Chapter 48: The War in the Jungle

“This is what they call a map instrument?”

Nangong Yuchen stared fixedly at the small blue sphere in his hand. Nothing was displayed on it. It was completely bare, and if not for the faint blue light shimmering across its surface, he would have thrown it away long ago.

Helplessly, he remained where he was. With the map instrument unable to display anything, he couldn’t meet up with Ke Xin or Anqi’er. Other than waiting in place, he had no other choice.

“What on earth is this thing?” After a while, Nangong Yuchen lost all interest in it. Just as he was wondering what to do, the blue sphere suddenly brightened, and a voice emerged from within.

“Thirty minutes of mech selection has passed. It seems everyone is ready. Now, let the competition begin!”

That sounded like Principal Yang’s voice. Could he be controlling the entire virtual island from outside?

Nangong Yuchen gripped the map instrument tightly. Moments later, the small sphere finally showed changes. Its bare surface gradually revealed mountains, rivers, forests, and cities.

Then the sphere rotated, and a complete flat map materialized in mid-air. It matched the display on the map instrument exactly, except now it was unfolded and presented openly.

“Hmm? These are the avatars of the 108 participating students?”

Nangong Yuchen examined the dotted markers on the map and realized he was among them, with all 108 spread across every corner of the terrain.

“Fifty-nine, fifty-eight, … forty-eight.”

“It’s counting down?”

At that moment, he noticed a one-minute countdown ticking on the map. Could it only update for one minute at a time?

Though uncertain about the countdown’s purpose, he didn’t dare risk it. Instead, he quickly searched the map for Ke Xin’s avatar.

A few seconds later, he spotted his sister’s avatar in the upper right corner. Joy flared in his voice as he cried out, “Found it! This is in the ruined city?”

Then he glanced at his own position and let out a helpless sigh. “So far…”

A river lay between them, followed by grassland and then a dense forest. The distance made him want to spit blood. Even just looking at the map felt like an impossible trek; how long would it really take to run?

Knowing he couldn’t arrive in time, Nangong Yuchen turned his focus to Anqi’er’s location. Just as the countdown reached twenty seconds, he finally located her avatar above the map.

“Anqi’er is in the ice plains? That’s good—the only obstacle is a patch of forest!”

Relief washed over him after that discovery. As the map’s final seconds ticked away, he suddenly spotted another avatar moving toward him, close by.

“Wow!”

Before he could make out the avatar’s features, the flat map vanished from mid-air, and the instrument in his hand dimmed. “Fifty-nine fifty-nine, fifty-eight fifty-nine…” flashed across its surface.

“One hour to view it once?” Nangong Yuchen was speechless. The school could really come up with such ruthless methods.

During those full hours of darkness, without any map access, the 108 students would likely bump into one another unknowingly, sparking sudden and mysterious battles.

“Never mind that. First, meet up with Ke Xin and Anqi’er!”

Ignoring the approaching student, he raced toward Ke Xin’s position. He refused to let his sister be eliminated because he arrived too late.

“Clack-clack!”

Upon entering the virtual island, every student’s stamina had risen to rank one. Nangong Yuchen’s speed therefore reached forty meters per second.

Trees and jungles blurred past in a rush. A thousand meters passed in half a minute.

The blazing sun hung high, scorching the earth. Sunlight pierced the sparse branches and leaves, beating down on Nangong Yuchen as he ran. He had already covered more than half an hour of terrain, sweat tracing down his face.

Suddenly, a yellow bullet shot straight at his forehead!

“Sniper!” Shock hit Nangong Yuchen. He had only been focused on running, forgetting the distance traveled, and now the entire jungle had been riddled with bullets. He had no idea how many enemies lurked in the surroundings.

“Boom!” In that critical instant, relying on rank-one neural reflex, he flung himself to the side of the jungle, barely dodging the bullet. Without the three balanced attributes, he would have been struck in the head and eliminated.

