Chapter 262: Survival at Sea, Day 12 (4) Trust in Memory…

A glass bottle about the same size as 250ml of water was filled with blue liquid, and it was impossible to tell what was inside.

After the water bottle left the bucket, the treasure chest bucket disappeared from its original location, leaving only the bottle of azure liquid on the sand.

The logic behind the disappearance of the bucket is the same as that of the treasure chest, except that this bottle of liquid should be unique to the expedition area and cannot be taken away.

There will be no useless things in the apocalypse. What can you do with them if you can’t take them away?

Hua Bie didn't say anything else, but Yu Miaomiao knew it quickly.

Looking around, you can vaguely see several small stone pillars behind the narrow lake.

She had seen someone else take a picture of this scene. The stone pillar was less than 1 meter high and stood there alone.

The top of the stone pillar looks like a spread-out flower, with a small hole in the center of the concave stone petals. No one knows where the hole leads to.

The arrangement of the pillars is very irregular, but you will see a few of them almost every time you pass by a lake. They are neither obstacles blocking the road nor stones that will pop out monsters. Everyone just treats them as decorations.

Yu Miaomiao picked up the bottle, took a photo with the camera in mid-air, then used the experience card again and returned to the base.

There were only two remaining exploration sites for survival at sea, but not many people came. Even after Yu Miaomiao returned to the cabin, he had not received any requests from others to apply to enter.

Feeling the changes in space, Yu Miaomiao was pounced on by a furry creature before he had time to observe the situation at the bottom of the iron rod in his hand.

"Little cutie." Yu Miaomiao hugged the cat, stroked its head, looked at the panic in its eyes, and said apologetically, "Little cutie, I'm sorry, I kept you waiting for so long."

Seeing Xiaoguai opening his mouth to lick her, she quickly reached out and blocked it with her arm.

The entire advanced shield lost 1 point of durability under its licking.

The barbs on the tongue are all capable of attacking, how powerful is that?

Yingying had been staying by Xiaoguai's side the entire time. Seeing the person suddenly appear, she exclaimed, "Sister Miaomiao, you're back! I was planning to tell you about Xiaoguai, but he seemed to be getting better, so I didn't rush to call you."

"Feeling better?" Yu Miaomiao felt that coming back was not a bad thing. Xiaoguai's mood was equally important to her. She stroked Xiaoguai for a while before getting up and asking Yingying, "How was Xiaoguai while I was away at the expedition?"

"When there were flying monsters before, it was quite happy to fight. After the monsters were dealt with, it was normal for me to feed it. When the smog disappeared, Brother Huabie left, and Xiaoguai also had some free time. After that, he started looking for you everywhere. I used a piece of meat to keep it from going into the sea, but I don't know why it didn't seem so anxious later and came back here to wait for you." Yingying walked to the stove and asked naturally, "Sister Miaomiao, all we need is some fire tongue grass, and this wolf meat and shrimp stew will be ready."

Yu Miaomiao was a little embarrassed. Flame Tongue Grass was a must-have in every bucket, but she didn't have any, and she hadn't even made any progress...

Looking at the rankings, he found that his exploration progress had actually increased by 1%, which meant that the treasure chest had indeed been opened, but there was no supplies except for the bottle of blue liquid that he could not take away.

Yu Miaomiao had no choice but to tell Yingying everything. Lulu, who was doing OEM work at the workbench, also came over to help analyze the photos.

Hua Bie originally didn't want to go back to the house for fear of embarrassment, but when he heard the noise inside, he couldn't control his heart. Before he even entered the room, he heard the conversation between several people.

Yingying held her chin and looked at the enlarged photo, carefully recalling the scene of the pillars she saw when she first went there. At that time, she didn't know what Fishman Island looked like, and she didn't dare to dive, so she had to swim quickly to the other side. As a result, there was nothing on the other side of the shore except these pillars. She thought the treasure chest was a pillar, so she studied the stone pillar for a long time.

Yu Miaomiao pointed at the stone pillar and asked, "Is the stone pillar you saw that time also like this?"

"Yes."

"I saw the same thing."

Yingying and Hanabie answered at the same time.

Yingying asked curiously, "Brother Huabie, I didn't even have time to ask you why you came back..."

