A man in a light gray T-shirt with a crew cut and a shrewd look saw Long Ming turn and leave alone. His eyes lit up, and he said to the few players he had just befriended beside him:
"Brothers, see that person leaving?"
"Yeah, what's up, Gu Yi?"
"Daring to leave alone at a time like this—usually that means they're an expert. We follow him!"
Gu Yi voiced his idea.
"Makes sense. Let's go!"
The players agreed with Gu Yi's analysis.
They immediately followed Long Ming.
At that moment, many players on site saw Gu Yi and the others following Long Ming and hurriedly said to those beside them:
"Look, someone's leading a group out. Let's follow them quickly!"
"Okay!"
For a while, a large number of players, caught up in the bandwagon effect, followed Long Ming away.
Of course, not all players followed Long Ming—only about a hundred left.
Qin Yan watched the direction Long Ming had gone, a pensive expression on his face.
At that moment, a muscular man with dark skin and stubble lowered his voice and asked Qin Yan:
"Are we following them?"
"No, Xie Shan. We're going the other way!"
Qin Yan then left with his companions.
Lin Yue saw Qin Yan and the others leave and hurriedly followed behind them.
Noticing this, quite a few female players followed as well.
The remaining players split into two groups and left in different directions.
Shortly after, at the edge of the ruins, Long Ming glanced back, a puzzled expression on his face. He didn't quite understand why so many people were following him.
Of course, he didn't dwell on it. After all, there were advantages to having many people around—when danger struck, as long as he could outrun them, he'd be fine.
But the moment Long Ming walked out of the ruins, he frowned as he looked into the distance.
Rolling yellow sand stretched to the horizon, with no end in sight.
The dry air rolled like heat waves under the sun.
For a moment, Long Ming didn't know which direction to take.
Gu Yi and the others stopped too. They watched Long Ming standing still, feeling a bit puzzled, but didn't dare go up and ask.
However, Long Ming quickly made a decision. Since he didn't know where to go, he might as well check out the nearest evacuation point first and see what it was like.
He raised his wristband to look at the map, confirmed the general direction of the nearest green dot, and headed toward the evacuation point.
Long Ming stepped on the scorching yellow sand, and every step felt like an effort.
Still, he endured it, walking forward step by step.
Seeing this, Gu Yi and the others hurried to catch up.
A few tens of minutes later, the players following behind Long Ming began to discuss among themselves.
"Damn, where exactly is this guy going?"
"Who knows?"
"He must not know the way and is just leading us around aimlessly?"
"Why don't you go ask?"
"I'm not going."
Long Ming naturally heard the players discussing behind him, but he didn't take it to heart at all, simply continuing forward.
Just as everyone's patience was reaching its limit, a circular mechanical platform appeared in the unchanging desert ahead.
The mechanical platform was completely out of place with the environment.
At that moment, Gu Yi and the others suddenly realized and exclaimed in surprise:
"This is an evacuation point!"
"Damn, we went through all that just to be brought to an evacuation point."
"I thought we were going somewhere else."
Other players seeing the evacuation platform felt rather speechless.
"We're here anyway; let me give it a try!"
At that moment, a male player ran excitedly onto the mechanical platform.
The instant he stepped on it, the intricate patterns at the bottom of the platform lit up with a faint glow. Then his wristband vibrated, and a prompt popped up.
"Evacuate?"
"Evacuate."
The player didn't think twice before tapping it.
Hum~
The mechanical platform was activated, and the player began to float up bit by bit. He shouted in bewilderment:
"Wow, wow, I'm flying!"
The next second, he turned into a beam of white light and left.
Seeing this, many players on site shook their heads and cursed:
"Idiot, wasting a scroll."
Long Ming was also speechless. He hadn't expected someone to personally demonstrate it for him.
But this was fine—now he knew exactly how to evacuate.
It was just that the road ahead wouldn't be easy to walk.
Long Ming looked around at the desert. Visually, every direction looked the same. Without the mini-map on his wristband, it was easy to get lost.
Of course, Long Ming didn't care whether he got lost or not. He had no particular goal anyway, so he continued walking forward.
Seeing Long Ming keep going, Gu Yi and the others had no choice but to grit their teeth and follow.
Time passed second by second.
Long Ming walked with his head drenched in sweat and his mouth parched. Without realizing it, his speed slowed.
He glanced at his wristband to check his status, only to find several negative prompts had appeared.
"Prompt: You are mildly dehydrated. Please replenish fresh water as soon as possible."
"Prompt: Stamina decline."
At this point, many of the following players couldn't take it anymore. Several plopped down on the ground.
"I'm not walking. I can't walk anymore."
Long Ming looked into the distance. The endless sand dunes still had no end in sight, so he stopped to rest.
At this moment, Gu Yi couldn't help but step forward and ask Long Ming:
"Brother, where exactly are you going?"
"I don't know. We'll go wherever we end up."
Long Ming replied indifferently.
Hearing Long Ming's words, Gu Yi's eyes went wide, and just as he was about to say something...
Suddenly, a cry of surprise rang out.
"Wow!"
Long Ming and the others turned to look. They saw a player who wasn't very tall, with some acne on his face, excitedly walking toward the sand dune on the left with two companions.
On that sand dune lay a red-spotted giant lizard over three meters long, with gray skin covered in red bumps. It was resting with its eyes closed and looked incredibly creepy.
"Zhao Wei, is this okay?"
The two companions following Zhao Wei asked nervously.
"What's there to fear? Isn't the game all about fighting monsters to level up? Charge!"
Zhao Wei pulled a rock out of his backpack without hesitation and rushed excitedly toward the red-spotted giant lizard, smashing the rock hard onto its head.
Thud!
Accompanied by a dull sound, the red-spotted giant lizard winced in pain, slowly opened its eyes, stood up, then opened its bloody maw and let out an angry roar.
Roar~
Zhao Wei was also frightened by this realistic scene and trembled as he turned to run.
At that moment, the red-spotted giant lizard exerted force through all four limbs, took a quick step, pounced suddenly, and bit onto Zhao Wei's waist.
"Ah, it hurts! Save me!"
Zhao Wei let out a heart-rending scream, instinctively calling for help.
At this moment, Zhao Wei's two companions dared not go up. They turned and fled in terror.
Long Ming's expression changed slightly. He warily watched the red-spotted giant lizard, with no intention of going up to help.
Crack!
The red-spotted giant lizard suddenly crunched Zhao Wei's body into two pieces. Blood and flesh flew everywhere.
Then Zhao Wei's shattered body began to dissolve into specks of light, and his backpack fell.
"Run!"
Gu Yi and the others were terrified and ran forward in panic.
(End of chapter)
Chapter 10