Under the dim light of the satellites, countless black shadows gathered from all directions, pouncing toward the firelight. The mutant rove beetles slammed into the building at high speed, making the surrounding glass vibrate with a rhythmic thud-thud sound.

“There are so many!”

A group of students held their military knives, covering those who were pouring oil at the window. The scene was chaotic, but they managed to finish the job. Under the intense heat, the poisonous insects fell like rain, shrouded in black smoke. The wind began to carry a pungent, burning, and foul odor.

Jiang Hao slashed and killed three insects that had flown inside, took two steps back, and looked at Li Xiao: “Boss, what’s the next step?”

Li Xiao stood by the window observing the situation outside. The fire was spreading toward the northeast with the wind. The flames could temporarily attract the attention of the vast majority of the insects, reducing the density of the swarm in other directions. Before the fire died out, it would be enough for them to escape safely.

Li Xiao: “Head to the southwest.”

At their original campsite, more than a dozen people had ignored Qian Can’s gong-beating warning, hoping to hide in their tents and wait for the swarm to pass. Seeing the sudden glow outside, they thought a rescue aircraft from the school had arrived. They had just poked their heads out of the tents when they were nearly covered in poisonous insects.

“It looks like it’s on fire!”

“The bugs are flying that way!”

Two Alphas carefully observed the outside through the gaps in their tent doors and realized it was true. More than half of the incoming insects were now following the light away.

“Quick! Leave now while we can!” One brown-haired Alpha scrambled out and threw his capsule tent into his backpack.

“It’s safe inside the tent!” another Alpha countered.

The brown-haired Alpha pointed at the window and hissed: “The swarm is dozens of times larger than we expected. If we don’t leave now, we’ll be buried alive by bugs!”

Hearing this, the others scrambled out to look. Under the firelight, they could see the situation clearly. The insects had gathered into massive black shadows, filling the field of vision near and far like storm clouds overhead. This volume could no longer be called a “swarm”—it was an “insect tide”! Was it because Li Xiao and his team had anticipated this that they had left so decisively?

“Hurry up, what are you dawdling for?!” the brown-haired one slashed at two incoming insects. “I told you earlier we should go with Li and the others, but you wouldn’t listen! I’m going myself if you don’t!”

The dozen people didn’t dare delay any longer; they packed their things and rushed to the seventh floor to regroup with Li Xiao’s team.

On the seventh floor, Li Xiao and Song Jin led them back to the restaurant area. After a quick observation, Qin Le waved to Song Jin and Li Xiao: “This spot is not bad!”

The southwest side was already shielded from the direct impact of the insect tide. Coupled with being in the shadows and the firelight drawing away most of the insects, there were only a few scattered stragglers outside, making it relatively safe.

“Right here,” Li Xiao said, putting on his goggles. “Once we go down, don’t linger on the road. Find a place to hide nearby and wait for the team notification.”

Song Jin and the four—Qian Can, Da Bei, Jiang Hao, and Qin Le—put on their goggles without objection. Seeing this, the others quickly dug out their own. Thinking about using ropes to escape from the seventh floor, they were both nervous and scared. They had practiced this in training, but that was with safety measures. Now, being hunted by bugs, if they made a mistake and fell in a panic, they didn’t even want to imagine it!

The steel frame exposed by the window was only two meters wide; it couldn’t accommodate everyone at once. Li Xiao kept an eye on the situation behind them: “I’ll cover the rear, you all go down first.”

Qin Le: “Then I’ll go down to scout the path. You all follow me.”

He had just taken out his launcher when an ear-piercing air-raid siren suddenly rang out.

“What’s going on?!”

“Is it the building’s fire alarm?”

“No! There’s sound outside, the whole city is ringing!”

“Look there!” Qian Can pointed outside the window.

On the roofs of buildings of varying heights, huge virtual screens popped up one after another, with yellow exclamation marks flashing continuously on the red backgrounds.

【Insect Tide Approaching. City-wide alert!】

【Insect Tide Approaching. City-wide alert!】

【Activating district defense wind tunnels—Enabled 1024… 5103… 12864… 35741…】

【50,000 wind tunnels are fully prepared!】

Following the prompts, Li Xiao and the others suddenly felt three strong gusts of wind blow from different directions, almost blowing them away.