Before I could see Hua Bie's strange look, I heard Xiaoguai making a "Meow-meow" sound.

Yingying immediately became interested and asked, "Sister Miaomiao, what does Xiaoguai mean by this?"

When Miaomiao was not around, Yingying tried to communicate with Xiaoguai, but failed. It could even be said that apart from food and toys, Xiaoguai would not even pay attention to her. She felt deeply frustrated.

Yu Miaomiao: "I want to masturbate..."

Yingying asked in confusion, "Huh?"

"Xiaoguai means... he wants to be petted." Yu Miaomiao began to cover up. Considering the way he was nodding his head, she started scratching it back and forth, explaining, "Cats are animals that usually only feel happy when you pet them. In real life, some cats will get annoyed and bite people if they're petted too much."

Yingying nodded and responded: "Oh~~~"

Lulu felt helpless about Yingying's indifference to the cat, so she continued the previous topic: "So, Sister Miaomiao, do you think there's something wrong with this stone pillar?"

Yu Miaomiao continued, "Well, I searched around and asked other people, but they all said they didn't know what the pillar was for. I also found a picture of the stone pillar that someone took."

After she finished speaking, she showed the picture to everyone. Hua Bie was standing at the door and couldn't see the picture on the holographic screen clearly. He took a few steps and just as he got closer, he was met with Xiaoguai's low warning roar. With a "ha" sound, he had to stop.

Yu Miaomiao mouthed "I'm sorry" to him.

Who can tell her why Xiaoguai is hostile to Huabie, or why he is trying to establish his presence? Yingying said that when she is not around, Xiaoguai would even eat the food that Huabie put down.

So when Yu Miaomiao and Hua Bie have obvious interactions, Xiaoguai will be particularly angry.

Hua Bie smiled bitterly and stood outside the door, motioning them to continue.

If you zoom in on the photo of the stone pillar, you can see that the small hole in the middle of this petal-shaped object is very small, and it would be difficult to insert even a finger, let alone other knives.

There are no sockets or mechanisms on the outer surface of the stone pillar. It is just a gray stone surface with a slightly sandy texture. Some people have tried to destroy it violently but were unable to move or break the stone pillar.

"Formation?" Lulu asked tentatively. "Looking at the photos, even in the differently numbered expedition sites, the stone pillars behind each lake are in the same position. Could it be that when this stone pillar is activated in some way, some mechanism will appear, revealing some kind of monster or a new treasure chest?"

Iris's voice rang out from behind. "Your guess seems correct. I just dived through five lakes and opened ten treasure chests, and my progress has only increased by 10%. I can already see the end of the island through the telescope. At this rate, I don't think I'll reach 50%. Perhaps the key lies in this stone pillar."

Bucket...as the name suggests, it is a bucket used to hold water, but when other people open this bucket, they get supplies. Of course, there may be liquid supplies such as stimulants in the supplies, but they do not conform to the logic of holding water in a bucket.

The liquid it could contain was the bottle of blue liquid that Yu Miaomiao had seen before, the one that could not be taken away from the expedition site.

It cannot be taken away, so it is used in the expedition site. Where is it used? Around the stone pillars?

If the stone pillars are flowers, then of course they need to be watered. So the blue liquid is the source of water?

When Yu Miaomiao expressed her idea, their eyes lit up and they all felt that this was really possible.

At this time, Xiaoguai's fur had been smoothed by her, and his huge body was lying lazily beside her with his eyes half-closed. Yu Miaomiao was wondering whether she should go there again.

The multiple-use card can be used 10 times, and she has two of them. There are only 8 days left before the ocean survival. After these days, the card will expire. Moreover, this time, her progress only increased by 1 point, which is really too little.

While the others were analyzing the photos, Yu Miaomiao tried to continue communicating with Xiaoguai through her consciousness, "Can I leave for a while? I'll be back soon."

“Meow hey hey——”

Don't you agree?

When Yingying saw Xiaoguai, who was lying on the ground purring comfortably, suddenly make this sound, she knew that Yu Miaomiao must be communicating with him through her consciousness. She didn't bother to continue the discussion and instead asked curiously, "Sister Miaomiao, what does Xiaoguai mean by this?"

Seeing Yingying had taken out a small notebook to record these things, Yu Miaomiao realized that Yingying really cared about Xiaoguai, so she patiently explained: "I told it that I wanted to go to the expedition site again, but it didn't want to."

