The three of them finally understood why this guy insisted on bringing them up here.
They were almost fainting from shock.
Li Yongqin stammered, his words barely coherent: “Pre…ah, Brother Hong. Maybe you’ve just arrived and don’t yet know what that thing means. In short, the three of us are afraid we might not be able to handle this, this… daunting task.”
“You can.”
Hong Haocheng placed his hand on Li Yongqin’s shoulder and encouraged him: “As the saying goes, nothing in the world is difficult for one who sets his mind to it.”
Cui Rong shivered as he looked at Hong Haocheng.
“Chief, how about we first practice for a year or two, or maybe five or six, and come back when our skills are better? It won’t be too late either…”
Hong Haocheng took a step forward, came to his side, and comforted him:
“As another saying goes, three cobblers with their wits pooled together equal Zhuge Liang himself. We have four people here, and a mere little monster is nothing.”
Cui Rong was on the verge of tears.
Zhang Miao looked over and just opened his mouth when Hong Haocheng swept his gaze toward him:
“Miao, you’ve been with me the longest and know my heart best. As the saying goes, when people are of one mind, they can move Mount Tai. You know that, right? Don’t worry, I already have a detailed plan.”
“A detailed plan?” Zhang Miao looked at him suspiciously.
Since there was a detailed plan, the three of them, who had already reached the island’s center, exchanged glances and each began to ponder.
After a few seconds, Li Yongqin gritted his teeth and said:
“Brother Hong, since you managed to lead us deep into the island, I’ll choose to trust you for now. Please tell us your detailed plan, and we’ll discuss and refine it together. If we can still pick up one or two Void Zero weapons, we’ll be rock-solid in this world!”
Upon hearing these words, Zhang and Cui still harbored fear in their hearts, but considering the potential payoff, it could indeed be their chance to turn things around in this world.
Everyone’s model abilities were pretty useless, so such weapons were a colossal boon.
“Fortune favors the bold, they say…” Zhang Miao hesitated, glancing at the flickering expressions of the other two.
He thought about how Hong Haocheng seemed almost magical—like a hiker following a wild trail, he had inexplicably led them straight into the core zone. This was a feat that even so-called experts in the city couldn’t accomplish in one or two years.
If this young man truly had a flawless strategy, today might be the moment to change their fate.
Zhang Miao tried to calm himself: “Alright, Brother Hong, let’s hear your plan then?”
Cui Rong looked over with barely concealed longing.
A glint of anticipation flickered in Li Yongqin’s eyes.
Hong Haocheng cleared his throat, fixing his gaze on the three people crouched in the grass.
“My plan is this—I’ll go throw rocks at it, get it chasing me, and while it’s distracted, you guys rush to search its nest. There’ll definitely be more valuable weapons hidden nearby.”
The three of them stood frozen as if turned to stone.
Hong Haocheng picked up a dusty fragment of brick, clutching it in his hand.
“No objections, right? No objections, and I’ll make my move.”
“What? Wait, you’re going in just like that?”
Seeing Hong Haocheng darting out like a crouching rabbit, the three rushed over frantically and pulled him back.
“What kind of crap plan is that!”
“President, calm down. This is a life-or-death situation.”
“Absolutely not. We can try again, but dying is real!”
“You don’t trust me?” Hong Haocheng sighed helplessly as he was stopped. “As the old saying goes, one good man with three…”
“Shut up.” Li Yongqin haphazardly covered his mouth.
“Why won’t you–”
The three held onto his arm and dragged him back into the grass.
“Let go of the brick.”
Zhang Miao pried the half-brick out of his hand with force.
But just as they were moving, the Bound Spirit in the distance, its body flickering with threads of light, turned its energy head in confusion, looking toward the direction of the rustling sound.
It hesitated, stepped forward one pace at a time, then froze.
“Aahh～”
A thunderous roar resounded through the night.
This sound-emitting Bound Spirit had already recognized that familiar figure, and with a thumping stride, it ran over.
“We’ve been found!”
“Quick, you guys circle around. I’ll draw it away.” Hong Haocheng immediately broke free from their grip as he spoke.
Zhang Miao and the others showed expressions of regret and determination.
“No time to argue. Go, do it now!”
A faint ring of light flickered in Hong Haocheng’s eyes as he snatched up a stone and madly bolted to the side.
The Bound Spirit, still remembering how Hong Haocheng had provoked it a few days ago, immediately gave chase to the boy. As its roar spread through the silent twilight, heavy and chaotic footsteps echoed from all directions within the dilapidated city.
“Let’s run,” Cui Rong said, his voice tinged with sobs.
Seeing that the terrifying figure, rumored among high-tier teams, was truly chasing after Hong Haocheng, Li Yongqin gritted his teeth and said through clenched jaws:
“Haocheng created an opportunity for us with his life. If it means risking my neck, so be it!”
Ignoring the other two, he dashed off frantically from another direction, heading hundreds of meters away.
At that moment, the man’s heart pounded wildly, the skin of his scalp feeling as if it were about to tear from the surging blood flowing through his veins.
Without a word, Zhang Miao crushed an acceleration Ability Sphere and followed suit.
Cui Rong hesitated for a moment, glancing at the two grilled fish at his feet, then bit the bullet and charged forward with a stomp of his foot.
“Wait for me!”
“Wait my ass, hurry up!”
The three of them, as if injected with stimulants, felt their very souls were about to be forced out of their bodies as the footsteps grew closer and closer.
Suddenly, an enormous pile of shattered bones and corpses came into their view.
The monster had made these remains its nest! Countless broken weapons lay scattered around it.
“Ah!” Li Yongqin let out a low roar.
His trembling legs, once again filled with strength, straightened up, and he charged headlong into the pile.