“Waaaaah—!”

The students screamed, grabbing onto each other to steady themselves.

“What is happening?!” Qian Can clung to a pillar, shouting at the top of his lungs, “Is this supposed to be a ‘defense wind tunnel’? Did they screw something up?!”

Da Bei gripped a vine with difficulty and shouted: “Did Mortis realize what was happening? Does that mean we don’t have to escape anymore?!”

Song Jin’s eyes swept over the wind tunnel ducts that had been deformed by the vines. These were originally designed to face outward to repel insect swarms, but now they were pointed toward the interior of the building. He said coldly: “This isn’t a prompt from Mortis; it’s a notification from the Wind City security system.”

“What does that mean?” a student shouted anxiously.

Li Xiao answered: “It means this is part of the competition.”

The group nearly broke down. Jiang Hao couldn’t figure out the function of the wind tunnels: “Can these wind tunnels stop the insect tide?”

“The wind tunnel defense system has long since failed,” Song Jin said, watching the sparks drifting in the wind outside the window. “Not only will it not stop them, but it will also increase the difficulty for us significantly.”

Everyone: “…?!” Even more difficult?! Were they trying to kill them off?

A calm, familiar voice suddenly echoed in the space.

Mortis: 【The second puzzle piece task has been triggered. Successfully resist the insect tide, and teams that reach the refuge point on the top floor of the Soya Church before midnight will be rewarded with the piece.】

Everyone: “…” The difficulty gap between the first and second levels was far too large! They suddenly felt that smelling duck poop wasn’t so bad after all.

“The windows over there are turning red!” Qian Can pointed to the northeast.

Qin Le frowned: “Wind fuels the fire. If it continues like this, it will reach here soon.”

Poisonous insects were constantly being blown over by the strong winds, and several students were unfortunately hit, almost falling out. If the fire grew, it could indeed greatly curb the insect tide’s invasion, but that was on the condition that they could successfully escape.

“But the wind is so strong right now, isn’t jumping down like this just asking for death?!” Lin Zhou roared at Li Xiao, “It’s all your terrible idea!”

Da Bei shouted back: “Then why didn’t you speak up just now?! Why did you follow us?! What a jerk! A hindsight hero!”

Li Xiao ignored them, having been looking for a way down with Song Jin and Qin Le from the start. The so-called “wind tunnel defense system” constructed wind pipe structures on the outer layer of the building to repel incoming insect swarms using precisely calculated strong winds; it was generally all-encompassing. If it could blow bugs away, it could certainly blow people away. However, most of the wind pipes were now twisted and deformed, full of holes, so finding a passable path wasn’t difficult.

Taking advantage of the fact that the fire hadn’t reached them yet and the insect density was still manageable, Li Xiao quickly locked onto a window five meters away and waved to the others: “Come over! Qin Le, Jiang Hao, you two lead the way. All Omegas follow them down, the remaining Betas in the third group, and the Alphas last!”

The situation was too urgent for anyone to question him; they quickly lined up according to their secondary gender. Seeing Lin Zhou and his group follow, Da Bei glared fiercely: “Find your own path, and don’t come blaming my brother if something goes wrong!”

Lin Zhou: “Is this place yours?!”

Jiang Hao wrapped a rope around the steel frame and added: “They want to take advantage of the benefits, but throw off all responsibility the moment they have to take accountability. You’ve shamed the Danse people.”

Seeing others around them looking over, Lin Zhou gritted his teeth and forced his anger down.

The number of poisonous insects blowing in from the northeast increased. When the Betas had mostly gone down, Li Xiao patted Song Jin, who was standing still, and urged: “You go down first.”

Song Jin: “What about you?”

Li Xiao: “I’ll follow you.”

Song Jin didn’t stand on ceremony with him. He tied his launcher to the steel frame, stepped onto it with his long legs, and flipped out of the window. Li Xiao was still planning to usurp the throne; he wouldn’t be stupid enough to kill himself here.

