As the other party got closer, the three finally saw clearly... it was actually Little Ma.

At this time, Tianma Xingkong was covered in dust, looking battered and exhausted. He held a silver torch in his hand, the tip of which was burning with a strange green flame.

"Eh?" Little Ma quickly saw his teammates too. "It really is you guys. I saw the flashlight's light and guessed it was you."

"Are you okay?" Uncle Waste asked.

"I'm alright. I encountered some monsters and traps along the way, but the loss of Survival Value wasn't too great," Tianma Xingkong replied.

After a brief exchange, the four turned and headed towards the sacrificial hall.

Along the way, Uncle Waste and the others roughly explained what happened after they met Feng Bujue, while Tianma Xingkong talked about his own experiences. As Jue-Ge had guessed, Tianma Xingkong was indeed teleported away during the time when the four of them were trapped. Of course, he didn't know anything about the switch, and he was completely clueless about how he suddenly entered the temple.

As they walked and talked, the group quickly returned to the sacrificial hall. Stepping through the archway, they could see Feng Bujue and the Soul of Imitation beside the altar.

Several tens of minutes had passed, and the two of them were still chatting, seemingly deeply engrossed in their conversation...

"Oh, you guys came back pretty quickly." When Jue-Ge caught sight of his four teammates, he stopped talking to the Soul of Imitation and turned to his companions. "I told you choosing the second option was the right thing to do. Now the mission is easily completed."

"Well... now that you're all here..." The Soul of Imitation glanced at the players and continued, "I guess it's about time for me to leave."

"Aren't you going to chat a bit more?" Feng Bujue asked.

"Hmph... don't take me for a fool, Feng Bujue," the Soul of Imitation said. "I know what you're up to. I'm just cooperating with you a little, to put your mind at ease."

"Heh... alright..." Feng Bujue smiled. "Then... I won't see you off."

"I don't need you to see me off..." The Soul of Imitation said, then seemed to remember something. It immediately continued, "I think you're a pretty reasonable guy, so I might as well give you some free advice..." It paused, its tone changing slightly. "If you encounter the 'Heart of Fear', you'd better run away as soon as possible. You 'humans' can't contend with it."

Before the words faded, the Soul of Imitation had already disappeared from everyone's sight.

"What's going on?" Atobe wondered. "Is it deliberately mystifying things? The Heart of Fear should be its companion, right? Why would it give us this kind of hint?"

"Who knows..." Uncle Waste replied. "Maybe the relationship between the four guardians isn't as simple as we thought."

"That's right. Just because the Soul of Imitation and the Hand of Impression get along well doesn't mean that all four guardians are like that." Feng Bujue turned around and said to his teammates, "Besides... the guardians' job isn't to kill people, so it's normal for them to give us hints."

"That's not right... back in the rock-paper-scissors domain, if the Hand of Impression had successfully imprinted all of us on the ground, then we would have collectively been screwed when the mission time ran out," Atobe replied.

"They can't control that," Feng Bujue replied. "System obliteration and other such nonsense is something that only affects us players and has nothing to do with the rules of the Island of Chewer." He spread his hands. "Think about it carefully... if the guardians' purpose was to kill us, then we would have all died long ago..."

"Well... that's true." Honghu adjusted his glasses and chimed in. "Take that Soul of Imitation, for example. If it wanted to kill us, it could have directly teleported us to the bottom of the Ghost Swamp. Anyway, it wouldn't have drowned in there itself."

"You shouldn't have said that..." Atobe said, immediately shivering. "Now that you mention it, I'm actually a little scared..."

"By the way, what did the Soul of Imitation mean by what it said to you just now?" Honghu turned to Jue-Ge again. "What's with 'I know what you're up to'?"

"Oh... that..." Feng Bujue smiled. "Heh... why do you think I was chatting with it for so long?"

"Because the two of you share the same anti-human interests?" Honghu quipped in a timely manner.

"It's to prevent it from repeating its old tricks, right?" Uncle Waste interjected from the side.

"Pa—" Feng Bujue snapped his fingers, pointing at Uncle Waste. "Insightful."

Although he was praised, Uncle Waste wouldn't be as cocky as Jue-Ge. He just continued to explain in his usual tone, "If we had let the Soul of Imitation leave immediately after arriving at the altar, then this situation might have happened... it would teleport to another place, disguise itself as Tianma Xingkong again, and then sneak back into our group."

"I see..." Honghu understood when he heard this. His gaze once again swept towards Jue-Ge. "You used the conversation to stall it, preventing it from repeating its old tricks."

"Yes, that's how it is." Feng Bujue tilted his head, making a helpless expression. "But... I have to say, this Soul of Imitation is really intelligent... The fact that it said, 'I'm just cooperating with you a little, to put your mind at ease' shows that it had already seen through my intentions." Jue-Ge scratched his head. "Well... an NPC with such a high degree of intelligence and personality is most likely a unique data, and should belong to the same level as the troublesome guys I've encountered before..."

"Whatever about that," Tianma Xingkong interrupted at this moment. "There's a very serious problem right now that we need to solve first!"

"What problem?" The teammates all turned to look at him, asking in unison.

"I'm hungry." Little Ma's answer was crisp and decisive, his three short words full of dominance.

The other four staggered, almost falling flat on their faces.

"Now that you mention it..." Feng Bujue muttered. "From the time we entered the scenario, it's indeed been almost four hours. Even if the system defaulted our status to 'just full' at the time, we should be feeling hungry now..."

Some things are better left unsaid. It would have been fine if no one mentioned it, but now that someone did, it became especially obvious.

"Ah... suddenly my legs feel weak, and I'm super hungry..." Atobe said, simply sitting down cross-legged.

"The physical exertion before was indeed considerable..." Uncle Waste's hand instinctively moved to his stomach. "From the Leech Forest to the Mocking Woods, then through the Ghost Swamp, and finally entering the temple... just the distance we've walked is unknown. In real life, we might not even be able to walk this much in a day."

"Well... there's something I've wanted to say before, but I haven't had a suitable opportunity." Honghu continued. "I've noticed that... my Stamina Value seems to be depleting much faster than in a normal scenario." He paused. "I guess... it's also due to the special settings of this scenario..."

"Fatigue, thirst..." Feng Bujue licked his lips. "The real threat seems to be surfacing..." As he spoke, he also sat down cross-legged and looked up at Tianma Xingkong. "Little Ma, when you walked into this great hall, the main quest had already been completed, right?"

"That's right," Tianma Xingkong replied.

"Well... okay..." Feng Bujue muttered thoughtfully. "I predict... the next main quest will appear in one of two possible times... either ten minutes after 'all players complete the previous quest', or ten minutes after 'the fixed time limit for the previous quest', which is 'three hours', has completely elapsed." He took a breath. "Hopefully it's the latter. At least we can use the extra two-plus hours to rest."

"It's hard to say..." Uncle Waste replied. "Since it's a Team Nightmare Mode, it's better to plan for the worst in everything."

"Heh... of course, I understand that," Feng Bujue said. "That's why I said 'hopefully' it's like that..."

"The key is still food and water..." Tianma Xingkong said. "Sitting here without eating or drinking is as good as not resting, right?"

"Well said." Feng Bujue smiled and asked, "Do you have any food on you?"

"Ha! Nope!" Tianma Xingkong replied loudly. A hero is a hero, so open and magnanimous.

"Alright..." Feng Bujue shrugged helplessly. He scanned his teammates and asked, "Does anyone have any food or water?"