Chapter 123: Chapter 115: Hunter’s Compass

As the dazzling lights before him dissipated, it was like the curtains on a stage suddenly being pulled back, revealing the stage scenery behind.

“The players here…”

With a touch of anticipation, Li Zheng looked towards the center of the room where a capsule dwelling stood, and a girl’s silhouette came into view before it.

“Hello!”

Just like the last meeting, Ye Yuan stood up and said these two words with a smile.

“Not Li Chun.”

For some reason, Li Zheng suddenly had a premonition.

If he couldn’t find that innocent girl quickly, by tonight, she would say goodbye to this world forever.

Not even waiting for the midnight room refresh.

“Hey, what kind of expression is that?”

Seeing Li Zheng’s somewhat disappointed look, Ye Yuan became annoyed: “We just teamed up for a dungeon earlier today, how long has it been, and you greet me like this?”

She even twirled around as if trying to prove something. Looking down at her feet, her round toes playfully wiggled. Thinking of something, her expression suddenly dropped: “Damn! Even I’m disappointed…”

“Everyone has their fate. Ten extra opportunities and couldn’t find that girl. Maybe it’s destiny.”

Yet, the small probability event of entering Ye Yuan’s location two days in a row occurred, but he still couldn’t find Li Chun…

No matter how he thought about it, wasn’t Phoenix Mountain supposed to bless him?

This luck was not up to the mark!

Li Zheng gathered his emotions, seeing Ye Yuan like that, he smiled wryly: “What in the world do you think about every day, little girl? Your figure… oops! Your age… not that either!

Anyway, don’t misunderstand, and don’t let your brother misunderstand.”

Li Zheng was genuinely afraid Ye Yuan would tell her brother, leading to a misunderstanding that his expression was out of “regret” for her figure, so he quickly explained: “I just didn’t find the person I’m looking for.”

“Looking for someone?”

Ye Yuan smelled a hint of gossip, and her eyes burned as she looked up at Li Zheng: “Who are you looking for? Your girlfriend? Is she pretty? Her figure… damn, skip that! Is she skilled? Is she strong? Is it Zhan Zhouzhou? It’s not her? Then is it Yan Guang? No, no, no, it shouldn’t be Yan Guang. She’s always thinking about Phoenix Mountain; you’re not her type!

Then who could it be?”

Rolling her eyes, this little girl began to deduce Li Zheng’s “girlfriend” in an amusing self-talk.

Li Zheng was utterly speechless at Ye Yuan’s thought process: “It’s not Yan Guang, and it’s not Zhan Zhouzhou. I don’t even have a girlfriend… Damn it, why does a deep sadness emerge when I say this?”

Mother’s womb, solo for over twenty years, perhaps feeling sad is expected?

“No girlfriend?” Ye Yuan stopped her speculations, gave Li Zheng a once-over, and suddenly had an enlightened expression: “Oh~~ I get it now!”

Li Zheng’s instincts told him she’d imagined an even worse scenario, chills running down his spine: “Get what you understand! You’re not that old, flat as a board, yet your imagination goes wild.”

“So what if I’m flat? I’m proud of being flat, and I save on fabric wearing clothes!”

Ye Yuan was instantly aggrieved, having hit a sore spot: “It’s not this, and it’s not that, you’re really dull!

So, what’s your situation?

Considering we’re teammates, maybe I can lend you a hand.”

“You? Help me?”

Li Zheng rolled his eyes: “I’d thank the heavens if you don’t meddle and make wild guesses… Wait!

I remember now, doesn’t your brother have some tool that can ignore exploration counts and directly track a specific player?”

He recalled that before, Ye Yuan had asked Ye Kai for something in the regional channel for the pocket watch, but was refused.

“Mm-hmm!” Ye Yuan squinted smugly. “If it’s really urgent, I can talk to my brother and have him rent it to you.”

“Urgent, it must be urgent…”

Li Zheng seemed to grasp the last straw and explained how he discovered Li Chun hadn’t been active in the regional channel for a while and that he couldn’t contact her after repeated attempts.