As Yingying pondered, she habitually bit the tip of her pen and scribbled a few strokes back and forth on the notebook. "Based on my observations of Xiaoguai, after you left, he looked around for people, but not too anxiously. It wasn't until Brother Huabie went to the adventure area that Xiaoguai became restless. When I asked Brother Huabie when I could tell you about this, oh yes, it should be after Brother Huabie came back that Xiaoguai got better."

Lulu caught the key words in her long speech. "You mean, Xiaoguai can accept Sister Miaomiao's temporary departure, but she can't disappear at the same time as the Flower Goddess?"

Yingying's eyes lit up, "Oh, that's right, Xiaoguai, are you worried that Brother Huabie has kidnapped Sister Miaomiao?"

Hearing this, everyone nodded, thinking it made sense. Only Iris looked at Hua Bie and Yu Miaomiao with a slightly ambiguous look.

Hua Bie didn't look at the others, but instead spoke to Yu Miaomiao first: "I'm going to find Siyue to spar with her and practice some fighting skills. I don't plan to go to the expedition area for the time being."

Worried that Miaomiao would say no, Huabie turned around and left.

Yingying's mind wasn't on the adventure at all; her eyes were filled with Xiaoguai. She reached out and tried to touch Xiaoguai's furry head. Seeing that the big cat didn't resist, she thought that Miaoshen's brief absence had helped Xiaoguai let down his guard against others and increased his acceptance of her. She said happily, "Miaoshen, now that Brother Huabie isn't going to the expedition area, you can go to Fishman Island anytime you want. I'll take good care of Xiaoguai."

Lulu held her forehead and said helplessly: "Yingying, stop playing with cats and losing your will. We are now in the end of the world..."

"The main thing is to improve your personal abilities." Yingying continued Lulu's remaining words of instruction, tapping her head with a finger. "Little old woman, don't be so serious. You're starting to get wrinkles."

Now for Miaomiao, leaving Xiaoguai to Yingying's care is indeed a good choice.

After discussing the situation at the expedition site with Iris, Yu Miaomiao confirmed Xiaoguai's feelings again, and surprisingly, it agreed as just analyzed.

With too many questions, Yu Miaomiao set off for Fishman Island again.

During the transmission process, she heard a new message sound.

As soon as her feet touched the ground, the iron rod touched the sand. She confirmed the shape of the sand under her feet and found that there were no marks left by her iron rod before she opened the message.

"Can't Stop Missing You: Miss, could you please tell me if you're currently in the Fishman Island Exploration Zone? I saw your post. You're thinking of leaving this apocalyptic game and returning home, right? Me too. I can join your team and provide you with some important information, but I have one request: I'd like you to help me get a Fishman Island Exploration Card."

Because Yu Miaomiao was slow to check messages, before she could reply, the other party sent another message.

"Unstoppable longing: If you let me open a treasure chest to get a bound card, it will use up your progress towards the exploration zone. So, for each treasure chest I open, I'll return double the items, which will count as purchasing your exploration progress. I'll also fight alongside you on the expedition. If I haven't opened the bound card yet and progress exceeds 10%, I can leave and it won't affect your subsequent explorations. Also, I have a reason for wanting the Fishman Island expedition card, but I can't tell you directly through the system while we're being monitored."

This is another person who has obtained hidden information from the system. Could it be that the unstoppable longing also has the ability to hide in "incognito mode"?

The information Iris can obtain is limited. Can she trust someone who suddenly appears from another server?

Could this unstoppable yearning be the mastermind behind interfering with the beta testers' acquisition of the card to repair the world order?

Yu Miaomiao did not stop the horizontal sword move in his hand, and under the two flashes of the sword, not even an eyeball fell.

This time she brought a lot of equipment with her just to open more bucket treasure chests to improve her progress. Without a certain level of trust, she couldn't come here in vain, let alone take risks.

Before she could send her rejection, she saw a new message from Nana.

"Yiren Tiaofantian: Miaobao, I asked around about the Tingting you mentioned earlier. One of our friends has met her and says she's been searching almost every district looking for someone, finally arriving in yours. My friend says this girl seems reliable, but be wary. Be careful."

