Six players followed suit, completely clearing out all the Aberrations blocking the elevator shaft.

The corpses of the miserably dead monsters lay strewn all over the ground.

The flesh and fungi carpet mercilessly extended its tendrils, devouring the flesh and blood of the Aberrations.

The players didn't have time to collect the monster remains from the ground. Hei Shengzi took the lead, leaping nimbly to the front of the elevator shaft, his thin sword slashing at the partially closed elevator door in a flurry of attacks.

Skill Name: Zhikong Geduan (Mid-Air Sever)

Type: Melee

Effect: Leaps into the air, using a sword-type weapon to release a crescent-shaped Qi blade attack in front. The duration of the release is determined by agility and constitution attributes. The player will remain suspended in the air during the release.

Consumption: 10% of total stamina

Cooldown: 5 minutes

Note: Staying still in the high air is the best way to become a target.

This skill was quite powerful, and the released Qi blade was a ranged attack.

However, the side effect of the user having to stay in the air was too fatal, equivalent to casting a control skill on oneself for a few seconds.

But in the current dangerous environment surrounded by low-intelligence monsters, it was more than suitable.

Dozens of cyan crescent-shaped Qi blades emerged from Hei Shengzi's thin sword, and after a slight delay in the air, flew rapidly toward the elevator door below.

Clang clang clang clang—

Dense, deep cut marks covered the metal door, forcibly digging out a sizable gap.

Hei Shengzi ended his suspended state, his body falling diagonally downward.

The instant his feet were about to touch the ground, his arm extended a great length like a ghost, barely reaching the elevator door gap, his body not touching the flesh and fungi carpet on the ground.

"Hoo..."

Hei Shengzi quietly breathed a sigh of relief. He tapped the elevator door with his toes, using the reaction force to somersault through the gap.

At this time, the other five players had also sprinted over, using the monsters' remains and severed limbs as footholds, bouncing into the gap.

Inside the elevator shaft, it was dark, confined, and the air was stale and stagnant.

Li Ang grabbed onto the wall crevices inside the elevator shaft with one hand, and took out a miner's lamp with the other, stretched open the elastic band, and clipped the lamp to his head.

The others also took out lamps, illuminating the elevator shaft.

The elevator was not on the floor where Li Ang and the others were. A sweep of the light downward revealed that the bottom of the elevator shaft was pitch black, terrifyingly deep.

"The elevator should be stopped at the very bottom."

Hei Shengzi said quietly, "Let's climb down."

"Yeah, climb climb climb, let's climb together."

Li Ang nodded, adjusted his position in the elevator shaft, head down and feet up, knees bent, toes hooked into the wall crevices, and spread his hands to support his center of gravity, sticking to the elevator shaft wall like a gecko.

This bizarre pose, like performance art, startled the other players. They couldn't quite understand it, and thought Li Ang had released some skill.

But after a long time, Li Ang didn't climb much faster than them, and seemed to be lagging behind a bit.

Wanli Fengdao hesitated for a moment, and couldn't help asking, "Brother Li, what unique posture is this?"

"You don't understand, do you?"

Li Ang, head down and feet up, climbed slowly, and said in a deep voice, "This move is called 'Gecko Climbing the Wall,' also known as 'Scorpion Inverted City Climb.' Have you seen the Gong'an stories *Da Yi*, *Xiao Yi*, or the modern *Ghost Blows Out the Light*?

This is authentic Chinese Kung Fu."

Wanli Fengdao squinted and complained, "But it doesn't seem like you're climbing faster than us?"

"That's because I haven't used my full strength yet."

Li Ang sneered, suddenly accelerated, and easily surpassed all the players.

After climbing more than ten meters, he suddenly stopped again, slowly turned his body around, and returned to the normal head-up and feet-down posture.

Everyone cast questioning glances.

Li Ang smiled heartily and raised his thumb. "I got a bit of a head rush from posing just now. As expected, this Kung Fu still has unique secrets that I don't know."

"..."

Wanli Fengdao suppressed the urge to ask "What exactly are you showing off, young man," and chuckled awkwardly a few times, continuing on his way.

The six players didn't know how long they had climbed in the deep, silent elevator shaft before they finally saw the elevator at the bottom of the shaft.

Zhuang Pengpai jumped down, pried open the access door above the elevator, and shone the flashlight into the elevator.

There was nothing unusual; the elevator was empty.

"Wait here for a moment."

Zhuang Pengpai jumped down expressionlessly, his fingertips hooked into the elevator door seams, and he used brute force to force the doors open to both sides.

After a series of teeth-aching metal twisting and breaking sounds, the elevator doors twisted and broke, revealing a gap.

Zhuang Pengpai walked out of the elevator door with a flashlight, arriving in a dark, enclosed corridor.

He looked around, and found nothing unusual. The Geiger counter in his hand also showed no abnormal radiation.

Zhuang Pengpai returned to the elevator and greeted the others. All the players descended into the corridor.

Not far from the elevator, a metal map of the entire area hung on the wall.

Li Ang walked over to take a look, and found that the underground area of this experimental center had three floors. The upper first and second floors were the main laboratories, drug laboratories, and laboratory auxiliary rooms of BSL-4 and ABSL-4 (highest security level biological and animal laboratories).

The third floor was the office area.

"We are now on the first floor,"

Li Ang shifted his gaze from the map and looked at the other players. "The third item of the mission requires us to destroy the biotechnology laboratory.

If we treat the entire underground structure as a laboratory, we need at least a very large amount of explosives to blow it up.

Do you have enough on you?"

The others shook their heads.

It was inexcusable for players not to carry any explosives.

However, the area of this underground laboratory was quite large, and the building structure was quite solid. It was impossible to directional blast with a small amount of explosives.

Even trying to use the power of the rock layer itself to "collapse" the laboratory was impossible.

They couldn't possibly ask the players to dig at the corners with hoes and shovels, trying to collapse the experimental center, right?

"The system will not issue missions that are absolutely impossible to complete. If the players do not have the ability to destroy the experimental center,

then this possibility must be hidden inside the experimental center... such as a button that activates a self-destruct function when pressed."

Li Ang said casually, "According to my guess of the system's nature,

both the mission 1 of eliminating the president of Tianping Company, and the mission 2 of eliminating the Aberration progenitor,

are likely to be in the same place as that possibly existing self-destruct button, such as the office area on the third floor underground."

Hei Shengzi frowned and asked, "Why?"

Li Ang smiled, extended his finger, and pointed upwards, "The bizarre scene upstairs, comparable to *Saya no Uta*, couldn't have been caused by radiation, right?

No matter what the Aberration progenitor is, it is inseparable from this Tianping Company laboratory.

Assuming that Tianping Company has indeed conducted research on life engineering, biological weapons, and biochemical viruses behind the scenes,

then it is understandable for them to set up a self-destruct device inside the experimental center because of their guilty conscience.

And that surviving President Alphonse Anderson will definitely hide in the safest, most reliable location, most resistant to nuclear bombing, after the disaster.

Having lived underground for two or three decades and still maintaining a 'system-recognized human form,' this Alphonse Anderson is very likely to have stored a large amount of food resources in the safe house, and is trapped there for some reason."