29: Swamp Moth

Examination Center.

Ning Que and all the examination hall directors held their breath, gazing intently at the small red dots on the map.

After the darkest half-hour at the very beginning, over 3,000 people were eliminated.

Afterward, only a sporadic dozen or so were eliminated, and the rest were all safe.

This daytime could be considered a good start.

However, night was approaching.

Compared to the daytime, the monsters at night were more active and bloodthirsty.

Humans, on the other hand, would be tired from the day's battles and craving rest.

With this increase and decrease, human strength was effectively reduced by twenty percent.

Furthermore, this was a group of inexperienced student soldiers, reducing their strength by another forty percent.

Ning Que's expression was grave, but he had long been prepared and had made the worst-case preparations.

On the real-time map.

One team had already reached the border of the Fourth District, and five other teams had reached the border of the Fifth District.

"Director Ning, take a close look. Is that team staying at the Fourth District border parked in the Magic Moth Swamp?"

?

That can't be, right?

Ning Que zoomed in on the image and saw that the red dot coincided with the boundary of the swamp; it was almost overlapping.

"Not good! The strongest seeded players are actually in danger. Why don't we give them a heads-up?"

"Say that again!!!"

The person who made the suggestion immediately shut up. The admissions exam concerned the entire life of every candidate in the country. If such a thing were actually done, and it got out, if it didn't leave a bad reputation for ten thousand years, it would at least be for a thousand.

After all, this concerned the entire nation, the life and death of over one hundred million people.

As of now, in the Ninth District alone, over three thousand candidates had sacrificed their lives.

Who would dare to trample on the rules?

Ning Que scratched his head in frustration, wishing he could drag the team stationed in the swamp area out and beat them up.

They are eighteen; don't they even have common sense?

Don't they know that the swamp is considered one of the most dangerous areas?

"Director, we can't give a reminder, but we can watch and take it as a warning, right?"

"Fine!"

Ning Que gritted his teeth and agreed; he also wanted to see which idiot team it was.

On the screen, one could see half swamp and half grassland.

The tent was pitched just three steps away from the edge of the swamp.

Next to the tent, a Little Peach Tree was planted, its dense leaves covering everything and shielding the surroundings.

Everyone widened their eyes, but they couldn't see a single figure.

Not even leaving anyone to keep watch?

And when did that Little Peach Tree appear?

"This is seriously looking for death!" someone cursed in anxiety.

"Sigh, it's good to take a look. Living next to the magic moths, they won't even be able to find their bones when they wake up tomorrow."

"Too miserable!"

"..."

Ning Que felt uneasy listening to this, and he had already decided to offer more wilderness survival classes in the future.

This kind of loss was too heartbreaking!

...

Xu Le did not know that the scene of him sleeping was being watched by a group of unscrupulous people.

Even if he were being watched, it wouldn't affect his sleep.

Why not sleep long while alive? One will surely sleep for a long time after death.

While still alive, one should practice sleeping more.

Li Yang, on the other hand, widened his eyes and, through the transparent tent door, fixed his gaze on the swamp.

Yes, the tent door was facing the swamp.

As the last trace of light disappeared from the earth, under the water grass leaves in the swamp, gray moths flapped their wings and began to forage.

"Are these monsters?"

Li Yang looked at the gray moths, which were about the size of normal moths, and frowned in thought.

The three contracted beasts resting under the Little Peach Tree did not hesitate and launched an attack directly.

The Little Yellow Chicken flew out from the shade, shook its body, and nine identical Clones began to cast the "Blazing Shockwave" Skill.

Fireballs slammed into the gray moths, exploding with a "pop," and the gray moths hit in the center died instantly.

The surrounding gray moths were not spared either, being bombarded by the individual fireballs.

Just one wave blasted dozens of gray moths to death.

Rows of experience points popped up.

【experience points +1080】

【Points +0.5】

【experience points +1080】

【Points +0.5】

...

"Damn, so many experience points?"

"The Rank must be quite high!"

Li Yang turned his head, wanting to call out to Xu Le, but thinking of Xu Le's composure, he surely wouldn't be this careless.

The only possibility was confidence.

"I'll keep watching for now."

A wave of gray moths died, but the appearing gray moths did not decrease in the slightest; on the contrary, there were even more.

It was as if a hornet's nest had been poked, and dense swarms of moths flew out from under the leaves.

They covered the sky and the earth; a conservative estimate was several thousand.

"Meteor Fire Rain!"

Ten red clouds hung in the low sky, continuously raining down fire.

On the grassland, one hundred dogs also appeared as a second line of defense.

However, this group of dogs did not growl fiercely but quietly surrounded the tent like ghosts.

Three gray moths passed through the rain of fire, their wings slightly scorched.

As soon as they flew over the grassland, three Little Dog Clones bit onto them.

One bite for each.

'Well done!'

Li Yang, who was peeking, excitedly clenched his fists and waved them in the air.

Then he felt something was wrong.

The three dogs that had bitten the gray moths to death began to lose HP.

To be precise, it wasn't just three dogs.

All the dogs began to lose HP.

"-5."

"-6."

"-4."

...

The amount of HP lost each time wasn't much, but it was dense, triggering three or four times per second.

"Brother Le, Brother Le, get up quickly. Those gray moths are too despicable; they release poison when they can't win."

Xu Le climbed up, first glanced at himself, then watched outside the tent for a moment, and smiled.

"It's fine. The boss said this tent has a slight filtering function. I didn't think it was just an advertisement, but I didn't expect it could actually filter out the toxic scale powder of those magic moths."

Li Yang still looked anxious.

Inside the tent was temporarily safe, but the dogs outside were losing HP rapidly. If the contracted beasts were all gone, they wouldn't survive either.

"The contracted beasts outside are fine too. Look at their HP bars."

As a teammate, Li Yang could also see the HP bars of the contracted beasts.

Only then did he realize that while those dogs were losing HP quickly, so much time had passed, and every dog's HP was still full.

Not only that.

The Little Yellow Chicken in the sky was casting Skills rapidly; it was one thing that their HP bars were full.

Even the mana bars were almost full.

How was that done?

Had energy conservation been advertised to contracted beasts, and casting Skills no longer required mana?

Li Yang didn't notice that he himself had an extra "Spirit Domain" buff. Within the root range of the Little Peach Tree, all friendly units could enjoy the benefit of having their HP and mana recovery speed increased by 3 times.

Under the "Spirit Domain" buff, the Life Wood Core consumed by the Little Dog alone could restore 40 HP to it every second.

Whoosh!

A white light flashed by.

Li Yang leveled up to Rank 26.

Xu Le stretched, then collapsed back onto the bed.

"Sleep well."

"These magic moths are only disgusting because of their toxic scale powder; their other methods are mediocre, and they just rely on numbers to bluff."

"Besides, if there really is danger, those contracted beasts will warn us."

"Uh..." Li Yang wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, thinking to himself that this quantity wasn't a bluff, but really intended to eat people.

In this kind of scene, even if Xu Le told him it was safe, and he himself felt there was no danger, every nerve in his body was afraid.

Another hour passed.

A sudden change occurred; the living magic moths no longer flew over the fire rain but gathered toward the center.