Volume 3, Chapter 24 – Listening to a Chorus of Frogs

“Why are you here again?”

The moment the door was pushed open, a woman standing inside the room spoke in surprise.

She was the NPC responsible for guiding players through the assessment.

Zhou Jieyu went in first, Leading the Charge second, and Anran walked in last.

She had never seen Outlanders take the assessment twice in a row within ten minutes, especially when these two Outlanders had just lost incredibly fast.

When she saw Anran at the very back of the group, the guide NPC was even more astonished.

Two very weak Outlanders, plus a girl who looked even weaker.

Surely they were not here to take the assessment, right?

“We’re here to take the assessment,” Zhou Jieyu said at once, shattering the guide NPC’s fantasy.

“You’re sure?”

The guide NPC widened her eyes. “Taking the assessment isn’t free. It costs 50 Bilu per person each time.”

What she really meant was: Aren’t you at least a little distressed about your money?

Who the hell cares about money when there’s EXP to earn!

“It’s fine, it’s fine. We’ll definitely pass the assessment this time,” Zhou Jieyu said.

With Anran here, she was full of confidence.

“…”

The guide NPC looked at Zhou Jieyu with a strange expression.

Definitely pass the assessment?

Hadn’t you just lasted less than twenty minutes last time?

“Pay first.”

The guide NPC spoke.

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If people were coming to hand over money, she could hardly drive them away.

Zhou Jieyu paid happily, Leading the Charge paid expressionlessly, and Anran paid with a slight pang of heartache.

After the payment, the guide NPC led them to another small room.

There were several other identical small rooms as well.

Ordinary reception rooms had been converted into assessment rooms.

Dense wiring ran along the corners of the walls, and on the table below were several uniquely shaped headbands.

“Put on this headband and the assessment can begin.” The guide NPC specifically reminded Anran.

After giving that reminder, she casually pulled the door shut behind her and left.

“I’m very experienced, so if there’s anything you don’t understand, you can ask me!”

Before putting on the headband, Zhou Jieyu said this with a cheerful grin.

Anran nodded with a “kind” smile. “Then I’ll have to trouble you two later!”

Sitting in the chair and fastening the headband in place, Anran closed her eyes. After a moment, she felt her consciousness being pulled into a strange place.

When she opened her eyes again, she found herself in a room lit by dim light spilling down from above.

She was sitting on an iron bed, and the clothes she was wearing had already changed into dark-colored gear.

Anran stood up and walked out of the small room. Outside was a larger connected room, with a raised platform standing in the middle and staircases around it leading up to the second floor.

And on the central platform was a counter for selecting weapons.

This scene somehow felt a bit like COD.

As soon as Anran stepped onto the platform, Zhou Jieyu and Leading the Charge came out of other rooms as well.

“We only have five minutes to prepare, so we need to make full use of the time and get ready properly,” Zhou Jieyu said with a serious expression.

Anran glanced at the countdown clock on the wall. Four minutes and thirty seconds. So that was how it worked.

“And you’ve got the nerve to say that? If you hadn’t kept dawdling last time, would we have rushed out with nothing but pistols and bombs?” Leading the Charge immediately shot back.

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“…”

Zhou Jieyu blushed and instantly defended herself. “You learn from setbacks. I’m kindly reminding you.”

“You should worry about yourself first. Don’t come begging me for supplies again later.” Leading the Charge had already started choosing the weapons he wanted.

The dungeon’s setup allowed you to assemble a loadout during the preparation phase.

That included a primary weapon, a secondary weapon, and tactical attachments.

For her primary weapon, Anran chose a three-round-burst assault rifle fitted with a red dot sight.

For her secondary weapon, she picked a semi-automatic pistol with a laser sight.

As for tactical attachments, she stuck with the standard combination of a fragmentation grenade and a Flashbang.

“Let’s go!”

Anran stood by the exit and was about to push the door open.

“Wait, wait!” Zhou Jieyu called out at once.

She had already fallen into the whirlpool of indecision.

“Just grab whatever weapons…”

Anran said it casually. They were cannon fodder anyway.

Emmm…

That didn’t sound so nice.

At the very least, they still counted as a mobile armory.

So Anran changed her wording. “Just take a sniper rifle and bring some grenades. That’ll be enough.”

Now that someone had pointed the way, Zhou Jieyu no longer had to agonize over her choice.

Once they had their equipment, the three of them stood at the door.

Among them, Leading the Charge looked the most like a real special forces officer.

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Anran pushed open the door.

At that moment, a narrator’s voice suddenly rang out in her ear and began explaining the background story of this dungeon.

“This is a small town located on the border, but a retired high-ranking government official lives here.”

“The people from the terrorist organization Morningstar have set their sights on this former official. They have dispatched multiple squads in an attempt to assassinate him. Just before the operation began, the government intercepted the information.”

“Because time is short, the government can only send in a special operations team first to disrupt their plan.”

“Mission objective: keep the official alive until daybreak (deadline: 6:00 a.m.).”

“Bonus objective: +1 point for each Morningstar Resistance member killed.”

“Successfully eliminate all invading Morningstar Resistance members: +50 points.”

The narration ended.

Anran asked, “What are the points for?”

Zhou Jieyu shook her head. “No idea.”

Anran looked at Leading the Charge again. He shook his head as well.

Anran lowered her head in thought. Since the dungeon had a point system, then those points definitely had an important use.

The way the bonus objective was set up meant the exact same dungeon would feel completely different for experts and weaklings.

Weaklings would do everything they could just to keep the official alive, and they still might fail.

Experts, on the other hand, while handling the main objective, would actively go out hunting the invading Morningstar Resistance.

Answer me out loud: who is the real hunter here?

“Ribbit, ribbit, ribbit…”

The sudden croaking of frogs in her ears brought Anran back to herself.

“We’re here already?” Anran lifted her head and found that she was already standing in a narrow alley.

There were no streetlights, only the faint glow spilling from the nearby houses.

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Even the ground was just bare dirt.

As expected of a remote little town.

Backward infrastructure, and the ever-present croak, croak, croak of a summer night.

Listening to a chorus of frogs.

Looking farther into the distance, Anran could even see green fireflies.

“Let’s go find that official first,” Zhou Jieyu said softly.

“No hurry.”

Anran opened the extra panel that had appeared.

“Ribbit, ribbit, ribbit…”

It was a virtual two-dimensional map. There was a red circle on it marking the official’s location.

And in the lower left corner of the map were a points display and a time display.

Current points: 0.

Current time: 11:50 p.m. More than six hours remained.

Time until Morningstar’s invasion: 30 minutes.

“First, we’ll scout the area around where the official lives, and then we’ll make contact with the people from Morningstar and test their strength,” Anran decided.

“No way, make contact with the people from Morningstar?” Zhou Jieyu and Leading the Charge exclaimed in surprise at the same time.

Wasn’t that just asking to die?

“Offense is the best defense!” Anran declared righteously.

Anyway, no one would really die in here, so if she wasn’t going wild now, when would she? Besides, players had cleared this dungeon solo before. Anran refused to believe that even after dragging along two pieces of cannon fodder, she still wouldn’t be able to clear it.

“…”