The fire spread recklessly under the strong winds from different angles, covering the entire northeast corner of the building at high speed and extending to both sides. Pungent, thick smoke began to permeate every floor. After the eight people led by Lin Zhou jumped down, Li Xiao observed the rope on the steel frame. He only jumped when there were eight ropes left.

The rope reached the fourth floor. Li Xiao swung his knife to clear a few incoming poisonous insects, but suddenly felt a slight movement below. He yanked the rope, stepped off the wall to stop, and a moment later, a blade tip poked out from the fourth-floor vines, grazing past his toes.

Li Xiao jumped to the left. An Alpha exchange student emerged from the fourth floor, stepping on the vines and lunging toward him: “Watch out for the bugs!”

While shouting that, the military knife in his hand stabbed straight at Li Xiao. Li Xiao pushed off the wall to avoid it and kicked back at the Alpha.

“Ugh!” The Alpha slammed hard into the vines, his knife nearly falling from his hand.

Seven ambushing exchange students emerged one after another, surrounding Li Xiao in mid-air, leaving him unable to move. There was a significant commotion above. Li Xiao raised his eyes and scanned. Many poisonous insects were blowing out of the seventh-floor window, falling in a scattered mess.

The insect tide was right before them; there would only be more bugs. Returning to the seventh floor was clearly unrealistic. The seven exchange students didn’t give Li Xiao much time to think. They wanted to take advantage of the confusion in the smoke and insect infestation to finish Li Xiao off. Everyone else was busy saving their own lives; no one would notice this.

Li Xiao made a few jumps to avoid the knives stabbing from different angles, controlled the rope with one hand, and stood up with both feet on the wall, his body nearly parallel to the ground. Just as he steadied himself, another knife passed his right shoulder, and two poisonous insects were dropped from above. Li Xiao leaned aside to avoid them, backhanded the knife to kill the bugs, and flicked the military knife flexibly in his hand, the back of the blade hacking heavily onto the Alpha’s shoulder.

“Ugh!” The Alpha grunted in pain, clutching his shoulder and swinging away.

Movement came from behind. Li Xiao held his knife horizontally in front of him, swatting away the two incoming knives. The hilt hit one person’s wrist, and he spun to kick the other. Both knives were knocked from their hands and fell.

“Hiss—!” The Alpha glared at Li Xiao, gritting his teeth, his tone vicious: “You’ve got hard bones!”

Li Xiao: “How else would I have survived until now if my bones weren’t hard?”

Catching sight of firelight from the left and thick fog spreading, Li Xiao’s field of vision gradually became unclear. The range of the insect swarm was expanding, and there were more and more poisonous bugs flying around. Li Xiao had to deal with seven people with one hand while dodging the bugs that lunged at him from time to time; his patience quickly wore thin.

When the Alpha on the left dodged the insects and moved aside, Li Xiao took the opportunity to jump into the fourth floor and put away his launcher.

His toes had just landed when a cold blade edge flashed before his eyes. Li Xiao stopped his momentum forward and leaned back to avoid it.

Lin Zhou pressed him step by step, his military knife attacking Li Xiao’s vital points rapidly. Li Xiao retreated as he dodged, soon hitting the window frame with his heels, and pulled his own military knife from his back waist to block.

Lin Zhou pressed Li Xiao outward with force, releasing his pheromones at the same time. His voice was more sinister than the pitch-black building: “Don’t struggle anymore, just rest in peace!”

Li Xiao’s upper body was pressed out of the window frame. Seeing a flash of light in the corner of his eye, a burnt vine caught fire and fell from high above. He looked at Lin Zhou faintly: “People with obsessions too deep can never rest in peace.”

The moment their eyes met, Lin Zhou’s heart jumped, and an instinctive sense of crisis surged crazily. Before he could react, he felt a sharp pain in his knee. Just as the vine was about to hit his face, Li Xiao grabbed the steel frame with his left hand and leaned outward, following Lin Zhou’s force. At the moment he was about to fall, he hooked the steel frame with his right hand, spun around, and kicked the burning red vine toward Lin Zhou.

Lin Zhou retreated limping, and before he could stand steady, his right hand was hit by a ball of fire. The sparks that burst out stuck to his skin, scalding him so much that he gasped in pain.