By the twilight glow, the man’s eyes quickly swept across the horrifying scene for anything useful.
[I discovered a Chrono Weapon.]
He dashed toward a pitch-black longsword with several nicks already on it. The moment his hand touched it, a sensation washed over him.
“Sixty years? Too bad, it’s not a Virtual Zero Timeline Weapon.”
[I discovered a Chrono Weapon.]
Li Yongqin lifted the sword.
[I discovered another Chrono Weapon.]
[There seems to be another one ahead.]
“Damn, so many of them.”
Rumble, rumble—the heavy footsteps grew closer.
The two behind him rushed to his side when suddenly, a massive tree exploded in the distance, snapped by a Bound Spirit. A figure charged toward them with terrifying wind pressure!
“Why are there so many of these Chrono Weapons?”
Cui Rong tried to pull out a weapon embedded deep in a corpse, but it wouldn’t budge. He abandoned it at once and dove deeper.
“Damn, that weapon has sixty-five years on it. Worth at least ten to twenty thousand temporal units!”
Li Yongqin glanced at the figure charging in from dozens of meters away. “Find a Virtual Zero Timeline Weapon, fast!”
Like ants on a hot pan, the three figures scrambled frantically through the debris of weapons and broken bones.
With his mind nearly blank from panic, Li Yongqin looked up into the distance again. Several figures had already appeared.
Zhang Miao coldly lifted his head. “I still have three acceleration orbs. I’ll lure them away—you keep going!”
As he spoke, he picked up a piece of bone shard and hurled it at the monster over a dozen meters away.
These things caused no harm to the Bound Spirit but could easily enrage these unintelligent monsters. The massive azure body immediately pounded its chest wildly and charged toward Zhang Miao.
“Well done. He succeeded too. Let’s hurry.”
“These two guys, seriously, they’re damn crazy!”
Cui Rong also mustered some courage, planting his legs, which had been itching to run, firmly among the bones.
Several monsters that had been skirting the edge of the area were running toward the direction of the continuous roars, paying no attention to the two here.
This bought a little more time for Li Yongqin and his companion, whose hearts were already in their throats.
Suddenly, a massive running figure on the other side halted and looked over.
“Ah, we’ve been spotted!”
“Quick, hurry, find it—two hundred meters, we still have some time before it gets here!”
Li Yongqin desperately bent down, fumbling among the pile of weapons, touching the safe parts of them.
The monster was drawing closer, its swinging arms like the fluttering wings of Death, whipping through the air with a whistling sound.
“Run!” Cui Rong jumped up.
He nervously sprinted through the heap of bones, then after rounding a small mound, suddenly caught a faint glimmer of light.
On the other side of that mound, twenty meters away, a battered building was barely recognizable, but its iron gate stood stubbornly erect.
Inside the doorway, a faint chaotic glow emanated.
The ground nearby was relatively clean.
“This is… that door.”
Cui Rong stared at it blankly.
Countless silver-white zigzag lines surged across his chest like waves, appearing and disappearing.
{Who’s inside?}
{Someone’s on the island’s center?!}
{Which team is it!}
“The door.” Cui Rong looked at the door blankly.
Behind it lay countless legendary treasures. How many had tried to pass through it, hoping to find deeper power in this world, only to fail and lose even their lives?
But right now, it was right in front of him.
“Found it!”
Cui Rong suddenly snapped back to reality. Li Yongqin excitedly held up a longsword emitting faint gray-black fine ripples!
Thump thump thump!
The ground trembled like hooves on soil as the towering figure rushed forward, accompanied by Bound Spirits emitting a blue glow.
“Move!”
Li Yongqin crushed an acceleration ball, grabbed Cui Rong by the arm, and ran sideways. Passing a weapon embedded in the ground, Cui Rong yanked it up and stumbled along as they fled.
{Just who is inside, after all.}
{Is it one of our people alive in there? Reply!}
“Roaaaar~” The distant special Bound Spirit let out another roar, shaking the entire island.
The Bound Spirits now close behind them hesitated briefly, then veered sharply and turned back, summoned away.
The two, whose brains felt about to burst from the frantic running, suddenly experienced a strange sensation of cooling numbness and tingling jostling inside their heads. “We’ve been freed.”
“Saved…”
……
Waves of mental pressure radiated outward.
Roars echoed across the island.
Inside the large tent at the shore, several captains who were discussing where to start exploring tomorrow lifted their heads. Feeling the spreading mental pressure, their expressions shifted one after another.
“There’s actually someone deep inside the island?”
Cheng Yunze quickly walked out of the tent, gazing toward the depths of the island under the glow of the setting sun.
Another roar came from deep within. A group of several dozen people buzzed with discussion around the tent.
“How strange.”
“Who’s so reckless? Just a few days ago, someone died, and now another dares to go in.”
Cheng Yunze listened for a while, his expression faintly changing.
Jiang Junyi and others came out, and Cheng Yunze turned his head to ask, “They say something similar happened before. Is that true?”
“Yes, there was a similar incident a few days ago. It seemed like something disturbed that guarding Bound Spirit, and all the monsters on the island were rushing there.”
One person speculated, “Maybe it’s not a human, but an internal territorial dispute among them?”
“Impossible. With that monster in control, no second one will emerge from the gate. It’s the uncrowned king of this island. No other Bound Spirit dares to challenge it.”
Cheng Yunze’s face changed, and he let out a heavy snort. “Fools. Do you think that place is a market where anyone can just walk in?”
He quickly returned to the tent.
The expressions of those around him changed. Indeed, even if someone wanted to go in and die, how could two people have managed to penetrate the core in such a short time?
It must have been the work of the same person!
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