“You mean the system continuously prompts that she’s resting?”

“Yes.”

Receiving a firm response, Ye Yuan’s expression turned serious, murmuring softly to herself: “So he’s in this channel too; I need to inform my brother about this.”

Then, no longer interacting with Li Zheng, she started contacting Ye Kai privately on her own.

Li Zheng couldn’t fathom what they were discussing, nor understood who this ‘he’ referred to.

He just knew that the Ye siblings seemed to have encountered similar cases before.

If that’s the case, then the likelihood of them lending him a tool was very high.

Sure enough, soon after, Li Zheng received two notifications.

[You have a new designated transaction.] x2

Opening the trading hall, Li Zheng found that in addition to Ye Kai, even Chu Xiao had sent a tool designated for him to lease.

The other party hadn’t set a leasing price, and Li Zheng took it directly and examined the attributes of the item sent by Ye Kai.

It appeared similar to a compass.

[Hunter’s Compass, Gold Level

Description: Locks onto a target’s location, allowing for a channel-specific jump ignoring exploration limits once. (Can be used 9/9 times daily)

Old Pu: Do you have friends who owe debts without repaying? Criminals who evade capture? Targets you’d kill yet can’t catch?

What are you waiting for?

The Hunter’s Compass helps make your wishes come true!]

[Lacks energy (energy cannot be below Gold Level)]

“Damn! Lin Fan really stepped on a landmine messing with you; no wonder he went berserk in the end and made a direct leap to escape.”

Li Zheng was wide-eyed, the dominant attributes like these would have anyone shaking in their boots if targeted!

“You received the item, a single Gold Level Active Core allows five uses; you have to bear the energy cost yourself.” Ye Yuan quickly explained its usage before finally saying, “Drop the idle talk for later, hurry up and set out; any later, and you’d only be collecting a corpse.”

“Got it.”

Li Zheng nodded, took out a Gold Level Active Core to install, turned the pointer, and a display box appeared before him.

Input information: 0000879 Li Chun.

Confirm!

The next moment, darkness enveloped his eyes.

In an instant, the environment around Li Zheng transformed, and a shout echoed in his ear.

“You beast, if not for your high potential, I’d have killed you long ago!”

Turning his attention towards the voice, Li Zheng hadn’t yet seen who spoke before he suddenly felt his mind cloud over, as if he hadn’t closed his eyes for ten and a half days straight, just wanting to sleep.

“No!”

With a jolt, Li Zheng snapped back to his senses, took out a lotus petal, and swallowed it down.

As the lotus took effect, the fog in his head cleared sharply, and he was free of drowsiness.

“Such a potent drug!”

Li Zheng was shocked to think this hypnotic was definitely high-level, almost causing even a Bronze++ physique to succumb, no wonder Li Chun had been in a “resting” state all day.

Fortunately, after consuming the lotus, not only were all negative states removed, but the residual effects left a buff, preventing further influence for a while.

“I’ll give you one last chance, submit to me!”

The rough voice from earlier sounded again, and Li Zheng turned to look, discovering that he was in a cave environment, conveniently shielded by a protruding wall.

“Ouch…”

Just as he was about to move closer to check the situation, a slight sound came from his shoulder, and his ear was grabbed tight by the small creature.

“Right, I should give it a petal too.”

Giving the small creature a lotus petal, Li Zheng placed it on the ground, then took out the Air Purifier, whispering to it: “Once I head out, find a place to hide with this and purify the air here, got it?”

“…”

The small creature nodded silently, swallowing the last bit of the lotus petal while hugging the purifier.

“Bang!”

A muffled thud, as if a sandbag took a heavy punch.

Peeking from the edge of the wall, Li Zheng looked outside.

A silhouette entwined with blood qi was beating a multicolored spider.

Behind the spider, a capsule dwelling unfolded, guarded fiercely by it.

…

Thanks to “Yu and Rain and Yu” for the 100-point reward!