“Why can you—!”

Li Xiao pulled himself up on the window frame and jumped back inside, walking over unhurriedly: “How could you kill me with only this much skill?”

Lin Zhou snorted: “One person isn’t enough, what about fifteen?!”

As soon as he finished speaking, a rope flew toward Li Xiao. Li Xiao raised his knife to block and threw off the rope that had bound his knife, but the next moment his waist was entangled by a rope coming from another direction.

Lin Zhou curled the corner of his mouth in a smile: “Li Xiao, I’ll give you a quick end.”

Downstairs, Qin Le, Jiang Hao, and the others landed safely one after another, but they quickly realized that the ground was no safer than the floors above. The ground was covered in insects like ants and ticks; from time to time, strong winds blew out insects from every nook and cranny.

“Oh my god!” Qian Can had just landed when he was chased by a mutant ant. Seeing Song Jin land, he said hurriedly: “Boss, find a safe place first!”

Qin Le scanned the surroundings and pointed to a five-story building not far across the street: “Go that way!”

After dealing with a wave of worker ants, the group crossed the street. Hearing a whistling sound behind them, they all turned to look back. The dozen-story building was almost completely swallowed by the raging fire. The soaring smoke dispelled many poisonous insects, but even so, the insect density remained high. Many students were still shaken.

“It’s good that Li Xiao was decisive, otherwise we would have had to open the airbags to call for help.”

“This fire is burning so fast!”

“There’s actually not much wind on the street.”

“I wonder how the people who came down later are doing?”

Jiang Hao stretched his neck to look, never seeing Li Xiao following, his heart growing more anxious. Song Jin stood in the middle of the street, which was full of vines and crawling bugs. The night wind tousled his hair, and the surroundings were filled with choking smoke and burnt smells, but he ignored it all, staring straight toward the fourth floor. In the thick fog, he could vaguely see several human shadows. There were only nine people left behind him; even if Li Xiao was slow, he should have come down.

Song Jin suddenly thought of something, scanned the crowd, realized the problem, and ran back quickly.

【07, is Li Xiao on the fourth floor?】

An operation interface and a lot of prompt text suddenly appeared in Song Jin’s vision. The circle locked onto the fourth floor of the building, identifying three names, all of whom were modified exchange students.

07: 【Shall I hack into Mortis’s surveillance system?】

Song Jin: 【Hack! Send me Li Xiao’s location!】

07: 【Hacking in progress—encountering resistance from old man Mortis—won, successfully hacked—】

But the monitored surveillance screen popped up pitch black; there was nothing. Song Jin glanced at the position of the surveillance equipment, his launcher coiled around the steel frame of the fourth floor, and he jumped up without hesitation.

“Boss! The fire has already burned over here!” Qian Can chased after him, shouting at the top of his lungs, “It’s dangerous! Come back!”

Before he could finish, a figure dashed past him. Qian Can reached out to block him subconsciously, but it was too late. “Xiao Jiang, what are you doing!”

On the fourth floor, Li Xiao was entangled at the waist by a launcher from the right. Sensing that the person was retracting the rope, the strong force of the launcher pulled him toward the right side. Seeing him controlled, Lin Zhou and four other exchange students attacked simultaneously with knives. Every time Li Xiao tried to move forward, he was pulled back by the rope, his actions severely restricted.

Taking advantage of the gap in the five people’s attack, Li Xiao brought the rope toward himself. The Alpha holding the launcher nearly lost his grip and quickly released the rope to cushion, fixing the end of the launcher to a vine and pressing the rope-retraction button. Li Xiao was pulled back a few steps; seeing this, he simply gave up struggling.

The Alpha quickly drew his military knife and stabbed toward the retreating Li Xiao. Just as the tip of the knife was about to pierce Li Xiao’s back, the Alpha’s eyes blurred. Li Xiao turned his back to knock off the military knife, supported himself on the vines with one hand to flip to a high place, and just as the rope hadn’t been fully retracted, he removed the launcher handle to untie the rope and fired the rope back at the Alpha below.

