47 Chapter 47

Somewhere, in an unknown place, was a space with nothing inside. That was if one ignored the papers scattered around from edge to edge.

Several pieces of paper, as full of words as many of the others around them, suddenly burned from their center. It didn't take long for them to disintegrate fully without leaving any trace behind. Unless someone was there and watched the whole process, they won't realize those papers were gone from among thousands of others.

---

[Holy hell, what is happening???]

[I saw it!! A giant beast came out of nowhere and is madly attacking the forest!]

[Damn, General Yi has really done it now…]

[No way General Yi would put the candidates in danger like this… would he?]

[Go! Go! Go! This is the thrill I've been waiting for!!]

[I came from another group. I saw mechas flying over to that giant beast]

[F*ck! Is it General Yi himself? Begging the military to send a drone to live stream the battle]

He Ruiqi watched a tree flew by to the side above him. Beside him, Bai Shui was clearly a bit more panicked than usual. When they were running earlier, a tree fell down in front of them. If they were running just a second faster, they would already be pummeled to the ground by now.

"Calm down, Bai Shui. We'll continue going to the west area. The military is going to take care of the beast–" Then, he realized something, "Oh no, we forgot to leave any trail for Huang Lixue and Lin Shisan…"

"Th-they're probably fine, right? Let's hurry to the west area. I don't want to die yet."

He Ruiqi nodded. He wanted to mark a tree, just in case Huang Lixue and Lin Shisan went by here later, when a group of people stumbled in front of them.

He couldn't be more familiar with that red hair.

One of Jing Hao's group members saw Bai Shui. He was going to ask what was going on but then noticed the person next to him.

"You–?!"

The 3 other people's attention was caught by their teammate's sudden exclamation. They turned around and found the person who was supposed to be buried underground somewhere was looking at them with cold eyes.

"How come you're here??" one of them asked in bafflement.

"Why can't I? Shouldn't you be glad I'm not dead yet, my teammates? Oh wait, I supposed you did try to kill me, so I must say it's unfortunate for you because I'm still very much alive." He Ruiqi replied bluntly.

Jing Hao inwardly panicked from He Ruiqi's direct confrontation. The drone was still monitoring them and live broadcasted it to the entire federation.

"What are you talking about? We were chased by those creatures, and you, unfortunately, fell into the pit. We wanted to help you, but the pit was too deep. I can't tell the others to sacrifice themselves to save you, right? Why are you sounding so resentful?"

"Heh," He Ruiqi scoffed, "Right, I 'unfortunately' fell. Why don't we watch the broadcast and see whether or not one of you pushed me?"

"He Ruiqi, your accusation is going too far!" a member rebuked.

"Yeah! Are you saying we're f*cking murderers??"

"You're welcome to check later. You think any person would try to murder someone in an examination monitored by the military? Are you stupid or too self-conscious?"

He Ruiqi frowned. He was sure that the freckle guy pushed him into the pit as clear as a day. He was pushed from the front, so when he fell, he saw the drone was right above them. There was no way their act wasn't caught.

Now that he thinks about it, it was strange that they could still be in this examination.

He looked at them one by one in their eyes. The shortest guy at the back flinched when his gaze landed on him.

"I see… You guys must've brought some kind of device to interfere with the drone."

"You're desperate aren't you? Well, do you want to conduct a body check right here right now? Go ahead!" Jing Hao ridiculed. He spread out his hand and invited him to search his body provokingly.

Bai Shui who was silent until now behind He Ruiqi held him by his shoulder, "He Ruiqi, I know you have some problem with them, but this isn't the right time to do this. We got to get out of here!"

He Ruiqi calmed down from Bai Shui's reminder, "You're right," he turned to look back at Jing Hao, "But I want the portion of the beasts I caught and my weapons."

"Hah!" Jing Hao laughed, "Before, you accused us. Now, you're begging for a portion? How shameless are you? As expected, a trash would always conduct like trash."

He Ruiqi took out 2 spikes into each of his hands, "If you're not giving it to me, I'll have to take it by force."

"You? Fighting us? There are four of us and two…" the freckle guy scrutinized Bai Shui up and down, "Scratch that. There's only you. You don't even have your weapons. Only what? Sticks? Don't be a rock and just piss off."

"Fine, I'll take that as your answer." He Ruiqi stopped trying to communicate with these bastards and went to attack.

"You think we're scared?"

Jing Hao and the rest took out their knives and simultaneously attacked He Ruiqi. Bai Shui who was ignored at the back pulled his hair in frustration watching the 5 people fight.

"Ahh!! What is wrong with you guys??!! Am I the only sober person here?! Is this stupid dispute more important than your life??"

He once again let out a shout in frustration before deciding to help He Ruiqi to finish faster. He saw the storage space was on the tallest member. Without further delay, he dashed from his spot and gave that person a flying kick to his side.

The member didn't expect the insignificant extra would suddenly attack him. His attention was on He Ruiqi and in addition, the light shield didn't react to frontal human attack because the examination allowed them to fight with other groups. So he was squarely hit and fell down.

Not only Jing Hao and the other 2 members, He Ruiqi was also surprised by Bai Shui's sudden attack.

Bai Shui took off the space storage from him while he was still immobile and wore it. He drew his gun and shot the other 3 before snatching He Ruiqi away. Jing Hao and the other's light shield protected them, but they also couldn't stop Bai Shui and He Ruiqi at the same time.

"Let's go, hurry up!! I don't want to be here any second longer!"

"Catch that damn thief!! He took our whole storage space!" Jing Hao angrily ordered.

Bai Shui could hear his shout, but it was quickly fading away with the speed they were going. With how he needed to catch up to Huang Lixue and Lin Shisan, his speed unintentionally improved although it wasn't as good as the other two.

Behind him, He Ruiqi almost tripped when Bai Shui suddenly yanked him, but he gradually matched his pace. Bai Shui already let him go and they ran non-stop heading to the west area.

Jing Hao and his team didn't have any chance to catch them.

When Bai Shui finally ran out of his adrenaline, he stopped and slumped into the ground gasping for breath. His face was drenched with sweat, and his legs were numb and throbbing. He Ruiqi sat down beside him in a slightly better condition.

Bai Shui gave the space storage to He Ruiqi and spoke while heaving, "I don't…hah…know…where your…weapons were. Next…hah…next time, please consider the time and situation before…brawling…hah…with someone, okay?"

He Ruiqi accepted it and looked at Bai Shui still with some astonishment, "I didn't think you would suddenly kick someone like that. You have decent combat skills. That kick was perfect."

"I know that what you want to say was that you didn't expect a coward like me can fight."

"I–"

"Yeah, I know. You didn't mean it like that," Bai Shui sat up, "Just saying, monsters are always infinitely scarier than humans for me. Isn't it just normal to be scared?"

"It's normal," He Ruiqi patted him, "But in the end, we didn't leave a single trail for Huang Lixue and Lin Shisan."

"…"

Bai Shui silently scolded himself. He's totally going to be targeted by Lin Shisan later.

---

"How's it going?"

Lixue opened his eyes, "It's going well. One more push and there's a high chance the exam will be stopped early."

"You didn't send out those butterflies yesterday for this, right?"

"I just wanted to scout around and planted some eyes. Didn't think I'd be using it to pull aggro."

Thirteen shifted his attention to their back, "So, are we going to put this in the south area?"

"No," Lixue grinned and a giggle crept out, "We'll dump this on the west."