Chapter 17 Finding the Exit

As the new main quest notification rang out, Xiao Tan and Bei Ling, still underground, were still traveling through the cave, searching for a way out.

Although the stone had said before ascending that they would definitely be able to walk out in a day and a night, it was clear that this guy's calculation method had a problem.

What he called a day and a night was probably twenty-four hours of non-stop, continuous progress.

There was no way Xiao Tan and Bei Ling could proceed like that. They were constrained by the consumption of stamina, and had to stop to rest from time to time. Both of them were level seventeen at this time, with 1700 stamina points at full status. Even if they were overconfident, they would at least have to keep their stamina above a quarter, right? Otherwise, what if they encountered a sudden event and their stamina happened to be running low? Wouldn't that be terrible?

Although the monsters and puzzles in this cave weren't triggered endlessly like landmines like in Pokémon, there were already enough flags distributed on the map. Under normal circumstances, there was no way to bypass them if they wanted to move forward. From time to time, there would also be a reward, something like a slap in the face followed by a piece of candy...

Therefore, the two of them had basically entered a state of playing a traditional RPG game... exploring the road, triggering events, getting rewards, resting, continuing to explore... repeating the cycle. Unconsciously, the map they explored became larger and larger. Since they didn't know the specific location of the exit, they would also try to explore any forks they encountered as much as possible.

And so, by the time the two of them finally found the exit, it was already past midnight on the second day. And since they first fell into the cave, it had probably been about thirty-five hours.

Playing these long-term scripts in Thriller Paradise to the later stages would produce a very strange sense of fatigue. The player's body was in a sleeping state in the game pod, while their spiritual world seemed to be active in a controllable dream.

If this dream lasted a long time, more than a day, or even two days, a person's sense of time would become problematic. This situation wasn't too strong in the script, and the real impact would be felt when the player left the game pod. At that time, the player would have the illusion that they had stayed up all night, but in reality, their body wouldn't be tired, they would just feel mentally that they hadn't rested well.

"This should be it, right?" Xiao Tan took off his miner's hat and put it away.

Bei Ling also turned off her flashlight, raised her head, and looked up in the direction of Xiao Tan's gaze, "It looks higher than the place we fell from."

At this moment, Bei Ling had already changed the batteries in her flashlight twice. She hadn't expected that this script would require a long time to use lighting equipment, so she only brought four spare batteries, which were now all used up. In fact, after talking to the stone, Bei Ling realized that the flashlight batteries might not last for a long time, and once they lost lighting, her and Xiao Tan's actions would be several times more difficult and dangerous. So she quickly proposed that the two of them not turn on their light sources at the same time, and turn off the lighting equipment when resting, in order to save some power.

Fortunately, they finally found the exit before the power ran out.

This was a cave similar to the place where they had fallen, without a ceiling, and with a passage above. The passage here was not the inverted funnel shape, but an ordinary cylindrical shape. In the middle of the cave was still a pool of water, and on the four walls of the cave, there were thick, gnarled yellow vines growing, like natural climbing ladders, intricately covering the stone walls, all the way to the top (similar to the demon vines in Darksiders).

Looking up, they could see light coming in at the top of the cylindrical passage, covered by vegetation, like a canopy covering the top of the passage.

Looking up from the dark bottom of the cave, the moonlight scattered through the cracks in the plants, hazy and indistinct. Although it couldn't be said to be a beautiful spectacle, it was indeed a decent view.

"Um... should I go up first?" Xiao Tan asked, "Oh... right, should we get a rope and tie each other together, like a safety rope when mountain climbing."

"You occasionally come up with some good ideas," Bei Ling replied, which was a rare compliment.

Xiao Tan just smiled and didn't answer anything. His personality was considered a strength. If it were Feng Bujue who was praised, he would definitely take it to heart and brag about himself a few more times.

Bei Ling had ropes in her backpack, and they were the kind of climbing ropes with safety buckles. This item was a store item, and the price was not cheap, but the practicality was beyond doubt, and it was worth the price.

They tied the ropes to their respective shoulders and waists, leaving seven or eight meters of rope between them, so that they could move without affecting each other's climbing movements, and if one of them accidentally fell, the other could promptly withstand the impact of the fall. Of course, this was just a safety measure, and it couldn't be ruled out that the other person would also be dragged down by the force of the falling person.

Before climbing, they rested for a while to allow their stamina to reach a safe level as much as possible, in order to avoid the situation of falling down halfway due to exhaustion. Then, Xiao Tan took the lead and began to climb.

Climbing walls was a basic skill that an assassin must master, like eating, sleeping, breathing, and blinking. An assassin could forget how to speak, but he would not forget how to get up when he encountered a wall.

Of course, Xiao Tan was not an assassin, he was just a player wearing the classic costume of Assassin's Creed, with agility as his development direction, and combat and investigation as his main specialties. But facing this well-designed climbing path in the game, he climbed relatively easily and comfortably, after all, the walls were full of handholds and footholds, and the vines were extremely strong and tough, so it was unlikely that he would miss a grab or step.

Although Bei Ling was a little weaker in terms of stamina and skill, she was lighter in weight, so climbing was not difficult for her. Because there was someone opening the way above, and she had a rope on her body, she was also more relaxed psychologically, following Xiao Tan's rhythm, and quickly climbed past the halfway point.

Looking down, there was darkness under her feet, and she could only vaguely hear the faint sound of the water in the pool, but she couldn't see the bottom. Looking up, the moonlight penetrating the vegetation seemed even brighter.

Climbing had been going on for nearly twenty minutes, and the two of them were gradually approaching the exit at the top. The excitement and joy of finally escaping overshadowed the physical and mental fatigue accumulated over the dozens of hours, and the dangers along the way were vivid in their minds... the seemingly endless tunnels, the monsters that would appear at any time, the puzzles that blocked the way, the sudden scares... these were finally coming to an end.

The mood at this moment was as refreshing as drinking a sip of iced milk after taking a bath.

"Hoo... finally out!" After the two returned to the ground, they both lay face up on the grass under the starry sky, taking a long breath.

At this moment, they were in a mountain forest, and the bright moonlight illuminated the surroundings like daytime. The trees in this area were sparse, and the terrain was slightly inclined, but they didn't see any obvious dangers for the time being.

"I say... is this already the early morning of the third day?" Xiao Tan asked.

"That's right, the duel is tonight," Bei Ling replied, "About a dozen hours left."

"Uh... judging from the main quest, Brother Jue and the others should still be in that place called the Lingzhong Realm, right?" Xiao Tan asked again.

Bei Ling seemed to have thought of something when she heard this: "That's right! How did helping that Su Nüxia break through her martial arts end?"

Xiao Tan showed a slightly worried expression: "Well... anyway, judging from the team column, Ji Bu hasn't died yet..."