The Alpha had just turned around when he discovered his waist was entangled by several circles of rope. His face changed, and he hurriedly went to snatch the launcher. Li Xiao stepped on the vines and jumped up, fixing the launcher handle into a gap at the top of the ceiling, simultaneously pressing the rope-retraction button.

The Alpha was hung face down toward the ceiling. No matter how he tried to reach behind his back, he couldn’t reach the launcher. Seeing the fire burning in along the vines, he shouted in a breakdown: “Save me! Save me!”

Burnt vines were constantly falling from high above, blown by the wind to various floors, and the entire building was blazing.

Movement came from behind. Li Xiao had just turned around to prepare to deal with Lin Zhou when a person suddenly flew out of the firelight and kicked Lin Zhou far away. Li Xiao thought he was seeing things—Song Jin had actually come back.

“Why did you come?”

“What do you think?”

Song Jin was in a very bad mood, grasping the flying rope and pulling it hard. The Alpha’s launcher was knocked out of his hand, and he stumbled forward violently. Song Jin elbowed his neck and spun with a kick.

“Ugh!” The Alpha flew out and hit the vines, breaking several ribs, unable to get up for a long time.

“What are you dawdling for?” Song Jin looked at Li Xiao, his voice very cold. “If you have time like this, why not spend it playing with me instead?”

Li Xiao: “…” Children’s anger points were indeed unique.

Five or six more people rushed over. Li Xiao lowered his voice: “Don’t kill them; throw away their launchers.”

Song Jin’s eyes narrowed slightly.

“You really care about our side’s stance?”

Li Xiao: “After all, we are family.”

Song Jin snorted and didn’t say anything more. Under the reflection of the firelight, the vines were intertwined and mottled. The two walked quickly in the light and shadow. Two exchange students observed left and right, trying hard to find Li Xiao and Song Jin’s whereabouts. Song Jin flashed to grasp the exchange student on the left, pulled off his launcher, and threw it out of the window cleanly. The exchange student on the right slashed at Song Jin, but his wrist was grasped from behind, his arm twisted and pressed onto the vines. Li Xiao snatched the launcher and kicked the person away.

The room was filled with thick smoke, and fire spread from all directions. Li Xiao threw away the last launcher and signaled for Song Jin to leave.

Lin Zhou found his way through the vines, sweating all over. Because of the lack of oxygen, his walking was a bit unstable. Seeing Li Xiao and Song Jin release their launchers, he threw the military knife in his hand and roared hoarsely: “Li Xiao, stop! If you have the guts, fight me one-on-one!”

Li Xiao tilted his body slightly to avoid it and looked at Lin Zhou calmly: “You should be glad that this is Shengya.”

After saying that, he didn’t care about Lin Zhou’s life or death anymore, pulled the rope with Song Jin and jumped out of the window, successfully landing after a few flips in the air to avoid the poisonous insects.

“Big Brother!”

“Boss!”

“Brother! Are you hurt?!”

Qian Can and the other four waited under the building; the off-road vehicle had also been driven out by them.

Li Xiao shook his head, seeing the eight exchange students at the intersection at a glance. Jiang Hao looked over in the direction of Li Xiao’s gaze and whispered: “They snuck over just now; I used the competition props to eliminate them.” He had wanted to go upstairs to help but was stopped by Song Jin, who told him to guard downstairs. He hadn’t expected someone to really come over.

“Hmm.” Li Xiao held Song Jin’s hand and said to the others, “Let’s get out of here first.”

The burning building was like a giant mosquito lamp, drawing all the poisonous insects to this vicinity. Song Jin broke free, patted Li Xiao’s hand back not too lightly and not too heavily, and asked Qin Le: “Where is Soya Church?”

Qin Le: “Follow me.”

Da Bei turned his head to look at the building; even the southwest side was completely engulfed in a sea of fire.

“Those people—”

Li Xiao: “If someone is unable to escape, they will call for rescue.”

Passing through various mutant ants and ticks, they hadn’t driven far when an aircraft flew over their heads. A group of rescue robots flew out from the landing bay, darted into the fourth floor of the building, and in the blink of an eye, brought fifteen life-saving airbags back to the aircraft.

One was still missing. Li Xiao thought of that Alpha who had been nailed to the ceiling by him with the launcher; he could probably guess who the one not eliminated was.

