Chapter 2674: Little Pink Hat Tries It Out

When he reached the outskirts of the village, the range of the characteristic expanded again, and the arrow grew longer as well. Judging from the direction, it should be pointing to the exit of this grove.

Following the arrow to the end, sure enough, it stopped at the edge of the woods.

So "100% Out of Character" was giving him a safe route based on his position. Wherever the arrow pointed was a relatively safe exit; he just wasn’t sure how large this "stage" could be.

After testing this characteristic, Xu Huo looked at the other two. "Protagonist Halo 2.0" added effects like the opponent’s "mistakes" and "bad luck" on top of the original "Protagonist’s Halo." The duration of the characteristic hadn’t changed; it was still ten minutes.

The newly added main characteristic, "Film Set," was a strong crowd-control type. Within one minute of using it, anyone within a five-hundred-meter radius could not leave the "Film Set," unless Xu Huo chose to end the characteristic or died.

This was actually a pretty good characteristic. Xu Huo called over some village kids to help test it and discovered that under this strong control characteristic, even using instruments couldn’t make people or animals, or even objects, move beyond that five-hundred-meter range. He just didn’t know whether the effects of Rank A Props would also be restricted, but as a supplementary method it was more than enough.

The Rank-A medical kit was a collection of various surgical tools for Players to treat injuries. In addition to six simple surgical Mechanical Arms, it also contained ultra-micro surgical robots—one injection into the wound and they could automatically perform delicate surgery, suitable for treating internal organs.

The S+ Clearance Player Club was a private platform set up by the Game Government for high-score clearance Players to communicate. A membership card was required for identity verification. Once you joined, you could communicate with high-rated Players from other Wormhole Points, and the Game Government would not interfere at all.

Xu Huo glanced at it, then set the membership card aside and continued sorting through the team rewards.

This time the team reward was indeed a Rank-B armed robot, but the weapon loadout was richer: in addition to close- and long-range weapons, it also had auto-tracking, searching, and stealth functions.

The Special item "Hazy Boundary" was specifically used to guard against stripping Props. Once worn, it made the Props on one’s body much less likely to fall off.

It didn’t look like much, but in real combat you occasionally ran into opponents using stripping Props. If you were slow to react, some of the important Props you were wearing might fall off. Losing them was one thing; more importantly, it could affect the battle. This was a detail that couldn’t be ignored.

As for the remaining one characteristic upgrade, after hesitating, he used it on "The Immortal Pedestrian."

"The Immortal Pedestrian" could grant immunity to general characteristics and Prop attacks for ten seconds; other physical and chemical attacks could also be warded off. But where the upper limit lay, Xu Huo still wasn’t sure. He didn’t often encounter situations that required him to keep using life-saving Props and characteristics; most of the time this characteristic served as a trump card for dealing with sudden emergencies.

The upgrade finished quickly.

The upgraded version, "The Immortal Pedestrian 2.0," still had a ten-second usage time, but the cooldown was reduced to six hours, and its defensive capability was enhanced. In the description of "The Immortal Pedestrian," it mentioned that crushing-level Space-Time Power might breach the barrier—this was basically saying it might not be able to block particularly high-level Super Evolution Power, which, judging from strength, should refer to top-tier Rank-A Super Evolvers. After the upgrade, the characteristic drew a clear line: while the characteristic was active, any non S-rank Space-Time Class Props or instruments could be defended against.

Characteristics came in all varieties, but if you traced them back, more or less all of them were tied to Super Evolution Power. "The Immortal Pedestrian" should also be a kind of special Spatial Barrier. After multiple upgrades, it now had an effect comparable to an S-rank Spatial Defense Artefact, and it also had damage-buffering effects, making it safer than ordinary Defense Props.

The downside was probably that the duration was only ten seconds, and the cooldown time was on the long side.

That wasn’t enough to solve the current problem.

If Xu Huo wanted to go find Yan Jiayu, he first had to determine whether that was the Suitcase Man’s instance.

After explaining to Gao Ming that he didn’t plan to have surgery for the time being, Gao Ming gave him a surgery log. "These are the notes for all the spatial surgeries I’ve performed. Take them. There’s always someone better out there; maybe you’ll run into a doctor stronger than me."

Xu Huo accepted it with thanks, then smiled. "Maybe I’ll come back to you again."

Gao Ming kept smiling. "You can come anytime."

After saying goodbye to him, Xu Huo headed straight for the Primeval Forest near Yu Country.

Earlier, he had asked Ji Qingcheng to investigate the situation with the instance, with special attention to whether any Battle Dolls were appearing nearby.

"You got back pretty fast." The one in charge was Dai He. He told Xu Huo about what their Players had found after going deeper in. So far, none of their people had suddenly vanished, and the instrument readings were all normal. They hadn’t discovered any spatial entrance with special power fluctuations.

Right now, any space that existed in the game and that people could enter presumably couldn’t entirely break free of the game’s control. With personal panels sealed and contact with the game cut off, Tickets also couldn’t be used. Besides special simulation instruments blocking things, it was possible this space itself was rather special. If it was the former, there was no need to worry too much. If it was the latter, the only thing that might break this boundary would be a new instance being born.

Back then, near the sea area close to Zone 011, Xu Huo had opened a random instance. At the time, Tickets couldn’t be used, but Props could. That sea area’s space was chaotic to begin with, so it was also possible that because it wasn’t a direct-to-destination Ticket region, that caused this kind of discrepancy. But after the instance opened and ended, Tickets indeed became usable.

He didn’t know whether this situation would also apply to the space inside the Primeval Forest.

Of course, that was only one of the possibilities.

He took out the Awakening Doll and called out the Little Pink Hat.

She only appeared after quite a while, stretching lazily. "What is it? I was sunbathing!"

"I’ve got something I want you to help with," Xu Huo said.

"Why is it that every time you look for me, it’s always that line?" Little Pink Hat said unhappily. "I told you, I don’t help grown-ups for free."

Xu Huo took out snacks, toys, and some Prop clothing to bribe her. Little Pink Hat looked left and right, then happily hugged everything away.

Afterward, Xu Huo explained the situation to her. Little Pink Hat thought for a moment, then said, "If it’s not an instance, then it really might be a game area that doesn’t bring in any income."

"But you’re guessing it’s a Super Player’s instance. If an instance can be opened inside, then of course it’s entered the game. Bringing an instance in with you won’t help."

She paused, then said, "You’re not thinking of asking me to go in, are you! I’m not going. A Super Player will smash me into pieces!"

"Take an Awakening Doll in and try," Xu Huo said. "If you can go in via the Doll, then things inside won’t be that bad."