But Xu An remained unmoved.
"Thirty it is, but you must keep this matter confidential," the man gritted out.
Only then did a hint of a smile appear on Xu An's composed face.
"Deal!"
The staff member beside the man felt an unsettling aura from Xu An's smile. She subtly tugged at the man's sleeve, "Supervisor, are you sure about that mineral vein? Is it really okay to tell Xu An?"
After the call ended, the supervisor rolled his eyes and pulled his sleeve free.
"It's fine. What can they even take? This is also the higher-ups' decision. Xu An has huge popularity right now. Compared to the mineral vein, Xu An and her team are more valuable."
After speaking, the man ignored the woman and turned to leave the broadcast hall. A mountain of tasks awaited his attention.
The woman stood alone, gazing at Xu An's smiling face on the screen.
For some reason, she had a premonition that Xu An could empty the entire mineral vein.
However, this premonition would indeed come true not long after.
By then, the girl would have already left and found a new job.
Zhou Haimei watched Xu An hang up the phone and pouted. "That was such hard work just now." She then remembered the surveillance cameras and the live broadcast, and tried to cover her mouth.
Xu An, however, smiled and shook her head. "It's fine. I've already communicated with the organizers. They'll mute our feed and only enable the audio at specific times."
Hearing this, Zhou Haimei finally felt at ease and began to speak.
Initially, Xu An had wanted to completely disable the audio for their live stream. However, during negotiations, the organizers proposed that the audio for Xu An's stream would be set as VIP paid content, with Xu An receiving a thirty percent cut of all revenue.
Considering the massive population on Lighthouse, even a thirty percent share would be quite considerable.
From the organizers' repeated concessions, Xu An had already deduced that their popularity on Lighthouse was likely not low.
It was precisely this popularity that gave Xu An the leverage to negotiate.
After resolving the live broadcast issue, Xu An lowered her head and looked at the map again.
"Let's head southeast next. According to what that man said, there are snow bears there. They are large but have low attack power, and their fur provides excellent warmth."
Zhou Haimei paused for a moment upon hearing this. "Are we going to hunt bears?" she blurted out, still processing. "Aren't bears protected animals?" After saying this, Zhou Haimei lowered her head in embarrassment, her neck flushing red.
Yes, in this post-apocalyptic world, what protection or protected animals were there?
Moreover, the animals here had long since mutated.
Now displaying their ferocity, it wasn't a matter that could be glossed over simply because Xu An and the others didn't act.
Even if Xu An and her group didn't make a move, those bears would still attack humans.
Guan Shan had no objections, and the group headed towards the marked location.
The place wasn't too far.
When Xu An and the others arrived, it was around three or four in the afternoon, and the sky had not yet completely darkened.
Xu An crouched behind a rock formation, peering at the cave ahead.
"The snow bears should be inside. Let's scout it first. If they're easy to deal with, we'll take care of them now. If not, we'll come back during the day tomorrow. It's getting dark soon, and we need to get back to camp before nightfall."
The snowfields at night not only caused one to completely lose their sense of direction, but the drastic temperature drop could also lead to severe body temperature imbalances.
Zhou Haimei and Guan Shan understood the risks and nodded in agreement.
Xu An thought for a moment, took out a piece of canned ham she carried, tied it to her hand with a rope, and secured it.
Then, she forcefully swung the rope.
The piece of canned ham landed perfectly at the entrance of the dark cave.
"An'an, will this method work?" Zhou Haimei sounded doubtful. She hadn't heard of snow bears eating canned ham.
Xu An pouted helplessly. "There aren't any suitable bait items here, so we'll have to make do. What if these bears just happen to like canned ham?"
Zhou Haimei replied, "Alright."
The three waited behind the rocks for about ten minutes, but there was still no movement from inside.
Even Xu An began to doubt herself. "Do bears really not eat canned ham?"
Zhou Haimei, however, looked around and offered a more plausible explanation.
"Maybe it's too cold, and the canned ham froze in the snow, so it's not emitting any scent. Or perhaps there's no one in this cave at all."
Xu An thought it made sense and handed the rope with the canned ham to Zhou Haimei.
"You two wait here. If the bears come back, use this rope to pull me, and I'll come out quickly."
As soon as Xu An finished speaking, Zhou Haimei understood what she intended to do.
"You want to go into the bear cave alone? Xu An! You're looking for death!"
Zhou Haimei's attitude was firm; she absolutely refused to let Xu An go in alone.
Guan Shan, who had been like an invisible presence, stepped forward voluntarily and pointed to himself.
Indicating that he could go.
However, Guan Shan's action did not receive approval from either of them. Zhou Haimei impatiently slapped Guan Shan's hand away.
"Don't be a nuisance. If Xu An goes down and something happens, she can at least say a few words for help. If you, a silent dummy, go down, we won't even know if something happens."
Her words were blunt but true. Guan Shan understood that the woman was looking out for him.
He didn't have any ridiculous machismo that compelled him to play the hero. Since the sisters said he couldn't go, Guan Shan obediently stood back and no longer mentioned going down.
Xu An looked at Zhou Haimei, understanding her thoughts and that Zhou Haimei was simply worried about her.
"You know I won't get hurt. Besides, I'm the only one among us who can go in and guarantee my safety. You know that."
Xu An blinked. She knew Zhou Haimei understood the meaning behind her words.
She possessed spatial abilities. As long as she sensed danger a moment before it struck, she could enter her space and be completely unharmed.
Zhou Haimei was aware of this fact.
However, she was still uneasy about Xu An going in alone.
But at this moment, there was no other option. Zhou Haimei could only cautiously warn Xu An, "Don't push yourself. Come out immediately if anything happens."