Qian Can: “Does this count as withdrawing from the competition or being eliminated?”

Qin Le shook his head: “I don’t know, should it count as withdrawing?”

As soon as he finished speaking, Mortis’s voice rang out from the loudspeakers on the utility poles by the roadside.

【Calling for rescue counts as elimination. After confirming the physical condition, one must return to the starting point to start over.】

Everyone: “…” Having to continue the competition in such a state, what a tragedy.

After driving for about fifteen minutes, a circular building ten stories high appeared ahead. Li Xiao wanted to drive the car to a hidden place to hide, but was almost overturned by the strong wind coming out of the nooks and crannies.

After an urgent turn and emergency brake, Qian Can hit his head firmly with Jiang Hao’s, hurting so much that he gasped: “Xiao Jiang, have you practiced iron-head skill?”

Jiang Hao held his forehead, his eyes black: “I’m about to be smashed to pieces by you.”

Li Xiao observed left and right, cut the engine, and opened the door: “There are many wind pipes nearby; get out of the car.” People being overturned would at most cause them to fall, but if the car was overturned, people might be crushed flat.

Song Jin got out of the passenger seat and could faintly hear the shouting coming from Soya Church: “It’s quite noisy.”

“Notifying us to come here must mean there’s an ambush.” Li Xiao handed the prop gun to Song Jin and said seriously, “Let’s go, go beat them up.”

Song Jin took it with a cold face. He always felt this kid was implying something about him. The other four bit their lips, holding their lip lines tightly to keep from laughing.

There were many insect corpses around the church; the six sneaked in through a hidden small door. It was pitch black inside, except for Li Xiao and Song Jin; the other four took a while to adapt to the dark environment. The church was a ring-shaped building, hollow in the middle, looking like a donut from high above.

They hadn’t walked far before they encountered another wave of students. Everyone over there in the darkness was very nervous.

“Hey! Not fighting at night is an unspoken rule; don’t play dirty with me!” Qian Can raised his gun and shouted a warning to the opposite side.

In the distance came Chen Xi’s voice: “Truce!”

Li Xiao and the other six approached, only to find fifty or sixty people on the opposite side. One by one, the young masters who were immaculate at the start of the competition were now bruised and battered, had switched to homeless hairstyles, and looked even more down-and-out than refugees.

Qian Can leaned in to look carefully, cursed under his breath, and pinched his nose as he shrank back: “Did you go to scavenge dung? Why are you so smelly and dirty?”

Many people in the crowd complained.

“Don’t even mention it! If I had known this friendship tournament was so difficult! I wouldn’t have participated!”

“Just tonight, I fell more than ten times because I stepped on the intestines of bugs!”

“We used the power of faith to escape under the insect tide! Don’t demand so much!”

“Bullshit!” Qian Can snorted, “You should thank us for being able to escape. If it weren’t for us luring away the rove beetles, you would still be howling over there!”

Qian Can added embellishments to the story of how they set the fire and how they escaped; a group of students called it awesome. Chen Xi looked at Li Xiao, thoughtful: “No wonder on the way here, I always felt that the outside was very bright and there was a burnt smell.”

Li Xiao and others circled a large circle, seeing many participating students, but were unable to find where the stairs were.

“Could it be a hidden elevator?” Qian Can looked around, “How to find it in such a dark place?”

Jiang Hao: “Then shall we walk against the wall? It’s impossible that there isn’t a single gap.”

Someone in the crowd said: “It’s useless; we’ve all searched it. We thought it was voice-activated and shouted loudly; it was all useless.”

Unable to find the passage to the upper floor, they couldn’t reach the so-called top floor, so no one could get the puzzle piece or pass the level. Seeing Li Xiao thoughtful, Song Jin asked in a low voice: “Thought of something?”

“The sound of the wind.” Li Xiao identified the direction by the sound and looked at the center of the donut. “It comes from there.”

Song Jin: “Let’s go see.”

Walking inside from an inconspicuous arch, a student behind said: “This is a dead end; we came in and turned around; it’s like a maze.”

But not long after he finished, he was slapped in the face.

