After maneuvering around a dozen drones and evading several patrol police squads, Yun You finally reached the end of R9 Street with the white-eyed girl in tow.

What appeared before them was a row of dilapidated, dark yellow buildings.

The residents on the upper floors were very quiet; most lights were off, but the ground floor was brightly lit, with people stemming in and out from the main door at intervals...

Some, lone drunks were so intoxicated they stumbled and crawled to the entrance, wanting to vomit, but were kicked away by the guard at the door and dumped into the trash bin...

Others gathered in groups of three or five, dressed flamboyantly, casting radiant electronic glances at passersby and the drunkards, hoping to attract customers... or find a couple of wealthy suckers.

Evidently, the rooms on this floor were mostly illegal establishments, either turned into gambling dens or shadowy clubs...

If the passersby could ignore the allure of the clubs and casinos and observe the buildings closely, they would easily discover that the external walls of this building were not the usual bricks and tiles but rather metal sheaths resembling container sheets — seemingly thin, providing neither insulation nor warmth.

In fact, these rooms were built from abandoned containers.

In the past, this place was a dormitory for a construction crew.

The ambitious owner of the crew took on the task of renovating the old alley, spending all his money on smoothing relationships but habitually neglecting worker wages and demolition compensation.

So in the end, on the night the forced demolition was scheduled, the enraged alley dwellers somehow produced a few hand-spun guns and publicly blew the owner's head off...

And the workers who were owed wages stood coldly by, even blocking the path of the health insurance squad, watching as the owner met his end.

Since then, this area called "Iron Cage District" was abandoned, gradually becoming a paradise for vagrants and gang members.

Simultaneously, this was exactly Yun You's home... To be precise, it was the girl's current temporary residence.

Although this place always had bad security, with frequent fights and gang warfare, it bore an advantage that a normal residential area could not compare with.

Which was: as long as you could tolerate the noisy gang neighbors, the potential threat of free looting, and the drunk homeless barging in to wreck your home, you wouldn't have to pay any rent.

Here, there were no penny-pinching landlords. If you wanted to live here, you could just find a room, break in, change the locks, and lay down to sleep.

For someone as poor and unafraid of theft as Yun You, it couldn't be more fitting.

However, to live peacefully in this mix of good and bad, acting low-key was necessary.

Yun You casually pulled a few tattered black rags from the roadside heap, covering her head, disguising as a vagrant... and also gave the girl beside her a plastic cape to hide her pretty little face.

In any place within Nest City, being naturally beautiful was sometimes not a good thing.

Because it excessively attracted attention... bringing disaster.

Yun You lowered her head, holding the girl's hand, and sneaked along the wall, slipping into the building.

Her method was indeed effective; those gang members didn't even notice the two peculiar kittens, assuming they were just a few vagrants who had gambled away their fortune and wanted to find shelter here.

The two slipped up to the top floor of the building.

Yun You glanced around; seeing no one noticing, she cautiously approached the rightmost room in the corridor, skillfully lifted the trash bin at the doorway, and retrieved a key from the soil-filled bin to unlock the door.

As they entered the room, a strong mix of smoke and rusty metal smell rushed at them.

Yun You's place wasn't large; with a roughly five-square-meter living room, a bathroom, and two rooms, it was the place she had lived in for a full year.

Her belongings were diverse; various plan sheets, maps, homemade explosive powder, and blades covered almost every table, yet everything was organized neatly, and the furniture was particularly clean.

It was clear; this little girl seemed to be quite fond of cleanliness.

"Have a seat first."

Yun You casually turned on the TV, then pointed to the sofa, signaling the white-eyed girl to sit there.

The girl was indeed obedient, saying nothing, quietly leaning on the sofa, staring at the TV screen, lost in thought or watching advertisements.

"I'll get you something to eat."

Yun You casually said, then walked out, closing the door.

She originally intended to take a nap on the bed...

But as soon as she lay down, her stomach rumbled... seemingly reminding Yun You: she hadn't eaten anything normal for three days.

The blood of the Apprentice Death God could suppress her hunger, but it couldn't deceive her mouth and stomach.

People can suffer anywhere — just not with an empty stomach...

Thus, Yun You decided to fetch something to eat and bring the white-eyed girl a dinner portion as well.

However, she didn't go looking for a restaurant, instead heading to the top floor corner nearby.

A large golden square machine silently laid there, with a large cargo compartment at the bottom and a screen embedded above displaying only five glowing characters.

[Universal Vending Machine]

Clearly, this was an automatic vending machine.

But unlike the regular vending machines scattered all over Nest City, the ones bearing the title "Universal" had quite a significant background.

They were manufactured by a massive corporation named "World River."

This giant corporation only offered one product — universal vending machines... But it pushed this business to the extreme, installing machines in every corner of Nest City.

Whether in the impoverished slums or the upscale banquet halls, people could spot these machines.

They sold almost every commodity, from food and medicine to firearms and prosthetic bodies... As long as money was at hand, people could buy any legitimate item circulating in the market from it.

Moreover, it could also "purchase" items from people's hands and provide a platform for some shady transactions.

So sometimes... People might even find freshly severed body parts in its cargo compartment... But worry not, it was merely a "collectible item" left behind by a careless "transactor."

Of course, these matters bore little relevance to Yun You; she merely sought to buy two servings of frozen boxed meals...

...

Yun You rummaged through all her pockets, barely extracting a silver coin inscribed with "5 Yabi" from her trouser pocket.

This thing's official name was "Yabi," short for "Asian Currency" — due to its high recognition and wide circulation, it became the common currency for most cities in Nest City.

But compared to its formal name, people preferred calling it "Silver Cannon," because its surface bore a cannon engraving.

The 5 Yabi coin in Yun You's hand was all she had.

Silver Cannon's purchasing power wasn't too bad — the average worker's monthly salary in Nest City barely reached over 1000, and black workers like Yun You without an identity could only earn around 500.

But with 5 Yabi, you definitely couldn't buy anything nice either.

Yun You tapped on the vending machine a few times, browsing through several pages in the product interface, unable to find any cheap nourishment.

Even the cheapest nutrient solution cost 3 Yabi... Given her current financial state, she could only afford a single unit.

"Sigh... Even a hero is stumped without a penny."

Yun You sighed helplessly.

But soon, she recalled something... rummaging through her pockets, she retrieved a small chip emitting a faint blue glow.

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