"They insisted on following us!" Yue Xiaoyan was furious. "Shi Rukui didn't want to go with them, but they said Nanshan wasn't theirs, so we couldn't stop them..."

Lu Cai paid attention to the surrounding movements. After hearing her words, he smiled and said, "I guess you have been taking good care of them along the way—"

Yue Xiaoyan pouted: "That bandit girl in tiger skin has a good personality. We helped her if we could..." Who knew that some shameless people would just go for it.

"From what you said just now, there are seven or eight of you, and that boat looks like it can only seat four people..." Cai Lu asked.

Yue Xiaoyan nodded: "The three of us, plus Sun Xiaoqi from before, the others are waiting on the shore." The girl dressed as a flower girl was named Sun Xiaoqi.

Lu Cai recalled the players who had alarmed a large number of scorpion monsters in the woods. They were probably Sun Xiaoqi's companions, but she didn't have time to take a closer look at them at that time.

Yue Xiaoyan thought of something and said angrily, "That Sun Xiaoqi saw that Shi Rukui had healing abilities, so she kept trying to get close to him. Then, when Shi Rukui ignored her, she went after Zhao Yan..."

Cai Lu glanced at Yue Xiaoyan, and seeing that Shi Rukui and Zhao Yan didn't seem to be surprised when she mentioned it, he turned his head away and curled his lips.

It's better to stop gossiping and watching the fun...

She concentrated her attention on trying to find out what was happening ahead. Yue Xiaoyan had just told her about the mechanisms and scorpion groups in the cave.

The mechanism was a secret door, allowing anyone walking through the cave to suddenly change their route. However, the scorpion swarm was unlike any they had encountered before; the scorpions were all normal-sized, their formidable strength and numbers being the only thing that mattered.

The densely packed black scorpions that pounced on us were like troublesome little devils, rushing forward one after another. Probably only a few more cans of insecticide could drive them away.

Lu Cai was not afraid of the situation of encountering a group of scorpions head-on. He was already there and there was no way to hide.

What she cares about is how to get out...

If this is the last level of the entire copy, there must be something crucial.

How to find the "key"?

map!

Lu Cai recalled the memory fragments he obtained after completing the side story. Those fragments were pieced together into a strange mountain map.

Perhaps the mountains on the map are just misleading information, and what they really point to is this secret tunnel.

When she had this guess, she looked up and saw that the dim cave looked like the winding corridor in a maze game.

But will the players just sit there and wait for death? They have props that can get the terrain of this area, such as the white silk handkerchief, without the need for memory fragments.

This is like testing the player's luck. If there happens to be a terrain detection item, the difficulty of passing the level will be reduced.

Unless... there are factors that can interfere with terrain detection...

——

"I said, it's not so easy for us to find the way--" Zhao Yan said unhappily, holding a white silk handkerchief in his hand.

Shi Rukui took the handkerchief and looked at the circular pattern in the center, covered in ripples. Surrounding the circle were tree symbols, symbolizing a forest. In the terrain Bai Juan had explored, this unknown tunnel was obscured by a vast lake.

When he returned to the community, he had to look for it. He didn't believe that he couldn't find a 3D terrain detection prop!

With a sigh, Shi Rukui put away the white silk and looked up at the road ahead. It was a cave passage with no end in sight.

After falling from the lake, they separated from Yue Xiaoyan. Whether she was alone or with that Sun Xiaoqi, it made people feel uneasy.

"I can only keep moving forward." Shi Rukui took a step forward, "One step at a time, it all depends on luck..."

"You said Yue Xiaoyan and Sun Xiaoqi are together, nothing will happen, right?" Zhao Yan could only follow.

Yue Xiaoyan is a person with special abilities, while Sun Xiaoqi is just an ordinary player. But sometimes, what matters is not ability, but face.

Shi Rukui's face darkened. At this moment, the only sound in the corridor was the rustling footsteps of two people.

A flurry of running footsteps approached from the front, and the two men stopped, their weapons tightly gripped in vigilance. That was until a thin figure approached. It turned out to be Sun Xiaoqi.

When she saw the two of them, her gloomy expression immediately turned into excitement.

Sun Xiaoqi rushed up and said, "I finally found you!" She almost ran towards them, tears in her eyes and a mixture of smile and tears on her face.

Before she could rush forward, she stopped in her tracks and saw a long black stick pointed at her head.

"What are you...doing?" Sun Xiaoqi sniffed, her voice trembling slightly, sounding a little pitiful.

Shi Rukui frowned: "Are you alone?"

Sun Xiaoqi trembled and lowered her eyes: "I'm alone... I can't find you guys, I'm scared to death..."

Shi Rukui looked at her. The bruise on her forehead was left by the collision, there were scratches on her left palm from gravel, the skin on her right palm was scraped off, but there was a scratch mark left by a fingernail, and her trouser legs were covered with dust and dirt. Of course, the dirtiest part was the heel of her shoe.

She bumped into something and fell backwards. She was so angry that she didn't dare to speak, so she could only clench her fists and swallow her anger.

If she had encountered danger, she would have cried and complained to them at this time to gain their sympathy. But she only said a few words lightly, which showed that she could not tell them what she had encountered.

"Where is Yue Xiaoyan?" Shi Rukui asked in a cold voice, not giving her a chance to argue.

Sun Xiaoqi looked flustered: "I don't know... I'm not with her..."