After running through all the zones, Yu Miaomiao didn't think about the man's perseverance in finding people, but rather how much supplies or information he had that would make everyone in every server with a cross-server invitation card willing to invite him.

Thinking about it this way, it seems like she's at a disadvantage for not knowing this information.

Yu Miaomiao waved the knife in one hand, killed the four first-generation fishmen crawling behind him, and then replied to Nana.

"Meow Meow is not short of water: Do you know how she got to your area at that time?"

"Yiren Fanfantian: My companion invited me here. I didn't ask, but it seems to be related to some of her personal matters."

Although Nana is enthusiastic and responsible, she doesn't like to pry into other people's privacy.

"Meow Meow is not short of water: Good, love you Nabo."

While she was replying to the message about killing the monster, the man had already sent a third message, looking very anxious.

"Unstoppable longing: Tell me anything you're worried about. I can also give you some weapons and protective gear in advance, so you can feel more at ease inviting me in. I've heard about you and others, so I chose to trust you. To be honest, the person I'm looking for appears to be dead on the system, but I don't believe he'll truly give up on me, so I want to crack this apocalypse as soon as possible and find him."

Yu Miaomiao was distracted for a moment, but her hand holding the knife handle did not stop. The dead fishman monster had dropped an eyeball, which she put into her backpack and got a portion of mucus.

"Meow Meow is not short of water: Trade me, and I will invite you in again."

Through the items given to her, she just wanted to see the other party's sincerity. In the end times, no one can trust what they say. Even if Nana said that this person might be reliable, he was only reliable at that time. People will change.

Soon the other party sent a transaction request.

On the trading slot, there are 2 advanced shields, 1 space container, 8 shotgun magazines, 1 titanium whip, 2 poison gas bombs, and 1 radiation protection suit.

There were quite a lot of things, including two very unique ones, especially the space container, which was a good thing she had never seen before.

【Name: Space Container (31/100)

Level: 99

Introduction: Love conquers everything, the answer lies in space. If time could stop, I would not stop missing you.

Attributes: Teleports the user to an independent space. Use again to return to the original location. The user cannot view the external situation in the space, and other people cannot enter the space where the user is located. Other disaster attacks cannot harm the user. Durability is consumed a little bit every minute, and items will become ineffective, but love will never change.

Yu Miaomiao: ...

Why not just name this item the Space of Love?

There are only 31 points of durability left, which means it has been used for 69 points, or 69 minutes. Looking at the item description, you can tell that this is a rare defensive artifact, and the other party just gave it to you like that.

After confirming receipt, Yu Miaomiao was a little surprised. What on earth did the adventure card mean to her endless longing that it was worth paying so much for?

The unstoppable thoughts, isn't that just the introduction of this item? Could it be that this space container is related to the other party?

Or maybe I changed the name after seeing the introduction.

The other party must have other defensive items as well, and they even specially sent over anti-radiation clothing, probably because they wanted to tell Yu Miaomiao some new news about the apocalypse.

Opportunity, trust, intelligence, and a vague memory.

Yu Miaomiao analyzed it in her mind and without further delay, she successfully added a friend and invited her to form a team. The next second, a girl appeared in front of her.

There was a girl about the same height as her, with blue hair tied in a high ponytail, wearing a pair of punk glasses and a silver-gray reflective tights. She looked a bit out of place in the apocalypse.

The girl was still chewing gum in her mouth and said in a mature and mature voice: "I didn't expect you also like wavy hair."

After saying that, the girl spit out a pink bubble of chewing gum, and then the bubble, which was half of the girl's face, quickly shrank until she chewed it back into her mouth.

"It seems that the space here is also above." When the girl spoke, there was a sticky sound in her voice, like the sound of chewing gum.

"Up there?" It was the first time Yu Miaomiao had met an online friend like this. She cleared her throat and introduced herself seriously, "Hello, I'm Miaomiao. What should I call you?"

"Ha." The girl chuckled. "My nickname in the game is 'Unstoppable Missing'. You can call me Tingting."

Before Miaomiao could continue asking questions, Tingting made a hushing gesture.

Tingting looked around, then raised her head to the gray sky, explaining, "I chew gum to prevent them from seeing your lip movements. You should also be careful when you speak. They can only record videos, not audio."

