Ice Age Apocalypse: I Hoard Billions of Supplies

Chapter 254: Secrets

Shen Moling’s words left Liang Yue stunned.

"I... I never abandoned any of you!" Liang Yue protested, feeling a pang of hurt. She had done everything she could to protect her students; how many of them would have survived without her efforts?

"Never abandoned us? Then why did you choose to leave us behind in that horrible place?" Shen Moling shot back, her gaze piercing.

"If we hadn’t used our bodies to secure a chance to escape, we might have ended up ‘disappeared’ like the others!" she added, her tone full of bitterness.

"Disappeared? What are you talking about?" Liang Yue asked, feeling a chill run down her spine. She had left the students behind when she moved to the Second Life Pod, but she believed there was nothing wrong with that decision. Society’s roles should be divided according to one’s abilities. Her students weren’t Superhumans nor had any particularly outstanding skills, so staying in the Fourth Life Pod, where they could generate power, was the best choice for them. What had she done wrong?

Shen Moling let out a cold laugh as if she wanted to say more, but Meng Zixuan quickly covered her mouth.

"Enough! Stop talking, or you’ll get us into trouble," Meng Zixuan warned, pulling Shen Moling’s hand away from her mouth.

Shen Moling shot Liang Yue a resentful glare before turning on her heel and retreating to her room. Meng Zixuan, left behind, looked apologetically at her former teacher.

"Bing’er, don’t be mad at her. She’s just been through some bad experiences," Meng Zixuan said, bowing to Liang Yue in apology.

Liang Yue took a deep breath, trying to steady her nerves. Could things be happening in the Fourth Life Pod that she was unaware of?

"Zixuan, what happened in the Fourth Life Pod?" Liang Yue asked, her voice filled with concern.

Meng Zixuan hesitated, biting her lip. Finally, she spoke, "After you left, many of our classmates disappeared."

"Disappeared? How could that happen?"

"We don’t know why. They were taken away, and we never saw them again," Meng Zixuan explained, her tone filled with sorrow. "I’m sorry, Teacher Liang, but that’s all I know. If you want to discover what happened, you should investigate yourself."

"Or maybe just pretend none of it ever happened—don’t ask any more questions," she added before quickly turning and fleeing down the hallway as if afraid of being implicated in something dangerous.

Liang Yue stood there, her mind racing. The students she had worked so hard to protect had disappeared in West Hill Base inexplicably?

"Could it be a misunderstanding? Maybe they were reassigned to other tasks, and no one else knows?" Liang Yue thought, but she knew this was a flimsy excuse.

The Third Life Pod was guarded by regular soldiers stationed at West Hill Base. The Second Life Pod, where she now lived, housed only top-tier talent, including Superhumans like herself. Those missing students couldn’t have gone to the Third Life Pod, and she would have seen them if they had been brought to the Second Life Pod.

Something major was behind their disappearance.

Liang Yue felt a growing unease. She couldn’t rest until she found out the truth. After all, she was a teacher—a protector of her students. She led them out of Tianqing Academy and felt responsible for their safety.

Taking a deep breath, Liang Yue decided to investigate the Fourth Life Pod herself, despite the late hour.

West Hill Base had strict security, with access between the different Life Pods tightly controlled. It was easy for someone from a higher-ranked pod to visit a lower one, but the reverse was strictly forbidden. However, Liang Yue’s status as a captain in the ACE Special Forces granted her the authority to move freely.

She went to the Fourth Life Pod, where the power generators ran 24/7 to supply the entire base with electricity. She went directly to the student dormitories and woke several students.

Seeing Liang Yue, the students immediately burst into tears and hugged her, desperate for help.

"Teacher Liang, you’re finally here! Are you here to take us away?"

"It’s so hard here—I’m so tired!"

"Teacher Liang, several of our classmates were taken away and never came back. Are they dead? What kind of place is this?"

Their cries woke the other students, who crowded around Liang Yue, seeing her as a beacon of hope. Everyone begged her to take them away.

Liang Yue comforted them as best she could before asking about the missing students.

The remaining students exchanged uneasy glances. Some were terrified, others indifferent, and a few even seemed envious.

Some speculated that the missing students had been taken away as food, while others thought their families had rescued them to live in comfort. Theories ranged from optimistic to pessimistic, leaving Liang Yue’s head spinning. These students knew little about the actual situation.

However, one thing was certain: every so often, someone would come to select one or two students, and those taken never returned.

"Teacher Liang, I’m so scared! What if I’m next?" one girl cried, clutching Liang Yue’s sleeve with tearful eyes.

Beside her, a boy shrugged it off. "What are you so scared of? We have nothing; why would they harm us? Those people probably just went to work somewhere else. Don’t overthink it."

Liang Yue was equally confused. She seemed to need to inquire with someone from a higher Life Pod to learn the truth.

"I’ll see Ge Rou tomorrow and demand to know where my students are!" Liang Yue resolved, determined not to let anything happen to her students.

After calming the students, she left the dormitory. The hallway was pitch black, as the lights were turned off at night to conserve energy. A low, familiar voice spoke from the shadows as she reached a corner.

"Teacher Liang, do you want to know where those students went?"

Liang Yue turned sharply towards the voice.

"Wu Chengyu?"

The voice belonged to Wu Chengyu, the class monitor. As a student leader, he interacted more with the teachers, so Liang Yue immediately recognized his voice.

Wu Chengyu stepped out of the shadows, cautiously glancing around before whispering, "Teacher Liang, come with me​."

Author's Note