"I'm asking you, where is Yue Xiaoyan?" Shi Rukui's face was gloomy, and his originally dull facial features became more vivid after being stained with gloom.

Sun Xiaoqi shuddered, a wave of fear rising within her, yet she felt a deep resentment. These people, relying on their special abilities, looked down upon other players, one after another, treating her like an ant or a blade of grass.

"She was taken away," she replied in a muffled voice. "I don't know who it was."

Taken away by a "person"? Shi Rukui's eyes darkened. Since it was a person, he was either a "player" or an "NPC".

If it was an NPC in this level, there's no reason to capture Yue Xiaoyan and let Sun Xiaoqi go. Furthermore, if the NPC was setting up obstacles, Sun Xiaoqi wouldn't have to be so hesitant and cover up, let alone emphasize that she "didn't know who the other person was."

Thinking that Qin Yu and the other two might have arrived earlier than them, and the person who could do such a thing as abandoning Sun Xiaoqi...

"Have you met Lu Cai?" Shi Rukui asked in a calm tone, all the tension he had just felt gone.

"What?" Zhao Yan couldn't keep up with his pace and was stunned.

Sun Xiaoqi's face turned visibly pale, and she bit her lip without saying a word.

"Let's go." Shi Rukui glanced at her coldly. Sun Xiaoqi had been targeting Yue Xiaoyan all the way, so he naturally had no good feelings towards her. "Don't follow us."

Lu Cai had driven her away, presumably because she had done something irritating. Lu Cai himself was a vindictive person, and Sun Xiaoqi, a coward who bullied the weak, would certainly not dare to provoke Lu Cai.

Therefore, the one who is angry should be...

"Are you really going to leave her here?" Zhao Yan lowered his voice and followed closely behind Shi Rukui.

Shi Rukui glanced at him and said, "How about you stay with her and I leave?"

"No, no, no!" Zhao Yan quickly rejected it, then sighed, "Aren't you a doctor? Doctors are supposed to be kind. Where's your kindness? Shrimp?"

"Doctors are not saviors. Don't use moral blackmail on me." Shi Rukui said coldly.

Seeing his bad face, Zhao Yan didn't dare to ask any more questions and could only comfort him with a few words: "Sister Xiaoyan is with that pervert Lu Cai, so she must be walking sideways. Nothing will happen to her——"

Shi Rukui smiled and said, "You guys actually trust Lu Cai."

Zhao Yan was puzzled: "You suspect Lu Cai? Is there something wrong with her?"

"Is there something wrong with her?" Shi Rukui asked back, "If she was, she wouldn't be fighting monsters with us in this dungeon—"

Zhao Yan laughed heartlessly, "We're fighting monsters in the KB game right now, which is a strange thing to do. Sometimes, I even wonder if I fell asleep and had a strange dream... So, don't take things like NPC awakenings too seriously. As long as she's not a bad person, why bother to delve into her background..."

As if thinking of something, Zhao Yan became hesitant. "If you look closely at your background, a top student like you who studies hard probably wouldn't want to be with me..."

Shi Rukui turned his head to look at Zhao Yan, and seeing that he was a little dazed, he turned back and continued walking: "...Well, I'm dead anyway, and the worst that can happen is that I die again, so why worry so much..."

What's wrong with being a top student? When you die, everything is just a dream.

It’s a pity to think about it, a person lives his life but leaves nothing behind... Not that much, he also left behind a gaming account that ranks first on the list.

——

A dim corridor became wider and wider as I walked along, and the fluorescent light above my head became more intense.

"We can't be that lucky, right?" Yue Xiaoyan asked doubtfully. She looked up at the high cave ceiling, as if she saw a bright starlight. "Could it be that we've found the nest?"

Lu Cai also looked up and said, "I think our luck can't be so good..." Before she finished speaking, as if in response to her words, there was a sound of stones rubbing against each other under her feet.

Before I could react, the bright light in front of my eyes shifted, and after being dazzled, the fluorescent light in the dome disappeared, leaving only darkness.

The two were silent.

Afterwards, Yue Xiaoyan said with a guilty conscience: "This is the mechanism of the stone cave. It's so fast that I don't even have time to use my superpowers..."

"Don't talk—" Lu Cai quickly interrupted her, concentrating and holding his breath. There seemed to be a rustling sound in the distance.

Lu Cai raised his hand, and red silk floated in the air. Several strands clung together, twisting into balls of light the size of ping-pong balls. The balls of light illuminated the surrounding scene.

They were in a narrow passage, facing a stone wall. Turning around and looking behind them, they saw a stone wall made up of small pieces of broken stones.

A strand of red thread penetrated the stone wall, detecting only compacted earth.

Lu Cai was dejected. The craftsmanship of our ancestors was truly remarkable...

The red ball floated towards the front and back of the passage, splitting into several strands of red silk, disappearing into the darkness, and exploring the way ahead.

Lu Cai was concentrating on receiving the information sent back by Hongsi, and Yue Xiaoyan was looking at her, paying attention to her expression.

After a while, Lu Cai suddenly opened her eyes, her gaze fierce: "Let's go!" She pulled Yue Xiaoyan and ran wildly to the left.

Although Yue Xiaoyan was a little confused, she was not stupid. When Lu Cai told her to run, she just ran!

Lu Cai, who was running wildly in front, recalled the scene of sensing the supernatural energy. He only saw a bunch of fast-moving black, one after another, thin and dense, which had blocked the entire passage, like a rushing black water!

That's a swarm of scorpions!