Chapter 210: A Perfect Escape Opportunity
"Really, it's fine." Zhang Biao glanced over, let out a "Ha" laugh, and his anger towards Da Zhi dissipated completely. "I think Dai Wenqian and that Xu guy are just exaggerating. It's not as dangerous as they said!"
Gu Yu and Kang Hong exchanged a look, both somewhat incredulous.
"Maybe we've been too tense," Gu Yu said. "Perhaps there's a certain chance of being attacked from outside the window, but it's not a guaranteed death sentence."
"We can only hope for the best," Kang Hong said, glancing back behind him. "At least those who stayed still have a chance to live."
Three hours passed quickly. The group, carrying the unconscious middle-aged man, took the elevator down to the seventh floor.
As for the potted plants that Tie Ge and his men had brought down from the thirteenth floor, aside from the few players with him, no one else got any. The extras were all smashed and thrown downstairs.
Xu Huo's cart, however, was taken along by Kang Hong and Chen Shu.
"Aren't the potted plants safer?" the square-faced man said. "It wouldn't hurt to share them."
"If everyone has a potted plant, then we're in danger," Tie Ge said. "Whether these things work or not is one thing, but we can't increase our own risk."
As he spoke, the elevator reached the seventh floor. The moment the doors opened, the first thing they heard was a bone-chilling chewing sound. The players tensed up, but upon closer inspection, they found no immediate danger—just some gnawed, mutilated corpses, not much different from the floors above.
Chen Shu located the source of the sound: a plant in the corner. "This is what's making the noise."
Gu Yu walked over, looked at it, and after a moment of thought, said, "I think I saw one on the thirteenth floor. I can't remember the name, but it can record sounds. Its maximum memory span is a week."
"All kinds of bizarre plants exist," Chen Shu remarked.
"What's there to study about a broken flower?" Zhang Biao snorted dismissively. Suddenly, he noticed something under a corpse not far away. He went over, turned the body over, and retrieved the item beneath it. His face lit up with surprise. "It's an item!"
Tie Ge and his men quickly moved over. Zhang Biao immediately stored the item in his inventory, then said, "This corpse must be a player. Search around—there might be other items."
Several players immediately began searching the seventh floor and, sure enough, found two more unclaimed items.
Killing a player allows you to take over their belongings, including items, potions, and tickets. But if a player dies by accident or at the hands of a non-player, their items are reclaimed by the game. Only items the player was actively using at the time of death are left behind as unclaimed items.
Tie Ge picked up a knife, stored it, and said, "Pretty mediocre."
"Bro, be grateful," Zhang Biao said. "The best players who can enter this instance are probably D-rank. A lot of E-rank players don't even have a single item. How rich could a D-rank player be?"
Tie Ge looked at the box in Chen Shu's hand and reached out. "Yours. Let me see it."
Chen Shu put the wooden box item away. "Finders keepers."
Beside her, Kang Hong and Gu Yu watched.
Tie Ge let out a cold laugh and looked away. He pulled out a pen and said, "Enough slacking. Let's draw lots."
Meanwhile, in the small wooden house inside the glass greenhouse.
"That man-eating flower just stirred a moment ago," Jiang Yihua said, looking at the distant flower crown. "Its energy value spiked."
"Is something wrong outside?" Zheng Liang asked nervously. "Gu Yu and the others are all out there."
"Nothing major," Xu Huo said. "With Kang Hong, the three of them, and her, they're roughly evenly matched against the remaining players. Unless the other eighty-two people team up against the players."
Jiang Yihua suddenly understood. "So that's why you had Da Zhi and the others stay behind."
"But it probably won't have much effect," Xu Huo said. "They've already reached the seventh floor. Reducing their numbers is inevitable."
"Then will Da Zhi and the others be in danger?" Jiang Yihua quickly asked. "Even a cornered rabbit will bite. No one's going to willingly die."
"Zhang Biao and his crew look stupid, but they're actually a bit clever," Dai Wenqian said coldly. "They won't let non-players kill players. One against ten, they have a chance."
"Instead of worrying about others, we should worry about ourselves," Wei Bin couldn't help but say. "This lamp can only last twelve hours. More than half of that is already gone."
"How do we escape?"
Xu Huo had already tried using the strings. The ceiling and floor of the glass greenhouse were over seventy meters apart, too far to reach the lamp. The small wooden house only had a switch button and no other controls, so using the high-intensity lamp to carve a path was out of the question.
"Start with the man-eating flower," Dai Wenqian said succinctly. "If the man-eating flower gets active, it can drive away the other mutant animals. It's not far from this building. If we move fast, we can make a run for it."
Jiang Yihua was stunned. "What about the other two?"
Dai Wenqian shrugged and said nothing.
The little girl, who had been crouching in the corner, too afraid to get close to them but also too afraid to stray far, started crying again. She choked out, "Don't abandon me. My family is rich. I can give you money..."
"Who cares about your lousy money!" Zheng Liang interrupted her impatiently. After a pause, he added, "We won't abandon you unless there's no other choice."
Xu Huo estimated the approximate position of the man-eating flower within the entire glass greenhouse and carefully recalled the circuit layout he had glimpsed in haste. He frowned slightly.
The main circuits were too far from both the wooden house and the man-eating flower, and the wiring was scattered. Even setting a fire wouldn't be effective. Unless there was a large area of flammable material, blindly crossing the dense thicket was too dangerous without knowing how many xenomorphs were hiding.
Moreover, that giant man-eating flower didn't look very cooperative. They might end up being attacked from both sides.
If only they could divert the attention of the xenomorphs and the man-eating flower...
No sooner had this thought crossed his mind than the dense thicket suddenly rustled. He jerked his head up and saw the giant man-eating flower quivering. It spread its broad leaves, and at the same time, its flower crown sprayed out a dense swarm of smaller man-eating flowers. Like living snakes, they avoided the areas illuminated by the high-intensity lamp and surged toward the building!
"Perfect opportunity!" Dai Wenqian was the first to leap out of the small wooden house.
"Let's go!" Xu Huo quickly rushed into the restroom, tied the injured woman and the little girl together, and used the strings to lift the bedsheet out of the wooden house. He himself ran toward the building, following the direction the small man-eating flowers were flowing.
Something on the building's side seemed to be attracting the giant man-eating flower. It didn't attack Xu Huo or the others, nor the surrounding mutant animals. But the fleeing mutant animals provided them with a perfect escape opportunity. In the blink of an eye, they were at the base of the building!
A red door and a green door appeared ahead. Dai Wenqian, in the lead, and Xu Huo, who had caught up, both opened the doors in front of them almost simultaneously—only one chose the green door, and the other chose the red door!
Just before entering, Xu Huo saw a look of surprise on Dai Wenqian's face. But in the next instant, he found himself inside the building. Jiang Yihua and Zheng Liang, who had followed behind, caught the two people lowered by the strings. Seeing Wei Bin enter the adjacent door, they immediately slammed the door shut!