115 The Black Panther Grew Smarter!

After leaving Song Yuan’s place, Xue Feng made his way to the dog kennel. Although called a kennel, the hunting dogs, including Black Panther, actually lived in villas.

Xue Feng played with Black Panther for a while and casually took out several crystal cores to feed him. Upon seeing the crystal cores, Black Panther became visibly excited, suggesting he understood the benefits these brought him.

Xue Feng felt a tinge of emotion. He had long noticed that Black Panther was fine after consuming the crystal cores, but he had never tried feeding them to humans. This was partly because his own abilities were strong enough, and with the system he possessed, he focused most of his energy on scavenging supplies rather than the significance of the crystal cores themselves. He had left all of them to Nie Xiaoyue.

“From now on, feed Black Panther and the other pups some crystal cores every meal,” Xue Feng instructed Li Wangmiao. There were already over a thousand crystal cores inside the base. Every time they took down wandering zombies, they never forgot to pry open their skulls to check for cores. These cores had become an important source of power.

“I always wondered why Black Panther was so strong and smart—it turns out it’s because of these!” Li Wangmiao exclaimed in surprise. She had been puzzled by Black Panther’s impressive growth and now understood it was due to a special supplement.

“Black Panther is very intelligent,” Xue Feng nodded. He could sense that Black Panther’s intelligence was nearly comparable to that of a ten-year-old child. According to statistics, before the apocalypse, the smartest pet dogs only reached about the intelligence level of an eight-year-old. Of course, Xue Feng scoffed at that notion. Eight-year-olds were already quite clever—some could speak multiple foreign languages or even code. No dog could learn programming, not even the simplest kind. Such claims were merely sales talk from pet merchants.

But Black Panther was different! Xue Feng genuinely felt that Black Panther’s intelligence was increasing.

“That Black Panther always wants to go out hunting zombies. What should I do?” Li Wangmiao asked cautiously. Recently, Black Panther seemed restless in the villa, eager to venture outside. Li Wangmiao could sense his intentions.

“Black Panther, you want to go hunt zombies?” Xue Feng chuckled as he scratched the dog’s head. Black Panther nodded vigorously.

“Do you know what to do if you encounter a powerful mutant?” Xue Feng queried further.

Black Panther immediately stood up, ran a few circles around the villa, then dashed back to lie down at Xue Feng’s feet.

“What does that mean?” Li Wangmiao was perplexed. Although she had been with Black Panther for several days, she couldn’t understand his behavior.

“It’s simple. Black Panther means he’ll shake off the mutant and then sneak back,” Xue Feng smiled. Sure enough, Black Panther nodded enthusiastically, confirming that was his plan.

Li Wangmiao was amazed. She hadn’t expected Black Panther to think so far ahead. When facing an unbeatable mutant, his first reaction wasn’t to run back but to first lose the powerful mutant—ensuring it wouldn’t follow back to the base and pose a threat. That was incredibly clever! Honestly, Li Wangmiao felt a bit ashamed; she hadn’t thought of such a smart strategy.

“Well then, Black Panther, you can go. But help me scout these locations and let me know if there are any survivors,” Xue Feng said, pulling out a map. This was the same map drawn by Qin Fengshan and his group, marked with several survivor gathering points.

“It can understand the map!” Li Wangmiao still found it hard to believe. Black Panther’s ability to comprehend human speech had already amazed her, and now Xue Feng was showing him the map. Even more astonishing was Black Panther’s repeated nodding, as though he understood the information on it.

“Heh, then go have fun. But don’t expose yourself to humans easily—many of them carry guns,” Xue Feng reminded Black Panther. To him, Black Panther was a valuable assistant, but to other starving survivors, he might just be a pot of dog meat soup.

Still, Xue Feng wasn’t too worried. Black Panther’s keen senses were far beyond those of ordinary humans. His sense of smell was incredibly sharp, capable of detecting human scent from afar.

With an excited howl, Black Panther dashed out eagerly. Seeing this, the other dogs grew excited as well, wanting to join the fun, but without Xue Feng’s order, they dared not move.

“When you all grow as strong as Black Panther, then you can go out too. For now, eat more crystal cores,” Li Wangmiao comforted the dogs. Under her soothing words, they quieted down.

At that moment, a gentle chime rang throughout the villa area through the broadcast system—it was lunchtime.

Today’s meal was especially grand, prepared on Xue Feng’s orders. Before, meals were served according to rank and position, each group eating in different areas. But this time was different—all were gathered in the central square of the villa complex.

Liu Jun and his team had brought over many tables and chairs of various kinds, totaling fifteen tables. There were 138 people in the entire base now. Liu Jun’s group had added over forty people. Originally, the food street only had about twenty people, but since Liu Jun’s team acquired firearms, their courage grew, and they began searching for supplies outside, discovering many survivors.

These survivors lived in small groups in safe places with ample food and water. After all, three boxes of instant noodles and two large barrels of water could sustain an adult for over a month. That was how they had survived until now. But supplies were running dangerously low. Seeing Liu Jun and his team scavenging, they willingly joined them.

They were fortunate to have met Liu Jun; encountering other ruthless survivors could have meant ending up as dried meat hanging on a wall.

Qin Fengshan sat at one of the tables. Last night, two people had crowded beside him while he slept, watching over him closely. Yet, it was the most restful night he had had in a long time. More surprisingly, he even managed to take a bath last night. Although the leader at the canned food factory was powerful, his management of the base was chaotic and disorganized.