“Puff!” Nangong Yuchen flipped behind a tree trunk, quickly drawing out the Thunder Sword Curtain and the Triangular Shield. Purple and yellow crystal blocks shimmered brilliantly, like strings of code, weaving densely around him from both sides. They began to entwine, condense, and form.

His heart pounded violently with tension.

He had never taken ordinary rank-one mech students seriously—his three attributes were all rank one, so he could have crushed them easily. But now he realized his mistake.

Especially the mysterious bullet that had pierced through, deflating his inflated confidence.

After all, this was his first time fighting as a rank-one mech warrior.

Speed and strength he had no fear of, but a sniper hidden in the shadows, relying on neural reflex, made him uneasy. One careless hit to an important organ could end him in a single strike. Then he would be eliminated before he could bring Ke Xin as a top student.

“Puff-puff!”

Another yellow bullet flew over, this time piercing the tree trunk and leaving a small black hole the size of a little finger. If not for the shield, he would have been hit.

“Where are you? Where exactly?”

Nangong Ychen’s face flushed with rage. He darted through the bushes, searching for the sniper’s position. But the distance seemed too great, and he couldn’t pinpoint it.

“Puff-puff!”

“Boom!” Another bullet screamed toward him. Nangong Yuchen raised his shield to block it. This was his advantage! Even without a gun, terrifying neural reflex allowed instant reactions. After all, a rank-one neural reflex cultivator could dodge twenty laser shots in succession!

“Found him!” Nangong Yuchen side-stepped and leaped. His deep eyes blazed with fire. He had finally located the opponent’s approximate position.

“Step-step!” Under tension and fury, his speed surged to full power. Forty meters per second left only a residual shadow, propelling him toward sixty degrees southeast.

“Hmm? Discovered?” In the grass more than eighty meters away, a boy wearing glasses suddenly rose. He grinned widely, lowered his sniper rifle, and picked up a heavy machine gun already prepared on the ground.

He was also a rank-one neural reflex mech warrior, his induction no weaker than Nangong Yuchen’s. When the distance closed to fifty meters, he felt it—Nangong Yuchen’s movements were too loud.

“Haha, taste the bullets!” The boy seemed unafraid. He pulled the trigger, lifting the nearly eighty-centimeter-long black heavy machine gun and sweeping toward the approaching Nangong Yuchen.

“Ratatatatata…”

“Bang-bang-bang-bang…”

Dense bullets transformed into yellow light beams, piercing trees, bushes, branches, and leaves, slamming into the Triangular Shield Nangong Yuchen held up.

“What?” Behind the shield, Nangong Ychen’s pupils shrank. He was being pushed back continuously by the heavy machine gun’s relentless fire. Originally ten meters apart, the impact force drove him fifteen meters away.

Worse still, he felt the shield in his hand slowly dissipating, as if too many attacks had been absorbed and it was about to shatter.

“Haha… You can’t move at all under a heavy machine gun sweep! Once this shield disappears, you’ll be shot into a bullet!”

The boy with glasses knew far more about mechs than Nangong Ychen did. That was why he remained calm, lifting the heavy machine gun without hesitation. He had spent long consideration choosing the perfect combination of sniper and heavy firepower.

Soon the Triangular Shield grew more translucent. Nangong Ychen felt it clearly: the next moment it would automatically return to the spatial ring.

Just then, he snapped.

“Ah… Rise for me!”

As the shield began to dissipate, Nangong Ychen’s strength and speed erupted simultaneously. He stomped the ground and leaped into the air more than five meters high. His right finger’s spatial ring flared with white light. Black dense crystal blocks drifted out while purple and yellow ones surged in densely.

Condense, entwine, form! S-M82A1-75 type cannon sniper!

“Die!” Before the boy could adjust his heavy machine gun’s angle, Nangong Ychen’s hand gained an additional nearly one-meter-long cannon-type sniper.

“Boom-boom!” Trigger pulled, arm-thick yellow energy cannonballs shot out, slamming directly into the boy’s body…