to come any closer.

  When Liam saw the girl’s face, he was pleasantly surprised. She had a delicate face, big and pure eyes, and a pair of small tiger teeth—she looked very cute. Even before the apocalypse, she would have been a beauty at the school level.

  "Little sister, which camp are you from? Do you have any family left?" Liam tried his best to show a kind smile. He felt a little awkward seeing her thinly clad, but he couldn’t help but glance at her occasionally.

  The girl stared at Liam warily, assuming a defensive posture. Liam talked to her, but she seemed not to understand, still growling softly as a warning.

  "Could she be mentally impaired?"

  Liam looked at the girl, feeling a twinge of regret. Such a cute girl, but with a mental problem—it was a waste of such beauty!

  But after the apocalypse, women were a rare resource. Even if a woman wasn’t good-looking, there would still be men who wanted to protect her—after all, in the harsh apocalypse, companionship was hard to come by...

  Even if the girl had mental issues, Liam didn’t plan to give up. He quickly wove his hair into a coat, then severed the connection between his hair and the coat.

  Holding the coat, Liam approached the girl gently and coaxed her: "Come on, put this on. It’s not good for a girl to be so thinly dressed."

  Unexpectedly, just as Liam got close, the girl suddenly slammed her head at him. Fortunately, Liam reacted quickly and immediately wove his hair into a net to block it—otherwise, that hit would have seriously injured him.

  Watching her hit the tree earlier hadn’t seemed like a big deal, but after experiencing it firsthand, Liam realized how incredible her strength was.

  But no matter how strong she was, it was useless. Liam wrapped her up tightly with his hair, leaving only her small head exposed. Now she had no way to resist.

  He patted the girl’s head, then pinched her cheek lightly, smiling: "Now you can’t hit me anymore."

  "Growl!!!" The girl bared her teeth and glared at Liam fiercely, as if she wanted to bite him.

  At that moment, Liam ignored the girl and turned to look at the giant tree instead. But as soon as he stepped closer to the tree, the girl struggled violently. Liam had to use more hair to hold her down.

  "You don’t want me to get close to this tree?" Liam asked, looking at the girl.

  The girl’s face turned red, obviously still struggling with all her strength. But each of Liam’s hairs was equivalent to thirty times his own strength. When all his hairs worked together, their strength was astonishing. The girl was basically competing against countless people—how could she win?

  Liam confirmed his guess from the girl’s expression and immediately began to study the giant tree’s secrets. The tree was extremely strong; even the girl could only make a small dent in it. Liam tested it with his hair—he needed a saw made of thirty strands of hair just to slightly cut into the tree.

  When the girl saw the tree being cut, she immediately let out anxious cries. But when Liam turned around, she looked at him with big, eager eyes—as if a little dog waiting for its owner to reward it with a bone. It seemed she knew she couldn’t defeat Liam with force, so she switched to acting cute.

  "You want something inside the tree?" Liam suddenly realized, feeling his heart soften at her cute act.

  The girl nodded immediately. It turned out she could understand Liam’s words—she just didn’t speak for some reason.

  "Then I’ll help you." Liam smiled.

  To win the girl’s trust, Liam decided to saw the tree, even though he had no idea what was inside it.

  His hair couldn’t withstand high temperatures, so he had to stop and cool it down every time he sawed a little. After a whole day, he only sawed one percent of the giant tree.

  Seeing that Liam could saw the tree and had agreed to help her, the girl’s hostility eased a little. At least when Liam let her go, she didn’t immediately hit him with her head.