"They?" In the gray air, Yu Miaomiao could see the hatred in Tingting's eyes.

Tingting nodded and whispered, "It's the system's backend artificial intelligence analysis group."

The words just said were spoken in a very affirmative tone, and Yu Miaomiao finally met someone who knew the truth about the system.

"Don't put all your hopes on me." Tingting seemed to see through Yu Miaomiao's thoughts. "I also learned this from the information my boyfriend left behind. He didn't dare leave too much for others to find out, so what I know is also very limited."

Yu Miaomiao was a little shocked, and tried to control her mouth shape to ask, "What message did your boyfriend leave?"

Tingting nodded and asked, "Well, I can only tell you the rest after I get the adventure card."

Yu Miaomiao was quickly convinced by the information bomb, but she remained cautious and asked, "Did you know there's a culprit behind the closed beta test? There's an insider from the system company hiding among the players, preventing us from obtaining all the cards to restore the world order."

This girl has appeared on many servers and used many aliases, but based on her last whereabouts, Tingting must have won first place on a ranking list, so she naturally knows about this card.

"You doubt me, don't you?" Tingting smiled sweetly. "Well, it's good to have doubts. A fool won't make it to the end. Ah Wei always said I was reckless before."

Tingting spoke the last few syllables with a bit of sadness. The smile on her face was somewhat inconsistent with her tone, and Yu Miaomiao was a little moved.

"The traitor you're talking about could only be on the internal testing server." Tingting saw Yu Miaomiao's expression and understood. "It's a professional habit. Don't mind the fake smile. To reassure you, I'll go ahead and you can follow behind. Communicate any underwater situations through the system."

Tingting emphasized the words "underwater situation", probably because she was afraid that Yu Miaomiao would not be able to help but ask for other information on the system.

Yu Miaomiao said "OK" and started searching the forum.

Yu Miaomiao rarely visited the forum in her later years because there was too much information in it, but she still remembered that when she first came to the end of the world, she saw a suicide note. The poster was called Awei, and the recipient was a person named Tingting.

Before Miaomiao could ask more questions, the girl walking in front of her had already stepped one foot into the water.

Tingting was seen putting a simple oxygen mask on her head at the same time, and then she was seen putting on the oxygen tank taken out from the system on her back, pulling the tube to connect the oxygen mask, and at the same time her body was immersed in it, she was fully dressed and her movements were smooth and fluid.

Immediately afterwards, the silver-white figure disappeared on the water. Yu Miaomiao deliberately kept a distance from the girl in front and waited on the shore for two seconds in case the other party had any weapons shooting from behind.

After going down to the lake this time, they soon encountered the first Type 2 fishman. It was only when Miaomiao got to the fishman that she saw its half-melted corpse, and the gray powder slowly merged with the lake water.

The girl in front is so strong.

Whether it is the underwater swimming speed or the killing efficiency, it is much better than herself, or it can be said that Yu Miaomiao can be on par with Tingting only when he uses various devices.

The gray figure quickly dived to the bottom of the lake. Yu Miaomiao followed behind and thought, doesn't Tingting need to slowly survey the environment first?

Is it because he is very familiar with it, or is he very confident in killing monsters?

Tingting's clothes almost blended into the lake water, and layers of red flocculent seaweed blocked Yu Miaomiao's view.

Yu Miaomiao carefully pushed aside the water plants, keeping an eye on the surroundings while slowly swimming towards the depths.

In the blink of an eye, I saw a silver-white figure fighting with the Type 2 fishman.

There are three type 2 mermaids. They work together in perfect harmony and are very agile in the water. They attack Tingting from the front and back.

Yu Miaomiao remained in a state of hibernation and was not discovered. She circled behind the nearest fish. The originally blue fish scales had now turned into a dark gray like lake water.

I heard from Hua Bie that the mermaids here change the color of their scales according to the environment.

Swinging a knife in water creates too much resistance, a dagger is just right.

Yu Miaomiao picked up the sonar dagger, used the monster positioning function first, confirmed the number of monsters, and then prepared to use the jet device to assist in assassinating them.

When Yu Miaomiao opened the holographic screen and saw the red dot on it, she was stunned for a moment.

There were not just three in the lake, but more than a dozen red dots densely packed around them, almost encircling them.