Chapter 33

Chapter 33

"Brother Hai!"

"Ahh, Brother Hai looks so fresh and youthful, he could be plucked right out for a fashion cover. He must have rested exceptionally well during this time."

As the main character appeared, the viewers in the live stream who had been waiting eagerly could no longer contain their excitement. They howled like wolves, repeatedly sending meaningless messages across the screen.

The Minister watched these meaningless screens filled with various languages and nationalities. For three years, he had been following the live streams of JiuZhou's students, witnessing all kinds of chat environments, but never one like this. It was as if they were fanatically chasing stars, their passion intense yet lacking reason.

More than ten days hadn't made them forget Ji Xinghai; instead, it had brewed their enthusiasm into uninhibited screams.

The enthusiastic cheering lasted nearly two minutes before normal comments began to appear.

"The student next door broke down and is fixing his car. There's even an unlucky one who drove into a bog, thankfully not too deep. Why does Brother Hai look so calm? He's actually cruising around, showing no signs of tension from entering the scenario."

"Nonsense, Brother Hai has a stable mental value of 59 for ages... Eh? Eh?! Mental value!"

At six o'clock sharp, all the students appeared on time in their live streams.

Most students were alone in their cars on a gray road, standard issue. However, some students somehow managed to crash into lamp posts or drive into small ponds, looking quite disheveled.

Still, even without accidents, there wasn't much joy on their faces. Judging by their listless and worried expressions, this exam was certainly no walk in the park.

Meanwhile, after experiencing one scenario, the students' mental values had decreased to varying degrees.

Students who died due to anomalies in the previous scenario were hit particularly hard, most falling below a score of 90. Some randomly selected students, already mentally fragile, had even dropped below 80, entering a dangerous range where they were easily startled, angered, and injured.

The audience didn't find this strange. In the real world, people who faced abnormal creatures would often suffer from nightmares and hallucinations for a long time afterward, and many would experience mental breakdowns. The impact on students killed in scenarios would likely be even greater.

Thus, it was normal for students' mental values to only decrease, not increase.

But this time, it seemed an anomaly had appeared.

Ji Xinghai's mental value had risen.

"Mental value 60?"

The people of JiuZhou rubbed their eyes several times: How could his mental value increase after a game of survival?

"This isn't scientific!"

"How could this happen? What happened? Is it because he scored high, so he's in high spirits due to good fortune?"

"It might be related to his special talent. The ingredients in the supplementary book have healing effects, let alone consuming the entities themselves?"

"So that's how it is!"

They accepted this explanation, as it was the most reasonable. Materials from abnormal beings indeed had the effect of healing soul damage, a fact proven by the wealthy men and women who spent large sums to buy special medicines from JiuZhou.

Jumping from 59 to 60, Ji Xinghai's mental value seemingly rose by just one digit, but it directly leaped from 'extremely dangerous' to 'highly dangerous'. It was as incredible as a dying patient being declared savable the next second.

"I know this makes sense, but everyone else is here to be tormented, while he... is probably here for recuperation?" Amidst eerie silence, a line of text slowly drifted across.

"..."

The Expert Group of psychologists from the Black Tower had entered a busy working state, wanting to uncover the reason behind Ji Xinghai's rising mental value.

Viewers suspected that the rise in mental value was due to him devouring those abnormal beings, but devouring abnormal beings was something from the last scenario, and his mental value hadn't changed then. So the reason still lay in the rest and recuperation over the past ten days after the scenario ended?

"Could it be because of the conversation with the higher-ups?"

"No, during the conversation, his tone and speech rate didn't change at all. He was still performing. He doesn't trust or expect anything from official promises. Saying 'good' at the end was merely out of social politeness."

"So what could it be?"

The psychological analysis team was anxious, while the other teams exchanged glances, finally bowing their heads hurriedly to begin work under the reflection of the Minister's glasses:

Regardless, their students' mental states had always been stable, so there shouldn't be too much worry.

"Yellowed grass and trees, the depths of autumn. The wilderness is vast, with no buildings or lamp posts on either side, but there's an element of a 'road.' What brand is this car?"

"There's no corresponding brand in reality. Looking at the model, it's neither a Mini nor conventional. It looks like a broken half. The driver's seat is on the left, driving on the right, manual transmission, with all English text instructions inside, and the odometer unit is 'miles.'"

"Even countries that originally used 'miles' have switched to 'kilometers.' Only three countries, including the Federation, still use 'miles' as their official unit, the country on the road."

"The Federation?"

"Are the other students in the same situation?"

On the staff's computers, dozens of small screens appeared, showing the live stream situations of students from other countries.

Aside from the unlucky ones whose cars were scrapped at the beginning, these students were also on a road, sitting in similar cars, with a random tool beside them: an axe, a baseball bat, a small chainsaw, or even a hunting rifle.

However, they weren't all driving. Some students were looking at maps, others listening to the radio, and some had gotten out of their cars to wander around.

Judging from their car models and the radio broadcasts they received, the official language used in this place was English.

As one of the most widely used official languages globally, three-quarters of the students could communicate in it, leaving only a quarter scratching their heads, at a loss. These students were all randomly selected.

This was one of the reasons why viewers didn't hold much hope for randomly selected students. Most couldn't speak a first language other than their native tongue, becoming deaf and blind once they entered the scenario. Even with great abilities, they could only utilize half of them.

