The group continued forward in a rather oppressive atmosphere. Every so often, Honghu would take out the infrared light to check the surroundings and to make sure everyone checked their skin for leeches.

This "leech forest" covered a much larger area than they had imagined. After walking for a long time, they were still surrounded by the invisible leeches. Because the leeches accumulated on their clothes, they eventually had to stop and clean them off before walking a little further... then stop again and clean again.

Finally, after Feng Bujue threw his second wild pitch of Nanto Seiken, about an hour after accepting the quest, the five of them arrived at a stream. The infrared light showed that there were no leeches on the opposite side of the forest, with this stream as the dividing line.

Seeing this, everyone cleaned the leeches off of themselves and jumped over the stream. Once on the other side, they carefully checked again to make sure they hadn't brought any with them, and only then did they breathe a sigh of relief.

"Ah... finally out of that disgusting place..." Young Master Atobe sighed, "It's like being born again..."

Tianma Xingkong added, "Yeah... a hero covered in wriggling, suction-cupping creatures is just not cool."

Feng Bujue stroked his chin and said, "Not necessarily. I've seen some interesting hero animations where... scantily clad female warriors are caught by strange suction-cupping creatures and lifted into the air..."

"Hey! Are you sure you're watching hero animations!" Atobe shouted, "Isn't that the kind of film with a title made up of a few letters and numbers?"

"Tch... uncultured." Feng Bujue snorted disdainfully, "The ones with titles made up of a few letters and numbers are live-action..."

"You two, knock it off!" Honghu shouted, "Why does the topic always drift to weird places so naturally! Focus on the script!"

"I say..." Uncle Fei Chai interrupted the three jokers, using a more serious tone, "Have you guys noticed..." he paused, "It seems to have gotten hotter."

"Eh? Now that you mention it..." Feng Bujue chimed in, "It really has."

"Yeah... the temperature seems to have suddenly risen from the twenties to over thirty-three degrees," Tianma Xingkong also responded.

"Hmph, you're all too slow," Honghu adjusted his glasses, saying smugly, "I noticed it a while ago..." He pointed to the stream behind him. "The temperature is noticeably different on either side of this stream. If you don't believe me, you can jump back and try it. It's definitely still in the twenties on the other side."

"Oh, is that so..." Jue-Ge rested his hands behind his head, saying leisurely, "So it really is getting hotter around here."

"What did you think it was?" Atobe asked.

"I thought it was because we were talking about interesting topics that my body was getting restless," Feng Bujue laughed.

That was Jue-Ge's sense of humor... He always made inexplicable jokes at the most inappropriate times, and the content of his words was unimaginable, sometimes so high-end that it was incomprehensible, and sometimes so lewd that people didn't want to understand it...

"You're getting restless pretty fast..." Honghu squinted and retorted, "You let your mind wander, imagine things, and then get yourself all worked up until you're hot all over... The whole process takes less than ten seconds, right? Your imagination is off the charts!"

"That's right, I'm an artist after all," Feng Bujue replied shamelessly.

"Alright," Uncle Fei Chai shook his head, interrupting them again, "I'm just reminding you that the temperature has changed. You three are really good at digressing..." He looked at Honghu. "Honghu, you know Feng-xiong's personality. Don't let him tempt you into retorting all the time."

"And, Feng-xiong," Uncle Fei Chai turned to look at Feng Bujue again, "Although I agree that casual players should focus on having fun when playing games, don't be too casual... After all, most of us in this team are professional players, and we care about clearing the game."

"Okay, okay... I understand," Feng Bujue shrugged. "I'll talk less nonsense, let's get back on the road." Jue-Ge nodded quickly, ending the conversation.

Feng Bujue was rather helpless when dealing with people like Uncle Fei Chai. He understood these people very well... They rarely spoke formally or gave lectures, but they were indeed very capable and clear-headed. If such a person adopted a serious attitude to remind or advise you, you'd better listen, because what they said made sense.

In real life, Jue-Ge had several friends of this type, such as Bao Qing and Ouyang Jian. The words Feng Bujue left for them in his will (yes, he had written one and was constantly adding to and revising it) were: "You are all people I envy. You are successful in your careers and have happy families; your talents are enough to give you the capital to despise others and make those who are all show and no substance ashamed of themselves, but you remain humble and uphold integrity. I originally had nothing to leave you, because you already possess many things that I do not. But after all... I'm better looking than you, so I've left some personal selfies for you to encourage you to reach even greater heights in your future lives."

...

"Look! What's that?" After walking along the forest path for another twenty minutes or so, Tianma Xingkong suddenly saw something. He stopped immediately and shouted in a low voice.

The four people behind him heard this and peered forward... They saw that in the shadows of the trees ahead, a tall, dark figure seemed to be approaching. The shadow was over two meters tall and wider than two people. Judging by the way it moved, it seemed to be a bipedal creature.

"How about we hide?" Feng Bujue asked.

"What's there to be afraid of?" Tianma Xingkong turned his head and said, "As a hero, hiding is just not dignified."

"Yes, well said," Feng Bujue patted the other person on the shoulder, then turned to the other three and said, "How about the four of us hide?"

"Okay!" The three of them responded in unison.

The next second, apart from Xiao Ma-ge, the other four all shot out like arrows, silently concealing themselves.

"Hey... these guys are going too far..." Tianma Xingkong shouted in his heart.

Creak-- creak--

As the dark figure approached, its footsteps became more and more obvious.

"As expected... when you're alone..." Tianma Xingkong swallowed, nervously watching the front, and muttered, "It's super scary!"

At this moment, the dark figure also emerged from the forest and saw Tianma Xingkong standing in the middle of the path.

"Hmm? A human?"

Moonlight (although it was a blood moon, the moonlight was white and quite bright) shone down from the gaps in the canopy, illuminating the figure of the strange shadow. It was a humanoid creature with a fleshy, baboon-like face. It was about one meter ninety tall, and its frame was very broad, comparable to a sumo wrestler, but its build was not "fat" but "strong."

This "person" was wearing a set of dark-colored coarse cloth clothing and a pair of large scaly leather boots. The reason the players had mistakenly thought he was over two meters tall was because he was carrying a large axe on his shoulder. The shadow of the axe overlapped with the shadow of the person, creating an illusion.

"Who goes there, quickly state your name!" Xiao Ma-ge's expression turned stern, and he immediately spoke.

"I'm going..." Feng Bujue, hiding in the dark, was shocked, and thought, "This guy's ability to communicate with NPCs is just negative... Talking like that, even friendly targets might turn hostile."

"Hehe... heh heh... ah ha ha..."

Unexpectedly, the "baboon face" actually laughed... It was a strange laugh, a crazy laugh, an inexplicable and chilling laugh.

"What?" Tianma Xingkong asked, "What's so funny?"

"Hahahaha!" The other party laughed wildly, "After so many years... finally a creature with normal thinking is talking to me! Hahaha!" He gesticulated wildly, his face filled with elation, "Hahaha... humans! Living humans!"

"Hey, hey... what kind of development is this?" Honghu, hiding in a tree, couldn't help but mutter.

Unexpectedly...

"Oh? There's more?" Baboon Face immediately looked up, accurately casting his gaze at Honghu's location, staring straight at him and saying, "Great, there are two." After he finished speaking to himself, he suddenly swung his axe and chopped down fiercely at Tianma Xingkong.

In an instant, Baboon Face put on an extremely ferocious expression, grinning madly: "Then it doesn't matter if I kill one, right! Hahahahaha!"