Chapter 1 The Beginning

As the saying goes, the world is full of surprises.

At this moment, Feng Bujue deeply understood the meaning of this sentence.

The discomfort in his body was nothing to him. His lower body had been soaked in the muddy swamp for a long time, and his upper body was being baptized by the torrential rain... He could tolerate all of this.

What he couldn't tolerate was the mental "geying" (discomfort), that is, the development of an event greatly exceeded his expectations, and the ending made him feel inexplicable...

For example, *The Mist*, *1408*, *Bag of Bones*, and so on...

Okay, apart from Edgar Allan Poe, Jue-ge also had a lot of opinions on Stephen King. The two sentences he most wanted to say to the latter were: "What the f*** (wtf)?" and "What's your beef with Maine?"

Back to the topic, the thing that made Jue-ge feel uncomfortable right now was... Kevin was dead.

And then... the gharial was also dead.

Moreover, he didn't know why...

...

A few minutes ago, when Kevin rushed to the gharial, Feng Bujue thought there would be a "hero fighting the dragon" kind of showdown.

But nothing happened...

After that imposing roar, the gharial actually chose to turn around and run away.

This scene was simply unbelievable to Jue-ge. In the human world, it was like: A third-grade elementary school student went to fight a third-grade junior high school student. When the junior high student saw the elementary school student coming, he picked up a kitchen knife and showed off a set of *kuangfeng* (wild wind) knife techniques in front of him, and then... the elementary school student didn't back down, but the junior high student ran away...

Was this possible in the animal kingdom?

At the time, Feng Bujue was thinking: "Could it be... that I underestimated Kevin's strength? In fact, his combat power is far beyond my imagination. And that gharial, with its animal instincts... keenly sensed this, so it chose to run away?"

As Jue-ge thought of this, Kevin had already run after it, pounced on the gharial's back, and used a move called "Camera Hammering."

But the next second, the gharial twisted its body and flipped over, using its tons of weight to press Kevin into the swamp.

"Eh?" So, Feng Bujue changed his mind and thought, "Could it be... that I underestimated the gharial's intelligence? In fact, its wisdom is far beyond my imagination. It felt that a head-on battle would inevitably cause damage, so it pretended to run away, sold a flaw, and then used this move called 'Lazy Donkey Roll' to seek a fatal blow?"

But as he thought of this, the gharial rolled over once and flipped to the other side, continuing to run away; and Kevin quickly stood up from the swamp, seemingly unharmed, and carried the camera, which had been crushed into a lump of iron, and ran after it.

"Na~ni!" Jue-ge was stunned again when he saw this. "So Kevin is so powerful! It seems that the gharial's move was just a delaying tactic. In fact, it was still afraid of Kevin, so it came up with this method to buy itself time to continue escaping..."

*Shua—shua—*

Kevin trudged through the muddy swamp, making a stirring sound. More than ten seconds later, he chased closer to the gharial again and went directly in front of it.

*Dang dang dang—*

In the rain, there were three sounds of impact, which was the sound of the iron block (camera) hitting the gharial's outer teeth (the gharial has two fangs growing outside its mouth on both cheeks).

At this point, the gharial finally couldn't bear it any longer. But seeing its cute eyes flash with a gleam, the next second, it opened its bloody mouth and bit at Kevin.

The scene was like a car opening its hood and clamping Kevin... and after clamping it, Kevin's upper body was completely gone, and his lower body also lost consciousness and sank into the swamp.

"I... le-ge~ cha!" Feng Bujue's mood at the moment was like accompanying Chun Shisanniang in a bandit fortress playing no-rope bungee jumping, rising and falling, wanting to die, "So fierce, why did you run! Just solve it with one bite! Instant kill! Turns out Kevin was no match at all!"

However, five seconds later, the gharial screamed miserably—and died.

...

Time returns to the present...

[Main Quest Progress Updated]

[Complete at least six of the challenges given by the production team, current progress 1/6]

[Side Quest Completed]

The system prompt proved that the target was completely dead.

"You two are messing with me, right..." Feng Bujue squinted, standing on the gharial's corpse, "Dying together has to be logical... someone explain it to me... I'd even believe it's a human-animal love suicide!"

*Rumble—*

In this torrential rain, in the wilderness, the only thing that could respond to him... was thunder.

"Tch... this sucks..." For Jue-ge, the result of what happened just now was not important, what was important was "why there was such a result." Unfortunately, with the information he currently had, it was impossible to deduce the truth...

So he had to continue to endure this feeling of "knowing what happened, but not knowing why."