"Common points: roads, cars, English environment. Differences: external environment. Aside from appearing in the wilderness, students from other countries also appear in rural roads, forest paths, and other places."

"We've compared the buildings on both sides of the rural roads. Our analysis leans towards the architectural style of Federation countryside."

"We've also compared the types of forest vegetation. Indeed, they are common trees and shrubs found in the Federation."

"It can be basically confirmed that the copy location is the Federation."

The Minister's brows furrowed slightly, Federation, highways, cars that don't exist in reality...

"Minister, Group C's psychological analysis has results. The students' facial expressions and body language indicate they currently have no clear objective. They want to go somewhere but don't know where it is, so looking at maps, listening to broadcasts, and exploring on foot are all means of finding their target.

"This examination might require the students to reach or arrive at a certain destination under restricted conditions."

"So..." The Minister turned to look at his own student, "What about Ji Xinghai?"

The person responsible for reporting hesitated, "Our student is an exception; he knows where he wants to go. However, our student is very skilled at hiding his thoughts, giving out too little information, so we can't speculate where he's going."

"Mm." The Minister nodded. Their student was indeed performing every moment, as if this had already become part of life.

"Federation, highways, an unknown but must-reach destination, what do you think of?"

The staff members of the Command Unit exchanged glances, raising their hands one after another.

"Carnivals, festivals. After all, the Federation is a nation on wheels, wherever there's a celebration, that's where you'll find a crowd of car people."

"Street racing. Those street racers over there are crazy. I mean, they've made several movies about it, right?"

"Battle Royale."

"And highway horror stories."

In the examination area.

Ji Xinghai, recuperating in the copy, was still cruising around. The radio in the car had long since switched from noisy music to a talk show, or rather, two hosts reporting recent news.

They spoke in a relaxed tone about a recent hazardous chemical spill at a chemical processing plant, stating that the employee who made the operational error had been fired and would be taken to court, and that the pollution had been scientifically treated and controlled, with air and water quality returning to normal.

Ji Xinghai wanted to hear more details, but they had already moved on to other topics.

From a popular singer's upcoming concert to news of a soccer star's divorce, even political jokes, the two hosts were sharp-tongued, nothing was off-limits. There was nothing abnormal in their laughter, everything looked ordinary and peaceful.

Was it just not time yet?

He had intended to turn off the radio, but in the end, he kept it on, just turning down the volume.

The car continued toward the gas station.

Ji Xinghai wasn't the only student randomly placed at the edge of the city. In between, two students chose different paths: they drove to the outskirts of the city.

Yes, they chose the path of 'escaping the city.'

And then...

they were apprehended.

Not exactly apprehended, those fat police officers didn't start shooting when they saw them, but politely asked them to retreat, otherwise, they would open fire.

"All residents are not allowed to leave this city, please return to your place of residence immediately," they shouted through a megaphone.

The last time such a terrifying statement was heard was during the gas leak incident, when the government required residents of the affected area not to flee and to return to their original locations.

The students may not know about this event, but it didn't prevent them from reading some bad information from it: they were being contained within this city.

"Tanks have come out, it's practically a lockdown. Lockdowns usually happen because of disease outbreaks or war, has the Federation had any similar events recently?"

The command units of various countries were searching for answers based on clues. They keenly sensed that this copy was far from ordinary, perhaps unlike anything before.

The students in the examination also felt something was wrong, but they didn't want to test the hardness of their bullets with their bodies, so they had to retreat.

The only options in front of them were setting up safe shelters and finding the Ark. It was obvious, even to someone thinking with their knees, that the Hungry Academy wanted them to find the Ark.

But damn, where the hell was this Ark?

At this point, Ji Xinghai was very close to his destination, the gas station.

Driving, listening to the radio, paying attention to everything flashing by on both sides, Ji Xinghai seemed to be on vacation, but he didn't miss anything in the corners, so when a strange white object appeared on the road, he noticed it first and slowed down to approach it.

It was a white, square box, shoebox-sized, lonely in the roadside grass, easy to miss.

This was the first thing on the side of the road after the signpost, even if it was trash, it was certainly trash with special significance.

Ji Xinghai drove closer, got out of the car, and pried open the lid with an axe.

"You have opened a Level 1 Resource Box, obtained 5 units of gasoline, a 180ml bottle of pure water, and a 120g pack of white bread." The emotionless electronic voice sounded, not only did he hear it, but even the viewers in the live broadcast room heard it clearly.

"A treasure chest?"

"What kind of pathetic treasure chest is that? I think it's more like the resource boxes that often appear in those survival mini-games. You know, the ones where you start with a raft, a small island, and upgrade by scavenging resource boxes, have you played them?"

"I have! These mini-games are quite popular lately."

"What are you talking about?"

The scarcity of resources had made the people of JiuZhou addicted to these stress-relieving mini-games, which could be stopped at any time, didn't require much effort, and could relieve the hardships of reality. So with a slight mention, everyone understood.

It was the foreign audience, whose environment was not as stable as JiuZhou's, who hadn't touched these casual mini-games for a long time.

"So our Brother Hai started with a broken car?"

The audience hadn't realized the seriousness of the problem yet and were still joking, but the expression of the Minister on the Black Tower grew grimmer.

A new type of copy?!