N-M Chapter 116 [This is not gratitude, it is submission]
Chapter 116 [This is not gratitude, it is submission]
As the sun set, it dyed the valley a dark red.
The wind swept through the ruins, carrying with it fine dust and the smell of blood.
The ground was covered with a layer of dried, dark red fungal carpet. The monsters that had wanted to devour everything not long ago had now turned into grayish-white powder.
A gust of wind blew, and dust rose up, covering the survivors' faces and hair.
Everyone remained in their fighting stance.
Their eyes were fixed on the four figures in the center of the battlefield.
Li Yao let out a burp. She put her hand down and wiped her mouth.
The deadly crimson fog that surrounded her was now completely gone, leaving not a trace.
Her face even flushed slightly from eating, and her gray robes moved without wind.
Lightning Blade, standing at the very front, swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing as he made a "gulp" sound.
An opportunity had arrived, his brain was frantically alerting him.
The opponent has just unleashed their ultimate move; now is the best time to go up and strike up a conversation.
Just by asking "What kind of task is there?" or even just getting some recognition by taking a picture and posting it on the forum, you can get tens of thousands of clicks.
"Big..." Lightning Blade raised his right foot, trying to take a step forward.
But his feet stopped in mid-air.
Li Yao turned her head and glanced over, her eyes revealing no emotion, as if she didn't even see them as human beings.
That look in his eyes was like he wanted to devour someone.
Lightning Blade's right foot began to tremble. Intense fear made him stand rooted to the spot, his jaw clenched tightly, afraid of attracting attention.
It wasn't just him.
The players around them, who were usually fearless and treated death as a daily occurrence, were now all too afraid to move, speak, or even breathe.
The four-person group completely ignored the hundreds or even thousands of gazes around them.
Chen Kai flicked his wrist, twirling the gun, and retracted [Breath of the Sky] behind him.
"Durability dropped by three percent." Chen Kai glanced down at the spear tip. "Those monsters' bones are a bit hard; I'll have to get the dwarves to fix them when we get back."
Wang Xuan put away the golden light shield and reached out to pat the dust off his shoulder.
"Not bad, you've gained a lot of experience." Wang Xuan swiped open the panel, tapping the air with his finger. "Aijia, are you done collecting the data?"
"There aren't enough samples." Ai Jia was toying with a fragment of black crystal in her hand. "They haven't fully evolved, these samples are useless, let's throw them away."
She tossed it casually; the crystal traced a line in the air before falling into the ground.
"Let's go," Chen Kai said. "We're going back to the village to get something to eat. Li Yao just finished eating, but I'm still hungry."
"I want to eat barbecue," Li Yao said softly, her voice gentle, completely belying that she had just swallowed a natural disaster.
The four people turned around and walked towards the tribe.
They were just chatting casually about things like what to have for dinner, equipment durability, and how to get back to town.
The players instinctively made way, and the crowd parted to both sides.
Just like Moses parted the Red Sea.
A passage several meters wide appeared in the center of the battlefield, leading directly to the tribe's gate.
Whether it's players who are blinded by rage, proud tribal warriors, or even ordinary players wearing tattered animal hides and carrying things in the back, it doesn't matter.
They all had their heads down, their bodies pressed tightly against the broken wall beside them, as if they wanted to squeeze themselves into the cracks between the bricks.
The four of them walked onto the passageway.
Chen Kai passed by a tall player.
This is a berserker who wields strength, and he also holds a double-edged battle axe with bits of monster flesh hanging from the blade.
He's quite a celebrity on the forum, known for his recklessness.
Chen Kai felt something sticky on the spear shaft, and he flicked his wrist slightly.
hum.
The gun barrel vibrated, and a drop of dark red blood was flung out.
Just a drop of blood.
The berserker, who was nearly two meters tall, suddenly felt his legs go weak and staggered back several steps, dropping his battle axe with a clatter to the side.
