Chapter 843 - 713: Hell

All the way down, through the damp and cold clouds, the view below suddenly opened up.

This was a dense jungle, birds flying and animals running, fish swimming in shallow waters, the only anomaly being that all living things had their sizes inverted.

The evergreen pine and cypress trees were only knee-high, elephants and cattle, about the size of pet pigs, were running through the woods, avoiding fox weasels the size of motorcycles hunting them.

Originally low weeds expanded to more than ten meters high, countless fireflies the size of buffaloes clung to the tops of the grass, their luminescent organs emitting flickering fluorescent light, illuminating the grasslands as bright as daylight.

"Hmm... [Netherworld Purgatory] from 0 to negative 1000 meters, known as [Inverted Hell]. Swapping animal and plant sizes, predators becoming prey."

Li Cheng was scrolling through his phone, benefiting from the communication terminals previously set up by players, he could easily connect to the local network here and check the intelligence uploaded by other players.

"Wow, how cute is this one."

Gray Rain scooped up a watermelon-sized, round and chubby elephant, winking madly at Li Cheng, "Why don’t we take one home to raise?"

"Elephants poop 15 times a day, spare our household cleaning robot, please."

Li Cheng didn’t even look up, continuing to scroll through his phone.

Dr. Noah uploaded a clock-in app on the local network, keeping track of player numbers, death count/locations/reasons, and exploration progress.

Currently, [Netherworld Purgatory] has a total of 1900 players, with over 8000 accumulated deaths, the deepest exploration reaching 30,000 meters underground...

Buzz buzz—

A winged, car-sized termite quietly approached from behind, its mandibles opening horizontally to 180°, diving down towards Li Cheng.

Human size, lots of meat, no sharp teeth or noticeable weapons, considered quite good food in the pit...

Li Cheng slightly tilted his head, gazing at the termite. Rooted in the insect’s genetic code, the termite instantly froze, its two pairs of membranous wings halted their vibration, and the entire insect crashed heavily into the shrubbery,

Three pairs of legs trembled and stood up wobbly, panicking and trying to escape, but it was already too late.

Li Cheng grabbed the termite’s hind legs with one hand, pulling it back, then took out a USB drive with his other hand, inserting it into the chitin armor seam between its head and thorax.

Accompanied by the prompt sound "Bluetooth connected," the USB bridged the neural system, the termite stopped struggling and obediently bent down its body.

Li Cheng called Gray Rain, jumped onto the termite’s back. The termite’s membranous wings flapped at high frequency, taking off stealthily, swiftly shuttling through the tall grass jungle.

"Woohoo, the goods have arrived!"

"Me too!"

The public channel on the local network intermittently echoed with players’ excited shouts.

[Inverted Hell] was full of treasures, casually digging would yield four or five-meter long thousand-year ginseng, pure gemstones larger than people (useful for certain casting professions), or even colossal lingzhi comparable to radio telescopes.

Running players acted like a locust swarm, stuffing anything valuable into their backpack and space items, wishing they could even take a sip from a stagnant pool with a straw.

However, it wasn’t entirely without benefits; communication terminals and reconnaissance drones were everywhere, creating a clear three-dimensional map.

Li Cheng maneuvered the termite, shuttling through the complex tall grass, all the way down to a broad, sunken sand pit.

The sand pit originally housed an over eighty-meter-long ant lion, its entire body buried deep in the sand pit, only its head and mouthparts exposed on the surface, waiting to ambush when some creature unwittingly fell in.

However, thanks to previous players scouting ahead, this ant lion had been dragged out and slaughtered three hours ago, head and body separated, pale green tissue fluid flowing all over, causing the sand pit beneath it to collapse, revealing a shaft leading further down.

There were no glowing fireflies at the bottom of the shaft, replaced instead by ever-burning torches, and under the torchlight...

"Roman Colosseum?"

Gray Rain’s mouth dropped open, below was a grand arena constructed of bricks and stones, a trio player team of warrior, mage, and priest stood in the center of the arena, struggling to fend off hundreds of mechanical beasts pouring in from all directions.

Whereas in the audience stands, close to a hundred players sat, commenting on the trio’s performance.

"Ah, the warrior is positioned too far forward, can’t protect teammates that way."

"The mage isn’t doing well either, using a consumption type magic scroll and still tearing it manually. Our Bell Tower now uses paper shredders that come with batteries."

"Do you even know how to play? The old priest is dead!"

It was easy being a critic, and the players in the stands freely expressed sharp opinions, while the trio in the arena suffered, inadvertently exposing flaws during mutual cover, soon having their defense breached by the mechanical beasts, getting picked off one by one.

"[Inverted Hell]’s next layer, [Killing Sin Hell]. To pass, one must actively jump into the arena and challenge the monsters shaped according to one’s own depth of sin. In other words, the more sins, the greater the challenge difficulty."

Gray Rain looked at the explanation on his phone screen, tilting his head as he tried hard to think, "We haven’t committed any sins, have we?"

Li Cheng thought for a moment, seriously replied, "Shouldn’t have. Killing is illegal after all."

Really? The MI6 agents who met a tragic end in London City are crying out loud.

The players in the audience sported strange expressions, silently griping, one red-haired, bearded strong man stood up, laughed out loud at Li Cheng, "Long time no see, Brother Pifu."

"Brother Blood Lion?"

The bearded strong man was exactly Blood Lion Roar, the vice president of the guild [Mechanical War Thunder], compared to last time they met, his right hand had disappeared and was replaced with a gleaming mechanical arm.

The two exchanged the usual pleasantries, Blood Lion Roar sighed and said, "The last task was all thanks to you, Brother Pifu, for having our backs, otherwise, we wouldn’t have known how we died."

He referred to the fully role-playing script task of [Living Brain Cells], where eleven high-level players had their memories wiped and played Werewolf on a space station,

including masters like God of Laughter Sacco from [Wild Laughter Troupe], former president Dir of [Witch Alliance], and Zhongli Mieing from the Special Affairs Bureau. But in full role-playing mode, they couldn’t bring their skills into play,

if not for Li Cheng’s critical intervention, they truly would’ve capsized in a ditch.

"Strictly speaking, it wasn’t I who had your backs, it was the derivative version possessing my personality and thinking mode."

Li Cheng corrected him with a comment, noticing the group of people standing beside Blood Lion Roar, "And these folks are..."

"Colleagues from our guild."

Blood Lion Roar made a simple introduction, "This is Robert, he pilots the Ingram Mecha from ’Mobile Police’;

This is Hansel, she pilots the Late Bell Mecha from the ’Armored Core’ series;

This is Grant, he pilots the F-35 Lightning II Mecha from the ’Muv-Luv Series’;

This is... uh, Boluo Mi, he pilots the Fruit Baby Mecha from ’Juice Special Attack’..."

A few young people somewhat awkwardly shook hands with Li Cheng, Blood Lion Roar laughed heartily, "Our president [Harley] is still exploring deeper below, asked me to stay here and wait for people. How about it, want to temporarily team up with us?"

"I think I’ll pass,"

Li Cheng shook his head, "Ever since I mistakenly wore a bra as a back support to school as a kid, I’ve never worn any exoskeleton mecha again."

You... all right, then.

Blood Lion Roar twitched the corner of his eye, uncertain what to say even for a polite compliment, scratched his head, and beckoned his colleagues to jump into the Colosseum.