Li Xiao led them through twists and turns, coming out from another archway in ten minutes. In front of them was the hollow area of the donut. From here, they could see the insects densely packed in the air, but they seemed uninterested in the church, just flying past from above without any intention of coming in to take a look.

Da Bei: “So strange, they don’t come near here at all.”

Qian Can: “Because the church is relatively holy?”

Li Xiao scanned the surroundings: “The wind tunnel system of this church is operating normally; they can’t get in.”

“There.” Song Jin signaled Li Xiao to look up. At a position thirty meters high on the ring-shaped metal wall, there was an open door, only it was completely suspended in mid-air, without any stairs to go up.

Li Xiao looked at the ground, having just tentatively taken a step, he was blocked by Song Jin.

“It’s a wind tunnel.”

Li Xiao held Song Jin’s hand and stepped in together. The next moment, a strong wind blew from below, lifting them and sending them slowly toward the high place. At the moment of weightlessness, Li Xiao felt the hand in his palm tighten, but it relaxed quickly.

“Scared?”

“Would I be scared?” Song Jin said, but he didn’t let go of Li Xiao’s hand.

Li Xiao chuckled: “I’m scared, you have to hold me, otherwise I will cry.”

Song Jin gripped tightly: “Daddy is here.”

Li Xiao: “…”

Soon, the two landed steadily in front of the thirty-meter-high door. Seeing this, Jiang Hao and Qin Le jumped out. Although it was a bit terrifying when taking off, it was quite fun after adapting. Some people hesitated and didn’t dare, being dragged by their teammates to fly up crying for their parents.

After entering the door, it was also a ring-shaped closed corridor. Unlike other dilapidated buildings, the glass here was still intact. A group of people walked to one place and suddenly heard someone exclaim.

“Such a big fire!”

“It really burned!”

“My god, so many bugs!”

Everyone surrounded the floor-to-ceiling glass window. From this angle, they could just see the burning high-rise building to the north. The soaring firelight made the black, swarming bugs all around clearly visible. The difficulty gap between the first and second levels, and the infinite loop play of the first and second levels, made Li Xiao have to think more.

The insect tide tonight was afraid that it was deliberate by someone, in order to filter out the batch of restless exchange students, and could reasonably shut all the exchange students in the competition venue for surveillance and observation, without causing any suspicion. General high school tournaments like this would hold a victory banquet for the winning team, especially since Danse participated this time, and it was on the Imperial Capital Star; many high-ranking officials and nobles would definitely participate.

As long as those problematic exchange students could not get a ranking, there would be no chance to attend the victory banquet, eliminating all possibilities of making trouble. Thinking from this angle, it was indeed the style of that person. Thinking of this, Li Xiao looked at Song Jin. He didn’t know if this kid had known for a long time?

Song Jin seemed to know what he was thinking and said lightly: “Don’t look at me, I don’t know either.”

Li Xiao: “…”

Under the firelight, Song Jin’s left cheek was a little red. Li Xiao took off his goggles to check; it looked like a burn.

“Don’t move.” Song Jin took the goggles back, “Be more reserved.”

“Your face is injured,” Li Xiao said.

Song Jin subconsciously wanted to touch it but was stopped by Li Xiao.

“I’ll help you deal with it; sit down.” Li Xiao took off his gloves, took out disinfectant spray to disinfect his hands, took out ointment from the small medicine box, and squeezed a little to apply it to Song Jin’s face. Seeing Song Jin obediently not moving, Li Xiao said casually: “Not saying you’ll do it yourself this time?”

Song Jin’s gaze swept across his smiling eyes: “My son’s service, I can afford it.”

Li Xiao: “…”

Could this “son” chapter not be flipped over?

Seeing Li Xiao withdraw his hand, Song Jin said lightly: “It hurts a little.”

Li Xiao put the things back and said casually: “Then shall I blow on it for you?”

Song Jin: “It’s not impossible.”

Li Xiao turned his head to the side and blew twice on Song Jin’s face: “Done.”

Song Jin: “…”

Perfunctory.

Qian Can and the other four, who were also ready to sit down and rest: “…”

It’s great to have a partner, but it’s comparing.