Players, Please Board the Train

On the sea surface not far from the island, Gan Qing stood upright on the water, dragging a person with each hand. He couldn’t bear it any longer and said, ”Have you two rested enough yet?”

Chu Yuan, who was holding onto his left hand, was just floating in the water and retorted righteously, ”I’m injured! How am I supposed to swim!”

On the other side, Dr. Deng also said apologetically, ”I’m truly sorry. The inflatable boat broke when we came up, and I’m a landlubber. I’m troubling you.”

Gan Qing was also quite seriously injured. Struggling to keep hold of the two men, he couldn’t help but say, ”We’ve already left the laboratory, and even left this island. Doesn’t that mean the dungeon is over?”

If the dungeon was over, he could leave this place. That would be better than dragging these two around like this.

”What if the Kong siblings come up, or the reinforcements from the Bolun Family arrive...”

”What are you worried about?” Chu Yuan interrupted him. ”If the dungeon has already ended, we can leave anytime. Even if the entire Bolun Family, hundreds of them, all showed up, it wouldn’t matter... I’m saying, can you hold on tighter? I’m about to slip off.”

Gan Qing lifted his leg and kicked him, losing his balance and causing all three of them to wobble on the water’s surface.

Chu Yuan and Dr. Deng each swallowed a couple of mouthfuls of seawater. After Gan Qing steadied himself, Dr. Deng said, ”I think the Bolun Family definitely didn’t anticipate players coming out early. We should be safe for a short while. It’s better to rest and recover. Entering the station while injured is also dangerous.”

”He makes sense. Can’t you walk on water? Hurry up and get us to shore,” Chu Yuan said.”My characteristic only allows me to stand on the surface of liquids, I can’t walk around freely,” Gan Qing said expressionlessly. ”Otherwise, I’d ditch you two and swim over myself.”

”I can’t swim!” Dr. Deng said nervously, then changed the subject. ”Has anyone else come up yet?”

”I wish no one else would come up. If it’s someone with the surname Kong...” Before Chu Yuan could finish his sentence, a person suddenly surfaced about ten meters away. The three of them were startled. Then, they saw Miao Yu emerge from the water, supporting herself on a floating corpse. ”Kong Cheng is already dead.”

”Wait, weren’t you on Kong Cheng’s side?” Gan Qing shouted.

Miao Yu took off her protective face shield and rolled her eyes. ”Could you be a bit smarter?”

Gan Qing, of course, knew he had been tricked by Qiu Xiangdong. After using the restraint bag three times in a row, his stamina simply couldn’t recover. That was also why he was standing here now instead of swimming to shore.

”I don’t understand. Could it be that half the players on this train ticket were sent by the Bolun Family?”

”Wu Xiaonan and Qiu Xiangdong switched sides temporarily,” Miao Yu said. ”Last night, Wu Xiaonan and I were dealing with Kong Hui. Kong Hui persuaded Wu Xiaonan. Those two teamed up. I barely managed to stab Wu Xiaonan once before I was captured.”

”No wonder,” Chu Yuan said. ”I said Wu Xiaonan seemed like a stingy person when she entered the dungeon. How could she be so generous, using up her stamina to search for potions even while injured? Even if she found potions, she definitely couldn’t have snatched them from the rest of us.”

Miao Yu scanned the area. ”It seems everyone else is dead. I’ll take you ashore.”

As she spoke, she released an inflatable boat, first getting Dr. Deng on board, then Gan Qing and Chu Yuan clumsily clambered in.

”Although the new-style inflatable boats are automatic, they can only carry two people. I bought an old-fashioned one. Manual operation is a bit troublesome.”

”Good thing you have a boat. Otherwise, I really didn’t have the strength to swim to shore,” Chu Yuan said, pouring potion on his bloodied leg. After the pain eased a bit, he leaned against the side of the boat and let out a long sigh. ”That Xu Zhi kid is a lunatic! Daring to start a fire in that environment, he really has no fear of death!”

”What does having no fear of death matter? He’s still dead,” Gan Qing said flatly. ”It’s a pity none of us cleared this dungeon.”

Dr. Deng touched the train ticket in his pocket, feeling quite worried. He said a good word for Xu Huo. ”If not for his move, maybe we wouldn’t have been able to escape from the Kong siblings at all.”

That was the truth. Gan Qing and Chu Yuan fell silent.

Miao Yu glanced at the exhausted group and asked Dr. Deng, ”Did you find the potion?”

Dr. Deng wasn’t concerned about the potion now, only worried about how to leave.

”Even if the potion was in the lab, that explosion probably ruined any chance. It does make it convenient for the Bolun Family to search, though.”

”If they could have found it by searching, the Bolun Family wouldn’t have waited until the dungeon opened to come,” Miao Yu said. ”The laboratory is different during dungeon time and non-dungeon time. There’s also that Ghostly Shadow that appears. Maybe the potion was hidden by it.”

”If the Ghostly Shadow is just an item, then there’s really no way. If there were other players hiding in the lab, they’re probably done for by now,” Chu Yuan said, pouring healing potion into his mouth. He swallowed a couple of gulps before continuing, ”Anyway, it’s none of my business. I definitely won’t go down to look again.”

Miao Yu was silent for a moment, about to say something else when the game prompt sound played.

[Congratulations to player Passerby for clearing ’Don’t Open the Door After Dark’. Based on your performance in this dungeon, your mission completion rating is A-Rank. You will receive one new characteristic, three items, two train tickets, and one hundred thousand White Bills.]

Xu Huo, who was rapidly ascending through the sea, raised an eyebrow upon receiving the game prompt.

The laboratory had been blown open, allowing players to freely enter and exit the dungeon area. That meant the dungeon had ended early. He originally thought failing to clear was a certainty, but unexpectedly, the situation turned around—he had actually completed the dungeon mission.

Thinking of the ”ghost” he had caught, he smiled slightly. Then he broke through the water’s surface, took off his item face shield, and flipped himself onto the inflatable boat.

”Xu Zhi!” Chu Yuan waved at him from a distance, calling out quite happily, ”You’re alive too!”

Xu Huo glanced at Kong Cheng’s corpse, steered the boat closer, and said to the group, ”You’re pretty badly hurt.”

Ironically, Dr. Deng was the least injured among them.

At this point, Gan Qing and Chu Yuan weren’t complaining about him anymore and explained the situation with Miao Yu.

Xu Huo didn’t show any surprise. Qiu Xiangdong and Wu Xiaonan’s behavior itself was off. With formidable enemies watching closely, even briefly, they shouldn’t have been expending stamina. Their enthusiasm was a bit excessive.

Therefore, when cooperating to use the restraint bag, he had used the kite string as a barrier, not touching the rivets on it.

Later, Qiu Xiangdong kept pressing Dr. Deng about whether he knew the potion’s location. The Kong siblings coming down directly meant they didn’t care about Dr. Deng’s life or death and were ready to kill.

As for whether Miao Yu was truly caught off guard by the switched-side Wu Xiaonan and Qiu Xiangdong as she claimed, that remained to be seen.

But now that the dungeon was over, it wasn’t important.

”This is the first time I’ve encountered a dungeon ending early due to the location being destroyed,” Miao Yu said. ”We all failed to clear. No return ticket, no rewards.”

The three of them were quite dejected. Seriously injured, items consumed, zero gains, and still having to deal with the risks ahead.

”Anyway, the dungeon time isn’t over yet. How about we hide on the island for a couple of days?” Chu Yuan suggested.