No one laughed at him. Everyone held their breath, staring at the splattered blood on the ground, then stealing a glance at the retreating figure who hadn't stopped.
At the end of the passage stood two people.
Tribal chieftain Terra, war leader Karn.
They were once the leaders and chiefs here.
Kahn's spear had taught countless disobedient players a lesson, and Terra's words had determined the life and death of countless people.
But now, they are just two elderly people in their twilight years.
Kahn's bone armor was shattered, and his once-proud muscles were covered in wounds.
Terra dropped the bone whistle from her hand, and her once straight back bent over.
They watched as four people walked towards them.
Kahn released the spear he had held for most of his life. The weapon slipped and embedded itself in the dirt at his feet.
Terra straightened her tattered robe.
The group of four walked up to them.
Chen Kai stopped in his tracks.
"It's solved," he said.
Terra took a deep breath, bent his knees, and knelt down in front of all the clansmen and outsiders. This old chieftain, who had never bowed his head to anyone, had never done so before.
His head drooped low, his forehead touching the cold ground.
Kahn, the once arrogant war maniac standing next to him, also knelt down.
Following the actions of the two leaders, the surviving tribal warriors laid down their weapons and knelt down in unison.
The wind blew through the ruins, carrying away the bloody smell of the battlefield.
The group of four didn't react in any particular way to the two leaders kneeling before them. Chen Kai simply nodded and walked past them.
Wang Xuan, Ai Jia, and Li Yao followed behind, heading east towards the forest shrouded in mist.
That is the source of the plague, and also the true core area of this instance.
Until their figures completely disappeared at the horizon.
"ha--"
"Cough cough cough—"
An invisible barrier was lifted, and the thousands of players and natives who were kneeling on the ground, pressed against the walls, or huddled behind rocks relaxed.
In those few short minutes, no one dared to breathe.
They were afraid of disturbing the four beings.
The open space in front of the tribal council hall was in a mess.
"You...you survived?" A player named "I Don't Eat Cilantro" slumped in the mud, the broken wooden spear in his hand rolling to the side.
The tribe's chieftain, Terra, and the war leader, Karn, helped each other to their feet, their backs appearing even more hunched at that moment.
They bowed deeply to the east, their eyes filled with nothing but humility before the gods.
[World Announcement: The first phase of the monster tide has been cleared.]
[Current area security level: Extremely high.]
These two short lines announced the end of this near-annihilation disaster.
The official forum's server froze for a moment, then the traffic data exploded vertically at a 90-degree angle.
The posts refreshed so fast they were invisible to the naked eye, but no one was celebrating the victory or bragging about how many monsters they had just killed.
The title of the pinned hot post has changed.
The article has changed from "How to Survive" to "On the Ultimate Powerlessness After Numerical Inflation - Do We Really Need This Kind of Beta Testing?".
Number of replies: 5+
"Brothers, I uninstalled it, I'm so frustrated; what was that just now? A mass curse? Concept erasure? We risked our lives to fill in the gaps, and they just wiped the map with a flick of their fingers."
"Don't be so dramatic, upstairs. That was a plot-driven death, definitely a plot-driven death! I don't believe players can have those stats at this stage."
"Plot-driven deaths? Have you ever seen plot-driven NPCs that can run around the map freely and interact with us? They even have player IDs and system panels!"
"That woman... she ate the plague; she actually ate the debuff that made me drop two levels like a snack; I feel like my worldview has shattered."
"Go wash up and go to sleep. This isn't a game for us." Zhang Wei leaned against a mud wall that hadn't collapsed yet, his fingers stiffly moving in the air as he operated his personal system panel.
He is the leader of the farming faction and the most rational and data-savvy strategist in the entire guild.
When the group of four passed by, he didn't bow his head in fear like the others; instead, he did something that no one else dared to do.
He pressed the use button on the [Intermediate Detection Technique] scroll that he had just spent a lot of money to acquire.
Target locked: The soldier at the very front (Chen Kai).
Now, the investigation report has been generated.