"Bai Zhiyuan, go for broke!"
"Did something just fly past Mo Zhi?"
"This reminds me of boost-kiting in CCF."
"Lastimosa: There's something not right in the training grounds!"
...
The Phantom Pilot's dungeon-clearing journey hadn't stopped. While Mo Zhi was lost in thought, several Arc Grenade explosions echoed from the cave again.
After four to five seconds, the impatient roars of a flamethrower sounded from further away.
Following that,
The prompt **"Challenge Failed"** appeared before Mo Zhi.
???
Mo Zhi's small head topped with a large question mark, her eyes full of intelligence and confusion.
I was only stunned for a few seconds, and the Phantom Pilot finished?
She cast a perfunctory glance at the countdown timer in the upper right corner, her jaw nearly dropping to the floor.
It had only been 13 seconds?
!!!
Wasn't I challenging Bai Zhiyuan's 23.25-second record?
How did this Phantom manage to break 13 seconds?
There was only one truth – even though she temporarily held first place, Bai Zhiyuan was still pushing her limits.
When Mo Zhi chose to challenge Bai Zhiyuan's record, Bai Zhiyuan had just set a new one, so the system hadn't had time to update the record before she started her challenge.
"This person definitely has some obsessive-compulsive disorder."
"She already broke into first place, yet she's not satisfied, and practically halved the record again."
Mo Zhi was indignant. As women, the gap was a bit too wide.
Fortunately, Bai Zhiyuan didn't stream, otherwise her title of "Torment Queen" would likely be handed over.
"No, I need to study how she did it."
Returning to the trial hall from the starting point, Captain Lastimosa leaned casually against the wall, waiting for Mo Zhi's trial to end before proceeding to the next item.
Mo Zhi approached the challenge monument and, as expected, Bai Zhiyuan's first-place score had changed from the original 23.25 seconds to 12.59 seconds, almost halved.
It was too exaggerated, it was hard to imagine what she had gone through.
Snaffling her dropped jaw back, Mo Zhi initiated a new round of challenge against Bai Zhiyuan.
This time, she was determined to figure out how Bai Zhiyuan achieved her super start.
At the same time.
Players worldwide experiencing "Titanfall" also saw the astonishing record and were completely unable to sit still.
Especially the overseas players who had not seen much of the world, they wore expressions of disbelief, and rushed to the public channel, using megaphones to express their inner shock.
"Oh, my dear God, is this Ms. Zhiyuan Bai sent by you to conquer us?"
"12.59 seconds? Is the Spirit Realm Administrator here? I want to report a Dragon Country player for cheating!"
"Oh my god, a full 13 seconds ahead of the second place! A new record has been set again!"
"What the hell! Even my late great-grandmother couldn't achieve this record!"
"Bai Zhiyuan: That year, with my hands in my pockets, I didn't know what an opponent was."
...
In Dragon Country, it was even more outrageous, with three trending topics directly appearing!
Of course,
Bai Zhiyuan, fighting on the national server, was unaware of this.
At this moment, she was trying her best to improve her strategy, striving to create a new record.
Initially, Bai Zhiyuan, like Mo Zhi, followed the process and barely managed to complete her first challenge with a "ground chicken" play.
Then, wall-running, ground chicken combined with wall-running... she tried countless methods.
The inspiration for the two-grenade super start came from the scene of Captain Lastimosa battling enemies in the opening cinematic.
Thinking about the pilots wearing high-precision bulletproof vests, a few grenades probably wouldn't be enough to kill them directly.
So, she started to experiment little by little.
It turned out that even powerful pilots could be killed by three grenades.
One grenade wasn't fatal, but the super start lacked follow-through, and two grenades exploded to just the right amount of damage.
However, simply learning the super start wasn't enough; clearing enemy targets also took time.
Missing one enemy added two seconds to the time, and killing an enemy with a gun also had a one-second buffer, all of which were times that had to be spent to achieve the record.
And grenade coverage could significantly reduce this time consumption.
Bai Zhiyuan believed that every detail planned by the designer was intentional. From the double jump after breaking an arm, the pilot would automatically pick up grenades on the high platform.
The observant Bai Zhiyuan caught this detail: super start + grenade coverage + agile wall-running + human talent created the globally shocking record.
Now, she wanted to break through her limits and create new glories.
However, no matter how many subsequent attempts she made, 12.59 seconds remained a limit she could no longer reach.
She decided to directly proceed to the next item, having played the trial ground to death.
She needed to find her next big toy.
"Contact is over?" Captain Lastimosa asked as Bai Zhiyuan approached, tilting his head.
[I am ready for the next challenge]
[Wait, I want to contact again]
Bai Zhiyuan decisively challenged the next item.
"Very good, you will like this one." Captain Lastimosa tapped his pilot helmet. "We can begin the latter half of the training, the [Titan] phase. Call one in."
"Let me pilot it?"
Bai Zhiyuan was a little bewildered. "Don't only pilots operate these?"
"This is just a simulator, not the real thing." Captain Lastimosa looked around the surroundings, then operated the equipment on his wrist. "However, we need more space first."
*Click!*
*Boom!*
With a dazzling distortion of space-time, the trial ground in front of them shattered into scattered light spots, replaced by a vast, open plain.
Not far away, a Titan knelt quietly on the grass, awaiting the pilot's call.
Captain Lastimosa pointed to the Titan and introduced it to Bai Zhiyuan: "Bt, that's my partner, a Vanguard-class."
"Independently developed by the Militia."
"This is our first self-developed Titan, not obtained from i/"
"Call your first Titan." However, Captain Lastimosa didn't give Bai Zhiyuan much time to think.
*Bum!*
Bai Zhiyuan willed it, and a deafening roar echoed in the sky as a giant pillar of light shot down.
"Look up, into the sky, it's coming."
Hearing this, Bai Zhiyuan's gaze followed the light pillar upwards. The clouds churned, and the sonic boom erupted in her ears.
Her heart pounded, her eyes fixed on the sky.
Here it comes!!
Suddenly, the clouds stirred, and a colossal object descended from the sky, like a demon king from heaven!
This steel beast—it was awesome!
*Clack clack...*
Just as the Titan was about to land, the virtual image seemed to stutter, the entire space showed repeated images, and the virtual Titan disappeared.
Captain Lastimosa's voice was unusually serious:
"Alright, rifleman, it looks like something big is about to happen."
...