Chapter 168 - 167: Backpackers

Chapter 168: Chapter 167: Backpackers

There were people inside, and they sounded like ordinary, living humans.

At least, Feng Ling thought, a Hunter would never be wailing and screaming like that.

Su Yuqing shouted up from below, "Feng Ling, tell the people inside we’re from the Inspection Bureau."

Feng Ling did as she was told, knocking on the window. "We’re from the Inspection Bureau. Open the door."

A commotion erupted inside the cabin, and Feng Ling heard people shouting:

"It’s the Inspection Bureau! Someone’s here to save us!"

"SOB SOB SOB... The rescue team is finally here! This is great! I want to go home!"

"Hurry and open the door! Open it for the rescue team!"

Then came a frantic series of bangs and clatters, and it sounded like someone even tripped.

The latch on the inside of the cabin door was pulled back, and the door finally swung open. A wave of warm air rushed out, making Feng Ling pause in surprise.

’So warm.’

’I can’t believe a small cabin like this could be so warm. It really is a system-designated safe house.’

Two men and two women were standing inside.

Although they had sounded miserable just moments ago, all four of them had healthy complexions and were dressed in clean, neat clothing. They didn’t look like they were in any distress at all.

Feng Ling found this strange.

Even Hunters weren’t guaranteed to make it through the Maze unscathed, yet these people seemed completely unharmed.

The people inside also found Feng Ling strange. Their eyes held a jumpy, nerve-wracked fear.

One of them clutched the doorframe and asked timidly, "...Are you really from the Inspection Bureau?"

Feng Ling thought for a moment before taking off her beast-bone mask. "We’re Hunters recruited by the Inspection Bureau, on a mission to eliminate Pollution Bodies. Who are you? And why are you here?"

"We were here for tourism..."

"Can you get us out of here? We’ve been trapped here for a week!"

Feng Ling put her mask back on. "Not today. It’s already dark, and we aren’t familiar with the area. I can’t guarantee your safety if we try to move now."

They were anxious. "Then can you get us out of here tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow’s no good either," Feng Ling refused them again, her tone unsparing. "The Maze is contaminated everywhere. You’ll need to wear protective suits to leave. You go when the suits get here."

Their faces were blank with confusion.

"W-What do you mean? You said this is a Maze? Isn’t this Garkhan Valley?"

Feng Ling couldn’t explain everything in just a few sentences. Instead, she turned and pulled Su Yuqing up into the cabin. He was in bad shape, and it would be good for him to get inside and warm up.

The small cabin was soon packed with people.

Outside, the sky darkened quickly.

Aside from the light of the cabin, which illuminated a surrounding circle of bizarre-looking snowmen, everything farther out was plunged into darkness, completely invisible.

Xu Yiming explained the situation in the Maze to the four backpackers, then shared some of his own food and water with them.

The four of them were two couples who enjoyed outdoor trekking. They had found out online about an obscure, off-trail hiking route here and had come to challenge themselves.

They never expected their luck to be so bad. They’d accidentally entered the Maze and even encountered a monster.

But then, their luck had also been exceptionally good. While fleeing, they discovered this cabin and stumbled into the safe house by a sheer fluke, avoiding any Pollution.

Furthermore, they had prepared plenty of dry rations for their trip, which was how they managed to hold out in the cabin for so long.

However, if help hadn’t arrived, they wouldn’t have been able to last much longer.

Their food was nearly gone. Most importantly, under the immense fear and stress, their minds were on the verge of breaking.

Xu Yiming reassured them. "Tomorrow, I’ll contact the other Hunters and have them figure out a way to get some protective suits in from the outside. Just wait for news here in the cabin and try not to worry."

Liang Jiaqin chimed in with a snarky comment from the side. "After the research institute detected Pollution here, they designated it a danger zone and sealed all the main roads. You guys must be really something to have snuck in."

The two couples looked embarrassed. One of the young men explained sheepishly, "We took an unmarked trail. The blogger who recommended the route didn’t say the area was restricted..."

Xu Yiming said to Liang Jiaqin, "It’s not their fault. To avoid causing a panic, the Inspection Bureau only sealed the main roads and didn’t issue a public announcement. They didn’t even start putting up the perimeter fence until after the expedition team had already departed."

Wen Xiuyan sighed. "You guys really were lucky. More than half the residents in the nearby town got infected. Now they’re just quarantined, waiting to die. Next time, please don’t go playing in such a remote place."

One of the young women in the group immediately replied, "I just want to go home now. I don’t care how beautiful the scenery is, I never want to leave the house again! Can we leave tomorrow?"

Wen Xiuyan sighed. "I don’t know. There’s a monster down the mountain called a Snow Woman, and it’s extremely dangerous. We’ll probably have to eliminate it before we can leave here safely... By the way, what did the monster you encountered look like? Could it have been a Snow Woman?"

"I-I don’t know... We couldn’t see its face clearly, but it did seem to have a woman’s shape... In any case, it was terrifying..."

As she listened to them talk, Feng Ling took off her thermal suit and spread it on the floor to use as a mattress.

There was nothing in this cabin. It was, in the most literal sense, just four bare walls.

’There’s no heating, so why is it so warm?’

The temperature felt like it was around twenty degrees Celsius, very close to the temperature outside the Maze.

Feng Ling guessed that the system might have carved out a pocket in the Maze and grafted a piece of outside space into it.

’But if that’s the case, why isn’t there a visible air-wall? Is it hidden in the cracks of the cabin walls?’

Curious, she couldn’t help but run her hand along the cabin wall.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Su Yuqing staring blankly at his phone.

"Did the call go through?" Feng Ling asked him quietly.

Su Yuqing slowly shook his head, his expression numb.

Huangfu Miaomiao tugged on the corner of Feng Ling’s sleeve and whispered, "He looks really scary."

"Yeah..." Feng Ling looked away and lowered her head to whisper back to Huangfu Miaomiao. "’That’s humans for you. They don’t need a Pollution Value to drive themselves crazy.’"

Su Yuqing: "..."

’Could you please not talk like you aren’t human yourself?!’

"Thanks" to Feng Ling, Su Yuqing, whose high fever had yet to break, managed to muster a bit of energy.

He spoke, his voice hoarse. "Of the four zones in the Maze, only Zone C is left for us to check... If we can’t get a call through from Zone C either, it’ll mean Ye Zheng’s phone is actually broken, and that using his signal as our guide was a mistake."

Xu Yiming sighed. "You should get some rest tonight. Even if we’re going to Zone C, it won’t be right away. We have to figure out how to deal with the Snow Woman here tomorrow, or else it’ll be difficult for us to leave safely."

Wen Xiuyan pulled out her phone and said proactively, "Let’s share intel with the other Hunters. That way, any Hunter who enters Zone B, our current zone, will receive our message."

Liang Jiaqin looked troubled. "How are we supposed to do that? There are over eighty Hunters on this operation..."

"We’ll just message them in order of the rankings," Wen Xiuyan said, her mind working fast and her words coming just as quickly. "There are five of us Hunters, plus Captain Su, so we have six phones to send from. That’s only a dozen or so people for each of us to message. It’ll be quick."

Wu Wei also took out his phone. "Alright, let’s do it..."

Inside the cabin, one of the four backpackers couldn’t help but blurt out, "You guys have those phones, too."