60: Chapter 60 Ember Hell

After buying the items, Zhou An wasn't done yet. He casually opened the team system's resource distribution permissions and directly transferred five million units of Tier 3 resources to the sub-accounts of Li Muzi, Zhang Ming, and Lin Qing.

"Funds have been distributed."

Zhou An sent a voice message in the group chat.

"In the future, if the areas you are responsible for lack any basic materials, just go to the Trading House and buy them yourselves. There is no need to report every single thing."

"Long live the boss!"

"The boss is generous!"

The channel was immediately flooded with a row of crazily excited emojis.

After giving these instructions, the main control AI, EVA, had already directed the robots to install two [Nano Recovery Liquid Pods] in the captain's quarters and Luo Ning's room, respectively.

Zhou An looked at the silver-white recovery pod in front of him and was about to lie down when the system popped up a notification: [Please replenish high-grade nano repair fluid].

"Buying a car means having to fuel it yourself, huh."

Zhou An smiled helplessly and then made a large purchase to fill it with repair fluid.

As the light blue gel filled the pod, Zhou An removed his blood-stained bandages and lay inside.

The hatch closed, and high-concentration oxygen and soothing medicinal liquid instantly enveloped his entire body. The nano-robots burrowed into his pores, bringing a tingling sensation, followed by extreme relaxation.

Zhou An slept extremely soundly.

The next morning, the hatch opened automatically. Zhou An sat up, his bones cracking like popping beans.

Looking down, the wounds that had previously been deep enough to see the bone had completely disappeared. His skin radiated a healthy glow, and even the fatigue deep within his soul had been swept away.

"As expected of an Epic-grade item, it was worth it."

Zhou An put on clean tactical gear and walked toward the first-floor dining room.

In the dining room, Zhang Ming was busy using the newly purchased cooking station. The air was filled with the aroma of spirit wheat porridge and roasted exotic beast meat.

Luo Ning was also already sitting at the dining table. She had changed into a sharp, tight-fitting work uniform. The bandages that had previously covered her body had all been removed, and not a trace of the self-harm she had frantically inflicted yesterday could be found on her fair skin.

She was biting into a golden strip of beast meat, looking as if she had recovered her usual quirky and mischievous self.

"Yo, boss, fully recovered?" Luo Ning raised an eyebrow in jest.

"This recovery pod is truly a miraculous item."

Zhou An sat down and took a sip of the warm porridge; a wave of warmth surged through his limbs and bones.

"Now that the injuries are healed, it's time to talk business." Zhou An's expression turned serious. "Regarding the 'Adventure' event released by the system, get ready to depart."

He casually pulled up the public chat channel for District 997, wanting to gather some intelligence. However, the screen was filled with messy messages like "Guild recruiting" and "Buying medicine at high prices." Real, core exploration intelligence had clearly been hoarded by the major guilds within their internal group chats.

However, the occasional wail from solo players was enough to illustrate the problem: "Don't go to the Adventure point in the west! Three LV3 airships didn't even make it past the perimeter before being shredded..." "The Adventure is completely about throwing lives at it! The monsters inside are impossible to deal with!"

Zhou An glanced at the number of survivors: 413,205 / 5,000,000.

In four months, it had plummeted from five million to four hundred thousand.

"You've seen the situation yourselves. The 'Adventure' comes with an extremely high mortality rate; this is simply not something that can be overcome by numbers alone." Zhou An closed the channel and looked at the group.

Immediately, he swiped a holographic screen above the dining table, and a radar star map instantly unfolded.

"Just a moment ago, EVA's wide-area life radar successfully locked onto a high-value Adventure signal."

Zhou An pointed to a blindingly bright dark red vortex coordinate in the northwest direction of the star map.

Luo Ning leaned in to look at the skyrocketing energy values on the radar, licking her lips in excitement: "The coordinate isn't too far from us, and this energy wave that is so red it's almost black... it must contain top-tier research materials! But looking at this situation, I reckon it's also a super meat grinder."

Li Muzi, Zhang Ming, and Lin Qing put down their chopsticks simultaneously, their expressions becoming unprecedentedly solemn.

"The usual rules."

Zhou An made the final decision.

"The three of you aren't suited for direct combat, and it's easy to be instantly killed by unknown energy shockwaves once inside. Muzi, later you will pilot the LV4 aircraft and take Zhang and Lin Qing to wait in the high-altitude safe zone on the periphery of the Adventure point."

Zhou An paused, casting his gaze toward Luo Ning: "Luo Ning and I will take the Cloud Top Fortress and head straight in. You all guard the retreat route, maintain communications, and be ready to provide support at any time."

"Understood!" The three replied in unison. They knew very well that not being a burden was the greatest contribution they could make to this team.

Once everything was arranged, the interior of the [Cloud Top Fortress] began final pre-battle preparations.

Zhou An donned his signature battle armor. The armor's nano-units fit his body perfectly, and the dual micro-fusion reactor built into his chest lit up with a faint blue glow.

He holstered the [High-Frequency Pulse Ripper] at his waist.

Nearby, Luo Ning had also finished arming herself. Her original jetpack had now advanced to LV4, far exceeding the scope of a "backpack," and was more like a set of lightweight, full-body exoskeleton armor.