"Oh well..." Feng Bujue sighed, took out the knife from his waist, "This monster didn't die under my [Bell's Everyday Knife], so the knife's special effect is useless... that's good news." As he spoke, he began to collect the gharial's skin and meat.

This giant monster was different from ordinary crocodiles. The skin on its back had the strength of steel and at the same time had reliable toughness. After cutting it into strips and tying it into a bundle, it was an extremely good rope.

And its meat was even more delicious. According to the settings in the comics, even without any seasoning, simply grilling it over a fire, its taste was unparalleled, so it was called "the world's highest-grade crocodile meat."

The "good news" that Feng Bujue said referred to this. If the gharial had died under his knife, then the deliciousness would not exist, and all that would be left was the taste of chicken...

...

On the other side, on the Dolphin, in the monitoring cabin.

"God! Is that guy dead?"

"Is that even a question? He was bitten in half!"

"This guy is a maniac! He actually attacked the gharial repeatedly. He was clearly courting death!"

"What do we do... This is the third death since the show started... I don't want to deal with the police again."

"So unlucky... The first time, we barely defined it as an accident, and we still had to pay compensation and change the rules. The second time, it was barely ruled as manslaughter, and the show was forced to stop broadcasting for a season. This time..."

"This time it's simple. As long as we submit the footage we shot to the judicial authorities, it should be possible to determine it as... an unidentified mentally ill person broke into the filming location and committed suicide in front of the camera."

The staff in the cabin were discussing in a flurry. They did feel sorry for Kevin, but for such a strange person, their sympathy was limited. More... they were thinking about themselves and how the show should end.

"Since... he was already unidentified..." Suddenly, that old and vigorous voice of Hai Meilong sounded again, "Then we... just pretend he never came... wouldn't that work?"

His words were like a cold wind passing through, causing everyone present to tremble.

Basically, everyone who heard this sentence understood what Hai Meilong meant, but no one dared to respond...

"No one's talking, huh?" Hai Meilong waited for a while, then continued, "That means there are no objections." As he spoke, he sat up from his chair and walked towards the operating table. "Okay, I'll personally... delete that recording."

...

At the same time, three nautical miles east of Cannabis Island.

Under the sea, a submarine was slowly advancing, approaching the desolate island in the wind and rain.

In the submarine's command room, a one-eyed man in a blue windbreaker was facing the radar, showing a grim expression.

This man looked about forty-five years old, with messy gray long hair and two horizontal gray mustaches under his nose. His right eye wore a black eye patch with a pirate symbol printed on it (a white skull and two crossed white bones); his right wrist had no hand, but was replaced by an iron hook; and on his left foot, he was not wearing boots, because the part below his calf... was a conical wooden peg.

"Why is there a ship there?" the gray-bearded man shouted, looking at the radar. "Who are those people? The Maritime Anti-Drug Agency?" The more he spoke, the louder he became. His authentic broken gong voice was the opposite of Kevin's. "Damn it! They must have discovered the 'treasure' I hid on the island! We have to take them out! Torpedoes! Prepare the torpedoes now!"

Although he was shouting, the crew members looked at each other, and no one moved.

Obviously, these guys were already used to similar scenes. They all knew that the captain's orders were often unreliable...

"Dad, I don't think there's any need to rush to use torpedoes." Before the gray-bearded man finished speaking, a somewhat childish voice sounded not far behind him. "Not to mention... we haven't confirmed the other party's identity and purpose. Even if it's really a ship from the Maritime Anti-Drug Agency, we shouldn't attack rashly... because their people may not all be on the ship. If we startle the snake, we will fall into a passive situation where they are in the dark and we are in the light."

The person speaking was actually a little boy who looked only eleven or twelve years old, with a rather fair face.

"Son... call me Captain." The gray-bearded man heard this, bent down, and whispered to his son.

"Sigh..." The little boy rolled his eyes and sighed. "Okay... Captain, I have an idea. Why don't we first find a place to land on the other side of the island, and then send a team to investigate the situation of that ship. If it's really someone from the Anti-Drug Agency, then we can make plans." He shrugged. "But... according to my speculation, this is likely just an ordinary cruise ship that stopped on this island to avoid bad weather. When the wind and waves subside, they will leave on their own."

"Hmm..." Captain Graybeard stroked his mustache, looked at his genius son with a smile, and then raised his head and said loudly, "Did you all hear what the first mate said?"

"Yes, Captain." The crew members in the command room replied in unison.

A minute ago, when facing Mr. Captain's "fire torpedoes" order, they became deaf; but now... as soon as the first mate spoke, the crew members seemed to have regained their hearing in an instant.

"Heh..." Graybeard shook his upper body pretentiously and raised the iron hook on his right hand. "What are we waiting for! Let's go!"