It’s a strange invasion, is it okay for me to fight back?

Chapter 609 shows progress

When the distance between players is less than ten meters, a player's identity icon will appear above their heads. When the distance is less than five meters, players can perform operations such as information inquiry, adding friends, and applying for team formation through the virtual screen.

When the distance between the player and the monster is less than the safe distance, a red indicator will be visible above the monster's head. The safe distance for ordinary monsters is 20 meters, for elite monsters it is 50 meters, for boss monsters it is 80 meters, and for lords and above it is 120 meters.

If a player is in a maze and gets too close to the maze's master, a red fog warning will appear.

Note that the relevant values ​​may fluctuate depending on environmental factors and card attributes.

For example, severe weather conditions such as heavy rain, blizzards, and dense fog may extend the safe distance determined by the system.

For example, when a player possesses a card with enhanced perception, they can see monsters further away than the safe distance. Similarly, if a boss monster has a similar ability to sense enemy activity, it can also detect players beyond the safe distance.

Feng Ling asked, "What level of monster is Aunt Wang? The Painted Skin Ghost is a high-level card, could she be a boss? Wouldn't she be recognized as soon as she gets a little close?"

Ye Zheng said with a blank face, "It's an elite monster, and one that has only recently advanced to the next level."

Feng Ling: "…………"

“If you hadn’t given her those two cards, she would probably just be a regular monster now.” Ye Zheng frowned and said, “I’m not blaming you, I just think this is too coincidental.”

Feng Ling looked up at the sky helplessly, "Sigh, I really feel like I didn't check the almanac before I went out today."

Ye Zheng was silent for a while, then said, "The Taoist priest cast a divination for you; it's the 'Before Completion' hexagram. He asked me to read it to you."

“Okay, go ahead and read it.” Feng Ling nodded.

Ye Zheng wore a bitter and resentful expression. "The Hexagram 21 (未济) is formed by two trigrams stacked on top of each other: the lower trigram is Kan (坎), and the upper trigram is Li (离). Li represents fire, and Kan represents water. Fire above water signifies that the fire's power overwhelms the water's, indicating that the great effort to extinguish the fire has not yet been accomplished, hence the name 'Unfinished.' The hexagram's text reads, 'The little fox is about to cross the river, but its tail is wet; there is no benefit…' This means that the little fox is about to cross the river, but its tail is wet. This shows that the journey will be unprofitable, indicating not only haste and recklessness, but also that your position and situation are very unfavorable. You need to remain calm and see the bigger picture from small details…"

Ye Zheng read it with great pain, and Feng Ling listened with great pain as well.

"Why don't you just give me the conclusion directly, keep it simple?" Feng Ling interrupted Ye Zheng.

Ye Zheng frowned and replied, "Bad luck, I'll leave it to fate."

Feng Ling laughed and said, "Tell the Taoist priest not to tell fortunes anymore."

A loud, shrill cry came from the video call: "Chirp chirp chirp!"

"Why are you so unsteady after turning into an animal?" Feng Ling teased.

At this moment, Huang Yi walked over quickly and said to Feng Ling, "We have drafted a preliminary plan. We want to divide the hostage exchange into two parts. First, we will use the dwarf sheep to exchange for a portion of the hostages, and then use 'Meteor' to exchange for the remaining half of the hostages. My team and I will be deployed in advance at a position about 80 meters away from the target. When the time is right, we will launch a large dose of anesthetic at the target. Do you have any comments to add?"

"How quickly does the anesthetic take effect?" Feng Ling asked.

Huang Yi hesitated for a few seconds, "...I don't know your definition of 'fast', but the onset time is definitely not instantaneous. Ideally, it should take effect within twenty seconds. The monster is very large, so it may take longer than we expect."

"Then..." Feng Ling asked, "What do we do before the anesthetic takes effect?"

Huang Yi looked at the soldiers not far away. "The army is responsible for rescuing the hostages, and we are responsible for dealing with the monsters. We will buy time for the hostage rescue and also buy time for the Painted Skin Ghost to evacuate."

Feng Ling lowered her head and thought for a moment, then silently opened her palm and grew an eye in the center of her palm.

A raven flew over with practiced ease and landed on her arm. "This monster is very strange. It crawled out of the desert; it's either a contaminant or a mutant..." Feng Ling said slowly, pressing her cultivated eyeball against the raven's forehead. "When I was wandering around the desert, I didn't find any large contaminants. There were only some small scorpions, or some clay figurines. Excluding contaminants, it can only be a mutant, but even that doesn't make sense..."

"What doesn't make sense?" Huang Yi asked, frowning. "If you believe that you killed the alien species present at the time, is it possible that there was an alien species with the ability to feign death?"

Feng Ling gently raised her hand, and the human-faced crow, carrying her eyeballs, flapped its wings and flew away, her gaze following it higher and farther.

“I find it strange because the only way for a mutant to become this size is to use its second form, but the second form requires a lot of energy, just like a Super Saiyan in a comic book, which can usually only be maintained for a few minutes.” Feng Ling muttered to herself, “I have never seen a mutant whose endurance can compare to mine.”

She couldn't accept being outshone.

Huang Yi also fell into deep thought.

According to the intelligence we have so far, the monster was discovered in the early morning. No one survived in the villages it passed through, not even livestock. The patrolmen were killed last night. All told, the monster's second form has lasted for at least ten hours, which is indeed a rare occurrence.

Feng Ling's third eye followed the human-faced crow as it flew high into a huge factory.

Each side of the factory building has several large doors that can be seen through, revealing various types of machines and intricate metal frames.

The human-faced crow flew in through the exhaust fan duct and perched on an iron bar of the handrail, silently surveying the entire area—

Feng Ling saw the monster lying motionless on the ground, its six eyes sometimes closed and sometimes open, its massive body rising and falling slowly, as if it were resting.

Compared to the monster, the hostages on its body were obviously in much more pain, each one like someone trapped in a swamp, constantly writhing and tearing, but the struggle only made them sink deeper into the monster's flesh and blood.

The human-faced crow quietly flew closer.

Feng Ling wanted to distinguish which were the real hostages, but she found she couldn't.

Because the red and white dots are all very close together, they are almost indistinguishable from a third-person perspective unless the hostages are separated by a distance of one to two meters.

One of the hostages suddenly convulsed violently, his mouth opening and closing repeatedly but unable to make a sound, his eyes bloodshot, and his entire face contorted in a grotesque manner!

The other hostages huddled around this man seemed oblivious, lost in their own fear.

A dozen seconds later, the hostage with the狰狞 face began to sink deeper, like a drowning person, slowly being swallowed up by the monster's flesh and blood.

Then Feng Ling noticed that one of the red dots in that area was missing.

She suddenly realized—

So that's how it is! No wonder it could maintain its second form for so long; all those hostages were actually provisions it carried with it!

Therefore, when dealing with it later, she should prioritize dismantling the "supplies," otherwise it will be difficult to kill the opponent.

Feng Ling withdrew her gaze, feeling that she had made great progress.

Now she is a person who plans and schemes.

(End of this chapter)