Several azure plasma thrusters were attached to the back of the armor, and she held two modified energy guns emitting high-dimensional radiation, making her look exactly like a heavy-armed, berserk loli.

"Muzi, you can depart now. Maintain radar silence and cruise at an altitude of 16,000 meters. Do not descend under any circumstances without my orders." Zhou An issued the final order through the internal communication channel.

"Received, boss! You must be careful!"

Accompanied by the roar of the airlock opening, the light aircraft piloted by Li Muzi spewed hot exhaust flames, shooting into the sky like an arrow released from a bow, quickly disappearing above the gray dome.

Having cleared away his concerns, Zhou An turned and sat at the captain's console, slamming the control stick forward: "EVA, full-power propulsion, lock onto the Adventure coordinate!"

"Understood, Captain. Main engine group grid connection complete, target coordinate locked."

After more than an hour of full-speed high-altitude flight, the [Cloud Top Fortress] resembled a silver behemoth tearing through the sound barrier, plowing a long path through the thick clouds. As the distance to the coordinate continuously shortened, the surrounding ambient temperature began to rise abnormally, and even the edges of the detection radar became covered in a layer of dark red noise.

When the fortress finally slowed down and hovered, the view ahead was no longer a monotonous sea of clouds, but a massive ring-shaped spatial rift that tore through the entire sky.

The edges of the rift burned with eerie black-red flames. Even just hovering at the outer periphery, the temperature gauge on the fortress's outer armor began to skyrocket.

In the airspace around the rift, the radar was densely flickering with signal points from other vehicles. Some were as massive as moving castles, while others were agile, high-speed battleships.

These cross-district elites from different regions and forces were all hovering in the buffer zone on the periphery of the rift, as if facing a formidable enemy.

Massive gravitational turbulence constantly spilled out from the depths of the rift, churning the surrounding clouds into visible energy vortexes.

Zhou An did not rush to dive in; instead, he maneuvered the fortress to cruise slowly along the periphery, observing this entrance that resembled the maw of a purgatory.

Just then, a grand, cold, synthesized system voice, carrying an irresistible will, exploded simultaneously in the minds of all survivors:

[District-wide Announcement: Large-scale Cross-district Adventure Event — 'Cinder Fire Purgatory' has been activated!]

[Current matching complete, participating teams: 30 / 30. Space has been anchored, all vehicle exits are denied.]

[Clearance condition: Survive in this Adventure space for over 12 hours. After 12 hours, survivors will receive huge settlement rewards.]

[Environmental restriction: Absolute no-fly zone has been covered! The maximum flight altitude for all vehicles / life forms will be forcibly suppressed to 300 meters! Violators will be erased by 'Heavenly Punishment Divine Thunder'.]

[Adventure space is about to open, countdown: 10, 9, 8...]

The moment they heard the system broadcast, the atmosphere in the cockpit dropped to freezing point.

"Cross-district Adventure..." Zhou An's eyes narrowed slightly, staring fixedly at the burning rift. He knew all too well the value of these four words.

"Boss, the clearance condition this time sounds like it's become more merciful?" Luo Ning tapped her tactical helmet, looking at the analysis data on the screen. "It doesn't force us to kill each other, we just need to survive for 12 hours?"

"Would the system be that kind? 'Survive for 12 hours' is a trap through and through." Zhou An sneered.

"Look at the environmental restrictions, the flight altitude is forcibly suppressed to 300 meters! 30 top-tier cross-district teams, each with their own massive vehicles, all compressed into an extreme space within 300 meters of the ground. What does that mean?"

Luo Ning's pupils constricted; she immediately realized: "It means there's no avoiding it! We can't use high-altitude visibility and vast airspace to avoid danger at all. Once we encounter someone, it will be the most brutal close-quarters combat!"

"Not only that, the terrain is the most lethal meat grinder." Zhou An pointed to the terrain contours that had begun loading on the holographic radar.

The scenery deep within the rift ahead gradually became clear. It was a world of active volcanoes that resembled a living purgatory.

The ground was crisscrossed with rivers of magma hundreds of meters wide, the dark red magma churning violently, spewing out high-temperature toxic gas of several thousand degrees.

And the most fatal part was that countless pitch-black volcanoes, like interlocking dog teeth, and towering obsidian mountains stood on this land.

Their maximum flight altitude was locked tight at 300 meters by the system!

This meant that no vehicle could fly over the mountains; they could only 'skim the ground' like rats in a sewer, traveling through narrow, winding valleys and canyons filled with magma and toxic gas. Once two massive fleets met in a narrow canyon, there would be no room to turn around or ascend; they would have no choice but to collide head-on, fighting to the death!

[3, 2, 1! Countdown finished!]

[Cinder Fire Purgatory, officially opened! Good luck to you all!]

Boom—! As soon as the system finished speaking, an extremely massive spatial suction force surged out from the rift. The vehicles of the 30 teams were instantly and violently dragged into it by this irresistible force.

"Hold on tight!" Zhou An roared, gripping the control stick tightly with both hands and slamming it all the way forward.

The [Cloud Top Fortress]'s Tier 4 composite energy shield activated at full power. Braving the terrifying high temperature that could instantly vaporize steel, the fortress, like a massive silver meteorite, plunged headlong into that space intertwined with churning dark red magma and endless mountains!