Chapter 2671: Jiayu Trapped
The person lying on the ground had a dazed expression for a moment before reacting, suddenly turning over and scrambling up, grabbing Xu Huo's arm and saying, "Quick, save Jiayu, she's trapped in a random instance!"
Xu Huo's expression darkened. He handed the man a bottle of water and led him aside before saying, "Don't rush. Take your time."
Qi Congming, real name Qi Cong, had previously followed Yan Jiayu to Rose Castle. He gulped down two mouthfuls of water before hurriedly explaining the situation from three months ago.
He had been following Yan Jiayu all along, but three months ago, after he came out of an instance, he couldn't contact her no matter what. At first, he thought he was being annoying and that Yan Jiayu just didn't want to deal with him, so he had to use a special tracking item to follow her trail.
That item could only be bound to one person. Once bound to Yan Jiayu, it couldn't be changed. It could indicate her general direction—basically, the places she had been to, but only within the same zone. So he spent a lot of money buying return tickets for many zones, combining them with the item to determine which return ticket had a higher probability. It took him nearly two months to finally find her trail.
"You're amazing," the Painting Woman praised him. "With that kind of patience and courage, you'd succeed at anything!"
Qi Cong didn't feel embarrassed at all and continued with his story.
What he found was a trace Yan Jiayu had left in another zone at a wormhole point—a message left using a special item, saying she was coming to this zone. Qi Cong thought his sincerity had moved her and eagerly followed her here.
But when he followed the item's indication near the Isle Country, he couldn't find Yan Jiayu anywhere. The item couldn't be wrong, so he guessed that Yan Jiayu had come here to do an instance and accidentally entered a random instance. By his calculations, she had probably been in the random instance for nearly three months.
Yan Jiayu had never had something like this happen before. An instance that could trap her for two months was definitely not a simple one, but since she wasn't dead yet, everything was still possible. That was why Qi Cong came to the Isle Country to ask for help.
But his luck was bad. On the way, he encountered consecutive player wars. Just passing by nearly cost him his life. He had originally planned to use the news of missing Isle Country players to rally the Isle Country into entering the random instance. Who knew that after finally finding the capital city, he learned that Lian Qingkong was dead.
With the national leader just killed, the Isle Country certainly wouldn't divert their attention to investigate the disappearance of their own players. But Qi Cong no longer had the strength to seek help from others, so he could only cling to this last hope and linger here.
Xu Huo didn't care about the deliberately concealed effects of the items in his words. After listening, he asked, "Do you know when Yan Jiayu left that message?"
Qi Cong was stunned for a moment. "It should be about three months ago."
"I haven't been able to contact her for nearly three months either," Xu Huo said. "This means the place trapping her isn't ordinary. The worst-case scenario is that she might be trapped in a special space where her personal panel is blocked."
Ordinary instances don't cut off players' contact with the outside world, especially high-level instances. Using such means to weaken players and create difficulty is low-class and defeats the purpose of high-level instances.
Either it's a special space, or she encountered a special situation within the instance—like being trapped in a container item, or someone tampered with the instance, cutting off the connection between the instance players and the outside world.
There's always a higher sky. Although Yan Jiayu excels in physical ability, that doesn't mean she has no opponents when both lose their items and instruments.
"Did you ask anyone about that random instance?" Xu Huo carefully examined the map Qi Cong had drawn and found the instance location pointed to a primeval forest area teeming with mutant animals. "Are you sure it's here? Random instance entrances usually aren't this remote."
Qi Cong was very certain. "No mistake, it must be here. I swear on my life and my love for Jiayu!"
Xu Huo automatically ignored the second half of his sentence and reminded him, "What about the instance situation?"
Qi Cong sighed. "The players in this zone are all fighting each other. Hardly anyone was willing to talk to me. Plus, the instance location is so remote that ordinary players wouldn't go there. I asked everyone I could talk to, but no one knows about this instance. Besides, if the instance can cut off players' contact with the outside world, how could information about the instance leak out?"
So the current situation was that they only knew Yan Jiayu might be trapped in a random instance, unable to contact the outside world through her personal panel, and the instance entrance was in a mutant animal-active area, making it extremely difficult to find.
Xu Huo put away the map and contacted Dai He, asking to return to the capital city.
Dai He contacted the Enforcement Team, who immediately let them into the city. This somewhat displeased the other players, and the area around the entrance was noisy. The players from Eternal Tower and Moon Horn also couldn't hold back, forcefully demanding entry to pay their respects.
The Enforcement Team received orders and allowed the players from both countries to pass.
After meeting the new Grand Archon, Ji Qingcheng, Xu Huo directly stated his request. The young player had already suppressed his grief and quickly arranged for government personnel to gather all information about that forest.
"The government regularly monitors the movements of mutant animals. If there's an instance inside, we should be able to find some clues."
Xu Huo thanked him and quickly flipped through the delivered materials.
Ji Qingcheng didn't stay long. Soon, Dai He came to call him away.
The Isle Country's data wasn't comprehensive. They usually used machines to send instruments to the edge of the forest, mainly to guard against mutant animals leaving the area. The deep forest, on the other hand, received little attention.
However, the monitoring data did capture several abnormal activities of mutant animals in the past few months. Compared to usual data, the mutant animals had been particularly active recently, causing three small-scale stampedes. The Isle Country monitoring personnel speculated that a new mutant species might have appeared in the forest, but no one had investigated deeply, so they didn't know what kind of species it was.
Now it seemed this wasn't about mutant animals but rather the ripples caused by the appearance of an instance.
Whether it was a ticket instance or a random instance, appearing here was highly unusual.
"Maybe the instance boss did it on purpose?" Qi Cong said. "Some instances use mutant species as their trump card. It's not strange for them to replenish supplies."
"That's certainly one possibility." Xu Huo then asked the government personnel about the movements of combat puppets in the Isle Country.
"Sorry, my authority isn't high enough," the staff member said.
Xu Huo went out to find Ji Qingcheng.
The atmosphere in the mourning hall was tense. The Isle Country players were in a standoff with the mourners from Eternal Tower and Moon Horn. Both sides were on edge, as if they might start fighting at any moment.
The players from Eternal Tower and Moon Horn deliberately tried to provoke Ji Qingcheng, questioning Lian Qingkong's final decisions and sowing discord between the government and player organizations. Although the government players were furious, they couldn't actually make a move.
As the stalemate continued, a voice suddenly sounded behind the players from both countries. "Since you're here to pay respects to a senior, kneeling and kowtowing shouldn't be too much to ask."
Before the words faded, the Eternal Tower captain's knees went weak, and he thudded to the ground. The Moon Horn captain beside him was pressed down by a hand, kneeling solidly!
The two, realizing what had happened, felt both shame and anger and immediately tried to get up. But with a heavy pressure bearing down, every single player from both countries, without exception, was forced to kneel on the ground.
The pressure from the item appeared only for a moment and then disappeared, but the kneeling was real. Xu Huo, who had moved to stand between the two captains, looked down at them. "Now that you've kowtowed, are you satisfied?"
Yan Jiayu's disappearance time has been changed to three months. After counting the instances, three months is more reasonable.