Vol 11: Chapter 9-1.
They stayed in Hamunaptra for ten more days until a hundred incendiary bombs were transported over from Europe. Everyone boarded the dirigible again and headed toward the golden pyramid. Zheng had completely recovered in these ten days.
“What God created is a world and not a mission. I had wondered why there is an option to return to previous worlds. If it is intended for resting and vacation, having the real world alone is enough. God has been hinting us that it didn’t need us to follow its rules. It wanted us to evolve. To search for dangers ourselves and overcome them. Your Explosion technique is the sign of your evolution.” Xuan said to Zheng as he looked down at the desert from the deck.
Zheng learned a lot from Xuan in these ten days. Such as possible bonus missions in their respective worlds, how to survive more efficiently, how to battle other teams, and even how he could improve his techniques. This man’s analysis were succinct and result oriented. It gave Zheng a lot of answers. Though some of which wasn’t what he wanted to hear.
Zheng said. “I have thought about how God judges each person’s strength to decide movie difficulties. The difficulties shouldn’t be equal among everyone. Or else people who are strong can easily farm points and rewards. So the technique I created doesn’t belong in difficulty judgment?”
Xuan nodded. “That’s for certain. Otherwise, God is a real god. It also doesn’t conform to the goal of evolution. The person that evolves should be rewarded. As you evolve, the difficulties will become easier and easier until you can afford to save up 50000 points and return to the real world.”
Zheng got excited. “If that’s the case then why don’t we enter the forest to kill pygmies? I think I just have to be careful and will be able to wipe them out easily. I have a unlimited ammunition Gatling cannon here.”
“This returns to our previous discussion.” Xuan frowned. “The possibility that God leaves a loophole to let you farm points and rewards is close to zero. Because if you are barely strong enough to kill the pygmies, you can keep running away and returning to kill them until you reach 50000 points. There wouldn’t be a need for evolution. The most probable situation is God increases your personal rating by a point for each monkey you killed, just like team China before. Once you accumulated enough rating, the difficulty will increase. Since you have killed several thousand pygmies already, I suspect that they will be using firearms from the 70s and 80s or even more modern by now. If you killed over ten thousand, you will probably be shot with missiles as soon as you step into the forest.”
Zheng sighed. “Then what about incendiary bombs? It should also count as killing.”
Xuan smiled very briefly. “Who gets credit for the kills? You or me? God isn’t stupid. Don’t try to game it. Even though this is a method that gets around to the pyramid, it’s actually one God might accept. Otherwise, this forest would have been a tropical forest. However, since you bypassed the danger, you lose the rewards. Unless you throw the incendiary bombs at their face. Every rule in this world follows risk equals reward.”
Zheng sighed. It was unfortunate that he couldn’t obtain the points from killing pygmies. He would have been able to revive at least three members with those points. “Following your theory, is the reward from the Scorpion King’s mission also going to be reduced from bypassing the danger of the forest?”
“No, because intelligence is also a part of evolution.” Xuan smiled.
The evolved dirigible, using the Sky Stick to carry it, returned to the border of the forest after a day and night of flying. Everyone was on guard against Imhotep the whole way. Even though the dirigible could fly faster than his sandstorm, they didn’t want to risk getting attacked in the sky.
Luckily, they arrived in safety. Everyone let out a sigh of relief after getting down from the dirigible. They wouldn’t be afraid of Imhotep anymore with the Book of Amun-Ra in hand and Evelyn to decipher the hieroglyph.
“It’s lucky we didn’t encounter him during the flight. I won’t be afraid even if he appears now.” Jonathan laughed.
O’Connell got off the dirigible after him. “I wonder who ran so fast the last time he saw some monkeys.”
Jonathan replied with a smile. Zheng gestured to let them know then walked into the forest.
He came to this conclusion after discussing with Xuan. He still had a pendant that wasn’t totally out of energy. Xuan’s theories were the most probable cases, not facts. Since they had some form of protection, they decided to test the pygmies’ current state. If the pygmies didn’t evolve too much, it was a good idea to kill some in close range.
While everyone else was setting up the camp, Zheng entered the forest alone. He felt the same sense of being watched by numerous eyes. His mission was only to probe and not fight, so he entered the first stage of the unlocked mode. He jumped in between trees and within a few minutes, he reached the inner part of the forest.
A sudden sense of danger swept him then bang! He was knocked back by three meters before he could react. The pendant in his palm shattered. A bullet just hit his chest at lightning speed. The barrier deflected it away but the force still pushed him back. Zheng was so familiar with the sound of that shot. That was from the same anti-material sniper rifle he used in the fight against team Devil.
As the name suggested, this sniper rifle was designed to pierce through tank armors. Even though it was still much weaker than the gauss sniper rifle, it would open a hole in his body if he gets shot.
Now that the pendant had became powder, Zheng was exposed under the threat of the sniper rifle. He felt a chill down his spine and immediately used Explosion. Then he jumped in between the trees, using the branches and leaves to obstruct vision while he ran. A second later, multiple gunshots followed. He could imagine the numerous bullet holes at where he was standing. A little delay could have cost his life. Sweat soaked his body.
“Burn them all down. This is crazy. The pygmies are going to be piloting Gundams before long at this rate.”