Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Hu! Hu!
In the forest, Phoenix’s running speed had already been greatly reduced. She felt like both of her legs were powerless, and presently, she nearly tripped over a tree vine on the ground.
“Damn it, why make this game so realistic?” Phoenix complained aloud as she panted hard. “Why should playing a game be so torturous?!” She felt like she was indeed unable to run anymore and had to stop for a while first. “My stamina is only left with 11 percent. Even if I were to continue running, I would, at most, last just another one or two minutes!”
Taking time to stop and look at her attribute panel, Phoenix’s face, still enchanting under the shine of the moonlight, turned a little grim. It was important to note that the lower one’s stamina went in the game, the slower its rate of recovery would be—to fully recover her stamina level now would require half an hour’s time. But with this Hunter’s ability to be able to directly lock on to the positions of all the participants of the “battle royale” game, it would clearly be impossible for her to have half an hour’s time.
“If I had known it would be a bad thing for points to exceed the original, I shouldn’t have let her come out and help!”
Just then, with a conflicted look on her face, she suddenly let loose a strange outburst. After that, however, her face changed again into an expression of distress.
“Losing levels upon death isn’t so bad. After all, to train my way back is still very easy. But it wasn’t easy to collect my Red Lotus full set; it’d explode if I were to die on this mission!”
As she thought of her full set of Level-45 Rare armor—already unlocked except for one piece—Phoenix’s forehead creased in distress! Plus, the Agent Hidden Profession Mission would be failed as well… She personally did not really like this mission, but she, on the other hand, was determined to own it!
“Right, where are the other four people of the investigation? I’ve already left quite a few signs at eye-catching points, but I haven’t met anyone even up until now. It can’t be that they’ve all been finished off by other players or NPCs!”
The pupils of Phoenix’s red eye-shadowed eyes displayed a look of doubt.
“But it can’t be… It’s fine if it’s those from the other two departments. This group of ours boasts the first and second-place positions on the leaderboard. Logically, they shouldn’t die so easily on such a mission!”
Phoenix recalled the two players disguised as NPCs sitting across her in Haruko’s room. She had intentionally neglected Big Pineapple, of course, who was ranked behind her.
“Hmm… Why am I wasting time thinking about this? No way! I must continue running. Humph! If I’m not in last, I can’t admit defeat no matter what!”
Phoenix regained her senses, straightened up, and slapped the tree beside her with a hand as she said, gritting her teeth.
“Ah!”
However, with that slap, a completely unexpected situation occurred. Her arm, unprotected without a hand guard, suddenly felt pain. At the same moment, a “−1846” damage coefficient appeared above her head.
“There’s a snake hiding on the tree!”
Phoenix had already withdrawn her hand as she looked at the area her hand had slapped. There, she now spotted a triangular-headed, black venomous snake that could only be vaguely distinguished amid the dark environment.
“It’s a Level-40 Elite monster!”
She hurriedly raised the Alloy Longsword in her hand and unleashed a Level-35 “Devastating Slash,” slicing the snake clean in two right at the center with a more than 2,000-point lethal damage coefficient!
However, this snake, even with its body cut into two sections, still was not dead yet. Its head, which had fallen onto the ground, actually sprang back up, quickly biting the armor at her thigh!
Although most of the parts of the armor on her body were empty, the system’s calculation of defense still applied. As such, while the message after the first attack indicated it was a Level-40 Elite monster venomous snake, the second bite only caused white damage of less than 700.
Phoenix, who waved her longsword once again, used two normal attack damages of over 1,000 to completely finish off the venomous snake!
Clearly, based on the damage sustained, this red suit of armor was definitely not just equipment for superficial attractiveness.
“So unlucky! To actually encounter an Elite monster at this time! Hmm… What…? I’m poisoned…!”
After finishing off this venomous snake, Phoenix’s expression changed as she looked at the system message.
It was important to know that there were quite a few clusters of monsters and Elite monsters on this island; during the “equipment-naked” period at the start, at least 100 people had died from the attacks of these monsters. However, the equipment of the participants was almost full now. Although the damage of this Elite venomous snake, at only Level 40, wasn’t much of a threat to average players, it was even less of an issue for Phoenix, who was fully clad in Rare equipment. She had finished it off with just two slashes.
The problem was, beyond its physical attack, this venomous snake also had a very rare “numbing” toxin. After a slight delay, it would send the victim into a “numb” state for a certain period of time. Only by using an antidote would this toxin’s effect be able to be reduced or eliminated. Or she could wait for the Biochip to detoxify it automatically, but this detoxification process required at least half a minute’s time!
“Half a minute! This is killing me!”
Feeling her body already losing control, Phoenix gritted her teeth. She had the antidote in her backpack, but she did not have enough remaining points to unlock it, and half a minute’s time would be more than sufficient for the Hunter behind her to close in.
In actual fact, there was no half a minute to spare—within only 10 seconds, the huge, heavy silhouette of the Hunter with the blinking red dots in its metallic eye sockets, glowing in the dark of the night, had already entered her field of view. With its night vision ability, it was obviously impossible for it not to see Phoenix as she moved!
Ka! Ka!
The red dots of its eyes blinked as they locked onto its target. The powerful heavy firearm in Hunter T-750’s hand was already raised and aimed straight in Phoenix’s direction, and the metallic-golden fingers revealed from the broken artificial skin had already pressed down hard on the trigger.
Just when it seemed that in the next moment, Phoenix, whose defense was not considerably high, would be shot dead by the bullets from this powerful assault rifle and unfortunately be eliminated…
Ping!
Suddenly, a low, muffled gunshot resounded from inside the forest.
A bullet with a faint blue glow shot out from behind her to the right without warning, outstandingly striking a precise hit to the right wrist of the Hunter holding the firearm!
Clang!
Despite the power of the Barrett, combined with the power of an energy armor-breaking bullet, it was still impossible to break the alloy arm of T-750 with a single shot. But the powerful force of a large-caliber bullet at a distance of less than 100 meters was sufficient to strike a distance from the metallic arm of a robot with astonishing strength!
Ta, ta, ta…
Plants bent and snapped beneath the bullets, tree bark cracked, and the dirt on the ground erupted in all directions! T-750’s finger had nonetheless pulled the trigger. By relying on his Scout Beetle’s vision, Feng Luo had managed a one-in-a-million shot, which caused the Hunter’s rifle muzzle to swing far out of range!
−607
−543
As the barrage swept in Phoenix’s direction, only two bullets hit her red armor. However, the bullets had actually caused over 1,000 damage to this player with a full set of Rare equipment! It felt like the power of the firearm in the hand of this Hunter was no lower than the damage caused by the Scout “agent instructor” from before!
Phoenix was still in a “numb” state. Due to more than 2,000 HP being lost from the combat with the Elite venomous snake, her HP had already been reduced by half. Even though Feng Luo had come in with a godly shot—saving her from an attack from a distance away—the danger actually hadn’t been eliminated!
Even though accurately hit by the energy armor-breaking bullet, the powerful strength of the Hunter T-750 allowed it to adjust the muzzle of its heavy assault rifle back into aim.
Due to the Barrett’s problem regarding firing intervals, even if Feng Luo had engaged “Rapid Shooting,” he would not have been able to fire continuously within a second. That means he wouldn’t be able to save Phoenix again as planned!
Ta, ta, ta…
The Hunter T-750 pulled the trigger once more. Flames erupted from the rifle’s muzzle like a fiery snake in the darkness of the night as a series of bullets were fired straight at the paralyzed Phoenix!
