Chapter 500

"Am I still alive?"

Bart Mo Si's personality backup stared blankly, first scanning his original body, reading the damaged data, confirming he wouldn't die soon, then looking up at the quadcopter.

He spoke rapidly: "I am Bart Mo Si, Lv27, affiliated with the Whale Song Guild. Half an hour ago, I and three other players were executing the Tremor mission when we encountered extraterrestrial transcenders and clashed.

The other three humans were all captured; I survived thanks to a special item."

To increase credibility, the personality backup extended a finger toward the strip-like metal implant on his original body's forehead, projecting the item's description.

【Item Name: Stress Escape Pod】

【Type: Tool】

【Quality: Perfect】

【Effect: Stress Evasion. Upon receiving fatal damage, instantly teleport to a random location within 500 kilometers. Prioritizes safe zones far from the damage source.】

【Consumption: None】

【Cooldown: 3 months】

【Usage Condition: Over 80% of the body, over 30% of the brain, must be mechanical prosthetics】

【Note: After stress evasion, I will die.】

The information overload made Claudia's pupils contract sharply; she gasped: "Extraterrestrial players? What level, how many?"

The existence of extraterrestrial players was no secret among mid- to high-level players; major guilds had long secretly disseminated information to prepare the ground.

But it was like extraterrestrial life—had they arrived? Yes. Had they truly arrived? Yes.

Long stuck in Schrödinger's cat quantum superposition.

Bart Mo Si is Lv27; his teammates must have been formidable, yet they were effortlessly captured, unable to even trigger emergency exit—only he escaped.

The personality backup knew the urgency and wasted no time, directly projecting the combat footage.

Considering high-level transcenders' neural reaction speeds far exceed normal humans, the video played at 7x speed.

In the footage, four human players—including Bart Mo Si—walked through a primordial forest.

With a flying pet scouting ahead, their mood remained tense yet relaxed, chatting and laughing.

Until a poorly handsome ancient-style swordsman activated his sixth sense, released a scanning skill, and discovered a half-mushroom, half-tree-creature lurking invisibly high in the treetops, watching them.

The scan result showed the creature had the same player panel as himself.

As the scanning range expanded, beyond the mushroom creature, the forest's upper air, lake waters, and underground each concealed a griffin, an octopus, and a rabbit-like subhuman.

Being tracked by high-level non-human players in a killzone was as terrifying as waking up to find yourself taking an exam.

Combined with slightly abnormal air composition, it was suspected to be poison gas.

One human player panicked and launched an attack; combat erupted instantly.

The four alien players had prepared in advance, activated domain skills, swiftly knocked down two, severely wounded Bart Mo Si, and despite the highest-level ancient swordsman's fierce resistance, he was overwhelmed and captured.

Only Bart Mo Si escaped.

White Horse Tomb sighed deeply and reported the identities of the humans in the footage: "Rolling Stone, Lv26, affiliated with the Monster Alliance.

Jayna, Lv27, affiliated with the Russian Anquan Bureau.

Wanli Fengdao, Lv33, freelance bounty hunter under the Special Affairs Bureau. Though his level isn't high, he's a veteran from the 0.5th batch of players." The average lifespan of the deceased bodybuilding athlete population in the real world is 47.7 years, with drug use spanning ten to twenty years.

Yet the average lifespan of players is only two and a half years—still worse than bodybuilders. Surviving over four years since the killzone's arrival qualifies one as "long-lived and venerable" among transcenders.

"If they could cleanly eliminate you, those extraterrestrial beings' average level must be at least Lv30."

Lei Yesi seized on the inconsistency and frowned at Bart Mo Si: "Why are you still here? Why not retreat to the real world to report?"

"One: I am currently in personality backup form, lacking player permissions, unable to use my original's panel functions.

Two: Among those captured is my friend Jayna. She's a hacker agent of the Russian Anquan Bureau."

Bart Mo Si's personality backup took a deep breath and spoke rapidly: "The battle occurred twenty minutes ago. Compared to the initial position, I should have moved 500 kilometers.

I cannot force you to help me—I can only beg you, since we're all Earth humans, to lend a hand."

The four players and Grey Rain on the pirate ship exchanged glances; "lend a hand" was too vague, with too many interpretations.

Sending another drone with a healing scroll to treat Bart Mo Si and restore his mobility counted as help;

Slowing down their own mission, dispersing in another direction to locate large guild signal stations or temporary outposts deployed in the killzone, then summoning reinforcements from major guilds, counted as help;

Posting images of Bart Mo Si's severe injuries on forums, Weibo, Douban, and Xiaohongshu with the caption "Rope always snaps at its weakest point; misfortune always targets the suffering. Please donate to save my family Bart Mo Si—or I won't be able to afford a Maybach"—also counted as help;

As they pondered, sudden change erupted.

A thunderous roar came from the abyss; a massive shadow approached rapidly, heading straight for Bart Mo Si.

The quadcopter immediately dove downward, switching on its spotlight to pierce the darkness.

It was a soft-bodied creature the size of the vampire octopus from the movie The Abyss, with hundreds of black-green, spiky tentacles; when fully extended, its span rivaled that of a ten-thousand-ton warship.

On its pale green head were two truck-sized orange-yellow eyeballs. When they spotted the drone, the eyes flickered with surprise—clear proof of high intelligence and mastery of transcendent power—more precisely, telekinesis identical to Zhao Zijing's.

Allowing it to glide effortlessly through the abyss.

Crack!

The quadcopter was crushed by telekinesis; the video feed cut off. The final image seen was the orange-eyed octopus lunging at Bart Mo Si, swallowing him whole.

No time to hesitate; Li Cheng pulled the 【Battle Arena Vehicle】 from his backpack and tossed it to Grey Rain, then flashed to the deck's edge, took a brief aim, and struck—light-speed elbow!

Boom!

The air was violently compressed by expanding space, forming two high-speed, burning walls of pressure.

Merely brushed by the shockwave, the Black Pearl's defensive array teetered on collapse; the deck planks blackened and charred.

Lei Yesi, White Horse Tomb, and Claudia burst from the cabin—there was no trace of Master Pi Fu.

"So unteamwork! Why did you go solo?!"

Claudia's face flushed pale then dark; Master Pi Fu was the madman who could elbow London into dust, a genius-level madman with insane combat power. Without him, the Tremor mission would almost certainly fail.

Engine noise came from behind; turning, Claudia saw Grey Rain and White Horse Tomb already mounted on the Battle Arena Vehicle, which had transformed into a twin-seat jet-powered motorcycle.

The words slipped out instinctively, "Tombstone, what about you?"

"Mr. Pi Fu once saved my life. By every right and every reason, I can't just leave him behind."

Bai Ma Mu Bei said in a low voice, "Young Lady Hui Yu, start the engines."

"Got it!"

Hui Yu, bold as a thundercloud, gripped the fighter's control stick—then remembered she'd only just graduated elementary school and hadn't the faintest idea how to fly a plane. She yanked it backward, and the fighter shot straight back, smashing with a tremendous clatter into a pile of instruments and gauges on the bridge of the pirate ship.