NOVEL WEB Chapter 161 - Training Exercise 9
The members of the Phantom Squad worked hard by the lake all night. By dawn, each person’s spatial device contained a certain amount of roasted mutated beast meat and two bags of drinking water.
“Where did this kid learn so many ancient techniques?” Instructor Li marveled.
“It is said that there was a mysterious person who secretly taught her when she was young,” Instructor Shan replied.
“Said?” Instructor Li found it hard to believe.
Given Xi’s life experience, especially after she appeared before everyone as a monstrous genius, it would be impossible not to uncover the background of any mysterious person around her.
After all, she is a quasi-soldier; the school must have investigated her background.
“Prince Arthur has classified Xi’s information as a level-three secret, especially concerning that mysterious person, which is highly encrypted,” Instructor Shan said.
Even if Prince Arthur had already sent people to erase some traces, there should still be clues left behind, and with some effort, it should be possible to investigate, since it was just a level-three secret.
However, the fact that Prince Arthur had personally investigated and encrypted the information indicated that Xi’s identity was completely legitimate. Who would bother to investigate someone without a valid reason?
When Instructor Li heard that Mai Dongzi’s profile had been encrypted by Prince Arthur, he was curious about who that mysterious person was but did not suspect that their identity would pose a problem.
“Even if Xi has great potential for cultivation and that mysterious person taught her exceptionally well, that individual must have considerable abilities,” Instructor Li sighed.
“No, I actually think that mysterious person somewhat hindered Xi. While her cultivation is fine, there are areas of knowledge where she is quite lacking. You must know that her learning ability is extremely strong; her current situation seems to be a result of intentional confinement,” Instructor Shan replied.
“No wonder Prince Arthur went out of his way to find a teacher for Xi,” Instructor Li suddenly realized.
He had been puzzled before; since Xi had been trained by that mysterious person, she should have taken that individual as her master.
“That person likely hasn’t been around for several years,” Instructor Shan expressed his understanding.
This would explain why the truth about the ‘true golden girl’ was revealed and spread everywhere, forcing Xi to expose her real situation through the survival live-streaming game.
Mai Dongzi was unaware that her rebirth was vastly different from the original owner, and under Prince Arthur’s intentional misdirection, many “reasonable” narratives were constructed by others, including their instructors.
She calmly directed the members of the Phantom Squad as they worked hard.
With more than twenty mutated beast skins, and lacking leather-making agents, Mai Dongzi taught the Phantom Squad to use scraping, smoking, and roasting techniques, and finally, after kneading with wood ash, they managed to turn the skins into relatively clean leather.
Such leather armor could be made into bags that would last one or two months, thus solving their problem of containers for drinking water.
With the basic survival issues addressed, the morale and spirit of the Phantom Squad changed significantly. They no longer resembled individuals who had gone a whole day and night without rest.
“We’ll go back to the cave and rest for a bit before discussing our next steps,” Mai Dongzi said.
They had worked all night to process the more than twenty beast skins.
Although, given everyone’s physical fitness, this level of labor wasn’t particularly exhausting, the “sun” of Liva Star had risen, and as the sky grew brighter, the light breeze from the night gradually strengthened.
So, Mai Dongzi decided that everyone would rest in the cave for a while and then assess the weather conditions.
This rest lasted until the afternoon, and the Phantom Team sat in the cave for a meeting. Mai Dongzi asked them to share their findings about Liva Star.
“Liva Star has a 16-hour day, with 8 hours of daylight and 8 hours of night,” Yu Guangxi said first.
“The highest temperature during the day is 18 degrees, while the lowest temperature at night drops to minus 45 degrees. The wind is very strong during the day, increasing with the temperature, reaching up to 18 or 19 levels at its peak, while the lowest wind speed at night is only 8 or 9 levels,” Durant added.
“Beasts on Liva Star are more active during the day than at night. They are not affected by the strong winds, which means that such windy weather is not uncommon,” Zhuang Huaiya said.
“Based on our initial estimates, we only need half a month to reach the designated location. But since a day on Liva Star is significantly shorter than we estimated, our time is actually not as abundant as we thought,” Wang Yiyi continued.
“I suggest we travel at night since it’s slower to move in strong winds,” Tony also suggested.
Mai Dongzi was very satisfied with the performance of the Phantom Team, and Tony’s suggestion received unanimous agreement.
So, with nothing much to carry, the Phantom Team filled their stomachs, and once the two “moons” appeared, they clapped their hands and set off.
In just one day and night, the Phantom Team had developed a habit of seizing every stone they came across, especially large ones.
They discovered that using stones as projectiles or as makeshift weapons to strike beasts was very practical.
That night, not long after they set off toward their destination, they encountered a group of 40 to 50 beasts.
Based on the direction the beasts were heading, they were moving toward the direction of their cave.
With so many beasts around, apart from Mai Dongzi, Moonlight, and Zhuang Huaiya, who could kill or incapacitate the beasts from a distance using stones as projectiles, the other members of the Phantom Team had to rely on smashing large stones from close range to eliminate most of the beasts before engaging them hand-to-hand. This approach helped avoid the situation of being surrounded by the beasts.
Otherwise, if they had to face so many beasts barehanded, most of them would likely have sustained injuries to some extent.
Unlike now, where only Chen Xinhe was injured after falling from the hill while trying to evade a beast’s attack, the injuries she sustained were not light. She hurt her calf, but none of them had any healing potions, so she would have to rely on her own body to heal.
Thus, while killing the beasts wasn’t an issue, sustaining injuries that couldn’t heal on their own could lead to the risk of elimination.
It was at this moment that they realized something important: their team leader was a third-level wood element ability user.
Chen Xinhe’s leg injury, which might take four to five days to heal, was treated by their leader in just a few minutes.
Feeling like they were following an extraordinary leader, the members of the Phantom Team admired her even more, and they became even more obedient.
After setting off again, the Phantom Team worked diligently to collect stones and other useful materials.
Having witnessed their leader use a large rock, slightly larger than a sixth-level beast, to knock out and then kill the beast, large stones became the Phantom Team’s ultimate weapon against the beasts. They made sure to seize every opportunity to collect these stones whenever they came across them.